THE GREAT CONSPIRACY

 Its Origin and History

 Part 1

 BY

 JOHN LOGAN

PREFACE. 

In the preparation of this work it has been the writer's aim to presentin it, with historical accuracy, authentic facts; to be fair andimpartial in grouping them; and to be true and just in the conclusionsnecessarily drawn from them. While thus striving to be accurate, fair, and just, he has not thought it his duty to mince words, nor to refrainfrom "calling things by their right names;" neither has he sought tocurry favor, in any quarter, by fulsome adulation on the one side, norundue denunciation on the other, either of the living, or of the dead. But, while tracing the history of the Great Conspiracy, from its obscurebirth in the brooding brains of a few ambitious men of the earliest daysof our Republic, through the subsequent years of its devolution, down tothe evil days of Nullification, and to the bitter and bloody period ofarmed Rebellion, or contemplating it in its still more recent and, perhaps, more sinister development, of to-day, he has conscientiouslydealt with it, throughout, in the clear and penetrating light of thevoluminous records so readily accessible at the seat of our NationalGovernment. So far as was practicable, he has endeavored to allow thechief characters in that Conspiracy-as well as the Union leaders, who, whether in Executive, Legislative, or Military service, devoted theirbest abilities and energies to its suppression--to speak for themselves, and thus while securing their own proper places in history, by a processof self-adjustment as it were, themselves to write down that history intheir own language. If then there be found within these covers aughtwhich may seem harsh to those directly or indirectly, nearly orremotely, connected with that Conspiracy, he may not unfairly exclaim:"Thou canst not say I did it. " If he knows his own heart, the writercan truly declare, with his hand upon it, that it bears neither hatred, malice, nor uncharitableness, to those who, misled by the cunningsecrecy of the Conspirators, and without an inkling or even a suspicionof their fell purposes, went manfully into the field, with a courageworthy of a better cause, and for four years of bloody conflict, believing that their cause was just, fought the armies of the Union, ina mad effort to destroy the best government yet devised by man upon thisplanet. And, perhaps, none can better understand than he, how hard, howvery hard, it must be for men of strong nature and intense feeling, after taking a mistaken stand, and especially after carrying theirconviction to the cannon's mouth, to acknowledge their error before theworld. Hence, while he has endeavored truly to depict--or to let thosewho made history at the time help him to depict--the enormity of theoffence of the armed Rebellion and of the heresies and plottings ofcertain Southern leaders precipitating it, yet not one word will befound, herein, condemnatory of those who, with manly candor, soldierlycourage, and true patriotism, acknowledged that error when the ultimatearbitrament of the sword had decided against them. On the contrary, toall such as accept, in good faith, the results of the war of theRebellion, the writer heartily holds out the hand of forgiveness for thepast, and good fellowship for the future. 

WASHINGTON, D. C. 

April 15, 1886. 

CONTENTS. 

[For detailed Table of Contents see below]

CHAPTER. 

I. A Preliminary Retrospect, II. Protection, and Free Trade, III. Growth of the Slavery Question, IV. Popular Sovereignty, V. Presidential Contest of 1860, VI. The Great Conspiracy Maturing, VII. "Secession" Arming, VIII. The Rejected Olive Branch, IX. Slavery's Setting Sun, X. The War Drum--"On to Washington, "

XI. Causes of Secession

XII. Copperheadism vs. Union-Democracy, XIII. The Storm of Battle, XIV. The Colored Contraband, XV. Freedom's Early Dawn, XVI. Compensated, Gradual, Emancipation, XVII. Border-State Opposition, XVIII. Freedom Proclaimed to All, XIX. Historical Review, XX. Lincoln's Troubles and Temptations, XXI. The Armed Negro

XXII. Freedom's Sun still Rising, XXIII. Thirteenth Amendment Passes the Senate

XXIV. Treason in the Northern Camp, XXV. The "Fire in the Rear, "

XXVI. Thirteenth Amendment Defeated in House, XXVII. Slavery Doomed at the Polls, XXVIII. Freedom at last Assured, XXIX. Lincoln's Second Inauguration, XXX. Collapse of Armed Conspiracy, XXXI. Assassination!

XXXII. Turning Back the Hands, XXXIII. What Next?

 CHAPTER I. A PRELIMINARY RETROSPECT. 

AFRICAN SLAVERY IN AMERICA IN 1620--CONTROVERSY BETWEEN THE COLONIES ANDENGLAND IN 1699--GEORGIAN ABHORRENCE OF SLAVERY IN 1775--JEFFERSON ANDTHE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE--SLAVERY A SOURCE OF WEAKNESS IN THEREVOLUTIONARY WAR--THE SESSION BY VIRGINIA OF THE GREAT NORTH-WEST--THEORDINANCE OF 1784 AND ITS FAILURE--THE ORDINANCE OF 1787 AND ITSADOPTION--THE GERM OF SLAVERY AGITATION PLANTED--THE QUESTION IN THECONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION--SUBTERFUGES OF THE OLD CONSTITUTION--THEBULLDOZING OF THE FATHERS--THE FIRST FEDERAL CONGRESS, 1789--CONDITIONSOF TERRITORIAL CESSIONS FROM NORTH CAROLINA AND GEORGIA, 1789-1802--THE"COLONY OF LOUISIANA" (MISSISSIPPI VALLEY) PURCHASE OF 1803--THE TREATY--CONDITIONS TOUCHING SLAVERY--THE COTTON INDUSTRY REVOLUTIONIZED--RAPIDPOPULATING OF THE GREAT VALLEY, BY SLAVEHOLDERS AND SLAVES--JEFFERSON'SAPPARENT INCONSISTENCY EXPLAINED--THE AFRICAN SLAVE TRADE--MULTIPLICATIONOF SLAVES--LOUISIANA ADMITTED, 1812, AS A STATE--THE TERRITORY OFMISSOURI--THE MISSOURI STRUGGLE (1818-1820) IN A NUTSHELL--THE "MISSOURICOMPROMISE"

 CHAPTER II. PROTECTION AND FREE TRADE. 

CHIEF CAUSE OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION--OUR INDEPENDENCE, INDUSTRIAL ASWELL AS POLITICAL--FAILURE OF THE CONFEDERATION DUE TO LACK OFINDUSTRIAL PROTECTION--MADISON'S TARIFF ACT OF 1789--HAMILTON'S TARIFFOF 1790--SOUTHERN STATESMEN AND SOUTHERN VOTES FOR EARLY TARIFFS--WASHINGTON AND JEFFERSON ON "PROTECTION "--EMBARGO OF 1807-8--WAR OF1812-15--CONSEQUENT INCREASE OF AMERICAN MANUFACTURES--BROUGHAM'S PLAN--RUIN THREATENED BY GLUT OF BRITISH GOODS--TARIFF ACT OF 1816--CALHOUN'SDEFENSE OF "PROTECTION"--NEW ENGLAND AGAINST THAT ACT--THE SOUTH SECURESITS PASSAGE--THE PROTECTIVE TARIFF ACTS OF 1824 AND 1828--SUBSEQUENTPROSPERITY IN FREE STATES--THE BLIGHT OF SLAVERY--BIRTH OF THE FREETRADE HERESY IN THE UNITED STATES IN 1797--SIMULTANEOUS BIRTH OF THEHERESY OF STATE RIGHTS--KENTUCKY RESOLUTIONS OF 1798--VIRGINIARESOLUTIONS OF 1799--JEFFERSON'S REAL PURPOSE IN FORMULATING THEM--ACTIVITY OF THE FEW SOUTHERN FREE TRADERS--PLAUSIBLE ARGUMENTS AGAINST"PROTECTION"--INGENIOUS METHODS OF "FIRING THE SOUTHERN HEART"--SOUTHERNDISCONTENT WITH TARIFF OF 1824--INFLAMMATORY UTTERANCES--ARMEDRESISTANCE URGED TO TARIFF OF 1828--WALTERBOROUGH ANTI-PROTECTIVE TARIFFADDRESS--FREE TRADE AND NULLIFICATION ADVOCACY APPEARS IN CONGRESS--THEHAYNE-WEBSTER DEBATE--MODIFIED PROTECTIVE TARIFF OF 1832--SOUTHCAROLINA'S NULLIFICATION ORDINANCE--HAYNE ELECTED GOVERNOR OF SOUTHCAROLINA--HERESY OF "PARAMOUNT ALLEGIANCE TO THE STATE"--SOUTH CAROLINAARMS HERSELF--PRESIDENT JACKSON STAMPS OUT SOUTHERN TREASON--CLAY'SCOMPROMISE TARIFF OF 1833--CHIEF JUSTICE MARSHALL'S SOLEMN WARNING--JACKSON'S FORECAST

 CHAPTER III. GROWTH OF THE SLAVERY QUESTION. 

"EMANCIPATION" IN NORTHERN AND MIDDLE STATES--VIRGINIA'S UNSUCCESSFULEFFORT--CESSION OF THE FLORIDAS, 1819--BALANCE OF POWER--ADMISSION OFARKANSAS, 1836--SOUTHERN SLAVE HOLDERS' COLONIZATION OF TEXAS--TEXANINDEPENDENCE, 1837--CALHOUN'S SECOND AND GREAT CONSPIRACY--DETERMINATIONBEFORE 1839 TO SECEDE--PROTECTIVE TARIFF FEATURES AGAIN THE PRETEXT--CALHOUN, IN 1841, ASKING THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT FOR AID--NORTHERNOPPOSITION TO ACQUISITION OF TEXAS--RATIONALE OF THE LOUISIANA ANDFLORIDA ACQUISITIONS--PROPOSED EXTENSION OF SLAVERY LIMITS--WEBSTERWARNS THE SOUTH--DISASTERS FOLLOWING COMPROMISE TARIFF OF 1833--INDUSTRIAL RUIN OF 1840--ELECTION AND DEATH OF HARRISON--PROTECTIVETARIFF OF 1842--POLK'S CAMPAIGN OF 1844--CLAY'S BLUNDER AND POLK'SCRIME--SOUTHERN TREACHERY--THE NORTH HOODWINKED--POLK ELECTED BYABOLITION VOTE--SLAVE-HOLDING TEXAS UNDER A SHAM "COMPROMISE"--WAR WITHMEXICO--FREE-TRADE TARIFF OF 1846--WILMOT PROVISO--TREATY OF GUADALUPE--HIDALGO--SLAVERY CONTEST IN CONGRESS STILL GROWING --COMPROMISE OF 1850--A LULL--FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW--NEBRASKA BILL OF 1852-3--KANSAS-NEBRASKABILL, 1853-4, REPORTED--PARLIAMENTARY "JUGGLERY"--THE TRIUMPH OFSLAVERY, IN CONGRESS--BLEEDING KANSAS--TOPEKA CONSTITUTION, 1855--KANSAS LEGISLATURE DISPERSED, 1856, BY UNITED STATES TROOPS--LECOMPTONCONSTITUTION OF 1857--FRAUDULENT TRIUMPH OF SLAVERY CONSTITUTION--ITSSUBSEQUENT DEFEAT--ELECTION OF BUCHANAN, 1856--KANSAS ADMITTED--MISERYAND RUIN CAUSED BY FREE-TRADE TARIFF OF 1846--FILLMORE AND BUCHANANTESTIFY

 CHAPTER IV. "POPULAR SOVEREIGNTY. "

DOUGLAS'S THEORY OF POPULAR SOVEREIGNTY--ILLINOIS LEGISLATIVEENDORSEMENT OF IT, 1851--DOUGLAS'S POSITION ON KANSAS--NEBRASKA BILL, 1854--DRED SCOTT DECISION--SPRINGFIELD, ILLINOIS, REPUBLICAN CONVENTIONOF 1858--LINCOLN'S REMARKABLE SPEECH TO THE CONVENTION--PIERCE ANDBUCHANAN, TANEY AND DOUGLAS, CHARGED WITH PRO-SLAVERY CONSPIRACY--DOUGLAS'S GREAT SPEECH (JULY 9TH, 1858) AT CHICAGO, IN REPLY--LINCOLN'SPOWERFUL REJOINDER, AT CHICAGO, (JULY 10TH)--THE ADMIXTURE OF RACES--THEVOTING "UP OR DOWN" OF SLAVERY--THE "ARGUMENTS OF KINGS"--TRUTHS OF THEDECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE--DOUGLAS'S BLOOMINGTON SPEECH (JULY 16TH), OF VINDICATION AND ATTACK--HISTORY OF THE KANSAS-NEBRASKA STRUGGLE--THEUNHOLY ALLIANCE--THE TWO POINTS AT ISSUE--THE "WHITE MAN'S" COUNTRY--DOUGLAS'S PLEDGES TO WEBSTER AND CLAY--DOUGLAS'S SPRINGFIELD SPEECH, JULY 17TH--THE IRRECONCILABLE PRINCIPLES AT ISSUE BETWEEN LINCOLN ANDHIMSELF--LINCOLN'S GREAT SPEECH, AT SPRINGFIELD, THE SAME EVENING--DOUGLAS'S TRIUMPHANT MARCHES AND ENTRIES--THE "OFFICES SEEN IN HISROUND, JOLLY, FRUITFUL FACE"--LINCOLN'S LEAN-FACED FIGHT, FOR PRINCIPLEALONE--DOUGLAS'S VARIOUS SPEECHES REVIEWED--THE REAL QUESTION BETWEENREPUBLICANS AND DOUGLAS MEN AND THE BUCHANAN MEN--JACKSON'S VETO OF THENATIONAL BANK CHARTER--DEMOCRATIC REVOLT AGAINST THE SUPREME COURTDECISION--VINDICATION OF CLAY--"NEGRO EQUALITY"--MR. LINCOLN'S CHARGE, OF "CONSPIRACY AND DECEPTION" TO "NATIONALIZE SLAVERY, " RENEWED--GREATJOINT DEBATE OF 1858, BETWEEN LINCOLN AND DOUGLAS, ARRANGED

 CHAPTER V. THE PRESIDENTIAL CONTEST OF 1860 THE CRISIS APPROACHING. 

HOW THE GREAT JOINT DEBATE OF 1858 RESULTED--THE "LITTLE GIANT" CAPTURESTHE SENATORSHIP--THE "BIG GIANT" CAPTURES THE PEOPLE--THE RISINGDEMOCRATIC STAR OF 1860--DOUGLAS'S GRAND TRIUMPHAL "PROGRESS" THROUGHTHE LAND--A POPULAR DEMOCRATIC IDOL--FRESH AGGRESSIONS OF THE SLAVEPOWER--NEW MEXICO'S SLAVE CODE OF 1859--HELPER'S "IMPENDING CRISIS"--JOHN BROWN AND HARPER'S FERRY--THE MEETING OF CONGRESS, DECEMBER, 1859--FORTY-FOUR BALLOTS FOR SPEAKER--DANGEROUSLY HEATED CONGRESSIONAL DEBATESON SLAVERY--THE DEMOCRATIC SPLIT--JEFFERSON DAVIS'S ARROGANTDOUBLE-EDGED PRO-SLAVERY' RESOLUTIONS--DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL CONVENTION, CHARLESTON, S. C. , 1860--DECLARATIONS OF THE MAJORITY AND MINORITYREPORTS AND BUTLER'S RECOMMENDATION, WITH VOTES THEREON--ADOPTION OF THEMINORITY (DOUGLAS) PLATFORM--SOUTHERN DELEGATES PROTEST AND "BOLT "--THEBOLTING CONVENTION ADJOURNS TILL JUNE AT RICHMOND--THE REGULARCONVENTION BALLOTS AND ADJOURNS TO BALTIMORE--THE BALTIMORE CONVENTION--"THE AFRICAN SLAVE-TRADER A TRUE MISSIONARY"--MORE BOLTING--DOUGLAS'SNOMINATION FOR THE PRESIDENCY--THE BOLTING CONVENTION NOMINATESBRECKINRIDGE--THE REPUBLICAN CONVENTION AND PLATFORM--NOMINATIONS OFLINCOLN, AND BELL--COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE FOUR RIVAL PARTYPLATFORMS--THE OCTOBER ELECTIONS--THE SOUTH PREPARING GLEEFULLY FORSECESSION--GOVERNOR GIST'S TREASONABLE MESSAGE TO S. C. LEGISLATURE, NOV. 5--OTHER SIMILAR UTTERANCES

 CHAPTER VI. THE GREAT CONSPIRACY MATURING. 

LINCOLN'S ELECTION ASSURED--SOUTHERN EXULTATION--NORTHERN GLOOM--"FIRINGTHE SOUTHERN HEART"--RESIGNATIONS OF FEDERAL OFFICERS AND SENATORS OFSOUTH CAROLINA--GOVERNOR BROWN, OF GEORGIA, DEFIES "FEDERAL COERCION"--ALEXANDER H. STEPHENS'S ARGUMENT AGAINST SECESSION--SOUTH CAROLINACALLS AN "UNCONDITIONAL SECESSION CONVENTION"--THE CALL SETS THE SOUTHABLAZE--PROCLAMATIONS OF THE GOVERNORS OF THE SOUTHERN STATES, FAVORINGREVOLT--LOYAL ADDRESS OF GOVERNOR MAGOFFIN OF KENTUCKY--THE CLAMOR OFREVOLT SILENCES APPEALS FOR UNION--PRESIDENT BUCHANAN'S PITIFULWEAKNESS--CONSPIRATORS IN HIS CABINET--IMBECILITY OF HIS LAST ANNUALMESSAGE TO CONGRESS, DEC. , 1860--ATTORNEY-GENERAL JEREMIAH BLACK'SOPINION AGAINST COERCION--CONTRAST AFFORDED BY GENERAL JACKSON'S LOYALLOGIC--ENSUING DEBATES IN CONGRESS--SETTLED PURPOSE OF THE CONSPIRATORSTO RESIST PLACATION--FUTILE LABORS OF UNION MEN IN CONGRESS FOR APEACEFUL SOLUTION--ABSURD DEMANDS OF THE IMPLACABLES--THE COMMERCIALNORTH ON ITS KNEES TO THE SOUTH--CONCILIATION ABJECTLY BEGGED FOR--BRUTAL SNEERS AT THE NORTH, AND THREATS OF CLINGMAN, IVERSON, AND OTHERSOUTHERN FIREEATERS, IN THE U. S. SENATE--THEIR BLUSTER MET BY STURDYREPUBLICANS--BEN WADE GALLANTLY STANDS BY THE "VERDICT OF THE PEOPLE"--PEACEFUL-SETTLEMENT PROPOSITIONS IN THE HOUSE--ADRIAN'S RESOLUTION, ANDVOTE--LOVEJOY'S COUNTER-RESOLUTION, AND VOTE--ADOPTION OF MORRIS'S UNIONRESOLUTION IN HOUSE

 CHAPTER VII. SECESSION ARMING. 

THE SOUTH CAROLINA SECESSION CONVENTION MEETS--SPEECHES AT "SECESSIONHALL" OF PARKER, KEITT, INGLIS, BARNWELL, RHETT, AND GREGG, THE FIRSTORDINANCE OF SECESSION--ITS JUBILANT ADOPTION AND RATIFICATION--SECESSION STAMPEDE--A SOUTHERN CONGRESS PROPOSED--PICKENS'S PROCLAMATIONOF SOVEREIGN INDEPENDENCE--SOUTH CAROLINA CONGRESSMEN WITHDRAW--DISSENSIONS IN BUCHANAN'S CABINET--COBB FLOYD, AND THOMPSON, DEMAND WITHDRAWAL OF FEDERAL TROOPS--BUCHANAN'S REPLY--SEIZURE OF FORTS, ETC. --THE "STAR OF THE WEST" FIRED ON--THE MADRUSH OF REBELLIOUS EVENTS--SOUTH CAROLINA DEMANDS THE SURRENDER OF FORTSUMTER AND THE DEMAND REFUSED--SECRETARY HOLT'S LETTER TO CONSPIRINGSENATORS AND REBEL AGENT--TROOP'S AT THE NATIONAL CAPITAL--HOLT'SREASONS THEREFOR--THE REVOLUTIONARY PROGRAMME--"ARMED OCCUPATION OFWASHINGTON CITY"--LINCOLN'S INAUGURATION TO BE PREVENTED--THE CRUMBLINGAND DISSOLVING UNION--THE NORTH STANDS AGHAST--GREAT DEBATE IN CONGRESS, 1860-1861--CLINGMAN ON THE SOUTHERN TARIFF-GRIEVANCE--DEFIANCE OF BROWNOF MISSISSIPPI--IVERSON'S BLOODY THREAT--WIGFALL'S UNSCRUPULOUS ADVICE--HIS INSULTING DEMANDS--BAKER'S GLORIOUSLY ELOQUENT RESPONSE--ANDYJOHNSON THREATENED WITH BULLETS--THE NORTH BULLIED--INSOLENT, IMPOSSIBLETERMS OF PEACE--LINCOLN'S SPEECHES EN ROUTE FOR WASHINGTON--SAVEARRIVAL--"I'LL TRY TO STEER HER THROUGH!"--THE SOUTH TAUNTS HIM--WIGFALL'S CHALLENGE TO THE BLOODY ISSUE OF ARMS!

 CHAPTER VIII. THE REJECTED OLIVE BRANCH. 

THE VARIOUS COMPROMISES OFFERED BY THE NORTH--"THE CRITTENDENCOMPROMISE"--THE PEACE CONFERENCE--COMPROMISE PROPOSITIONS OF THESOUTHERN CONSPIRATORS--IRRECONCILABLE ATTITUDE OF THE PLOTTERS--HISTORYOF THE COMPROMISE MEASURES IN CONGRESS--CLARK'S SUBSTITUTE TO CRITTENDENRESOLUTIONS IN THE SENATE--ANTHONY'S MORE THAN EQUITABLE PROPOSITIONS--HIS AFFECTING APPEAL TO STONY HEARTS--THE CONSPIRACY DEVELOPING--SIXSOUTHERN SENATORS REFUSE TO VOTE AGAINST THE CLARK SUBSTITUTE--ITSCONSEQUENT ADOPTION, AND DEFEAT OF THE CRITTENDEN RESOLUTIONS--LYINGTELEGRAMS FROM CONSPIRING SENATORS TO FURTHER INFLAME REBELLION--SAULSBURY'S AFTER-STATEMENT (1862) AS TO CAUSES OF FAILURE OFCRITTENDEN'S COMPROMISE--LATHAM'S GRAPHIC PROOF OF THE CONSPIRATORS'"DELIBERATE, WILFUL DESIGN" TO KILL COMPROMISE--ANDREW JOHNSON'SEVIDENCE AS TO THEIR ULTIMATE OBJECT "PLACE AND EMOLUMENT FORTHEMSELVES"--"THE POWERS OF GOVERNMENT IN THE HANDS OF THE FEW"--THE CORWIN COMPROMISE RESOLUTION IN THE HOUSE--THE BURCH AMENDMENT--KELLOGG'S PROPOSITION--THE CLEMENS SUBSTITUTE--PASSAGE BY THE HOUSE OFCONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT PROHIBITING CONGRESSIONAL INTERFERENCE WITHSLAVERY WHERE IT EXISTS--ITS ADOPTION BY THE SENATE--THE CLARKSUBSTITUTE RECONSIDERED AND DEFEATED--PROPOSITIONS OF THE PEACE CONGRESSLOST--REJECTION OF THE CRITTENDEN COMPROMISE

 CHAPTER IX. SLAVERY'S SETTING AND FREEDOM'S DAWN. 

