Year: 1860




Mt home, endeayorng 10 trample under foot the
laws of the United States enacted in conformity with
the constitution, and 10 Of s provisions
provision so significant that il has been remarked
and is part Of history, that the Union could not
have been formed If II had not been incorporated in
the constitution The oaths Of such men become
cheap as custom-house oaths, and asked to
stake our future security the mere guarantee
which such an oath gives.


But the Senator from New York arraigns those
who speak In certain contingency Of providing for
their own safety out Of the Unon being in opposi-
ton to his love for the Union and he manfcsts his
incapacity TO understand doctrine of State rights
by the very smile which he employs when he speaks
OF our fathers building temple wherein they had a
collision Of opinion as 10 whether the marble should
be white whether il should be manifold in its color
and at last agreed ogether-orgetfn that our faith
ers were occupied in providing a common agent for
the States not building up central government To
look over them. The States remained each its own
temple. They made agent. Their controversy
was rs to the functions and powers of that agent
not as the nature of the temple in which they should
preserve their liberties That temple is tho State
governments. Beneath that we sit down as under
our own vine and hg tree, secure in our power to
| maintain rights


But the Senator asks, how is it that whilst we are
protesting this general fraternity and adherence TO
the Union, we still assert that If Of his party is
elected President, we ready 10 dissolve the Unionl


do not know who has made that assertion if il has
been made However, the language employed
as the Senator fairly presented it, under the convc
tion that they spoke Of those who sought the govern
| mcnt to use IL for their destruction. That tho
proyocation, that the contingency, which, how
ever the language may have been expressed was tho
idea i have embodied in every resolution of
| that kind wherever II has been passed. To ask
that we shall sit still, under such government is as
though were TO be asked TO sit in this Senate
| Chamber whilst knew that some one was destroy
ing the foundation which it rested; 10 ask US TO
rely upon the durability which that foundation had
when the building was constructors to rely confident
ly on the strength we knew it to possess,
when we had been advised that that foundation was
being destroyed. Are we not advised that the sena-
tor and those with whom he cooperates asssiing
our constitutional right How then, can we sit
down quietlyl If instead Of sitting here to admire


the panel and the plaster and the typical decorations
| of the ceiling, one aware that the foundation was
being undermined should walk out of the Chamber,
| would you arragn him for cndcavoring TO destroy
the building, or would you level your charges
against the sapper and miner who at work on its
foundationl That is the proposition


| Who has heen more Industrious patient and skill
full as sapper and miner against the foundations
of the constitution than the the Senator himself p


Who has been in advance of him in the fiery charge
ON the rights Of the States and in assuming TO the
Federal government the power 10 crush and cocrce
thcml Even to-day he has repeated his doctrines.
lie tells us this is government which we will learn
Is not merely government of the States but gov
crnmcnt of each individual of the people of the Uni


States and he refers TO that doctrine Of coercion
| which the great mind of Hamilton (the mighty in-
telIect of New York, which, in his day, like lens,
| gathered in all which could illuminate the subject
| upon which his mind concentratcd) said a
proposition not to provide for union of the States.
but for their destruction Such was the view which
he who led the forces of the strong government party
took of this idea of enabling the Federal government
to coerce n State. Here the Senator in advance Of
that, still installing the fundamental principles upon
which our government rests, talks about the indivl-
ual masses coercing the sovereign States of his
| Union Sir, when il comes to that there will bo an
'irrepressible conflict indeed and have now tho
faith have before announced that, when il to
that, he will find men loyal to the government and
true to its institutions residing around his hone who
Will arrest his footsteps and hold him prisoner in the
name of liberty and the constitution


There Is nothing Mr.. President, which has led men
to greater confusion Of ideas than this of free
States" and " slave States" and trusted that tho
Senator, with his discriminating and logical mind
was going to give us something tangible instead Of
dealing IN phrase never applicable. lie applied
another; but what was his phrasel "Capta States"
and "labor States" And where is the State in
which nobody labors? The fallacy upon which tho
Senator hung adjective after adjective was that all
the labor Of the southern States was performed by
negroes. Did he not know that the negroes formed
but small part OF the people Of the southern Statesl
Did he suppose nobody laborcd but a negro thcrc?-
IL so, he less informed than had previously be-
lieved him to be- Negro slavery exists in the South
and by the existence Of negro slavery the white man
is raised TO the dignity of white man and an equal
Nowhere else will you find every white superior
to menial service. Nowhere else will you find every
white man recognized so far as an equal as never to
be excluded from any mans house or any mans ta-
| ble Your menial who blacks your boots drives
your carriage wears your livery and is your own in
every sense of the word is not your cqua and such
Is society wherever negro slavery is not the sustra-
tum ON which the white is elevated 10 its true
dignity We however, have no theory TO press upon
you; we leave you to such institutions as YOU may
prefer; but when you assail ours come TO the vim
dication of our institutions by showing you that all
your phrases are false that the frcemcn.--
| With us, and with alone as believe the white
man attains TO his true dignity in the government
80 much for the great falacy which the Senator's
argument hangs that the labor of the South is all
negro labor, and that the white must there lc
degratcd If he labors or that we have no laborny
white men. do not know what Is his opinion !; one
Of the two. The Senator has himself resided in
| southern State, and therefore | say believed him
to he better informed before he spoke / must sup
pose him to be as ignorant as his speech would inii-
cate No man, however, who has seen any portion Of
southern society, entertain any such opinion as
that which he presents and il is in order that the
statement he has made may not 20 out 10 deceive
those less informed than himself that offer a; this
time the correction.


The Senator makes rather haclxncvcd argument
that in asserting right to 90 into the Tcrritory
and enjoy It, we are seeking 10 take exclusive possess
sion OF IT, i shall not dwell ON that point further
than to say that we have sought 10 exclude nobody
We have sought not to usurp the Territory TO our cx-
elusive possession; have sought that governments
should lie instituted in order that evcrv pcrson ana
property might he protected that went into 1.-THE
white man coming from the North. and the white
man coming from the South, both meeting on an
equality in the Territory and each with whnfcvcr
property he may hold under the laws Of his State and
the constitution of the United States Such Is our
position IL Is to array prejudice, which does not
justly attach 10 us to assume that have ever sought
to exclude any citizen from any State or Territory
from going into any Territory and thcro possessing
| all the rights which VIC claim TO ourselves.


We have heard time and again this session the
same point made against the democratic party that
they hedging themselves behind the decisiono Of
| the Supreme Court II this had boon presented in
the beginning, II might bavo had some fairness; but
after yeirs OF conflict and after we had found il
utterly impossible over 10 roach conclusion salts.
factory 10 both sdes-n other words 10 enact q Law
which would answer the pnrpDsc--wc then agreed 10
postpone question iudiciaiy In its character and
thus agreed 10 he bouud legsatvely and politically
by the decision which that judicial question should
receive. Now, the Senator pleads TO the inrisdis-
tion, ms though we had ever asserted that the SUI
prone Court coull decide political qnestlon; hut
he was bound in honor, aud 80 were all who acted
with him, TO abide by the decision Of an umpire 10
which they had themselves referred the casc We
are willing TO abide by H. We but claim of them that
to which we pledged ourselves, and that 10 which
they were mutually pledged when this position was
taken by tho two Houses Of Congress.