THE LAST NIGHT OF THE 36TH CONGRESS--MR. CRITTENDEN'S PATRIOTIC APPEAL--"THE SADDEST SPECTACLE EVER SEEN"--IMPOTENCY OF THE BETRAYED AND FALLINGSTATE--DOUGLAS'S POWERFUL PLEA--PATRIOTISM OF HIMSELF AND SUPPORTERS--LOGAN SUMMARIZES THE COMPROMISES, AND APPEALS TO PATRIOTISM ABOVE PARTY--STATESMANLIKE BREADTH OF DOUGLAS, BAKER AND SEWARD--HENRY WINTER DAVISELOQUENTLY CONDENSES "THE SITUATION" IN A NUTSHELL--"THE FIRST FRUITS OFRECONCILIATION" OFFERED BY THE NORTH, SCORNED BY THE CONSPIRATORS--WIGFALL AGAIN SPEAKS AS THE MOUTHPIECE OF THE SOUTH--HE RAVES VIOLENTLYAT THE NORTH--THE SOUTH REJECTS PEACE "EITHER IN THE UNION, OR OUT OFIT"--THE DAWN OF FREEDOM APPEARS (MARCH 4TH, 1861)--INAUGURATION OFPRESIDENT LINCOLN--LINCOLN'S FIRST INAUGURAL--GRANDEUR AND PATHOS OF HISPATRIOTIC UTTERANCES--HIS FIRST SLEEPLESS AND PRAYERFUL NIGHT AT THEWHITE HOUSE--THE MORROW, AND ITS BITTER DISAPPOINTMENT--THE MESSAGE OF"PEACE AND GOOD WILL" REGARDED AS A "CHALLENGE TO WAR"--PRESIDENTLINCOLN'S CABINET

 CHAPTER X. THE WAR-DRUM--"ON TO WASHINGTON!"

REBEL COMMISSIONERS AT WASHINGTON ON A "MISSION"--SEWARD "SITS DOWN"ON THEM--HE REFUSES TO RECOGNIZE "CONFEDERATE STATES"--THE REBELCOMMISSIONERS "ACCEPT THE GAGE OF BATTLE THUS THROWN DOWN TO THEM"--ATTEMPT TO PROVISION FORT SUMTER--THE REBELS NOTIFIED--THE FORT AND ITSSURROUNDINGS--THE FIRST GUN OF SLAVERY FIRED--TERRIFIC BOMBARDMENT OFTHE FORT--THE GARRISON, STARVED AND BURNED OUT, EVACUATES, WITH ALL THEHONORS OF WAR--THE SOUTH CRAZY WITH EXULTATION--TE DEUMS SUNG, SALUTESFIRED, AND THE REBEL GOVERNMENT SERENADED--"ON TO WASHINGTON!" THEREBEL CRY--"GRAY JACKETS OVER THE BORDER"--PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S FIRSTPROCLAMATION AND CALL FOR TROOPS--INSULTING RESPONSES OF GOVERNORSBURTON, HICKS, LETCHER, ELLIS, MAGOFFIN, HARRIS, JACKSON AND RECTOR--LOYAL RESPONSES FROM GOVERNORS OF THE FREE STATES--MAGICAL EFFECT OFTHE CALL UPON THE LOYAL NORTH--FEELING IN THE BORDER-STATES--PRESIDENTLINCOLN'S CLEAR SUMMARY OF THE SITUATION AND ITS PHILOSOPHY--HIS PLAINDUTY--THE WAR POWER--THE NATIONAL CAPITAL CUT OFF--EVACUATION OFHARPER'S FERRY--LOYAL TROOPS TO THE RESCUE--FIGHTING THEIR WAY THROUGHBALTIMORE--REBEL THREATS--"SCOTT THE ARCH--TRAITOR, AND LINCOLN THEBEAST"--BUTLER RELIEVES WASHINGTON--THE SECESSION OF VIRGINIA AND NORTHCAROLINA--SHAMEFUL EVACUATION OF NORFOLK NAVY YARD--SEIZURE OF MINTS ANDARSENALS--UNION AND REBEL FORCES CONCENTRATING--THE NATIONAL CAPITALFORTIFIED--BLOCKADE OF SOUTHERN PORTS--DEATH OF ELLSWORTH--BUTLERCONFISCATES NEGRO PROPERTY AS "CONTRABAND OF WAR"--A REBEL YARN

 CHAPTER XI. THE CAUSES OF SECESSION. 

ABOUNDING EVIDENCES OF CONSPIRACY--MACLAY'S UNPUBLISHED DIARY1787-1791--PIERCE BUTLER'S FIERCE DENUNCIATION OF THE TARIFF--SOUTHCAROLINA WILL "LIVE FREE OR DIE GLORIOUS"--JACKSON'S LETTER TO CRAWFORD, ON TARIFF AND SLAVERY--BENTON'S TESTIMONY--HENRY CLAY'S EVIDENCE--NATHANAPPLETON'S--A TREASONABLE CAUCUS OF SOUTHERN CONGRESSMEN--ALEXANDER H. STEPHEN'S EVIDENCE ON THE CAUSES OF SECESSION--WIGFALL'S ADMISSIONS--THEONE "REGRETTED" CLAUSE IN THE CONSTITUTION PRECLUDING MONARCHIAL STATES--ADMISSIONS OF REBEL COMMISSIONERS TO WASHINGTON--ADMISSIONS IN ADDRESSOF SOUTH CAROLINA TO THE SLAVE-HOLDERS--JEFFERSON DAVIS'S STATEMENT INSPECIAL MESSAGE OF APRIL 29, 1861--DECLARATIONS OF REBEL COMMISSIONERS, TO LORD JOHN RUSSELL--HIGH TARIFF AND "NOT SLAVERY" THE PRINCIPAL CAUSE--PERSONAL LIBERTY BILLS--PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S DECLARATION OF THEUNDERLYING CAUSE OF REBELLION--A WAR UPON LABOR AND THE RIGHTS OF THEPEOPLE--ANDREW JOHNSON ON THE "DELIBERATE DESIGN" FOR A "CHANGE OFGOVERNMENT"--"TIRED OF FREE GOVERNMENT"--DOUGLAS ON THE "ENORMOUSCONSPIRACY"--THE REBEL PLOT TO SEIZE THE CAPITOL, AND HOLD IT--MCDOUGALL'S GRAPHIC EXPOSURE OF THE TREASONABLE CONSPIRACY--YANCEY'SFAMOUS "SLAUGHTER" LETTER--JEFFERSON DAVIS'S STANDARD OF REVOLT, RAISEDIN 1858--LAMAR'S LETTER TO JEFF. DAVIS (1860)--CAUCUS OF TREASON, ATWASHINGTON--EVANS'S DISCLOSURES OF THE CAUCUS PROGRAMME OF SECESSION--CORROBORATING TESTIMONY--YULEE'S CAPTURED LETTER--CAUCUS RESOLUTIONS INFULL

 CHAPTER XII. COPPERHEADISM VS. UNION DEMOCRACY. 

NORTHERN COMPLICITY WITH TREASON--MAYOR FERNANDO WOOD RECOMMENDSSECESSION OF NEW YORK CITY--THE REBEL JUNTA AT WASHINGTON INSPIRES HIM--HE OBEYS ORDERS, BUT SHAKES AT THE KNEES--KEITT BRAGS OF THE "MILLIONSOF DEMOCRATS IN THE NORTH, " FURNISHING A "WALL OF FIRE" AGAINSTCOERCION--ATTEMPTED REBEL--SEDUCTION OF NEW JERSEY--THE PRICE-BURNETTCORRESPONDENCE--SECESSION RESOLUTIONS OF THE PHILADELPHIA DEMOCRACY ATNATIONAL HALL--LANE OF OREGON "SERVES NOTICE" OF "WAR ENOUGH AT HOME"FOR REPUBLICANS--"NORTHERN DEMOCRATS NEED NOT CROSS THE BORDER TO FINDAN ENEMY"--EX-PRESIDENT PIERCE'S CAPTURED TREASONABLE LETTER TO JEFF. DAVIS--THE "FIGHTING" TO BE "WITHIN OUR OWN BORDERS, IN OUR OWNSTREETS"--ATTITUDE OF DOUGLAS, AND THE DOUGLAS DEMOCRACY, AFTER SUMTER--DOUGLAS CALLS ON MR. LINCOLN AT THE WHITE HOUSE--HE PATRIOTICALLYSUSTAINS THE UNION--HE RALLIES THE WHOLE NORTH TO STAND BY THE FLAG--THERE CAN BE "NO NEUTRALS IN THIS WAR; ONLY PATRIOTS AND TRAITORS"--LAMENTED DEATH OF "THE LITTLE GIANT"--TRIBUTES OF TRUMBULL ANDMCDOUGALL TO HIS MEMORY--LOGAN'S ATTITUDE AT THIS TIME, AND HISRELATIONS TO DOUGLAS--THEIR LAST PRIVATE INTERVIEW--DOUGLAS'S INTENTIONTO "JOIN THE ARMY AND FIGHT"--HIS LAST EFFORTS IN CONGRESS--"CONCILIATION, " BEFORE SUMTER--"NO HALF-WAY GROUND" AFTER IT

 CHAPTER XIII. THE STORM OF BATTLE. 

THE MILITARY SITUATION--THE GREAT UPRISING--POSITIONS AND NUMBERS OF THEUNION AND REBEL ARMIES--JOHNSTON EVACUATES HARPER'S FERRY, AND RETREATSUPON WINCHESTER--PATTERSON'S EXTRAORDINARY CONDUCT--HE DISOBEYS GENERALSCOTT'S ORDERS TO "ATTACK AND WHIP THE ENEMY"--JOHNSTON CONSEQUENTLYFREE TO REINFORCE BEAUREGARD AT MANASSAS--FITZ JOHN PORTER'SACCOUNTABILITY FOR THE DISASTROUS CONSEQUENCES--MCDOWELL'S ADVANCE UPONBEAUREGARD--PRELIMINARY BATTLE AT BLACKBURN'S FORD--JUNCTION OF JOHNSTONWITH BEAUREGARD--REBEL PLANS OF ADVANCE AND ATTACK--CHANGE IN MCDOWELL'SPLANS--GREAT PITCHED-BATTLE OF BULL RUN, OR MANASSAS, INCLUDING THESECOND BATTLE AT BLACKBURN'S FORD--VICTORY, AT FIRST, WITH MCDOWELL--THE CHECK--THE LEISURELY RETREAT--THE PANIC AT, AND NEAR, THE NATIONALCAPITAL--THE WAR FULLY INAUGURATED

 CHAPTER XIV. THE COLORED CONTRABAND. 

THE KNELL OF SLAVERY--THE "IMPLIED POWERS" OF CONGRESS IN THECONSTITUTION--PATRICK HENRY'S PREDICTION--JOHN QUINCY ADAMS'S PROPHECY--JOHN SHERMAN'S NON-INTERFERENCE--WITH-SLAVERY RESOLUTIONS--JOHN Q. ADAMSON EMANCIPATION--POWERS OF CONGRESS AND MILITARY COMMANDERS--GENERALMCCLELLAN'S WEST VIRGINIA PROCLAMATION OF NONINTERFERENCE WITH SLAVES--GENERAL BUTLER'S CORRESPONDENCE WITH GENERAL SCOTT AND SECRETARYCAMERON--CAMERON'S REPLY--MILITARY TENDERNESS FOR THE DOOMEDINSTITUTION--CONGRESS, AFTER BULL RUN--CONFISCATION, AND EMANCIPATION, OF SLAVES USED TO AID REBELLION--RINGING WORDS OF TRUMBULL, WILSON, MCDOUGALL, AND TEN EYCK, IN THE SENATE--ROMAN COURAGE OF THE HOUSE--CRITTENDEN'S STATEMENTS--WAR RESOLUTIONS--BRECKINRIDGE'S TREASONABLESPEECH UPON "THE SANCTITY" OF THE CONSTITUTION--BAKER'S GLORIOUS REPLY--HIS MATCHLESS APOSTROPHE TO FREEDOM--HIS SELF-SACRIFICING DEVOTION ANDHEROIC DEATH AT BALL'S BLUFF

 CHAPTER XV. FREEDOM'S EARLY DAWN. 

THADDEUS STEVENS'S STARTLING UTTERANCES--CAPTURED SLAVES MUST BE FREEFOREVER--"NO TRUCES WITH THE REBELS"--HIS PROPHECY AS TO ARMING SLAVESTO FIGHT REBELLION--SECRETARY CAMERON'S LETTER TOUCHING FUGITIVES FROMSERVICE--GENERAL FREMONT'S PROCLAMATION OF CONFISCATION ANDEMANCIPATION--ITS EFFECT NORTH AND SOUTH--JEFF. THOMPSON'S SAVAGEPROCLAMATION OF RETALIATION--PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S EMBARRASSMENT--HEPRIVATELY SUGGESTS TO FREMONT CERTAIN MODIFICATIONS--FREMONT DEFENDS HISCOURSE--"STRONG AND VIGOROUS MEASURES NECESSARY TO SUCCESS"--THEPRESIDENT PUBLICLY ORDERS THE MODIFICATION OF FREMONT'S PROCLAMATION--THE MILITARY MIND GREATLY CONFUSED--GENERAL INSTRUCTIONS ISSUED BY THEWAR DEPARTMENT--GENERAL T. W. SHERMAN'S PORT ROYAL PROCLAMATION--GENERALWOOL'S SPECIAL AND GENERAL ORDERS AS TO EMPLOYMENT OF "CONTRABANDS"--GENERAL DIX'S PROCLAMATION FOR REPULSION OF FUGITIVE SLAVES FROM HISLINES--HALLECK ORDERS EXPULSION AS WELL AS REPULSION--HIS LETTER OFEXPLANATION TO FRANK P. BLAIR--SEWARD'S LETTER TO MCCLELLAN ON"CONTRABANDS" IN THE DISTRICTOF COLUMBIA

 CHAPTER XVI. "COMPENSATED GRADUAL EMANCIPATION. "

PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S ATTITUDE--SACRIFICES OF PATRIOTISM--ASSERTION BYCONGRESS OF ITS EMANCIPATING WAR-POWERS--THE CAUSE OF FREEDOM SLOWLY"MARCHING ON"--ABANDONED SLAVES OF BEAUFORT, S. C. --SECRETARY CAMERONFAVORS ARMING THEM--THE PRESIDENT'S CAUTIOUS ADVANCES--HE MODIFIESCAMERON'S REPORT TO CONGRESS ON THE SUBJECT--THE MILITARY MIND, ALL "ATSEA"--COMMANDERS GUIDED BY POLITICAL BIAS--HALLECK'S ST. LOUISPROCLAMATION, 1862--BUELL'S LETTER--CONTRARY ACTION OF DIX AND HALLECK, BUELL AND HOOKER, FREMONT AND DOUBLEDAY--LINCOLN'S MIDDLE COURSE--HEPROPOSES TO CONGRESS, COMPENSATED GRADUAL EMANCIPATION--INTERVIEWBETWEEN MR. LINCOLN AND THE BORDER-STATE REPRESENTATIVES--INTERESTINGREMARKS OF THE PRESIDENT--MR. LINCOLN BETWEEN TWO FIRES--VIEWS, ONCOMPENSATED EMANCIPATION, OF MESSRS. NOELL, CRISFIELD, MENZIES, WICKLIFFE, AND HALL--ROSCOE CONKLING'S JOINT RESOLUTION, ADOPTED BY BOTHHOUSES--HOOKER'S "CAMP BAKER" ORDER--MARYLAND FUGITIVE--SLAVE HUNTERSPERMITTED TO SEARCH THE CAMP--UNION SOLDIERS ENRAGED--SICKLES ORDERS THESLAVE HUNTERS OFF--DOUBLEDAY'S DISPATCH AS TO "ALL NEGROES" ENTERING HISLINES--TO BE "TREATED AS PERSONS, NOT AS CHATTELS"

 CHAPTER XVII. BORDER--STATE OPPOSITION. 

APPOINTMENT OF A SELECT COMMITTEE, IN HOUSE, ON GRADUAL EMANCIPATION--DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA EMANCIPATION ACT--THE PRESIDENT'S SPECIAL MESSAGEOF APPROVAL--GEN. HUNTER'S EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION--PRESIDENT LINCOLNPROMPTLY RESCINDS IT BY PROCLAMATION--HIS SOLEMN AND IMPASSIONED APPEALTO PEOPLE OF THE BORDER-STATES--HE BEGS THEIR CONSIDERATION OF GRADUALCOMPENSATED EMANCIPATION--GEN. WILLIAMS'S ORDER EXPELLING RUNAWAYNEGROES FROM CAMP, AT BATON ROUGE--LIEUT. -COL. ANTHONY'S ORDER EXCLUDINGFUGITIVE-SLAVE HUNTERS FROM "CAMP ETHERIDGE"--GEN. MCCLELLAN'S FAMOUS"HARRISON'S LANDING LETTER" TO THE PRESIDENT--"FORCIBLE ABOLITION OFSLAVERY" AND "A CIVIL AND MILITARY POLICY"--SLAVEHOLDING BORDER-STATESENATORS AND REPRESENTATIVES AT THE WHITE HOUSE--PRESIDENT LINCOLN'SADDRESS TO THEM, JULY, 1862--GRADUAL EMANCIPATION THE THEME--COMPENSATION AND COLONIZATION TO ACCOMPANY IT--THE ABOLITION PRESSUREUPON THE PRESIDENT INCREASING--HE BEGS THE BORDER STATESMEN TO RELIEVEHIM AND THE COUNTRY IN ITS PERIL--THEIR VARIOUS RESPONSES

 CHAPTER XVIII. FREEDOM PROCLAIMED TO ALL. 

PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S PERSONAL APPEAL TO COLORED FREEMEN--HE BEGS THEM TOHELP IN THE COLONIZATION OF THEIR RACE--PROPOSED AFRICAN COLONY INCENTRAL AMERICA--EXECUTIVE ORDER OF JULY 2, 1862--EMPLOYMENT OF NEGROESFOR MILITARY PURPOSES OF THE UNION--JEFF. DAVIS RETALIATES--MCCLELLANPROMULGATES THE EXECUTIVE ORDER WITH ADDENDA OF HIS OWN--HORACEGREELEY'S LETTER TO PRESIDENT LINCOLN--THE LATTER ACCUSED OF"SUBSERVIENCY" TO THE SLAVE HOLDERS--AN "UNGRUDGING EXECUTION OF THECONFISCATION ACT" DEMANDED--MR. LINCOLN'S FAMOUS REPLY--HIS "PARAMOUNTOBJECT, TO SAVE THE UNION, AND NOT EITHER TO SAVE OR DESTROY SLAVERY"--VISIT TO THE WHITE HOUSE OF A RELIGIOUS DEPUTATION FROM CHICAGO--MEMORIAL ASKING FOR IMMEDIATE EMANCIPATION, BY PROCLAMATION--THEPRESIDENT'S REPLY TO THE DEPUTATION--"THE POPE'S BULL AGAINST THECOMET"--VARIOUS OBJECTIONS STATED TENTATIVELY--"A PROCLAMATION OFLIBERTY TO THE SLAVES" IS "UNDER ADVISEMENT"--THE PROCLAMATION OFEMANCIPATION ISSUED--ITS POPULAR RECEPTION--MEETING OF LOYAL GOVERNORSAT ALTOONA--THEIR STIRRING ADDRESS--HOMAGE TO OUR SOLDIERS--PLEDGEDSUPPORT FOR VIGOROUS PROSECUTION OF THE WAR TO TRIUMPHANT END--PRESIDENTLINCOLN'S HISTORICAL RESUME AND DEFENSE OF EMANCIPATION--HE SUGGESTS TOCONGRESS, PAYMENT FOR SLAVES AT ONCE EMANCIPATED BY BORDER STATES--ACTION OF THE HOUSE, ON RESOLUTIONS SEVERALLY REPREHENDING AND ENDORSINGTHE PROCLAMATION--SUPPLEMENTAL EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION OF JAN. 1, 1863

 CHAPTER XIX. HISTORICAL REVIEW. 

COURSE OF SOUTHERN OLIGARCHS THROUGHOUT--THEIR EVERLASTING GREED ANDRAPACITY--BROKEN COVENANTS AND AGGRESSIVE METHODS--THEIR UNIFORM GAINSUNTIL 1861--UPS AND DOWNS OF THE TARIFF--FREE TRADE, SLAVERY, STATES-RIGHTS, SECESSION, ALL PARTS OF ONE CONSPIRACY--"INDEPENDENCE"THE FIRST OBJECT OF THE WAR--DREAMS, AMBITIONS, AND PLANS OF THECONSPIRATORS--LINCOLN'S FAITH IN NORTHERN NUMBERS AND ENDURANCE--"RIGHTMAKES MIGHT"--THE SOUTH SOLIDLY-CEMENTED BY BLOOD--THE 37TH CONGRESS--ITS WAR MEASURES--PAVING THE WAY TO DOWNFALL OF SLAVERY AND REBELLION

 CHAPTER XX. LINCOLN'S TROUBLES AND TEMPTATIONS. 

INTERFERENCE WITH SLAVERY FORCED BY THE WAR--EDWARD EVERETT'S OPINION--BORDER-STATES DISTRUST OF LINCOLN--IMPOSSIBILITY OF SATISFYING THEIRREPRESENTATIVES--THEIR JEALOUS SUSPICIONS AND CONGRESSIONAL ACTION--PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE OF KINDLY WARNING--STORMY CONTENTION IN CONGRESS--CRITTENDEN'S ARGUMENT ON "PROPERTY" IN MAN--BORDER--STATES "BID" FORMR. LINCOLN--THE "NICHE IN THE TEMPLE OF FAME" OFFERED HIM--LOVEJOY'SELOQUENT COUNTERBLAST--SUMNER (JUNE, 1862, ) ON LINCOLN AND EMANCIPATION--THE PRESIDENT HARRIED AND WORRIED--SNUBBED BY BORDER STATESMEN--MCCLELLAN'S THREAT--ARMY-MISMANAGEMENT--ARMING THE BLACKS--HOW THEEMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION WAS WRITTEN--CABINET SUGGESTIONS--MILITARYSITUATION--REBEL ADVANCE NORTHWARD--LINCOLN, AND THE BREAST-WORKS--WASHINGTON AND BALTIMORE MENACED--ANTIETAM, AND THE FIAT OF FREEDOM--BORDER-STATE DENUNCIATION--KNIGHTS OF THE GOLDEN CIRCLE, ETC. 

 CHAPTER XXI. THE ARMED--NEGRO. 

"WHO WOULD BE FREE, HIMSELF MUST STRIKE THE BLOW!"--THE COLORED TROOPSAT PORT HUDSON--THEIR HEROISM--STIRRING INCIDENTS--AT MILLIKEN'S BEND--AT FORT WAGNER--AT PETERSBURG AND ABOUT RICHMOND--THE REBEL CONSPIRATORSFURIOUS--OUTLAWRY OF GENERAL BUTLER, ETC. --JEFFERSON DAVIS'S MESSAGE TOTHE REBEL CONGRESS--ATROCIOUS, COLD-BLOODED RESOLUTIONS OF THAT BODY--DEATH OR SLAVERY TO THE ARMED FREEMAN--PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S RETALIATORYORDER--THE BLOODY BUTCHERY AT FORT PILLOW--SAVAGE MALIGNITY OF THE REBELS--A COMMON ERROR, CORRECTED--ARMING OF NEGROES COMMENCED BY THE REBELS--SIMILAR SCHEME OF A REVOLUTIONARY HERO, IN 1778--REBEL CONGRESSIONAL ACT, CONSCRIPTING NEGROES--JEFFERSON DAVIS'S POSITION--GENERAL LEE'S LETTERTO BARKSDALE ON THE SUBJECT

 CHAPTER XXII. FREEDOM'S SUN STILL RISING. 

DEFINITE CONGRESSIONAL ACTION, ON EMANCIPATION, GERMINATING--GLORIOUSNEWS FROM THE WEST AND EAST--FALL OF VICKSBURG--GETTYSBURG--LINCOLN'SGETTYSBURG ORATION--THE DRAFT--THE REBEL "FIRE IN THE REAR"--DRAFT RIOTSIN NEW YORK--LINCOLN'S LETTER, AUGUST, 1863, ON THE SITUATION--CHATTANOOGA--THE CHEERING FALL-ELECTIONS--VALLANDIGHAM'S DEFEAT--EMANCIPATION AS A "POLITICAL" MEASURE--"THIRTEENTH AMENDMENT" REPORTEDIN THE SENATE--THADDEUS STEVENS'S RESOLUTIONS, AND TEST VOTE IN THEHOUSE--LOVEJOY'S DEATH--ELOQUENT TRIBUTES OF ARNOLD, WASHBURNE, GRINNELL, THADDEUS STEVENS, AND SUMNER

 CHAPTER XXIII. "THIRTEENTH AMENDMENT" IN THE SENATE. 

GREAT DEBATE IN THE U. S. SENATE, ON EMANCIPATION--THE WHOLE VILLANOUSHISTORY OF SLAVERY, LAID BARE--SPEECHES OF TRUMBULL, HENRY WILSON, HARLAN, SHERMAN, CLARK, HALL, HENDERSON, SUMNER, REVERDY JOHNSON, MCDOUGALL, SAULSBURY, GARRETT DAVIS, POWELL, AND HENDRICKS--BRILLIANTARRAIGNMENT AND DEFENSE OF "THE INSTITUTION"--U. S. GRANT, NOW "GENERALIN CHIEF"--HIS PLANS PERFECTED, HE GOES TO THE VIRGINIA FRONT--MR. LINCOLN'S SOLICITUDE FOR THE THIRTEENTH AMENDMENT--BORDER--STATEOBSTRUCTIVE MOTIONS, AMENDMENTS, AND SUBSTITUTES, ALL VOTED DOWN--MR. LINCOLN'S LETTER TO HODGES, OF KENTUCKY, REVIEWING EMANCIPATION AS A WARMEASURE--THE DECISIVE FIELD-DAY (APRIL 8, 1864)--THE DEBATE ABLY CLOSED--THE CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT PASSED BY THE SENATE

 CHAPTER XXIV. TREASON IN THE NORTHERN CAMPS. 

EMANCIPATION TEST--VOTES IN THE HOUSE--ARNOLD'S RESOLUTION--BLUEPROSPECTS FOR THE THIRTEENTH AMENDMENT--LINCOLN'S ANXIETY--CONGRESSIONALCOPPERHEADS--THINLY-DISGUISED TREASON--SPEECHES OF VOORHEES, WASHBURNE, AND KELLEY--SPRINGFIELD COPPERHEAD PEACE-CONVENTION--"THE UNION AS ITWAS"--PEACE ON ANY TERMS--VALLANDIGHAM'S LIEUTENANTS--ATTITUDE OF COX, DAVIS, SAULSBURY, WOOD, LONG, ALLEN, HOLMAN, AND OTHERS--NORTHERNENCOURAGEMENT TO REBELS--CONSEQUENT SECOND INVASION, OF THE NORTH, BYLEE--500, 000 TREASONABLE NORTHERN "SONS OF LIBERTY"--RITUAL AND OATHS OFTHE "K. G. C. " AND "O. A. K. "--COPPERHEAD EFFORTS TO SPLIT THE NORTHAND WEST, ON TARIFF-ISSUES--SPALDING AND THAD. STEVENS DENOUNCETREASON-BREEDING COPPERHEADS

 CHAPTER XXV. THE "FIRE IN THE REAR. "

THE REBEL MANDATE--"AGITATE THE NORTH!"--OBEDIENT COPPERHEADS--THEIRDENUNCIATIONS OF THE GOVERNMENT--BROOKS, FERNANDO WOOD, AND WHITE, ONTHE "FOLLY" OF THE WAR FOR THE UNION--EDGERTON'S PEACE RESOLUTIONS--ECKLEY, ON COPPERHEAD MALIGNITY--ALEXANDER LONG GOES "A BOW-SHOT BEYONDTHEM ALL"--HE PROPOSES THE ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF SOUTHERN INDEPENDENCE--GARFIELD ELOQUENTLY DENOUNCES LONG'S TREASON--LONG DEFIANTLY REITERATESIT--SPEAKER COLFAX OFFERS A RESOLUTION TO EXPEL LONG--COX AND JULIAN'SVERBAL DUEL--HARRIS'S TREASONABLE BID FOR EXPULSION--EXTRAORDINARY SCENEIN THE HOUSE--FERNANDO WOOD'S BID--HE SUBSEQUENTLY "WEAKENS"--EXCITINGDEBATE--LONG AND HARRIS VOTED "UNWORTHY MEMBERS" OF THE HOUSE

 CHAPTER XXVI. "THIRTEENTH AMENDMENT" DEFEATED IN THE HOUSE. 

GLANCE AT THE MILITARY SITUATION--"BEGINNING OF THE END"--THECONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT--HOLMAN "OBJECTS" TO "SECOND READING"--KELLOGGSCORES THE COPPERHEAD-DEMOCRACY--CONTINUOUS "FIRE IN THE REAR" IN BOTHHOUSES--THE PROPOSED AMENDMENT ATTACKED--THE ADMINISTRATION ATTACKED--THE TARIFF ATTACKED--SPEECHES OF GARRETT DAVIS, AND COX--PEACE-RESOLUTIONS OF LAZEAR AND DAVIS--GRINNELL AND STEVENS, SCORE COXAND WOOD--HENDRICKS ON THE DRAFT--"ON" TO RICHMOND AND ATLANTA--VIOLENTDIATRIBES OF WOOD, AND HOLMAN--FARNSWORTH'S REPLY TO ROSS, PRUYN, ANDOTHERS--ARNOLD, ON THE ETHICS OF SLAVERY--INGERSOLL'S ELOQUENT BURST--RANDALL, ROLLINS, AND PENDLETON, CLOSING THE DEBATE--THE THIRTEENTHAMENDMENT DEFEATED--ASHLEY'S MOTION TO RECONSIDER--CONGRESS ADJOURNS

 CHAPTER XXVII. SLAVERY DOOMED AT THE POLLS. 

THE ISSUE BETWEEN FREEDOM AND SLAVERY--MR. LINCOLN'S RENOMINATION--ENDORSED, AT ALL POINTS, BY HIS PARTY--HIS FAITH IN THE PEOPLE--HORATIOSEYMOUR'S COPPERHEAD DECLARATIONS--THE NATIONAL DEMOCRACY DECLARE THEWAR "A FAILURE"--THEIR COPPERHEAD PLATFORM, AND UNION CANDIDATE--MCCLELLAN THEIR NOMINEE--VICTORIES AT ATLANTA AND MOBILE--FREMONT'STHIRD PARTY--SUCCESSES OF GRANT AND SHERIDAN--DEATH OF CHIEF-JUSTICETANEY--MARYLAND BECOMES "FREE"--MORE UNION VICTORIES--REPUBLICAN"TIDAL-WAVE" SUCCESS--LINCOLN RE-ELECTED--HIS SERENADE-SPEECHES--AMAZINGCONGRESSIONAL-RETURNS--THE DEATH OF SLAVERY INSURED--IT BECOMES SIMPLY AMATTER OF TIME

 CHAPTER XXVIII. FREEDOM AT LAST ASSURED. 

THE WINTER OF 1864--THE MILITARY SITUATION--THE "MARCH TO THE SEA"--THOMAS AND HOOD--LOGAN'S INTERVIEW WITH THE PRESIDENT--VICTORIES OFNASHVILLE AND SAVANNAH--MR. LINCOLN'S MESSAGE TO CONGRESS, ON THIRTEENTHAMENDMENT--CONGRESSIONAL RECESS--PRESIDENT LINCOLN STILL WORKING WITH, THE BORDER-STATE REPRESENTATIVES--ROLLINS'S INTERVIEW WITH HIM--THETHIRTEENTH AMENDMENT UP, IN THE HOUSE, AGAIN--VIGOROUS AND ELOQUENTDEBATE--SPEECHES OF COX, BROOKS, VOORHEES, MALLORY, HOLMAN, WOOD, ANDPENDLETON, AGAINST THE AMENDMENT--SPEECHES OF CRESWELL, SCOFIELD, ROLLINS, GARFIELD, AND STEVENS, FOR IT--RECONSIDERATION OF ADVERSE VOTE--THE AMENDMENT ADOPTED--EXCITING SCENE IN THE HOUSE--THE GRAND SALUTE TOLIBERTY--SERENADE TO MR. LINCOLN--"THIS ENDS THE JOB"

 CHAPTER XXIX. LINCOLN'S SECOND INAUGURATION. 

REBELLION ON ITS "LAST LEGS"--PEACE COMMISSIONS AND PROPOSITIONS--EFFORTS OF GREELEY, JACQUES, GILMORE, AND BLAIR--LINCOLN'S ADVANCES--JEFFERSON DAVIS'S DEFIANT MESSAGE TO HIM--THE PRESIDENT AND THE REBELCOMMISSIONERS AT HAMPTON ROADS--VARIOUS ACCOUNTS, OF THE SECRETCONFERENCE, BY PARTICIPANTS THE PROPOSITIONS ON BOTH SIDES--FAILURE--THE MILITARY OUTLOOK--THE REBEL CAUSE DESPERATE--REBEL DESERTIONS--"MILITARY" PEACE-CONVENTION PROPOSED BY REBELS--DECLINED--CORRESPONDENCEBETWEEN GRANT AND LEE, ETC. --THE SECOND INAUGURATION OF PRESIDENTLINCOLN--A STRANGE OMEN--HIS IMMORTAL SECOND-INAUGURAL

 CHAPTER XXX. COLLAPSE OF THE ARMED CONSPIRACY. 

PROGRESS OF THE WAR--CAMPAIGN OF THE CAROLINAS, 1865--MEETING, AT CITYPOINT, OF LINCOLN, GRANT, AND SHERMAN--SHERMAN'S ACCOUNT OF WHAT PASSED--GRANT NOW FEELS "LIKE ENDING THE MATTER"--THE BATTLES OF DINWIDDIECOURT HOUSE AND FIVE FORKS--UNION ASSAULT ON THE PETERSBURG WORKS--UNIONVICTORY EVERYWHERE--PETERSBURG AND RICHMOND EVACUATED--LEE'S RETREAT CUTOFF BATTLE OF SAILOR'S CREEK--GRANT ASKS LEE TO SURRENDER--LEE DELAYS--SHERIDAN CATCHES HIM, AND HIS ARMY, IN A TRAP--THE REBELS SURRENDER, ATAPPOMATTOX--GRANT'S GENEROUS AND MAGNANIMOUS TERMS--THE STARVING REBELSFED WITH UNION RATIONS--SURRENDER OF JOHNSTON'S ARMY--OTHER REBEL FORCESSURRENDER--THE REBELLION STAMPED OUT--CAPTURE OF JEFFERSON DAVIS--THEREBELS "YIELD EVERYTHING THEY HAD FOUGHT FOR"--THEY CRAVE PARDON ANDOBLIVION FOR THEIR OFFENCES

 CHAPTER XXXI. ASSASSINATION!

PRESIDENT LINCOLN AT RICHMOND--HIS RECEPTIONS AT JEFFERSON DAVIS'SMANSION--RETURN TO WASHINGTON--THE NEWS OF LEE'S SURRENDER--LINCOLN'SLAST PUBLIC SPEECH--HIS THEME, "RECONSTRUCTION"--GRANT ARRIVES AT THENATIONAL CAPITAL--PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S LAST CABINET MEETING--HIS FONDHOPES OF THE FUTURE--AN UNHEEDED PRESENTIMENT--AT FORD'S THEATRE--THELAST ACCLAMATION OF THE PEOPLE--THE PISTOL SHOT THAT HORRIFIED THEWORLD--SCULKING, RED HANDED TREASON--THE ASSASSINATION PLOT-COMPLICITYOF THE REBEL AUTHORITIES, BELIEVED BY THE BEST INFORMED MEN--TESTIMONYAS TO THREE ATTEMPTS TO KILL LINCOLN--THE CHIEF REBEL-CONSPIRATORS"RECEIVE PROPOSITIONS TO ASSASSINATE"--A NATION'S WRATH--ANDREWJOHNSON'S VEHEMENT ASSEVERATIONS--"TREASON MUST BE MADE ODIOUS"--RECONSTRUCTION

 CHAPTER XXXII. TURNING BACK THE HANDS

"RECONSTRUCTION" OF THE SOUTH--MEMORIES OF THE WAR, DYING OUT--THEFOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH AMENDMENTS--THE SOUTHERN STATES REHABILITATEDBY ACCEPTANCE OF AMENDMENTS, ETC. --REMOVAL OF REBEL DISABILITIES--CLEMENCY OF THE CONQUERORS--THE OLD CONSPIRATORS HATCH A NEW CONSPIRACY--THE "LOST CAUSE" TO BE REGAINED--THE MISSISSIPPI SHOT-GUN PLAN--FRAUD, BARBARITY, AND MURDERS, EFFECT THE PURPOSE--THE "SOUTH" CEMENTED "SOLID"BY BLOOD--PEONAGE REPLACES SLAVERY--THE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION OF 1876--THE TILDEN "BARREL, " AND "CIPHER DISPATCHES"--THE "FRAUD" CRY--THE OLDLEADERS DICTATE THE DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE OF 1880--THEIRFREE-TRADE ISSUE TO THE FRONT AGAIN--SUCCESSIVE DEMOCRATIC EFFORTS TO FORCEFREE-TRADE THROUGH THE HOUSE, SINCE REBELLION--EFFECT OF SUCH EFFORTS--REPUBLICAN MODIFICATIONS OF THEIR OWN PROTECTIVE TARIFF--THE "SOLIDSOUTH" SUCCEEDS, AT LAST, IN "ELECTING" ITS CANDIDATE FOR PRESIDENT--IS THIS STILL A REPUBLIC, OR IS IT AN OLIGARCHY?

 CHAPTER XXXIII. WHAT NEXT?

THE PRESENT OUTLOOK--COMMERCIAL PROSPECTS, BRIGHT--WHAT THE PEOPLE OFTHE NORTHERN AND WESTERN STATES SEE--WHAT IS A "REPUBLICAN FORM OFGOVERNMENT?"--WHAT DID THE FATHERS MEAN BY IT--THE REASON FOR THEGUARANTEE IN THE NATIONAL CONSTITUTION--PURPOSES OF "THE PEOPLE" INCREATING THIS REPUBLIC--THE "SOLID-SOUTHERN" OLIGARCHS DEFEAT THOSEPURPOSES--THE REPUBLICAN PARTY NOT BLAMELESS FOR THE PRESENT CONDITIONOF THINGS--THE OLD REBEL-CHIEFTAINS AND COPPERHEADS, IN CONTROL--THEYGRASP ALMOST EVERYTHING THAT WAS LOST BY THE REBELLION--THEIR GROWINGAGGRESSIVENESS--THE FUTURE--"WATCHMAN, WHAT OF THE NIGHT?"

PORTRAITS. 

MAPS. 

SEAT OF WAR IN VIRGINIA. 

FIRST BULL RUN BATTLE-FIELD. 

FIRST BULL RUN BATTLE-FIELD, SHOWING POSITION OF ARMIES. 

EDWARD D. BAKER, BENJ. F. BUTLER, J. C. BRECKINRIDGE, JOHN C. CALHOUN, HENRY CLAY, J. J. CRITTENDEN, HENRY WINTER DAVIS, JEFFERSON DAVIS, SIMON CAMERON, STEPHEN A. DOUGLAS, JOHN C. FREMONT, H. W. HALLECK, ISAAC W. HAYNE, PATRICK HENRY, DAVID HUNTER, THOMAS JEFFERSON, ABRAHAM LINCOLN, GEO. B. MCCLELLAN, THAD. STEVENS, WM. H. SEWARD, LYMAN TRUMBULL, BENJ. F. WADE, DANIEL WEBSTER, LOUIS T. WIGFALL. 

 CHAPTER I. 

 A PRELIMINARY RETROSPECT. 

To properly understand the condition of things preceding the great warof the Rebellion, and the causes underlying that condition and the waritself, we must glance backward through the history of the Country to, and even beyond, that memorable 30th of November, 1782, when theIndependence of the United States of America was at last conceded byGreat Britain. At that time the population of the United States wasabout 2, 500, 000 free whites and some 500, 000 black slaves. We hadgained our Independence of the Mother Country, but she had left fastenedupon us the curse of Slavery. Indeed African Slavery had already in1620 been implanted on the soil of Virginia before Plymouth Rock waspressed by the feet of the Pilgrim Fathers, and had spread, prior to theRevolution, with greater or less rapidity, according to the surroundingadaptations of soil, production and climate, to every one of thethirteen Colonies. 

But while it had thus spread more or less throughout all the originalColonies, and was, as it were, recognized and acquiesced in by all, asan existing and established institution, yet there were many, both inthe South and North, who looked upon it as an evil--an inherited evil--and were anxious to prevent the increase of that evil. Hence it wasthat even as far back as 1699, a controversy sprang up between theColonies and the Home Government, upon the African Slavery question--a controversy continuing with more or less vehemence down to theDeclaration of Independence itself. 

It was this conviction that it was not alone an evil but a dangerousevil, that induced Jefferson to embody in his original draft of thatDeclaration a clause strongly condemnatory of the African Slave Trade--aclause afterward omitted from it solely, he tells us, "in complaisanceto South Carolina and Georgia, who had never* attempted to restrain theimportation of slaves, and who, on the contrary, still wished tocontinue it, " as well as in deference to the sensitiveness of Northernpeople, who, though having few slaves themselves, "had been prettyconsiderable carriers of them to others" a clause of the greatindictment of King George III. , which, since it was not omitted for anyother reason than that just given, shows pretty conclusively that wherethe fathers in that Declaration affirmed that "all men are createdequal, " they included in the term "men, " black as well as white, bond aswell as free; for the clause ran thus: "Determined to keep open a marketwhere MEN should be bought and sold, he has prostituted his negative forsuppressing every Legislative attempt to prohibit or to restrain thisexecrable commerce. And that this assemblage of horrors might want nofact of distinguished dye, he is now exciting those very people to risein arms among us, and purchase that liberty of which he has deprivedthem, by murdering the people on whom he also obtruded them; thus payingof former crimes committed against the LIBERTIES of our people withcrimes which he urges them to commit against the LIVES of another. "

 [Prior to 1752, when Georgia surrendered her charter and became a Royal Colony, the holding of slaves within its limits was expressly prohibited by law; and the Darien (Ga. ) resolutions of 1775 declared not only a "disapprobation and abhorrence of the unnatural practice of Slavery in America" as "a practice founded in injustice and cruelty, and highly dangerous to our Liberties (as well as lives) but a determination to use our utmost efforts for the manumission of our slaves in this colony upon the most safe and equitable footing for the masters and themselves. "]

During the war of the Revolution following the Declaration ofIndependence, the half a million of slaves, nearly all of them in theSouthern States, were found to be not only a source of weakness, but, through the incitements of British emissaries, a standing menace ofperil to the Slaveholders. Thus it was that the South was overrun byhostile British armies, while in the North-comparatively free of thiselement of weakness--disaster after disaster met them. At last, however, in 1782, came the recognition of our Independence, and peace, followed by the evacuation of New York at the close of 1783. 

The lessons of the war, touching Slavery, had not been lost upon ourstatesmen. Early in 1784 Virginia ceded to the United States her claimsof jurisdiction and otherwise over the vast territory north-west of theOhio; and upon its acceptance, Jefferson, as chairman of a SelectCommittee appointed at his instance to consider a plan of governmenttherefor, reported to the ninth Continental Congress an Ordinance togovern the territory ceded already, or to be ceded, by individual Statesto the United States, extending from the 31st to the 47th degree ofnorth latitude, which provided as "fundamental conditions between thethirteen original States and those newly described" as embryo Statesthereafter--to be carved out of such territory ceded or to be ceded tothe United States, not only that "they shall forever remain a part ofthe United States of America, " but also that "after the year 1800 of theChristian era, there shall be neither Slavery nor involuntary servitudein any of the said States"--and that those fundamental conditions were"unalterable but by the joint consent of the United States in Congressassembled, and of the particular State within which such alterationis proposed to be made. "

But now a signal misfortune befell. Upon a motion to strike out theclause prohibiting Slavery, six States: New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York and Pennsylvania, voted to retainthe prohibitive clause, while three States, Maryland, Virginia and SouthCarolina, voted not to retain it. The vote of North Carolina wasequally divided; and while one of the Delegates from New Jersey voted toretain it, yet as there was no other delegate present from that State, and the Articles of Confederation required the presence of "two or more"delegates to cast the vote of a State, the vote of New Jersey was lost;and, as the same Articles required an affirmative vote of a majority ofall the States--and not simply of those present--the retention of theclause prohibiting Slavery was also lost. Thus was lost the greatopportunity of restricting Slavery to the then existing Slave States, and of settling the question peaceably for all time. Three yearsafterward a similar Ordinance, since become famous as "the Ordinance of'87, " for the government of the North-west Territory (from which theFree States of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin havesince been carved and admitted to the Union) was adopted in Congress bythe unanimous vote of all the eight States present. And the sixtharticle of this Ordinance, or "Articles of Compact, " which it wasstipulated should "forever remain unalterable, unless by commonconsent, " was in these words:

"Art. 6. There shall be neither Slavery nor involuntary servitude inthe said Territory, otherwise than in punishment of crimes, whereof theparty shall have been duly convicted; provided always that any personescaping into the same from whom labor or service is lawfully claimed inany one of the original States, such fugitive may be lawfully reclaimed, and conveyed to the person claiming his or her labor, or service, asaforesaid. "

But this Ordinance of '87, adopted almost simultaneously with theframing of our present Federal Constitution, was essentially differentfrom the Ordinance of three years previous, in this: that while thelatter included the territory south of the Ohio River as well as thatnorth-west of it, this did not; and as a direct consequence of thisfailure to include in it the territory south of that river, the Statesof Tennessee, Alabama and Mississippi, which were taken out of it, weresubsequently admitted to the Union as Slave States, and thus greatlyaugmented their political power. And at a later period it was thisincreased political power that secured the admission of still otherSlave States--as Florida, Louisiana and Texas--which enabled the SlaveStates to hold the balance of such power as against the original Statesthat had become Free, and the new Free States of the North-west. 

Hence, while in a measure quieting the great question of Slavery for thetime being, the Ordinance of '87 in reality laid the ground-work for thelong series of irritations and agitations touching its restrictions andextension, which eventually culminated in the clash of arms that shookthe Union from its centre to its circumference. Meanwhile, as we haveseen--while the Ordinance of 1787 was being enacted in the last Congressof the old Confederation at New York--the Convention to frame thepresent Constitution was sitting at Philadelphia under the Presidency ofGeorge Washington himself. The old Confederation had proved itself tobe "a rope of sand. " A new and stronger form of government had become anecessity for National existence. 

To create it out of the discordant elements whose harmony was essentialto success, was an herculean task, requiring the utmost forbearance, unselfishness, and wisdom. And of all the great questions, dividing theframers of that Constitution, perhaps none of them required a higherdegree of self abnegation and patriotism than those touching humanSlavery. 

The situation was one of extreme delicacy. The necessity for a closerand stronger Union of all the States was apparently absolute, yet thisvery necessity seemed to place a whip in the hands of a few States, withwhich to coerce the greater number of States to do their bidding. Itseemed that the majority must yield to a small minority on even vitalquestions, or lose everything. 

Thus it was, that instead of an immediate interdiction of the AfricanSlave Trade, Congress was empowered to prohibit it after the lapse oftwenty years; that instead of the basis of Congressional Representationbeing the total population of each State, and that of direct taxationthe total property of each State, a middle ground was conceded, whichregarded the Slaves as both persons and property, and the basis both ofRepresentation and of Direct Taxation was fixed as being the total Freepopulation "plus three-fifths of all other persons" in each State; andthat there was inserted in the Constitution a similar clause to thatwhich we have seen was almost simultaneously incorporated in theOrdinance of '87, touching the reclamation and return to their owners ofFugitive Slaves from the Free States into which they may have escaped. 

The fact of the matter is, that the Convention that framed ourConstitution lacked the courage of its convictions, and was "bulldozed"by the few extreme Southern Slave-holding States--South Carolina andGeorgia especially. It actually paltered with those convictions andwith the truth itself. Its convictions--those at least of a greatmajority of its delegates--were against not only the spread, but thevery existence of Slavery; yet we have seen what they unwillingly agreedto in spite of those convictions; and they were guilty moreover of thesubterfuge of using the terms "persons" and "service or labor" when theyreally meant "Slaves" and "Slavery. " "They did this latter, " Mr. Madison says, "because they did not choose to admit the right ofproperty in man, " and yet in fixing the basis of Direct Taxation as wellas Congressional Representation at the total Free population of eachState with "three-fifths of all other persons, " they did admit the rightof property in man! As was stated by Mr. Iredell to the North CarolinaRatification Convention, when explaining the Fugitive Slave clause:"Though the word 'Slave' is not mentioned, this is the meaning of it. "And he added: "The Northern delegates, owing to their peculiar scrupleson the subject of Slavery, did not choose the word 'Slave' to bementioned. "

In March, 1789, the first Federal Congress met at New York. It at onceenacted a law in accordance with the terms of the Ordinance of '87--adapting it to the changed order of things under the new FederalConstitution--prohibiting Slavery in the Territories of the North-west;and the succeeding Congress enacted a Fugitive-Slave law. 

In the same year (1789) North Carolina ceded her western territory (nowTennessee) south of the Ohio, to the United States, providing as one ofthe conditions of that cession, "that no regulation made, or to be made, by Congress, shall tend to emancipate Slaves. " Georgia, also, in 1802, ceded her superfluous territorial domain (south of the Ohio, and nowknown as Alabama and Mississippi), making as a condition of itsacceptance that the Ordinance of '87 "shall, in all its parts, extend tothe territory contained in the present act of cession, the article onlyexcepted which forbids Slavery. "

Thus while the road was open and had been taken advantage of, at theearliest moment, by the Federal Congress to prohibit Slavery in all theterritory north-west of the Ohio River by Congressional enactment, Congress considered itself barred by the very conditions of cession frominhibiting Slavery in the territory lying south of that river. Hence itwas that while the spread of Slavery was prevented in the one Section ofour outlying territories by Congressional legislation, it was stimulatedin the other Section by the enforced absence of such legislation. As anecessary sequence, out of the Territories of the one Section grew moreFree States and out of the other more Slave States, and this conditionof things had a tendency to array the Free and the Slave States inopposition to each other and to Sectionalize the flames of that Slaveryagitation which were thus continually fed. 

Upon the admission of Ohio to Statehood in 1803, the remainder of theNorth-west territory became the Territory of Indiana. The inhabitantsof this Territory (now known as the States of Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin), consisting largely of settlers from the SlaveStates, but chiefly from Virginia and Kentucky, very persistently (in1803, 1806 and 1807) petitioned Congress for permission to employ SlaveLabor, but--although their petitions were favorably reported in mostcases by the Committees to which they were referred--without avail, Congress evidently being of opinion that a temporary suspension in thisrespect of the sixth article of the Ordinance of '87 was "notexpedient. " These frequent rebuffs by Congress, together with theconstantly increasing emigration from the Free States, prevented thetaking of any further steps to implant Slavery on the soil of thatTerritory. 

Meanwhile the vast territory included within the Valley of theMississippi and known at that day as the "Colony of Louisiana, " was, in1803, acquired to the United States by purchase from the French--to whomit had but lately been retroceded by Spain. Both under Spanish andFrench rule, Slavery had existed throughout this vast yet sparselypopulated region. When we acquired it by purchase, it was alreadythere, as an established "institution;" and the Treaty of acquisitionnot only provided that it should be "incorporated into the Union of theUnited States, and admitted as soon as possible, according to theprinciples of the Federal Constitution, " but that its inhabitants in themeantime "should be maintained and protected in the free enjoyment oftheir liberty, property, and the religion which they professed"--and, as "the right of property in man" had really been admitted in practice, if not in theory, by the framers of that Constitution itself--thatinstitution was allowed to remain there. Indeed the sparseness of itspopulation at the time of purchase and the amazing fertility of its soiland adaptability of its climate to Slave Labor, together with the thenrecent invention by Eli Whitney, of Massachusetts, of that wonderfulimprovement in the separation of cotton-fibre from its seed, known asthe "cotton-gin"--which with the almost simultaneous inventions ofHargreaves, and Arkwright's cotton-spinning machines, and Watt'sapplication of his steam engine, etc. , to them, marvelously increasedboth the cotton supply and demand and completely revolutionized thecotton industry--contributed to rapidly and thickly populate the wholeregion with white Slave-holders and black Slaves, and to greatly enrichand increase the power of the former. 

When Jefferson succeeded in negotiating the cession of that vast andrich domain to the United States, it is not to be supposed that eitherthe allurements of territorial aggrandizement on the one hand, or theimpending danger to the continued ascendency of the political partywhich had elevated him to the Presidency, threatening it from all theirritations with republican France likely to grow out of such nearproximity to her Colony, on the other, could have blinded his eyes tothe fact that its acquisition must inevitably tend to the spread of thatvery evil, the contemplation of which, at a later day, wrung from hislips the prophetic words, "I tremble for my Country when I reflect thatGod is just. " It is more reasonable to suppose that, as he believed theascendency of the Republican party of that day essential to theperpetuity of the Republic itself, and revolted against being driveninto an armed alliance with Monarchical England against what he termed"our natural friend, " Republican France, he reached the conclusion thatthe preservation of his Republican principles was of more immediatemoment than the question of the perpetuation and increase of humanSlavery. Be that as it may, it none the less remains a curious factthat it was to Jefferson, the far-seeing statesman and hater of AfricanSlavery and the author of the Ordinance of 1784--which sought to excludeSlavery from all the Territories of the United States south of, as wellas north-west of the Ohio River--that we also owe the acquisition of thevast territory of the Mississippi Valley burdened with Slavery in suchshape that only a War, which nearly wrecked our Republic, could get ridof!

Out of that vast and fertile, but Slave-ridden old French Colony of"Louisiana" were developed in due time the rich and flourishing SlaveStates of Louisiana, Missouri and Arkansas. 

It will have been observed that this acquisition of the Colony ofLouisiana and the contemporaneous inventions of the cotton-gin, improvedcotton-spinning machinery, and the application to it of steam power, hadalready completely neutralized the wisdom of the Fathers in securing, asthey thought, the gradual but certain extinction of Slavery in theUnited States, by that provision in the Constitution which enabledCongress, after an interval of twenty years, to prohibit the AfricanSlave Trade; and which led the Congress, on March 22, 1794, to pass anAct prohibiting it; to supplement it in 1800 with another Act in thesame direction; and on March 2, 1807, to pass another supplemental Act--to take effect January 1, 1808--still more stringent, and covering anysuch illicit traffic, whether to the United States or with othercountries. Never was the adage that, "The best laid schemes o' mice an'men gang aft agley, " more painfully apparent. Slaves increased andmultiplied within the land, and enriched their white owners to such adegree that, as the years rolled by, instead of compunctions ofconscience on the subject of African Slavery in America, the Southernleaders ultimately persuaded themselves to the belief that it was notonly moral, and sanctioned by Divine Law, but that to perpetuate it wasa philanthropic duty, beneficial to both races! In fact one of themdeclared it to be "the highest type of civilization. "

In 1812, the State of Louisiana, organized from the purchased Colony ofthe same name, was admitted to the Union, and the balance of theLouisiana purchase was thereafter known as the Territory of Missouri. 

In 1818 commenced the heated and protracted struggle in Congress overthe admission of the State of Missouri--created from the Territory ofthat name--as a Slave State, which finally culminated in 1820 in thesettlement known thereafter as the "Missouri Compromise. "

Briefly stated, that struggle may be said to have consisted in theefforts of the House on the one side, to restrict Slavery in the Stateof Missouri, and the efforts of the Senate on the other, to give it freerein. The House insisted on a clause in the Act of admission providing, "That the introduction of Slavery or involuntary servitude beprohibited, except for the punishment of crimes whereof the party hasbeen duly convicted; and that all children born within the said State, after the admission thereof into the Union, shall be declared Free atthe age of twenty-five years. " The Senate resisted it--and the Billfell. In the meantime, however, a Bill passed both Houses forming theTerritory of Arkansas out of that portion of the Territory of Missourinot included in the proposed State of Missouri, without any suchrestriction upon Slavery. Subsequently, the House having passed a Billto admit the State of Maine to the Union, the Senate amended it bytacking on a provision authorizing the people of Missouri to organize aState Government, without restriction as to Slavery. The Housedecidedly refused to accede to the Senate proposition, and the result ofthe disagreement was a Committee of Conference between the two Houses, and the celebrated "Missouri Compromise, " which, in the language ofanother--[Hon. John Holmes of Massachusetts, of said Committee onConference, March 2, 1820. ]--, was: "that the Senate should give up itscombination of Missouri with Maine; that the House should abandon itsattempt to restrict Slavery in Missouri; and that both Houses shouldconcur in passing the Bill to admit Missouri as a State, with" a"restriction or proviso, excluding Slavery from all territory north andwest of the new State"--that "restriction or proviso" being in thesewords: "That in all that territory ceded by France to the United Statesunder the name of Louisiana, which lies north of thirty-six degrees, thirty minutes north latitude, excepting only such part thereof as isincluded within the limits of the State contemplated by this act, Slavery and involuntary servitude, otherwise than in the punishment ofcrime, whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall be and ishereby forever prohibited; Provided always, that any person escapinginto the same, from whom labor and service is lawfully claimed in anyState or Territory of the United States, such Fugitive may be lawfullyreclaimed and conveyed to the person claiming his or her labor orservice, as aforesaid. " At a subsequent session of Congress, at whichMissouri asked admission as a State with a Constitution prohibiting herLegislature from passing emancipation laws, or such as would prevent theimmigration of Slaves, while requiring it to enact such as wouldabsolutely prevent the immigration of Free Negroes or Mulattoes, afurther Compromise was agreed to by Congress under the inspiration ofMr. Clay, by which it was laid down as a condition precedent to heradmission as a State--a condition subsequently complied with--thatMissouri must pledge herself that her Legislature should pass no act "bywhich any of the citizens of either of the States should be excludedfrom the enjoyment of the privileges and immunities to which they areentitled under the Constitution of the United States. "

This, in a nut-shell, was the memorable Missouri Struggle, and the"Compromise" or Compromises which settled and ended it. But during thatstruggle--as during the formation of the Federal Constitution and atvarious times in the interval when exciting questions had arisen--thebands of National Union were more than once rudely strained, and thistime to such a degree as even to shake the faith of some of the firmestbelievers in the perpetuity of that Union. It was during this bitterstruggle that John Adams wrote to Jefferson: "I am sometimes Cassandraenough to dream that another Hamilton, another Burr, may rend thismighty fabric in twain, or perhaps into a leash, and a few more choicespirits of the same stamp might produce as many Nations in North Americaas there are in Europe. "

It is true that we had "sown the wind, " but we had not yet "reaped thewhirlwind. "

 CHAPTER II. 

 PROTECTION AND FREE TRADE. 

We have seen that the first Federal Congress met at New York in March, 1789. It organized April 6th. None knew better than its members thatthe war of the Americana Revolution chiefly grew out of the efforts ofGreat Britain to cripple and destroy our Colonial industries to thebenefit of the British trader, and that the Independence conquered, wasan Industrial as well as Political Independence; and none knew betterthan they, that the failure of the subsequent political Confederation ofStates was due mainly to its failure to encourage and protect thebudding domestic manufactures of those States. Hence they hastened, under the leadership of James Madison, to pass "An Act laying a duty ongoods, wares and merchandize imported into the United States, " with apreamble, declaring it to be "necessary" for the "discharge of the debtof the United States and the encouragement and protection ofmanufactures. " It was approved by President Washington July 4, 1789--adate not without its significance--and levied imports both specific andad valorem. It was not only our first Tariff Act, but, next to thatprescribing the oath used in organizing the Government, the first Act ofthe first Federal Congress; and was passed in pursuance of thedeclaration of President Washington in his first Message, that "Thesafety and interest of the People" required it. Under the inspirationof Alexander Hamilton the Tariff of 1790 was enacted at the secondsession of the same Congress, confirming the previous Act and increasingsome of the protective duties thereby imposed. 

An analysis of the vote in the House of Representatives on this TariffBill discloses the fact that of the 39 votes for it, 21 were fromSouthern States, 13 from the Middle States, and 5 from New EnglandStates; while of the 13 votes against it, 9 were from New EnglandStates, 3 from Southern States, and 1 from Middle States. In otherwords, while the Southern States were for the Bill in the proportion of21 to 3, and the Middle States by 13 to 1, New England was against it by9 to 5; or again, while 10 of the 13 votes against it were from the NewEngland and Middle States, 21 (or more than half) of the 39 votes for itwere from Southern States. 

It will thus be seen-singularly enough in view of subsequent events--that we not only mainly owe our first steps in Protective Tarifflegislation to the almost solid Southern vote, but that it was thussecured for us despite the opposition of New England. Nor did ourindebtedness to Southern statesmen and Southern votes for theinstitution of the now fully established American System of Protectioncease here, as we shall presently see. 

That Jefferson, as well as Washington and Madison, agreed with the viewsof Alexander Hamilton on Protection to our domestic manufactures asagainst those of foreign Nations, is evident in his Annual Message ofDecember 14, 1806, wherein-discussing an anticipated surplus of Federalrevenue above the expenditures, and enumerating the purposes ofeducation and internal improvement to which he thinks the "whole surplusof impost" should during times of peace be applied; by which applicationof such surplus he prognosticates that "new channels of communicationwill be opened between the States; the lines of separation willdisappear; their interests will be identified, and their Union cementedby new and indissoluble ties"--he says: "Shall we suppress the impostand give that advantage to foreign over domestic manufactures. On a fewarticles of more general and necessary use, the suppression in dueseason, will doubtless be right; but the great mass of the articles onwhich impost is paid is foreign luxuries, purchased by those only whoare rich enough to afford themselves the use of them. " But his embargoand other retaliatory measures, put in force in 1807 and 1808, and theWar of 1812-15 with Great Britain, which closely followed, furnishedProtection in another manner, by shutting the door to foreign importsand throwing our people upon their own resources, and contributedgreatly to the encouragement and increase of our home manufactures--especially those of wool, cotton, and hemp. 

At the close of that War the traders of Great Britain determined, evenat a temporary loss to themselves, to glut our market with their goodsand thus break down forever, as they hoped, our infant manufactures. Their purpose and object were boldly announced in the House of Commonsby Mr. Brougham, when he said: "Is it worth while to incur a loss uponthe first importation, in order by the glut to stifle in the cradlethose rising manufactures in the United States which the War had forcedinto existence contrary to the natural course of things. " Against thisthreatened ruin, our manufacturers all over the United States--the sugarplanters of Louisiana among them--clamored for Protection, and Congressat once responded with the Tariff Act of 1816. 

This law greatly extended and increased specific duties on, anddiminished the application of the ad valorem principle to, foreignimports; and it has been well described as "the practical foundation ofthe American policy of encouragement of home manufactures--the practicalestablishment of the great industrial system upon which rests ourpresent National wealth, and the power and the prosperity and happinessof our whole people. " While Henry Clay of Kentucky, William Loundes ofSouth Carolina, and Henry St. George Tucker of Virginia supported theBill most effectively, no man labored harder and did more effectiveservice in securing its passage than John C. Calhoun of South Carolina. The contention on their part was not for a mere "incidental protection"--much less a "Tariff for revenue only"--but for "Protection" in itsbroadest sense, and especially the protection of their cottonmanufactures. Indeed Calhoun's defense of Protection, from the assaultsof those from New England and elsewhere who assailed it on the narrowground that it was inimical to commerce and navigation, was a notableone. He declared that:

"It (the encouragement of manufactures) produced a system strictlyAmerican, as much so as agriculture, in which it had the decidedadvantage of commerce and navigation. The country will from this derivemuch advantage. Again it is calculated to bind together more closelyour wide-spread Republic. It will greatly increase our mutualdependence and intercourse, and will, as a necessary consequence, excitean increased attention to internal improvements--a subject every way sointimately connected with the ultimate attainment of national strengthand the perfection of our political institutions. "

He regarded the fact that it would make the parts adhere more closely;that it would form a new and most powerful cement far outweighing anypolitical objections that might be urged against the system. In hisopinion "the liberty and the union of the country were inseparablyunited; that as the destruction of the latter would most certainlyinvolve the former, so its maintenance will with equal certaintypreserve it;" and he closed with an impressive warning to the Nation ofa "new and terrible danger" which threatened it, to wit: "disunion. "Nobly as he stood up then--during the last term of his service in theHouse of Representatives--for the great principles of, the AmericanSystem of Protection to manufactures, for the perpetuity of the Union, and for the increase of "National strength, " it seems like the veryirony of fate that a few years later should find him battling againstProtection as "unconstitutional, " upholding Nullification as a "reservedright" of his State, and championing at the risk of his neck that very"danger" to the "liberties" and life of his Country against which hisprophetic words had already given solemn warning. 

Strange was it also, in view of the subsequent attitudes of the Southand New England, that this essentially Protective Tariff Act of 1816should have been vigorously protested and voted against by New England, while it was ably advocated and voted for by the South--the 25 votes ofthe latter which secured its passage being more than sufficient to havesecured its defeat had they been so inclined. 

The Tariff Acts of 1824 and 1828 followed the great American principleof Protection laid down and supported by the South in the Act of 1816, while widening, increasing, and strengthening it. Under theiroperation-especially under that of 1828, with its high duties on wool, hemp, iron, lead, and other staples--great prosperity smiled upon theland, and particularly upon the Free States. 

In the cotton-growing belt of the South, however, where the prosperitywas relatively less, owing to the blight of Slavery, the very contrastbred discontent; and, instead of attributing it to the real cause, theadvocates of Free Trade within that region insisted that the ProtectiveTariff was responsible for the condition of things existing there. 

A few restless and discontented spirits in the South had indeed agitatedthe subject of Free Trade as against Protected manufactures as early as1797, and, hand in hand with it, the doctrine of States Rights. AndJefferson himself, although, as we have already seen, attached to theAmerican System of Protection and believing in its Constitutionality, unwittingly played into the hands of these Free Traders by drawing upthe famous Kentucky Resolutions of '98 touching States Rights, whichwere closely followed by the Virginia Resolutions of 1799 in the samevein by Madison, also an out-and-out Protectionist. It was mainly incondemnation of the Alien and Sedition Laws, then so unpopulareverywhere, that these resolutions were professedly fulminated, but theygave to the agitating Free Traders a States-Rights-Secession-weapon ofwhich they quickly availed themselves. 

Their drift may be gathered from the first of the Kentucky Resolutionsof '98, which was in these words: "Resolved, That the several Statescomposing the United States of America are not united on the principleof unlimited submission to their General Government, but that, by acompact under the style and title of a Constitution for the UnitedStates, and of amendments thereto, they constituted a General Governmentfor special purposes--delegated to that Government certain definitepowers, reserving, each State to itself, the residuary mass of right totheir own self-government; and that whensoever the General Governmentassumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and ofno force; that to this compact each State acceded as a State, and as anintegral party, its co-States forming, as to itself, the other party;that the Government created by this compact was not made the exclusiveor final judge of the extent of the powers delegated to itself; sincethat would have made its discretion, and not the Constitution, themeasure of its powers; but that, as in all other cases of compact amongpowers having no common judge, each party has an equal right to judgefor itself, as well of infractions as of the mode and measure ofredress. "

The Resolutions, after enumerating the Alien and Sedition and certainother laws as in point, conclude by calling upon the other States tojoin Kentucky in her opposition to such Federal usurpations of power asthus embodied, and express confidence: "That they will concur with thisCommonwealth in considering the said Acts as so palpably against theConstitution as to amount to an undisguised declaration that thatcompact is not meant to be the measure of the powers of the GeneralGovernment, but that it will proceed in the exercise over these States, of all powers whatsoever; that they will view this as seizing the rightsof the States, and consolidating them in the hands of the GeneralGovernment, with the power assumed to bind the States (not merely as tothe cases made federal (casus foederis) but) in all cases whatsoever, bylaws made, not with their consent, but by others against their consent;that this would be to surrender the form of government we have chosen, and live under one deriving its powers from its own will, and not fromour authority; and that the co-States, returning to their natural rightsin cases not made federal, will concur in declaring these Acts void andof no force, and will each take measures of its own in providing thatneither these Acts, nor any others of the General Government, notplainly and intentionally authorized by the Constitution, shall beexercised within their respective territories. "

The doctrine of States Rights as formulated in these Resolutions, including the assumed right of a State to nullify laws of the GeneralGovernment, naturally led up, as we shall see, not only to threats ofdisunion, but ultimately to a dreadful sectional War waged in the effortto secure it. That Jefferson, when he penned them, foresaw the terribleresults to flow from these specious and pernicious doctrines, is not tobe supposed for an instant; but that his conscience troubled him may befairly inferred from the fact that he withheld from the World for twentyyears afterward the knowledge that he was their author. It is probablethat in this case, as in others, he was a victim of that casuistry whichteaches that "the end justifies the means;" that he hoped and believedthat the assertion of these baleful doctrines would act solely as acheck upon any tendency to further centralization of power in theGeneral Government and insure that strict construction of theConstitution. 

Though afterward violated by himself at the same time that he for themoment threw aside his scruples touching African slavery, when he addedto our domain the great French Slave Colony of Louisiana--was none theless the great aim of his commanding intellect; and that he fortuitouslybelieved in the "saving common sense" of his race and country as capableof correcting an existing evil when it shall have developed into illeffects. 

 [Mr. Jefferson takes this very ground, in almost the same words, in his letter, 1803, to Wilson C. Nichols in the Louisiana Colony purchase case, when, after proving by his own strict construction of the Constitution that there was no power in that instrument to make such purchase, and confessing the importance in that very case of setting "an example against broad construction, " he concludes: "If, however, our friends shall think differently, certainly I shall acquiesce with satisfaction; confiding that the good sense of the country will correct the evil of construction when it shall produce ill ejects. "]

Be that as it may, however, the fact remains that the seeds thus sown bythe hands of Jefferson on the "sacred soil" of Virginia and Kentucky, were dragon's teeth, destined in after years to spring up as legions ofarmed men battling for the subversion of that Constitution and thedestruction of that Union which he so reverenced, and which he was solargely instrumental in founding--and which even came back in his ownlife to plague him and Madison during his embargo, and Madison's war of1812-15, in the utterances and attitude of some of the New EnglandFederalists. 

The few Free Traders of the South--the Giles's and John Taylor's and menof that ilk--made up for their paucity in numbers by their unscrupulousingenuity and active zeal. They put forth the idea that the AmericanProtective Policy was a policy of fostering combinations by Federallaws, the effect of which was to transfer a considerable portion of theprofits of slave labor from the Slave States to other parts of the Unionwhere it was massed in the hands of a few individuals, and thus createda moneyed interest which avariciously influenced the General Governmentto the detriment of the entire community of people, who, made restive bythe exactions of this power working through the Federal Government, wereas a consequence driven to consider a possible dissolution of the Union, and make "estimates of resources and means of defense. " As a means alsoof inflaming both the poor whites and Southern slave-holders by arousingthe apprehensions of the latter concerning the "peculiar institution" ofSlavery, they craftily declared that "If the maxim advanced by theadvocates of the protecting duty system will justify Congress inassuming, or rather in empowering a few capitalists to assume, thedirection of manufacturing labor, it also invests that body with a powerof legislating for the direction of every other species of labor andassigning all occupations whatsoever to the care of the intelligence ofmercenary combinations"--and hence untold misery to labor. 

They charged as a further means of firing the Southern heart, that thismoneyed power, born of Protection, "works upon the passion of the Statesit has been able to delude by computations of their physical strengthand their naval superiority; and by boasting of an ability to use theweakening circumstance of negro slavery to coerce the defrauded anddiscontented States into submission. " And they declared as fundamentaltruths upon which they rested that "The Federal is not a NationalGovernment; it is a league between nations. By this league, a limitedpower only over persons and property was given to the representatives ofthe united nations. This power cannot be further extended, under thepretext of national good, because the league does not create a nationalgovernment. "

It was the passage of the Tariff of 1824 that gave these crafty FreeTraders their first great success in spreading their doctrine of FreeTrade by coupling it with questions of slave labor, States Rights, andnullification, as laid down in the Kentucky and Virginia resolutions. These arguments created great excitement throughout the South--especially in South Carolina and Georgia--which was still furtherincreased by the passage of the Tariff of 1828, since declared byeminent authority to have been "the highest and most protective everadopted in this country. "

 [Mr. Greeley, in his "History of the American Conflict, " 1864. ]

Prior to the passage of this Tariff Act, excited assemblages met in someof the Southern States, and protested against it as an outrage upontheir rights--arraying the South in seditious and treasonable attitudeagainst not only the North but the Union, with threats of Secession. Atone of these meetings in South Carolina, in 1827, one of their leaders--[Dr. Thomas Cooper, President of South Carolina College. ]--declared that"a drilled and managed majority" in the House of Representatives haddetermined "at all hazards to support the claims of the Northernmanufacturers, and to offer up the planting interest on the altar ofmonopoly. " He denounced the American system of Protection exemplifiedin that Tariff measure as "a system by which the earnings of the Southare to be transferred to the North--by which the many are to besacrificed to the few--under which powers are usurped that were neverconceded--by which inequality of rights, inequality of burthens, inequality of protection, unequal laws, and unequal taxes are to beenacted and rendered permanent--that the planter and the farmer underthis system are to be considered as inferior beings to the spinner, thebleacher, and the dyer--that we of the South hold our plantations underthis system, as the serfs and operatives of the North, subject to theorders and laboring for the benefit of the master-minds ofMassachusetts, the lords of the spinning jenny and peers of thepower-loom, who have a right to tax our earnings for their emolument, and to burthen our poverty and to swell their riches;" and aftercharacterizing Protection as "a system of fraud, robbery andusurpation, " he continued "I have said that we shall ere long becompelled to calculate the value of our Union; and to enquire of whatuse to us is this most unequal alliance, by which the South has alwaysbeen the loser and the North always the gainer. Is it worth our whileto continue this union of States, where the North demands to be ourmasters and we are required to be their tributaries? who with the mostinsulting mockery call the yoke they put upon our necks the 'Americansystem!' The question, however, is fast approaching the alternative ofsubmission or separation. "

Only a few days after this inflammatory speech at Columbus, S. C. , inciting South Carolinians to resist the pending Protective Tariff evento the lengths of Secession, during a grand banquet at Richmond, Va. , William B. Giles--another Free Trade leader--proposed, and those presentdrank a toast to the "Tariff Schemer" in which was embodied adeclaration that "The Southerners will not long pay tribute. " Despitethese turbulent and treasonable mutterings, however, the "JacksonianCongress" passed the Act--a majority of members from the Cotton and NewEngland States voting against, while the vote of the Middle and WesternFree States was almost solidly for, it. 

At a meeting held soon after the enactment of the Tariff of 1828, atWalterborough Court House, S. C. , an address was adopted and issuedwhich, after reciting the steps that had been taken by South Carolinaduring the previous year to oppose it, by memorials and otherwise, andstating that, despite their "remonstrances and implorations, " a TariffBill had passed, not indeed, such as they apprehended, but "ten-foldworse in all its oppressive features, " proceeded thus:

"From the rapid step of usurpation, whether we now act or not, the dayof open opposition to the pretended powers of the Constitution cannot befar off, and it is that it may not go down in blood that we now callupon you to resist. We feel ourselves standing underneath its mightyprotection, and declaring forth its free and recorded spirit, when wesay we must resist. By all the great principles of liberty--by theglorious achievements of our fathers in defending them--by their nobleblood poured forth like water in maintaining them--by their lives insuffering, and their death in honor and in glory;--our countrymen! wemust resist. Not secretly, as timid thieves or skulking smugglers--notin companies and associations, like money chafferers or stock jobbers--not separately and individually, as if this was ours and not ourcountry's cause--but openly, fairly, fearlessly, and unitedly, asbecomes a free, sovereign and independent people. Does timidity askWHEN? We answer NOW!"

These inflammatory utterances, in South Carolina especially, stirred theSouthern heart more or less throughout the whole cotton belt; and thepernicious principles which they embodied found ardent advocates even inthe Halls of Congress. In the Senate, Mr. Hayne, of South Carolina, wastheir chief and most vehement spokesman, and in 1830 occurred thatmemorable debate between him and Daniel Webster, which forever put anend to all reasonable justification of the doctrine of Nullification, and which furnished the ground upon which President Jackson afterwardstood in denouncing and crushing it out with the strong arm of theGovernment. 

In that great debate Mr. Hayne's propositions were that the Constitutionis a "compact between the States, " that "in case of a plain, palpableviolation of the Constitution by the General Government, a State mayinterpose; and that this interposition is constitutional"--a propositionwith which Mr. Webster took direct issue, in these words: "I say, theright of a State to annul a law of Congress cannot be maintained, but onthe ground of the inalienable right of man to resist oppression; that isto say, upon the ground of revolution. I admit that there is anultimate violent remedy, above the Constitution and in defiance of theConstitution, which may be resorted to when a revolution is to bejustified. But I do not admit that, under the Constitution, and inconformity with it, there is any mode in which a State Government, as amember of the Union, can interfere and stop the progress of the generalmovement by force of her own laws under any circumstances whatever. "Mr. Webster insisted that "one of two things is true: either the laws ofthe Union are beyond the discretion and beyond the control of theStates, or else we have no Constitution of General Government, and arethrust back again to the days of the Confederation;" and, in concludinghis powerful argument, he declared that "even supposing the Constitutionto be a compact between the States, " Mr. Hayne's doctrine was "notmaintainable, because, first, the General Government is not a party tothe compact, but a Government established by it, and vested by it withthe powers of trying and deciding doubtful questions; and secondly, because, if the Constitution be regarded as a compact, not one Stateonly, but all the States are parties to that compact, and one can haveno right to fix upon it her own peculiar construction. "

While the comparatively miserable condition of the cotton-growing Statesof the South was attributed by most of the Southern Free Traders solelyto the Protective Tariff of 1828, yet there were some Southernerswilling to concede--as did Mr. Hayne, in the Senate (1832)--that therewere "other causes besides the Tariff" underlying that condition, and toadmit that "Slaves are too improvident, too incapable of that minute, constant, delicate attention, and that persevering industry which areessential to manufacturing establishments, " the existence of which wouldhave made those States prosperous. But such admissions were unwillingones, and the Cotton-lords held only with the more tenacity to the viewthat the Tariff was the chief cause of their condition. 

The Tariff Act of 1832, essentially modifying that of 1828, was passedwith a view, in part, to quiet Southern clamor. But the Southern CottonStates refused to be mollified. On the contrary, the Free Traders ofSouth Carolina proceeded to extreme measures, putting in action thatwhich they had before but threatened. On November 19, 1832, the leadingmen of South Carolina met in Convention, and a few days thereafter--[November 24, 1882]--unanimously passed an Ordinance of Nullificationwhich declared the Tariff Acts of 1828 and 1832 "Unauthorized by theConstitution, " and "null, void, and no law, nor binding on this State, its officers, or citizens. " The people of the State were forbidden byit to pay, after the ensuing February 1st, the import-duties thereinimposed. Under the provisions of the Ordinance, the State Legislaturewas to pass an act nullifying these Tariff laws, and any appeal to theUnited States Supreme Court against the validity of such nullifying actwas prohibited. Furthermore, in the event of the Federal Governmentattempting to enforce these Tariff laws, the people of South Carolinawould thenceforth consider themselves out of the Union, and will"forthwith proceed to organize a separate Government, and do all otheracts and things which sovereign and independent States may of right do. "

At the subsequent meeting of the Legislature, Mr. Hayne, who had been amember of the Convention, having resigned his seat in the United StatesSenate, was elected Governor of the State. He declared in his messagethat he recognized "No allegiance as paramount to that which thecitizens of South Carolina owe to the State of their birth or theiradoption"--that doctrine of "paramount allegiance to the State" which inafter-years gave so much trouble to the Union and to Union-lovingSoutherners--and declared that he held himself "bound by the highest ofall obligations to carry into effect, not only the Ordinance of theConvention, but every act of the Legislature, and every judgment of ourown Courts, the enforcement of which may devolve upon the Executive, "and "if, " continued he, "the sacred soil of Carolina should be pollutedby the footsteps of an invader, or be stained with the blood of hercitizens, shed in her defense, I trust in Almighty God * * * even shouldshe stand alone in this great struggle for constitutional liberty, encompassed by her enemies, that there will not be found, in the widelimits of the State, one recreant son who will not fly to the rescue, and be ready to lay down his life in her defense. " In support of thecontemplated treason, he even went to the length of calling for anenrolling of volunteer forces and of holding them ready for service. 

But while South Carolina stood in this treasonable and defiant attitude, arming for war against the Union, there happened to be in thePresidential chair one of her own sons--General Jackson. Foreseeingwhat was coming, he had, prior to the meeting of the Convention thatframed the Nullification Ordinance, ordered General Scott to Charlestonto look after "the safety of the ports of the United States"thereabouts, and had sent to the Collector of that port preciseinstructions as to his duty to resist in all ways any and all attemptsmade under such Ordinance to defeat the operation of the Tariff lawsaforesaid. Having thus quietly prepared the arm of the GeneralGovernment for the exercise of its power, he issued in December aProclamation declaring his unalterable resolution to treat Nullificationas Treason--and to crush it. 

In that famous document President Jackson said of Nullification: "Ifthis doctrine had been established at an earlier day, the Union wouldhave been dissolved in its infancy. The Excise law in Pennsylvania, theEmbargo and Non-intercourse law in the Eastern States, the Carriage-taxin Virginia, were all deemed unconstitutional, and were more unequal intheir operation than any of the laws now complained of; but fortunately, none of those States discovered that they had the right now claimed bySouth Carolina. * * * The discovery of this important feature in ourConstitution was reserved for the present day. To the statesmen ofSouth Carolina belongs the invention, and upon the citizens of thatState will unfortunately fall the evils of reducing it to practice. * ** I consider, then, the power to annul a law of the United States, assumed by one State, incompatible with the existence of the Union, contradicted expressly by the letter of the Constitution, unauthorizedby its spirit, inconsistent with every principle on which it was foundedand destructive of the great object for which it was formed. * * * Tosay that any State may at pleasure secede from the Union, is to say thatthe United States are not a Nation, because it would be a solecism tocontend that any part of a Nation might dissolve its connection with theother parts, to their injury or ruin, without committing any, offense. "

Farther on, in his moving appeal to the South Carolinians, he bids thembeware of their leaders: "Their object is disunion; be not deceived bynames. Disunion, by armed force, is Treason. " And then, reminding themof the deeds of their fathers in the Revolution, he proceeds: "I adjureyou, as you honor their memory, as you love the cause of freedom towhich they dedicated their lives, as you prize the peace of yourcountry, the lives of its best citizens, and your own fair fame, toretrace your steps. Snatch from the archives of your State thedisorganizing edict of its Convention--bid its members to reassemble andpromulgate the decided expression of your will to remain in the pathwhich alone can conduct you to safety, prosperity, and honor--tell themthat, compared to disunion, all other evils are light, because thatbrings with it an accumulation of all--declare that you will never takethe field unless the Star-spangled banner of your country shall floatover you--that you will not be stigmatized when dead, and dishonored andscorned while you live, as the authors of the first attack on theConstitution of your country! Its destroyers you cannot be. "

After asserting his firm "determination to execute the laws-to preservethe Union by all constitutional means"--he concludes with the prayer, "May the great Ruler of Nations grant, that the signal blessings withwhich He has favored, ours may not, by the madness of party, or personalambition be disregarded and lost; and may His wise providence bringthose who have produced this crisis to see the folly before they feelthe misery, of civil strife; and inspire a returning veneration for thatUnion, which, if we may dare to penetrate His designs, He has chosen asthe only means of attaining the high destinies to which we mayreasonably aspire. "

The firm attitude of General Jackson, together with the wiseprecautionary measures he had already taken, and the practical unanimitywith which his declaration to crush out the Treason was hailed in mostof the Southern as well as the Northern States, almost at once broke theback of Nullification. 

 [In this connection the following letter, written at that time by the great Chief Justice Marshall, to a cousin of his, on the subject of State Sovereignty, is of interest, as showing how clearly his penetrating intellect perceived the dangers to the Union hidden in the plausible doctrine of State Rights:

 RICHMOND, May 7, 1833. 

 "MY DEAR SIR:

 "I am much indebted to you for your pamphlet on Federal Relations, which I have read with much satisfaction. No subject, as it seems to me, is more misunderstood or more perverted. You have brought into view numerous important historical facts which, in my judgment, remove the foundation on which the Nullifiers and Seceders have erected that superstructure which overshadows our Union. You have, I think, shown satisfactorily that we never have been perfectly distinct, independent societies, sovereign in the sense in which the Nullifiers use the term. When colonies we certainly were not. We were parts of the British empire, and although not directly connected with each other so far as respected government, we were connected in many respects, and were united to the same stock. The steps we took to effect separation were, as you have fully shown, not only revolutionary in their nature, but they were taken conjointly. Then, as now, we acted in many respects as one people. The representatives of each colony acted for all. Their resolutions proceeded from a common source, and operated on the whole mass. The army was a continental army commanded by a continental general, and supported from a continental treasury. The Declaration of Independence was made by a common government, and was made for all the States. 

 "Everything has been mixed. Treaties made by Congress have been considered as binding all the States. Some powers have been exercised by Congress, some by the States separately. The lines were not strictly drawn. The inability of Congress to carry its legitimate powers into execution has gradually annulled those powers practically, but they always existed in theory. Independence was declared `in the name and by the authority of the good people of these colonies. ' In fact we have always been united in some respects, separate in others. We have acted as one people for some purposes, as distinct societies for others. I think you have shown this clearly, and in so doing have demonstrated the fallacy of the principle on which either nullification or the right of peaceful, constitutional secession is asserted. 

 "The time is arrived when these truths must be more generally spoken, or our Union is at an end. The idea of complete sovereignty of the State converts our government into a league, and, if carried into practice, dissolves the Union. 

 "I am, dear sir, "Yours affectionately, "J. MARSHALL. 

 "HUMPHREY MARSHALL, ESQ. , "FRANKFORT, KY. "]

The Nullifiers hailed with pretended satisfaction the report from theHouse Committee on Ways and Means of a Bill making great reductions andequalizations of Tariff duties, as a measure complying with theirdemands, and postponed the execution of the Ordinance of Nullificationuntil the adjournment of Congress; and almost immediately afterward Mr. Clay's Compromise Tariff Act of 1833 "whereby one tenth of the excessover twenty per cent. Of each and every existing impost was to be takenoff at the close of that year; another tenth two years thereafter; soproceeding until the 30th of June, 1842, when all duties should bereduced to a maximum of twenty per cent. "--[Says Mr. Greeley, in hisHistory aforesaid. ]--agreed to by Calhoun and other Nullifiers, waspassed, became a law without the signature of President Jackson, andSouth Carolina once more became to all appearances a contented, law-abiding State of the Union. 

But after-events proved conclusively that the enactment of thisCompromise Tariff was a terrible blunder, if not a crime. Jackson hadfully intended to hang Calhoun and his nullifying coadjutors if theypersisted in their Treason. He knew that they had only seized upon theTariff laws as a pretext with which to justify Disunion, and prophesiedthat "the next will be the Slavery or Negro question. " Jackson'sforecast was correct. Free Trade, Slavery and Secession were from thattime forward sworn allies; and the ruin wrought to our industries by thedisasters of 1840, plainly traceable to that Compromise Tariff measureof 1833, was only to be supplemented by much greater ruin and disasterscaused by the Free Trade Tariff of 1846--and to be followed by the armedRebellion of the Free Trade and Pro-Slavery States of the South in 1861, in a mad attempt to destroy the Union. 

 CHAPTER III. 

 GROWTH OF THE SLAVERY QUESTION. 

It will be remembered that during the period of the Missouri Struggle, 1818-1820, the Territory of Arkansas was formed by an Act of Congressout of that part of the Missouri Territory not included in the proposedState of Missouri, and that the Act so creating the Territory ofArkansas contained no provision restricting Slavery. Early in 1836, thepeople of Arkansas Territory met in Convention and formed a Constitutionunder which, "and by virtue of the treaty of cession by France to theUnited States, of the Province of Louisiana, " they asked admission tothe Union as a State. Among other provisions of that Constitution was asection rendering the State Legislature powerless to pass laws for theemancipation of slaves without the consent of the owners, or to preventemigrants to that State from bringing with them slaves. On June 15th ofthe same year, Arkansas was, under that Constitution, admitted to theUnion as a Slave State, with the sole reservation, that nothing in theAct of admission should be" construed as an assent by Congress to all orany of the propositions contained" in the said Constitution. 

Long ere this, all the Northern and Middle States had made provision forthe emancipation of such slaves as remained within their borders, andonly a few years previous (in 1829 and 1831-32) Virginia had made strongbut insufficient efforts toward the same end. The failure to freeVirginia of Slavery--the effort to accomplish which had been made bysome of the greatest of her statesmen--only served to rivet the chainsof human bondage more securely throughout all the Slave States, and fromthat time on, no serious agitation occurred in any one of them, lookingtoward even the most gradual emancipation. On the other hand, theadvocates of the extension of the Slave-Power by the expansion ofSlave-territory, were ever on the alert, they considered it of the lastimportance to maintain the balance of power between the Slave States andthe Free States. Hence, while they had secured in 1819 the cession fromSpain to the United States of the Slave-holding Floridas, and theorganization of the Slave Territory of Florida in 1822--whichsubsequently came in as a Slave State under the same Act (1845) thatadmitted the Free State of Iowa--their greedy eyes were now cast uponthe adjoining rich territories of Mexico. 

Efforts had (in 1827-1829) been made to purchase from Mexico the domainwhich was known as Texas. They had failed. But already a part of Texashad been settled by adventurous Americans under Mexican grants andotherwise; and General Sam Houston, an adherent of the Slave Power, having become a leading spirit among them, fomented a revolution. InMarch, 1836, Texas, under his guidance, proclaimed herself a Republicindependent of Mexico. 

The War that ensued between Texas and Mexico ended in the flight of theMexican Army and the capture of Santa Anna at San Jacinto, and a treatyrecognizing Texan independence. In October, 1836, General Houston wasinaugurated President of the Republic of Texas. Close upon thisfollowed (in August, 1837) a proposition to our Government from theTexan envoy for the annexation of Texas to the United States. PresidentVan Buren declined the offer. The Northern friends of Freedom were asmuch opposed to this annexation project as the advocates of Slavery wereanxious for it. Even such conservative Northern Statesmen as DanielWebster strongly opposed the project. In a speech delivered in New York[1837], after showing that the chief aim of our Government in theacquisition of the Territory of Louisiana was to gain command of themouths of the great rivers to the sea, and that in the acquisition ofthe Floridas our policy was based on similar considerations, Mr. Websterdeclared that "no such necessity, no such policy, requires theannexation of Texas, " and that we ought "for numerous and powerfulreasons to be content with our present boundaries. He recognized thatSlavery already existed under the guarantees of the Constitution andthose guarantees must be fulfilled; that "Slavery, as it exists in theStates, is beyond the power of Congress. It is a concern of the Statesthemselves, " but "when we come to speak of admitting new States, thesubject assumes an entirely different aspect. Our rights and our dutiesare then both different. The Free States, and all the States, are thenat liberty to accept or to reject;" and he added, "In my opinion thepeople of the United States will not consent to bring into the Union anew, vastly extensive and Slaveholding country, large enough for a halfa dozen or a dozen States. In my opinion, they ought not to consent toit. "

Farther on, in the same speech--after alluding to the strong feeling inthe Northern States against the extension of Slavery, not only as aquestion of politics, but of conscience and religious conviction aswell-he deems him a rash man indeed "who supposes that a feeling of thiskind is to be trifled with or despised. " Said he: "It will assuredlycause itself to be respected. It may be reasoned with; it may be madewilling--I believe it is entirely willing--to fulfill all existingengagements and all existing duties--to uphold and defend theConstitution as it is established, with whatever regrets about someprovisions which it does actually contain. But to coerce it intosilence, to endeavor to restrain its free expression, to seek tocompress and confine it, warm as it is, and more heated as suchendeavors would inevitably render it, --should this be attempted, I knownothing, even in the Constitution or in the Union itself, which wouldnot be endangered by the explosion which might follow. "

In 1840, General Harrison, the Whig candidate, was elected to thePresidency, but died within a few weeks after his inauguration in 1841, and was succeeded by John Tyler. The latter favored the Slave Power;and on April 12th, 1844, John C. Calhoun, his Secretary of State, concluded with Texas a treaty of annexation--which was, however, rejected by the Senate. Meanwhile the public mind was greatly agitatedover the annexation and other, questions. 

 [In the London Index, a journal established there by Jefferson Davis's agents to support the cause of the rebellious States, a communication appeared during the early part of the war, Dec. 4, 1861, supposed to have been written by Mr. Mason, of Virginia, in which he said: "To tell the Norths, the Butes, the Wedderburns of the present day, that previous to the year 1839 the sovereign States of the South had unalterably resolved on the specific ground of the violation of the Federal Constitution by the tariff of spoliation which the New England States had imposed upon them--to secede from the Union; to tell them that in that year the leader of the South, Calhoun, urged an English gentleman, to whom he had fully explained the position of the South, and the intolerable tyranny which the North inflicted upon it, to be the bearer of credentials from the chief persons of the South, in order to invite the attention of the British Government to the coming event; that on his death-bed (Washington, March 31, 1850), he called around him his political friends--one of whom is now in England--warned them that in no event could the Union survive the Presidential election of 1860, though it might possibly break up before that urged them to be prepared; leaving with his dying words the sacred cause of Southern secession a solemn legacy in their hands--to have told this to the Norths and Dartmouths of the present day, with more and even stronger evidence of the coming events of November, 1860, would have been like speaking to the stones of the street. In November, 1860, they were thoroughly ignorant of all the momentous antecedents of secession--of their nature, their character, their bearing, import, and consequences. "

 In the same correspondence the distinguished Rebel emissary substantially let out the fact that Calhoun was indirectly, through himself (Mason), in secret communication with the British Government as far back as 1841, with a view to securing its powerful aid in his aforesaid unalterable resolve to Secede from the Union; and then Mr. Mason pleads--but pleads in vain--for the armed intervention of England at this later day. Said he:

 "In the year 1841 the late Sir William Napier sent in two plans for subduing the Union, to the War Office, in the first of which the South was to be treated as an enemy, in the second as a friend and ally. I was much consulted by him as to the second plan and was referred to by name in it, as he showed by the acknowledgment of this in Lord Fitzroy Somerset's letter of reply. This plan fully provided for the contingency of an invasion of Canada, and its application would, in eighteen or twenty months, have reduced the North to a much more impotent condition than it exhibits at present. At this very moment the most difficult portion of that plan has been perfectly accomplished by the South itself; and the North, in accordance with Sir William Napier's expectations, now lies helpless before England, and at our absolute mercy. Nor is there any doubt of this, and if Lord Palmerston is not aware of it Mr. Seward certainly is. We have nothing remaining to do but to stretch out our arm in the way Sir William Napier proposed, and the Northern power--power as we ignorantly call it--must come to an end. Sir William knew and well estimated the elements of which that quasi power consisted; and he knew how to apply the substantive power of England to dissolve it. In the best interest of humanity, I venture to say that it is the duty of England to apply this power without further delay--its duty to itself, to its starving operatives, to France, to Europe, and to humanity. And in the discharge of this great duty to the world at large there will not even be the dignity of sacrifice or danger. "]

Threats and counter-threats of Disunion were made on either hand by theopponents and advocates of Slavery-extension through annexation; nor wasit less agitated on the subject of a Protective Tariff. 

The Compromise Tariff of 1833, together with President Jackson'supheaval of our financial system, produced, as has already been hinted, terrible commercial disasters. "In 1840, " says competent authority, "allprices had ruinously fallen; production had greatly diminished, and inmany departments of industry had practically ceased; thousands ofworking men were idle, with no hope of employment, and their familiessuffering from want. Our farmers were without markets, their productsrotted in their barns, and their lands, teeming with rich harvests, weresold by the sheriff for debts and taxes. The Tariff, which robbed ourindustries of Protection failed to supply Government with its necessaryrevenues. The National Treasury in consequence was bankrupt, and thecredit of the Nation had sunk very low. "

Mr. Clay himself stated "the average depression in the value of propertyunder that state of things which existed before the Tariff of 1842 cameto the rescue of the country, at fifty per cent. " And hence it was thatProtection was made the chief issue of the Presidential campaign of1840, which eventuated in the election of Harrison and Tyler, and in theTariff Act of August 30, 1842, which revived our trade and industries, and brought back to the land a full measure of prosperity. With thosedisasters fresh in the minds of the people, Protection continued to be aleading issue in the succeeding Presidential campaign of 1844--butcoupled with the Texas-annexation issue. In that campaign Henry Claywas the candidate of the Whig party and James K. Polk of the Democraticparty. Polk was an ardent believer in the annexation policy and stoodupon a platform declaring for the "re-occupation of Oregon and there-annexation of Texas at the earliest practicable moment"--as if theprefix "re" legitimatized the claim in either case; Clay, on the otherhand, held that we had "fairly alienated our title to Texas by solemnNational compacts, to the fulfilment of which we stand bound by goodfaith and National honor;" that "Annexation and War with Mexico areidentical, " and that he was "not willing to involve this country in aforeign War for the object of acquiring Texas. "

 [In his letter of April 17, 1844, published in the National Intelligencer. ]

As to the Tariff issue also, Clay was the acknowledged champion of theAmerican system of Protection, while Polk was opposed to it, and wassupported by the entire Free-trade sentiment, whether North or South. 

As the campaign progressed, it became evident that Clay would beelected. Then occurred some of those fatalities which have more thanonce, in the history of Presidential campaigns, overturned the mostreasonable expectations and defeated the popular will. Mr. Claycommitted a blunder and Mr. Polk an equivocation--to use the mildestpossible term. Mr. Clay was induced by Southern friends to write aletter--[Published in the North Alabamian, Aug. 16, 1844. ]--in which, after stating that "far from having any personal objection to theannexation of Texas, I should be glad to see it--without dishonor, without War, with the common consent of the Union, and upon just andfair terms, " he added: "I do not think that the subject of Slavery oughtto affect the question, one way or the other. " Mr. Polk, on the otherhand, wrote a letter in which he declared it to be "the duty of theGovernment to extend, as far as it may be practicable to do so, by itsrevenue laws and all other means within its power, fair and justProtection to all the great interests of the whole Union, embracingAgriculture, Manufactures, the Mechanic Arts, Commerce and Navigation. "This was supplemented by a letter (August 8, 1844) from Judge WilsonMcCandless of Pennsylvania, strongly upholding the Protective principle, claiming that Clay in his Compromise Tariff Bill had abandoned it, andthat Polk and Dallas had "at heart the true interests of Pennsylvania. "Clay, thus betrayed by the treachery of Southern friends, was greatlyweakened, while Polk, by his beguiling letter, backed by the falseinterpretation put upon it by powerful friends in the North, made theNorth believe him a better Protectionist than Clay. 

Polk was elected, and rewarded the misplaced confidence by making RobertJ. Walker his Secretary of the Treasury, and, largely through thatgreat Free Trader's exertions, secured a repeal by Congress of theProtective Tariff of 1842 and the enactment of the ruinous Free TradeTariff of 1846. Had Clay carried New York, his election was secure. Asit happened, Polk had a plurality in New York of but 5, 106 in an immensevote, and that slim plurality was given to him by the Abolitioniststhrowing away some 15, 000 on Birney. And thus also it curiouslyhappened that it was the Abolition vote which secured the election ofthe candidate who favored immediate annexation and the extension of theSlave Power!

Emboldened and apparently sustained by the result of the election, theSlave Power could not await the inauguration of Mr. Polk, but proceededat once, under whip and spur, to drive the Texas annexation schemethrough Congress; and two days before the 4th of March, 1845, an Actconsenting to the admission of the Republic of Texas as a State of theUnion was approved by President Tyler. 

In that Act it was provided that "New States of convenient size, notexceeding four in number, in addition to the said State of Texas, andhaving sufficient population, may hereafter, by the consent of saidState, be formed out of the territory thereof, which shall be entitledto admission under the provisions of the Federal Constitution; and suchStates as may be formed out of that portion of said territory lyingsouth of thirty-six degrees thirty minutes north latitude, commonlyknown as the Missouri Compromise line, shall be admitted into the Unionwith or without Slavery, as the people of each State asking admissionmay desire. And in such State or States as shall be formed out of saidterritory north of said Missouri Compromise line, Slavery or involuntaryservitude (except for crime) shall be prohibited. " As has been lucidlystated by another, --[Greeley's History]--"while seeming to curtail andcircumscribe Slavery north of the above parallel (that of 36 30' northlatitude), this measure really extended it northward to that parallel, which it had not yet approached, under the flag of Texas, withinhundreds of miles. But the chief end of this sham Compromise was theinvolving of Congress in an indirect indorsement of the claim of Texasto the entire left bank of the Rio Grande, from its mouth to its source;and this was effected. "

Texas quickly consented to the Act of annexation, and in December, 1845, a Joint Resolution formally admitting her as a State of the Union, reported by Stephen A. Douglas, was duly passed. 

In May, 1846, the American forces under General Taylor, which had beendispatched to protect Texas from threatened assault, were attacked bythe Mexican army, which at Palo Alto was badly defeated and at Resaca dela Palma driven back across the Rio Grande. 

Congress immediately declared that by this invasion a state of Warexisted between Mexico and the United States. Thus commenced the Warwith Mexico--destined to end in the triumph of the American Army, andthe acquisition of large areas of territory to the United States. Inanticipation of such triumph, President Polk lost little time in askingan appropriation of over two million dollars by Congress to facilitatenegotiations for peace with, and territorial cession from, Mexico. Anda Bill making such appropriation was quickly passed by the House ofRepresentatives--but with the following significant proviso attached, which had been offered by Mr. Wilmot: "Provided. That as an express andfundamental condition to the acquisition of any territory from theRepublic of Mexico by the United States, by virtue of any treaty thatmay be negotiated between them, and to the use by the Executive of themoneys herein appropriated, neither Slavery nor involuntary servitudeshall ever exist in any part of said territory, except for crime, whereof the party shall first be duly convicted. "

The debate in the Senate upon the Wilmot proviso, which immediatelyensued, was cut short by the expiration of the Session of Congress--andthe Bill accordingly failed of passage. 

In February, 1848, the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was made betweenMexico and the United States, and Peace reigned once more. About thesame time a Bill was passed by the Senate providing TerritorialGovernments for Oregon, California and New Mexico, which provided forthe reference of all questions touching Slavery in such Territories tothe United States Supreme Court, for arbitration. The Bill, however, failed in the House. The ensuing Presidential campaign resulted in theelection of General Taylor, the Whig candidate, who was succeeded uponhis death, July 10, 1850, by Fillmore. Meanwhile, on the OregonTerritory Bill, in 1848, a strong effort had been made by Mr. Douglasand others to incorporate a provision extending to the Pacific Ocean theMissouri Compromise line of 36 30' of north latitude and extending toall future organizations of Territories of the United States theprinciples of said Compromise. This provision was adopted by theSenate, but the House struck it from the Bill; the Senate receded, andOregon was admitted as a Free Territory. But the conflict in Congressbetween those who would extend and those who would restrict Slaverystill continued, and indeed gathered vehemence with time. In 1850, California was clamoring for admission as a Free State to the Union, andNew Mexico and Utah sought to be organized under TerritorialGovernments. 

In the heated discussions upon questions growing out of bills for thesepurposes, and to rectify the boundaries of Texas, it was no easy matterto reach an agreement of any sort. Finally, however, the Compromise of1850, offered by Mr. Clay, was practically agreed to and carried out, and under it: California was admitted as a Free State; New Mexico andUtah were admitted to Territorial organization without a word pro or conon the subject of Slavery; the State of Texas was awarded a pecuniarycompensation for the rectification of her boundaries; the Slave Trade inthe District of Columbia was abolished; and a more effectual FugitiveSlave Act passed. 

By both North and South, this Compromise of 1850, and the measuresgrowing out of it, were very generally acquiesced in, and for a while itseemed as though a permanent settlement of the Slavery question had beenreached. But in the Fugitive Slave law, thus hastily enacted, layembedded the seed for further differences and excitements, speedily togerminate. In its operation it proved not only unnecessarily cruel andharsh, in the manner of the return to bondage of escaped slaves, butalso afforded a shield and support to the kidnapping of Free Negroesfrom Northern States. The frequency of arrests in the Northern States, and the accompanying circumstances of cruelty and brutality in theexecution of the law, soon made it especially odious throughout theNorth, and created an active feeling of commiseration for the unhappyvictims of the Slave Power, which greatly intensified and increased thegrowing Anti-Slavery sentiment in the Free States. 

In 1852-53, an attempt was made in Congress to organize into theTerritory of Nebraska, the region of country lying west of Iowa andMissouri. Owing to the opposition of the South the Bill was defeated. In 1853-4 a similar Bill was reported to the Senate by Mr. Douglas, butafterward at his own instance recommitted to the Committee onTerritories, and reported back by him again in such shape as to create, instead of one, two Territories, that portion directly west of Missourito be called Kansas, and the balance to be known as Nebraska--one of thesections of the Bill enacting:

"That in order to avoid all misconstruction it is hereby declared to bethe true intent and meaning of this Act, so far as the question ofSlavery is concerned, to carry into practical operation the followingpropositions and principles, established by the Compromise measures of1850, to wit:

"First, That all questions pertaining to Slavery in the Territories, andthe new States to be formed therefrom, are to be left to the decision ofthe people residing therein through their appropriate representatives. 

"Second, That 'all cases involving title to slaves, ' and 'questions ofpersonal freedom, ' are referred to the adjudication of the localtribunals with the right of appeal to the Supreme Court of the UnitedStates. 

"Third, That the provisions of the Constitution and laws of the UnitedStates, in respect to fugitives from service, are to be carried intofaithful execution in all the `organized Territories, ' the same as inthe States. "

The sections authorizing Kansas and Nebraska to elect and send delegatesto Congress also prescribed:

"That the Constitution, and all laws of the United States which are notlocally inapplicable, shall have the same force and effect within thesaid Territory, as elsewhere in the United States, except the section ofthe Act preparatory to the admission of Missouri into the Union, approved March 6th, 1820, which was superseded by the principles of theLegislation of 1850, commonly called the Compromise Measures, and isdeclared inoperative. "

And when "explaining this Kansas-Nebraska Bill" Mr. Douglas announcedthat, in reporting it, "The object of the Committee was neither tolegislate Slavery in or out of the Territories; neither to introduce norexclude it; but to remove whatever obstacle Congress had put there, andapply the doctrine of Congressional Non-intervention in accordance withthe principles of the Compromise Measures of 1850, and allow the peopleto do as they pleased upon this as well as all other matters affectingtheir interests. "

A vigorous and able debate ensued. A motion by Mr. Chase to strike outthe words "which was superseded by the principles of the legislation of1850, commonly called the Compromise Measures, " was defeated decisively. Subsequently Mr. Douglas moved to strike out the same words and insertin place of them, these: "which being inconsistent with the principlesof Non-intervention by Congress with Slavery in the States andTerritories, as recognized by the legislation of 1850 (commonly calledthe Compromise Measures), is hereby declared inoperative and void; itbeing the true intent and meaning of this Act not to legislate Slaveryinto any Territory or State, nor to exclude it therefrom, but to leavethe people thereof perfectly free to form and regulate their domesticinstitutions in their own way, subject only to the Constitution of theUnited States"--and the motion was agreed to by a vote of 35 yeas to 10nays. Mr. Chase immediately moved to add to the amendment just adoptedthese words: "Under which, the people of the Territory, through theirappropriate representatives, may, if they see fit, prohibit theexistence of Slavery therein;" but this motion was voted down by 36 naysto 10 yeas. This developed the rat in the meal-tub. The people were tobe "perfectly free" to act either way on the subject of Slavery, so longas they did not prohibit Slavery! In this shape the Bill passed theSenate. 

Public sentiment in the North was greatly stirred by this direct attemptto repeal the Missouri Compromise. But by the superior parliamentarytactics of Southern Representatives in the House, whereby the radicalfriends of Freedom were shut out from the opportunity of amendment, aHouse Bill essentially the same as the Senate Bill was subsequentlypassed by the House, under the previous question, and afterward rapidlypassed the Senate, and was approved by the President. At once commencedthat long and terrible struggle between the friends of Free-Soil and thefriends of Slavery, for the possession of Kansas, which convulsed thewhole Country for years, and moistened the soil of that Territory withstreams of blood, shed in numerous "border-ruffian" conflicts. 

The Territorial Government of Kansas was organized late in 1854, and an"election" for Delegate held, at which the Pro-Slavery candidate(Whitfield) was fraudulently elected. On March 30, 1855, a TerritorialLegislature was similarly chosen by Pro-Slavery voters "colonized" fromMissouri. That Legislature, upon its meeting, proceeded at once toenact most outrageous Pro-Slavery laws, which being vetoed by theFree-Soil Governor (Reeder), were passed over the veto, and the Free-SoilGovernor had to give place to one who favored Slavery in Kansas. Butthe Free-Soil settlers of Kansas, in Mass Convention at Big Springs, utterly repudiated the bogus Legislature and all its acts, to which theyrefused submission. 

In consequence of these radical differences, two separate elections forDelegate in Congress were held by the opposing factions, at one of whichwas elected the Pro-Slavery Whitfield, and at the other the Free-SoilerReeder. Furthermore, under a call issued by the Big Springs Convention, a Free-State Constitutional Convention was held in October, 1855, atTopeka, which framed a Free-State Constitution, and asked admissionunder it to the Union. 

In 1856, the House of Representatives--which, after a protractedstruggle, had elected N. P. Banks Speaker--passed a Bill, by a baremajority, admitting Kansas under her Topeka Constitution; but the Senatedefeated it. July 4, 1856, by order of President Pierce, the Free-StateLegislature, chosen under the Topeka Constitution to meet at Topeka, wasdispersed by United States Troops. Yet, despite all oppositions, discouragements, and outrages, the Free-State population ofKansas continued to increase from immigration. 

In 1857, the Pro-Slavery Legislature elected by the Pro-Slavery votersat their own special election--the Free-State voters declining toparticipate--called a Constitutional Convention at Lecompton, whichformed a Pro-Slavery Constitution. This was submitted to the people insuch dexterous manner that they could only vote "For the Constitutionwith Slavery" or "For the Constitution without Slavery"--and, as theConstitution prescribed that "the rights of property in Slaves now inthe Territory, shall in no manner be interfered with, " to vote "for theConstitution Without Slavery" was an absurdity only paralleled by thecourse of the United States Senate in refusing to permit the people ofKansas "to prohibit Slavery" while at the same time declaring them"perfectly free to act" as they chose in the matter. 

The Constitution, with Slavery, was thus adopted by a vote of over6, 000. But in the meanwhile, at another general election held for thepurpose, and despite all the frauds perpetrated by the Pro-Slavery men, a Free-State Legislature, and Free-State Delegate to Congress had beenelected; and this Legislature submitted the Lecompton Pro-SlaveryConstitution to the people, January 4, 1858, so that they could vote:"For the Lecompton Constitution with Slavery, " "For the LecomptonConstitution without Slavery, " or "Against the Lecompton Constitution. "The consequence was that the Lecompton Constitution was defeated by amajority of over 10, 000 votes--the Missouri Pro-Slavery colonistsdeclining to recognize the validity of any further election on thesubject. 

Meanwhile, in part upon the issues growing out of this Kansas conflict, the political parties of the Nation had passed through anotherPresidential campaign (1856), in which the Democratic candidate Buchananhad been elected over Fremont the "Republican, " and Fillmore the"American, " candidates. Both Houses of Congress being now Democratic, Mr. Buchanan recommended them to accept and ratify the LecomptonPro-Slavery Constitution. 

In March, 1858, the Senate passed a Bill--against the efforts of StephenA. Douglas--accepting it. In the House, however, a substitute offeredby Mr. Montgomery (Douglas Democrat) known as the Crittenden-MontgomeryCompromise, was adopted. The Senate refused to concur, and the reportof a Committee of Conference--providing for submitting to the Kansaspeople a proposition placing limitations upon certain public landadvantages stipulated for in the Lecompton Constitution, and in casethey rejected the proposition that another Constitutional Conventionshould be held--was adopted by both Houses; and the proposition beingrejected by the people of Kansas, the Pro-Slavery Lecompton Constitutionfell with it. 

In 1859 a Convention, called by the Territorial Legislature for thepurpose, met at Wyandot, and framed a Free State Constitution which wasadopted by the people in October of that year, and at the ensuing Stateelection in December the State went Republican. In April, 1860, theHouse of Representatives passed a Bill admitting Kansas as a State underthat Constitution, but the Democratic Senate adjourned without action onthe Bill; and it was not until early in 1861 that Kansas was at lastadmitted. 

In the meantime, the Free Trade Tariff of 1846 had produced the train ofbusiness and financial disasters that its opponents predicted. Insteadof prosperity everywhere in the land, there was misery and ruin. Eventhe discovery and working of the rich placer mines of California and theconsequent flow, in enormous volume, of her golden treasure into theEastern States, could not stay-the wide-spread flood of disaster. President Fillmore, who had succeeded General Taylor on the latter'sdeath, frequently called the attention of Congress to the evils producedby this Free Trade, and to the necessity of protecting our manufactures"from ruinous competition from abroad. " So also with his successor, President Buchanan, who, in his Message of 1857, declared that "In themidst of unsurpassed plenty in all the productions and in all theelements of national wealth, we find our manufactures suspended, ourpublic works retarded, our private enterprises of different kindsabandoned, and thousands of useful laborers thrown out of employment andreduced to want. " Further than this, the financial credit of the Nationwas at zero. It was financially bankrupt before the close of Buchanan'sPresidential term. 

 CHAPTER IV. 

 POPULAR SOVEREIGNTY. 

But now occurred the great Presidential struggle of 1860 --whichinvolved not alone the principles of Protection, but those of humanFreedom, and the preservation of the Union itself-between AbrahamLincoln of Illinois, the candidate of the Republican party, as againstStephen A. Douglas of Illinois, the National or Douglas-Democraticcandidate, John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky, the Administration orBreckinridge-Democratic candidate, and John Bell of Tennessee, thecandidate of the Bell-Union party. The great preliminary struggle whichlargely influenced the determination of the Presidential politicalconflict of 1860, had, however, taken place in the State of Illinois, two years previously. To that preliminary political contest of 1858, therefore, we will now turn our eyes--and, in order to fully understandit, it may be well to glance back over a few years. In 1851 theLegislature of Illinois had adopted--[The vote in the House being 65yeas to 4 nays. ]--the following resolution: "Resolved, That our Libertyand Independence are based upon the right of the people to form forthemselves such a government as they may choose; that this greatprinciple, the birthright of freemen, the gift of Heaven, secured to usby the blood of our ancestors, ought to be secured to futuregenerations, and no limitation ought to be applied to this power in theorganization of any Territory of the United States, of eitherTerritorial Government or State Constitution, provided the government soestablished shall be Republican and in conformity with the Constitutionof the United States. " This resolution was a practical endorsement ofthe course of Stephen A. Douglas in supporting the Compromise measuresof 1850, which he had defended as being "all founded upon the greatprinciple that every people ought to possess the right to form andregulate their own domestic institutions in their own way, " and that"the same principle" should be "extended to all of the Territories ofthe United States. "

In accordance with his views and the resolution aforesaid, Mr. Douglasin 1854, as we have already seen, incorporated in the Kansas-NebraskaBill a clause declaring it to be "the true intent and meaning of the Actnot to legislate Slavery into any State or Territory, or to exclude ittherefrom, but to leave the people thereof perfectly free to form andregulate their domestic institutions in their own way, subject only tothe Constitution of the United States. "

His position, as stated by himself, was, substantially that theLecompton Pro-Slavery Constitution was a fraud upon the people ofKansas, in that it did not embody the will of that people; and he deniedthe right of Congress to force a Constitution upon an unwilling people--without regard, on his part, to whether that Constitution allowed orprohibited Slavery or any other thing, whether good or bad. He heldthat the people themselves were the sole judges of whether it is good orbad, and whether desirable or not. 

The Supreme Court of the United States had in the meantime made adecision in a case afterward known as the "Dred Scott case, " which washeld back until after the Presidential election of 1856 had taken place, and added fuel to the political fire already raging. Dred Scott was aNegro Slave. His owner voluntarily took him first into a Free State, and afterward into a Territory which came within the Congressionalprohibitive legislation aforesaid. That decision in brief wassubstantially that no Negro Slave imported from Africa, nor hisdescendant, can be a citizen of any State within the meaning of theConstitution; that neither the Congress nor any Territorial Legislaturehas under the Constitution of the United States, the power to excludeSlavery from any Territory of the United States; and that it is for theState Courts of the Slave State, into which the negro has been conveyedby his master, and not for the United States Courts, to decide whetherthat Negro, having been held to actual Slavery in a Free State, has, byvirtue of residence in such State, himself become Free. 

Now it was, that the meaning of the words, "subject only to theConstitution, " as used in the Kansas-Nebraska Act, began to bediscerned. For if the people of a Territory were to be "perfectlyfree, " to deal with Slavery as they chose, "subject only to theConstitution" they were by this Judicial interpretation of thatinstrument "perfectly free" to deal with Slavery in any way so long asthey did not attempt "to exclude" it! The thing was all one-sided. Mr. Douglas's attitude in inventing the peculiar phraseology in theKansas-Nebraska Act--which to some seemed as if expressly "made toorder" for the Dred Scott decision--was criticized with asperity; thepopularity, however, of his courageous stand against President Buchananon the Lecompton fraud, seemed to make it certain that, his term in theUnited States Senate being about to expire, he would be overwhelminglyre-elected to that body. 

But at this juncture occurred something, which for a long time held theresult in doubt, and drew the excited attention of the whole Nation toIllinois as the great battle-ground. In 1858 a Republican StateConvention was held at Springfield, Ill. , which nominated AbrahamLincoln as the Republican candidate for United States Senator to succeedSenator Douglas in the National Legislature. On June 16th--after suchnomination--Mr. Lincoln made to the Convention a speech--in which, withgreat and incisive power, he assailed Mr. Douglas's position as well asthat of the whole Democratic Pro-Slavery Party, and announced in compactand cogent phrase, from his own point of view, the attitude, upon theSlavery question, of the Republican Party. 

In that remarkable speech--which at once attracted the attention of theCountry--Mr. Lincoln said: "We are now far into the fifth year, since apolicy was initiated with the avowed object, and confident promise, ofputting an end to Slavery agitation. Under the operation of thatpolicy, that agitation has not only not ceased, but has constantlyaugmented. In my opinion it will not cease, until a crisis shall havebeen reached and passed. 'A House divided against itself cannot stand. 'I believe this Government cannot endure permanently half Slave and halfFree. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved--I do not expect theHouse to fall--but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It willbecome all one thing, or all the other. Either the opponents of Slaverywill arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mindshall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimateextinction; or its advocates will push it forward, till it shall becomealike lawful in all the States, old as well as new, North as well asSouth. "

 [Governor Seward's announcement of an "irrepressible conflict" was made four months later. ]

He then proceeded to lay bare and closely analyze the history of allthat had been done, during the four years preceding, to produce theprevailing condition of things touching human Slavery; describing it asresulting from that, "now almost complete legal combination-piece ofmachinery, so to speak--compounded of the Nebraska doctrine and the DredScott decision. " After stating the several points of that decision, andthat the doctrine of the "Sacred right of self-government" had beenperverted by the Nebraska "Squatter Sovereignty, " argument to mean that, "if any one man chose to enslave another, no third man shall be allowedto object, " he proceeded to show the grounds upon which he charged"pre-concert" among the builders of that machinery. Said he: "The peoplewere to be left perfectly free, 'subject only to the Constitution. 'What the Constitution had to do with it, outsiders could not see. Plainly enough now, it was an exactly fitted niche for the Dred Scottdecision to afterward come in and declare the perfect freedom of thepeople to be just no freedom at all. Why was the amendment, expresslydeclaring the right of the people, voted down? Plainly enough now, theadoption of it would have spoiled the niche for the Dred Scott decision. Why was the Court decision held up? Why even a Senator's individualopinion withheld, till after the Presidential election? Plainly enoughnow: the speaking out then would have damaged the 'perfectly free'argument upon which the election was to be carried. Why the outgoingPresident's felicitation on the indorsement? Why the delay of are-argument? Why the incoming President's advance exhortation in favor ofthe decision? These things look like the cautious patting and pettingof a spirited horse, preparatory to mounting him, when it is dreadedthat he may give the rider a fall. And why the hasty after-indorsementof the decision, by the President and others? We cannot absolutely knowthat all these exact adaptations are the result of pre-concert. Butwhen we see a lot of framed timbers, different portions of which we knowhave been gotten out at different times and places and by differentworkmen--Stephen, Franklin, Roger, and James--[Douglas, Pierce, Taneyand Buchanan. ]--for instance--and when we see these timbers joinedtogether, and see they exactly make the frame of a house or a mill, allthe tenons and mortices exactly fitting, and all the lengths andproportions of the different pieces exactly adapted to their respectiveplaces, and not a piece too many or too few--not omitting even thescaffolding, or, if a single piece be lacking, we see the place in theframe exactly fitted and prepared yet to bring such piece in--in such acase, we find it impossible not to believe that Stephen and Franklin andRoger and James all understood one another from the beginning, and allworked upon a common plan or draft drawn up before the first blow wasstruck. "

He drew attention also to the fact that by the Nebraska Bill the peopleof a State, as well as a Territory, were to be left "perfectly free, ""subject only to the Constitution, " and that the object of lugging a"State" into this merely Territorial law was to enable the United StatesSupreme Court in some subsequent decision to declare, when the publicmind had been sufficiently imbued with Judge Douglas's notion of notcaring "whether Slavery be voted up or voted down, " that "theConstitution of the United States does not permit a State to excludeSlavery from its limits"--which would make Slavery "alike lawful in allthe States. " That, he declared to be Judge Douglas's present mission:--"His avowed mission is impressing the 'public heart' to care nothingabout it. " Hence Mr. Lincoln urged Republicans to stand by their cause, which must be placed in the hands of its friends, "Whose hands are free, whose hearts are in the work--who do care for the result;" for he heldthat "a living dog is better than a dead lion. "

On the evening of July 9, 1858, at Chicago, Mr. Douglas (Mr. Lincolnbeing present) spoke to an enthusiastic assemblage, which he fitlydescribed as a "vast sea of human faces, " and, after stating that heregarded "the Lecompton battle as having been fought and the victorywon, because the arrogant demand for the admission of Kansas under theLecompton Constitution unconditionally, whether her people wanted it ornot, has been abandoned, and the principle which recognizes the right ofthe people to decide for themselves has been submitted in its place, " heproceeded to vindicate his position throughout; declared that he opposed"the Lecompton monstrosity solely on the ground than it was a violationof the fundamental principles of free government; on the ground that itwas not the act and deed of the people of Kansas; that it did not embodytheir will; that they were averse to it;" and hence he "denied the rightof Congress to force it upon them, either as a Free State or a SlaveState. "

Said he: "I deny the right of Congress to force a Slaveholding Stateupon an unwilling people. I deny their right to force a Free State uponan unwilling people. I deny their right to force a good thing upon apeople who are unwilling to receive it. The great principle is theright of every community to judge and decide for itself, whether a thingis right or wrong, whether it would be good or evil for them to adoptit; and the right of free action, the right of free thought, the rightof free judgment upon the question is dearer to every true American thanany other under a free Government. * * * It is no answer to thisargument to say that Slavery is an evil, and hence should not betolerated. You must allow the people to decide for themselves whetherit is good or evil. " He then adverted to the arraignment of himself byMr. Lincoln, and took direct issue with that gentleman on hisproposition that, as to Freedom and Slavery, "the Union will become allone thing or all the other;" and maintained on the contrary, that "it isneither desirable nor possible that there should be uniformity in thelocal institutions and domestic regulations of the different States ofthis Union. "

Upon the further proposition of Mr. Lincoln, which Mr. Douglas describedas "a crusade against the Supreme Court of the United States on accountof the Dred Scott decision, " and as "an appeal from the decision" ofthat Court "upon this high Constitutional question to a Republicancaucus sitting in the country, " he also took "direct and distinct issuewith him. " To "the reason assigned by Mr. Lincoln for resisting thedecision of the Supreme Court in the Dred Scott case * * * because itdeprives the Negro of the privileges, immunities and rights ofcitizenship which pertain, according to that decision, only to the Whiteman, " Mr. Douglas also took exception thus: "I am free to say to youthat in my opinion this Government of ours is founded on the Whitebasis. It was made by the White man for the benefit of the White man, to be administered by White men, in such manner as they shoulddetermine. It is also true that a Negro, an Indian, or any other man ofinferior race to a White man, should be permitted to enjoy, and humanityrequires that he should have, all the rights, privileges, and immunitieswhich he is capable of exercising consistent with the safety of society. * * * But you may ask me what are these rights and these privileges?My answer is, that each State must decide for itself the nature andextent of these rights. * * * Without indorsing the wisdom of thatdecision, I assert that Virginia has the same power by virtue of hersovereignty to protect Slavery within her limits, as Illinois has tobanish it forever from our own borders. I assert the right of eachState to decide for itself on all these questions, and I do notsubscribe to the doctrine of my friend, Mr. Lincoln, that uniformity iseither desirable or possible. I do not acknowledge that the States mustall be Free or must all be Slave. I do not acknowledge that the Negromust have civil and political rights everywhere or nowhere. * * * I donot acknowledge any of these doctrines of uniformity in the local anddomestic regulations in the different States. * * * Mr. Lincoln goesfor a warfare upon the Supreme Court of the United States because oftheir judicial decision in the Dred Scott case. I yield obedience tothe decisions in that Court--to the final determination of the highestjudicial tribunal known to our Constitution. He objects to the DredScott decision because it does not put the Negro in the possession ofthe rights of citizenship on an equality with the White man. I amopposed to Negro equality. * * * I would extend to the Negro, and theIndian, and to all dependent races every right, every privilege, andevery immunity consistent with the safety and welfare of the Whiteraces; but equality they never should have, either political or social, or in any other respect whatever. * * * My friends, you see that theissues are distinctly drawn. "

On the following evening (July 10th) at Chicago, Mr. Lincoln addressedanother enthusiastic assemblage, in reply to Mr. Douglas; and, afterprotesting against a charge that had been made the previous night by thelatter, of an "unnatural and unholy" alliance between AdministrationDemocrats and Republicans to defeat him, as being beyond his ownknowledge and belief, proceeded: "Popular Sovereignty! EverlastingPopular Sovereignty! Let us for a moment inquire into this vast matterof Popular Sovereignty. What is Popular Sovereignty? We recollect atan early period in the history of this struggle there was another namefor the same thing--Squatter Sovereignty. It was not exactly PopularSovereignty, but Squatter Sovereignty. What do those terms mean? Whatdo those terms mean when used now? And vast credit is taken by ourfriend, the Judge, in regard to his support of it, when he declares thelast years of his life have been, and all the future years of his lifeshall be, devoted to this matter of Popular Sovereignty. What is it?Why it is the Sovereignty of the People! What was Squatter Sovereignty?I suppose if it had any significance at all, it was the right of thepeople to govern themselves, to be sovereign in their own affairs whilethey were squatted down in a country not their own--while they hadsquatted on a territory that did not belong to them in the sense that aState belongs to the people who inhabit it--when it belonged to theNation--such right to govern themselves was called 'SquatterSovereignty. '

"Now I wish you to mark. What has become of that Squatter Sovereignty?What has become of it? Can you get anybody to tell you now that thepeople of a Territory have any authority to govern themselves, in regardto this mooted question of Slavery, before they form a StateConstitution? No such thing at all, although there is a general runningfire and although there has been a hurrah made in every speech on thatside, assuming that that policy had given the people of a Territory theright to govern themselves upon this question; yet the point is dodged. To-day it has been decided--no more than a year ago it was decided bythe Supreme Court of the United States, and is insisted upon to-day, that the people of a Territory have no right to exclude Slavery from aTerritory, that if any one man chooses to take Slaves into a Territory, all the rest of the people have no right to keep them out. This beingso, and this decision being made one of the points that the Judge(Douglas) approved, * * * he says he is in favor of it, and sticks toit, and expects to win his battle on that decision, which says there isno such thing as Squatter Sovereignty; but that any man may take Slavesinto a Territory and all the other men in the Territory may be opposedto it, and yet by reason of the Constitution they cannot prohibit it;when that is so, how much is left of this vast matter of SquatterSovereignty, I should like to know? Again, when we get to the questionof the right of the people to form a State Constitution as they please, to form it with Slavery or without Slavery--if that is anything new, Iconfess I don't know it * * *. 

"We do not remember that, in that old Declaration of Independence, it issaid that 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men arecreated equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certaininalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuitof happiness; that to secure these rights, governments are institutedamong men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. 'There, is the origin of Popular Sovereignty. Who, then, shall come inat this day and claim that he invented it? The Lecompton Constitutionconnects itself with this question, for it is in this matter of theLecompton Constitution that our friend, Judge Douglas, claims such vastcredit. I agree that in opposing the Lecompton Constitution, so far asI can perceive, he was right. * * * All the Republicans in the Nationopposed it, and they would have opposed it just as much without JudgeDouglas's aid as with it. They had all taken ground against it longbefore he did. Why, the reason that he urges against that Constitution, I urged against him a year before. I have the printed speech in my handnow. The argument that he makes, why that Constitution should not beadopted, that the people were not fairly represented nor allowed tovote, I pointed out in a speech a year ago which I hold in my hand now, that no fair chance was to be given to the people. * * * The LecomptonConstitution, as the Judge tells us, was defeated. The defeat of it wasa good thing or it was not. He thinks the defeat of it was a goodthing, and so do I, and we agree in that. Who defeated it? [A voice--'Judge Douglas. '] Yes, he furnished himself, and if you suppose hecontrolled the other Democrats that went with him, he furnished threevotes, while the Republicans furnished twenty. That is what he did todefeat it. In the House of Representatives he and his friends furnishedsome twenty votes, and the Republicans furnished ninety odd. Now, whowas it that did the work? * * * Ground was taken against it by theRepublicans long before Douglas did it. The proportion of opposition tothat measure is about five to one. "

Mr. Lincoln then proceeded to take up the issues which Mr. Douglas hadjoined with him the previous evening. He denied that he had said, orthat it could be fairly inferred from what he had said, in hisSpringfield speech, that he was in favor of making War by the North uponthe South for the extinction of Slavery, "or, in favor of inviting theSouth to a War upon the North, for the purpose of nationalizingSlavery. " Said he: "I did not even say that I desired that Slaveryshould be put in course of ultimate extinction. I do say so now, however; so there need be no longer any difficulty about that. * * * Iam tolerably well acquainted with the history of the Country and I knowthat it has endured eighty-two years half Slave and half Free. Ibelieve--and that is what I meant to allude to there--I believe it hasendured, because during all that time, until the introduction of theNebraska Bill, the public mind did rest all the, time in the belief thatSlavery was in course of ultimate extinction. That was what gave us therest that we had through that period of eighty-two years; at least, so Ibelieve. 

"I have always hated Slavery, I think, as much as any Abolitionist--Ihave been an Old Line Whig--I have always hated it, but I have alwaysbeen quiet about it until this new era of the introduction of theNebraska Bill began. I always believed that everybody was against it, and that it was in course of ultimate extinction. * * * The great massof the Nation have rested in the belief that Slavery was in course ofultimate extinction. They had reason so to believe. The adoption ofthe Constitution and its attendant history led the People to believe so, and that such was the belief of the framers of the Constitution itself. Why did those old men about the time of the adoption of the Constitutiondecree that Slavery should not go into the new territory, where it hadnot already gone? Why declare that within twenty years the AfricanSlave Trade, by which Slaves are supplied, might be cut off by Congress?Why were all these acts? I might enumerate more of these acts--butenough. What were they but a clear indication that the framers of theConstitution intended and expected the ultimate extinction of thatinstitution?

"And now, when I say, as I said in my speech that Judge Douglas hasquoted from, when I say that I think the opponents of Slavery willresist the further spread of it, and place it where the public mindshall rest with the belief that it is in course of ultimate extinction, I only mean to say, that they will place it where the founders of thisGovernment originally placed it. I have said a hundred times, and Ihave now no inclination to take it back, that I believe there is noright, and ought to be no inclination in the people of the Free States, to enter into the Slave States, and interfere with the question ofSlavery at all. I have said that always; Judge Douglas has heard me sayit--if not quite a hundred times, at least as good as a hundred times;and when it is said that I am in favor of interfering with Slavery whereit exists, I know that it is unwarranted by anything I have everintended, and as I believe, by anything I have ever said. If, by anymeans, I have ever used language which could fairly be so construe (as, however, I believe I never have) I now correct it. So much, then, forthe inference that Judge Douglas draws, that I am in favor of settingthe Sections at War with one another. 

"Now in relation to his inference that I am in favor of a generalconsolidation of all the local institutions of the various States * * *I have said, very many times in Judge Douglas's hearing, that no manbelieved more than I in the principle of self-government from beginningto end. I have denied that his use of that term applies properly. Butfor the thing itself, I deny that any man has ever gone ahead of me inhis devotion to the principle, whatever he may have done in efficiencyin advocating it. I think that I have said it in your hearing--that Ibelieve each individual is naturally entitled to do as he pleases withhimself and the fruit of his labor, so far as it in no wise interfereswith any other man's rights--that each community, as a State, has aright to do exactly as it pleases with all the concerns within thatState that interfere with the rights of no other State, and that theGeneral Government, upon principle, has no right to interfere withanything other than that general class of things that does concern thewhole. I have said that at all times. 

"I have said, as illustrations, that I do not believe in the right ofIllinois to interfere with the cranberry laws of Indiana, the oysterlaws of Virginia, or the liquor laws of Maine. I have said these thingsover and over again, and I repeat them here as my sentiments. * * *What can authorize him to draw any such inference? I suppose theremight be one thing that at least enabled him to draw such an inferencethat would not be true with me or many others, that is, because he looksupon all this matter of Slavery as an exceedingly little thing--thismatter of keeping one-sixth of the population of the whole Nation in astate of oppression and tyranny unequaled in the World. 

"He looks upon it as being an exceedingly little thing only equal to thecranberry laws of Indiana--as something having no moral question in it--as something on a par with the question of whether a man shall pasturehis land with cattle, or plant it with tobacco--so little and so small athing, that he concludes, if I could desire that anything should be doneto bring about the ultimate extinction of that little thing, I must bein favor of bringing about an amalgamation of all the other littlethings in the Union. 

"Now it so happens--and there, I presume, is the foundation of thismistake--that the Judge thinks thus; and it so happens that there is avast portion of the American People that do not look upon that matter asbeing this very little thing. They look upon it as a vast moral evil;they can prove it as such by the writings of those who gave us theblessings of Liberty which we enjoy, and that they so looked upon it, and not as an evil merely confining itself to the States where it issituated; while we agree that, by the Constitution we assented to, inthe States where it exists we have no right to interfere with it, because it is in the Constitution; and we are by both duty andinclination to stick by that Constitution in all its letter and spirit, from beginning to end. * * * The Judge can have no issue with me on aquestion of establishing uniformity in the domestic regulations of theStates. * * *

"Another of the issues he says that is to be made with me, is upon hisdevotion to the Dred Scott decision, and my opposition to it. I haveexpressed heretofore, and I now repeat, my opposition to the Dred Scottdecision; but I should be allowed to state the nature of thatopposition. * * * What is fairly implied by the term Judge Douglas hasused, 'resistance to the decision?' I do not resist it. If I wanted totake Dred Scott from his master, I would be interfering with propertyand that terrible difficulty that Judge Douglas speaks of, ofinterfering with property, would arise. But I am doing no such thing asthat, but all that I am doing is refusing to obey it, as a politicalrule. If I were in Congress, and a vote should come up on a questionwhether Slavery should be prohibited in a new Territory, in spite of theDred Scott decision, I would vote that it should. That is what I woulddo. 

"Judge Douglas said last night, that before the decision he mightadvance his opinion, and it might be contrary to the decision when itwas made; but after it was made, he would abide by it until it wasreversed. Just so! We let this property abide by the decision, but wewill try to reverse that decision. We will try to put it where JudgeDouglas would not object, for he says he will obey it until it isreversed. Somebody has to reverse that decision, since it is made, andwe mean to reverse it, and we mean to do it peaceably. 

"What are the uses of decisions of Courts? They have two uses. Asrules of property they have two uses. First, they decide upon thequestion before the Court. They decide in this case that Dred Scott isa Slave. Nobody resists that. Not only that, but they say to everybodyelse, that persons standing just as Dred Scott stands, are as he is. That is, they say that when a question comes up upon another person, itwill be so decided again, unless the Court decides in another way--unless the Court overrules its decision. --Well, we mean to do what wecan to have the Court decide the other way. That is one thing we meanto try to do. 

"The sacredness that Judge Douglas throws around this decision is adegree of sacredness that has never before been thrown around any otherdecision. I have never heard of such a thing. Why, decisionsapparently contrary to that decision, or that good lawyers thought werecontrary to that decision, have been made by that very Court before. Itis the first of its kind; it is an astonisher in legal history. It is anew wonder of the world. It is based upon falsehood in the main as tothe facts--allegations of facts upon which it stands are not facts atall in many instances; and no decision made on any question--the firstinstance of a decision made under so many unfavorable circumstances--thus placed, has ever been held by the profession as law, and it hasalways needed confirmation before the lawyers regarded it as settledlaw. But Judge Douglas will have it that all hands must take thisextraordinary decision, made under these extraordinary circumstances, and give their vote in Congress in accordance with it, yield to it andobey it in every possible sense. 

"Circumstances alter cases. Do not gentlemen remember the case of thatsame Supreme Court, some twenty-five or thirty years ago, deciding thata National Bank was Constitutional? * * * The Bank charter ran out, and a recharter was granted by Congress. That re-charter was laidbefore General Jackson. It was urged upon him, when he denied theConstitutionality of the Bank, that the Supreme Court had decided thatit was Constitutional; and General Jackson then said that the SupremeCourt had no right to lay down a rule to govern a co-ordinate branch ofthe Government, the members of which had sworn to support theConstitution--that each member had sworn to support that Constitution ashe understood it. I will venture here to say, that I have heard JudgeDouglas say that he approved of General Jackson for that act. What hasnow become of all his tirade about 'resistance to the Supreme Court?'"

After adverting to Judge Douglas's warfare on "the leaders" of theRepublican party, and his desire to have "it understood that the mass ofthe Republican party are really his friends, " Mr. Lincoln said: "If youindorse him, you tell him you do not care whether Slavery be voted up ordown, and he will close, or try to close, your mouths with hisdeclaration repeated by the day, the week, the month, and the year. Isthat what you mean? * * * Now I could ask the Republican party, afterall the hard names that Judge Douglas has called them by, all hisrepeated charges of their inclination to marry with and hug negroes--allhis declarations of Black Republicanism--by the way, we are improving, the black has got rubbed off--but with all that, if he be indorsed byRepublican votes, where do you stand? Plainly, you stand ready saddled, bridled, and harnessed, and waiting to be driven over to theSlavery-extension camp of the Nation--just ready to be driven over, tiedtogether in a lot--to be driven over, every man with a rope around hisneck, that halter being held by Judge Douglas. That is the question. If Republican men have been in earnest in what they have done, I thinkthat they has better not do it. * * *

"We were often--more than once at least--in the course of JudgeDouglas's speech last night, reminded that this Government was made forWhite men--that he believed it was made for White men. Well, that isputting it in a shape in which no one wants to deny it; but the Judgethen goes into his passion for drawing inferences that are notwarranted. I protest, now and forever, against that counterfeit logicwhich presumes that because I do not want a Negro woman for a Slave I donecessarily want her for a wife. My understanding is that I need nothave her for either; but, as God has made us separate, we can leave oneanother alone, and do one another much good thereby. There are Whitemen enough to marry all the White women, and enough Black men to marryall the Black women, and in God's name let them be so married. TheJudge regales us with the terrible enormities that take place by themixture of races; that the inferior race bears the superior down. Why, Judge, if we do not let them get together in the Territories, they won'tmix there. 

" * * * Those arguments that are made, that the inferior race are to betreated with as much allowance as they are capable of enjoying; that asmuch is to be done for them as their condition will allow--what arethese arguments? They are the arguments that Kings have made forenslaving the People in all ages of the World. You will find that allthe arguments in favor of king-craft were of this class; they alwaysbestrode the necks of the People, not that they wanted to do it, butbecause the People were better off for being ridden! That is theirargument, and this argument of the Judge is the same old Serpent thatsays: you work, and I eat; you toil, and I will enjoy the fruits of it. 

"Turn it whatever way you will--whether it come from the mouth of aKing, an excuse for enslaving the People of his Country, or from themouth of men of one race as a reason for enslaving the men of anotherrace, it is all the same old Serpent; and I hold, if that course ofargumentation that is made for the purpose of convincing the public mindthat we should not care about this, should be granted, it does not stopwith the Negro. 

"I should like to know, taking this old Declaration of Independence, which declares that all men are equal upon principle, and makingexceptions to it, where will it stop? If one man says it does not meana Negro, why not say it does not mean some other man? If thatDeclaration is not the truth, let us get the Statute Book, in which wefind it, and tear it out! Who is so bold as to do it? If it is nottrue, let us tear it out!" [Cries of "No, no. "] "Let us stick to itthen; let us stand firmly by it, then. * * *

" * * * The Saviour, I suppose, did not expect that any human creaturecould be perfect as the Father in Heaven; but He said, 'As your Fatherin Heaven is perfect, be ye also perfect. ' He set that up as astandard, and he who did most toward reaching that standard, attainedthe highest degree of moral perfection. So I say, in relation to theprinciple that all men are created equal--let it be as nearly reached aswe can. If we cannot give Freedom to every creature, let us do nothingthat will impose Slavery upon any other creature. Let us then turn thisGovernment back into the channel in which the framers of theConstitution originally placed it. Let us stand firmly by each other. * * * Let us discard all this quibbling * * * and unite as one Peoplethroughout this Land, until we shall once more stand up declaring thatall men are created equal. "

At Bloomington, July 16th (Mr. Lincoln being present), Judge Douglasmade another great speech of vindication and attack. After sketchingthe history of the Kansas-Nebraska struggle, from the introduction byhimself of the Nebraska Bill in the United States Senate, in 1854, downto the passage of the "English" Bill--which prescribed substantiallythat if the people of Kansas would come in as a Slave-holding State, they should be admitted with but 35, 000 inhabitants; but if they wouldcome in as a Free State, they must have 93, 420 inhabitants; which unfairrestriction was opposed by Judge Douglas, but to which after it becamelaw he "bowed in deference, " because whatever decision the people ofKansas might make on the coming third of August would be "final andconclusive of the whole question"--he proceeded to compliment theRepublicans in Congress, for supporting the Crittenden-Montgomery Bill--for coming "to the Douglas platform, abandoning their own, believing(in the language of the New York Tribune), that under the peculiarcircumstances they would in that mode best subserve the interests of theCountry;" and then again attacked Mr. Lincoln for his "unholy andunnatural alliance" with the Lecompton-Democrats to defeat him, becauseof which, said he: "You will find he does not say a word against theLecompton Constitution or its supporters. He is as silent as the graveupon that subject. Behold Mr. Lincoln courting Lecompton votes, inorder that he may go to the Senate as the representative of Republicanprinciples! You know that the alliance exists. I think you will findthat it will ooze out before the contest is over. " Then with manyhandsome compliments to the personal character of Mr. Lincoln, anddeclaring that the question for decision was "whether his principles aremore in accordance with the genius of our free institutions, the peaceand harmony of the Republic" than those advocated by himself, JudgeDouglas proceeded to discuss what he described as "the two points atissue between Mr. Lincoln and myself. "

Said he: "Although the Republic has existed from 1789 to this day, divided into Free States and Slave States, yet we are told that in thefuture it cannot endure unless they shall become all Free or all Slave. * * * He wishes to go to the Senate of the United States in order tocarry out that line of public policy which will compel all the States inthe South to become Free. How is he going to do it? Has Congress anypower over the subject of Slavery in Kentucky or Virginia or any otherState of this Union? How, then, is Mr. Lincoln going to carry out thatprinciple which he says is essential to the existence of this Union, towit: That Slavery must be abolished in all the States of the Union ormust be established in them all? You convince the South that they musteither establish Slavery in Illinois and in every other Free State, orsubmit to its abolition in every Southern State and you invite them tomake a warfare upon the Northern States in order to establish Slaveryfor the sake of perpetuating it at home. Thus, Mr. Lincoln invites, byhis proposition, a War of Sections, a War between Illinois and Kentucky, a War between the Free States and the Slave States, a War between theNorth and South, for the purpose of either exterminating Slavery inevery Southern State or planting it in every Northern State. He tellsyou that the safety of the Republic, that the existence of this Union, depends upon that warfare being carried on until one Section or theother shall be entirely subdued. The States must all be Free or Slave, for a house divided against itself cannot stand. That is Mr. Lincoln'sargument upon that question. My friends, is it possible to preservePeace between the North and the South if such a doctrine shall prevailin either Section of the Union?

"Will you ever submit to a warfare waged by the Southern States toestablish Slavery in Illinois? What man in Illinois would not lose thelast drop of his heart's blood before lie would submit to theinstitution of Slavery being forced upon us by the other States againstour will? And if that be true of us, what Southern man would not shedthe last drop of his heart's blood to prevent Illinois, or any otherNorthern State, from interfering to abolish Slavery in his State? Eachof these States is sovereign under the Constitution; and if we wish topreserve our liberties, the reserved rights and sovereignty of each andevery State must be maintained. * * * The difference between Mr. Lincoln and myself upon this point is, that he goes for a combination ofthe Northern States, or the organization of a sectional political partyin the Free States, to make War on the domestic institutions of theSouthern States, and to prosecute that War until they all shall besubdued, and made to conform to such rules as the North shall dictate tothem. 

"I am aware that Mr. Lincoln, on Saturday night last, made a speech atChicago for the purpose, as he said, of explaining his position on thisquestion. * * * His answer to this point which I have been arguing, is, that he never did mean, and that I ought to know that he neverintended to convey the idea, that he wished the people ofthe Free States to enter into the Southern States and interfere withSlavery. Well, I never did suppose that he ever dreamed of enteringinto Kentucky, to make War upon her institutions, nor will anyAbolitionist ever enter into Kentucky to wage such War. Their mode ofmaking War is not to enter into those States where Slavery exists, andthere interfere, and render themselves responsible for the consequences. Oh, no! They stand on this side of the Ohio River and shoot across. They stand in Bloomington and shake their fists at the people ofLexington; they threaten South Carolina from Chicago. And they callthat bravery! But they are very particular, as Mr. Lincoln says, not toenter into those States for the purpose of interfering with theinstitution of Slavery there. I am not only opposed to entering intothe Slave States, for the purpose of interfering with theirinstitutions, but I am opposed to a sectional agitation to control theinstitutions of other States. I am opposed to organizing a sectionalparty, which appeals to Northern pride, and Northern passion andprejudice, against Southern institutions, thus stirring up ill feelingand hot blood between brethren of the same Republic. I am opposed tothat whole system of sectional agitation, which can produce nothing butstrife, but discord, but hostility, and finally disunion. * * *

"I ask Mr. Lincoln how it is that he purposes ultimately to bring aboutthis uniformity in each and all the States of the Union? There is butone possible mode which I can see, and perhaps Mr. Lincoln intends topursue it; that is, to introduce a proposition into the Senate to changethe Constitution of the United States in order that all the StateLegislatures may be abolished, State Sovereignty blotted out, and thepower conferred upon Congress to make local laws and establish thedomestic institutions and police regulations uniformly throughout theUnited States. 

"Are you prepared for such a change in the institutions of your country?Whenever you shall have blotted out the State Sovereignties, abolishedthe State Legislatures, and consolidated all the power in the FederalGovernment, you will have established a Consolidated Empire asdestructive to the Liberties of the People and the Rights of the Citizenas that of Austria, or Russia, or any other despotism that rests uponthe neck of the People. * * * There is but one possible way in whichSlavery can be abolished, and that is by leaving a State, according tothe principle of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, perfectly free to form andregulate its institutions in its own way. That was the principle uponwhich this Republic was founded, and it is under the operation of thatprinciple that we have been able to preserve the Union thus far underits operation. Slavery disappeared from New Hampshire, from RhodeIsland, from Connecticut, from New York, from New Jersey, fromPennsylvania, from six of the twelve original Slave-holding States; andthis gradual system of emancipation went on quietly, peacefully, andsteadily, so long as we in the Free States minded our own business, andleft our neighbors alone. 

"But the moment the Abolition Societies were organized throughout theNorth, preaching a violent crusade against Slavery in the SouthernStates, this combination necessarily caused a counter-combination in theSouth, and a sectional line was drawn which was a barrier to any furtheremancipation. Bear in mind that emancipation has not taken place in anyone State since the Free Soil Party was organized as a political partyin this country. Emancipation went on gradually, in State after State, so long as the Free States were content with managing their own affairsand leaving the South perfectly free to do as they pleased; but themoment the North said we are powerful enough to control you of theSouth, the moment the North proclaimed itself the determined master ofthe South, that moment the South combined to resist the attack, and thussectional parties were formed and gradual emancipation ceased in all theSlave-holding States. 

"And yet Mr. Lincoln, in view of these historical facts, proposes tokeep up this sectional agitation, band all the Northern States togetherin one political Party, elect a President by Northern votes alone, andthen, of course, make a Cabinet composed of Northern men, and administerthe Government by Northern men only, denying all the Southern States ofthis Union any participation in the administration of affairswhatsoever. I submit to you, my fellow-citizens, whether such a line ofpolicy is consistent with the peace and harmony of the Country? Can theUnion endure under such a system of policy? He has taken his positionin favor of sectional agitation and sectional warfare. I have takenmine in favor of securing peace, harmony, and good-will among all theStates, by permitting each to mind its own business, anddiscountenancing any attempt at interference on the part of one Statewith the domestic concerns of the others. * * *

"Mr. Lincoln tells you that he is opposed to the decision of the SupremeCourt in the Dred Scott case. Well, suppose he is; what is he going todo about it? * * * Why, he says he is going to appeal to Congress. Letus see how he will appeal to Congress. He tells us that on the 8th ofMarch, 1820, Congress passed a law called the Missouri Compromise, prohibiting Slavery forever in all the territory west of the Mississippiand north of the Missouri line of thirty-six degrees and thirty minutes;that Dred Scott, a slave in Missouri, was taken by his master to FortSnelling, in the present State of Minnesota, situated on the west branchof the Mississippi River, and consequently in the Territory whereSlavery was prohibited by the Act of 1820; and that when Dred Scottappealed for his Freedom in consequence of having been taken into thatTerritory, the Supreme Court of the United States decided that DredScott did not become Free by being taken into that Territory, but thathaving been carried back to Missouri, was yet a Slave. 

"Mr. Lincoln is going to appeal from that decision and reverse it. Hedoes not intend to reverse it as to Dred Scott. Oh, no! But he willreverse it so that it shall not stand as a rule in the future. How willhe do it? He says that if he is elected to the Senate he will introduceand pass a law just like the Missouri Compromise, prohibiting Slaveryagain in all the Territories. Suppose he does re-enact the same lawwhich the Court has pronounced unconstitutional, will that make itConstitutional? * * * Will it be any more valid? Will he be able toconvince the Court that the second Act is valid, when the first isinvalid and void? What good does it do to pass a second Act? Why, itwill have the effect to arraign the Supreme Court before the People, andto bring them into all the political discussions of the Country. Willthat do any good? * * *

"The functions of Congress are to enact the Statutes, the province ofthe Court is to pronounce upon their validity, and the duty of theExecutive is to carry the decision into effect when rendered by theCourt. And yet, notwithstanding the Constitution makes the decision ofthe Court final in regard to the validity of an Act of Congress, Mr. Lincoln is going to reverse that decision by passing another Act ofCongress. When he has become convinced of the Folly of the proposition, perhaps he will resort to the same subterfuge that I have found othersof his Party resort to, which is to agitate and agitate until he canchange the Supreme Court and put other men in the places of the presentincumbents. "

After ridiculing this proposition at some length, he proceeded:

"Mr. Lincoln is alarmed for fear that, under the Dred Scott decision, Slavery will go into all the Territories of the United States. All Ihave to say is that, with or without this decision, Slavery will go justwhere the People want it, and not an inch further. * * * Hence, if thePeople of a Territory want Slavery, they will encourage it by passingaffirmatory laws, and the necessary police regulations, patrol laws andSlave Code; if they do not want it, they will withhold that legislation, and, by withholding it, Slavery is as dead as if it was prohibited by aConstitutional prohibition, especially if, in addition, theirlegislation is unfriendly, as it would be if they were opposed to it. "

Then, taking up what he said was "Mr. Lincoln's main objection to theDred Scott decision, " to wit: "that that decision deprives the Negro ofthe benefits of that clause of the Constitution of the United Stateswhich entitles the citizens of each State to all the privileges andimmunities of citizens of the several States, " and admitting that suchwould be its effect, Mr. Douglas contended at some length that thisGovernment was "founded on the White basis" for the benefit of theWhites and their posterity. He did "not believe that it was the designor intention of the signers of the Declaration of Independence or theframes of the Constitution to include Negroes, Indians, or otherinferior races, with White men as citizens;" nor that the former "hadany reference to Negroes, when they used the expression that all menwere created equal, " nor to "any other inferior race. " He held that, "They were speaking only of the White race, and never dreamed that theirlanguage would be construed to apply to the Negro;" and after ridiculingthe contrary view, insisted that, "The history of the Country shows thatneither the signers of the Declaration, nor the Framers of theConstitution, ever supposed it possible that their language would beused in an attempt to make this Nation a mixed Nation of Indians, Negroes, Whites, and Mongrels. "

The "Fathers proceeded on the White basis, making the White people thegoverning race, but conceding to the Indian and Negro, and all inferiorraces, all the rights and all the privileges they could enjoy consistentwith the safety of the society in which they lived. That, " said he, "ismy opinion now. I told you that humanity, philanthropy, justice, andsound policy required that we should give the Negro every right, everyprivilege, every immunity consistent with the safety and welfare of theState. The question, then, naturally arises, what are those rights andprivileges, and what is the nature and extent of them? My answer is, that that is a question which each State and each Territory must decidefor itself. * * * I am content with that position. My friend Lincolnis not. * * * He thinks that the Almighty made the Negro his equal andhis brother. For my part I do not consider the Negro any kin to me, norto any other White man; but I would still carry my humanity and myphilanthropy to the extent of giving him every privilege and everyimmunity that he could enjoy, consistent with our own good. "

After again referring to the principles connected with non-interferencein the domestic institutions of the States and Territories, and to thedevotion of all his energies to them "since 1850, when, " said he, "Iacted side by side with the immortal Clay and the god-like Webster, inthat memorable struggle in which Whigs and Democrats united upon acommon platform of patriotism and the Constitution, throwing asidepartisan feelings in order to restore peace and harmony to a distractedCountry"--he alluded to the death-bed of Clay, and the pledges made byhimself to both Clay and Webster to devote his own life to thevindication of the principles of that Compromise of 1850 as a means ofpreserving the Union; and concluded with this appeal: "This Union canonly be preserved by maintaining the fraternal feeling between the Northand the South, the East and the West. If that good feeling can bepreserved, the Union will be as perpetual as the fame of its greatfounders. It can be maintained by preserving the sovereignty of theStates, the right of each State and each Territory to settle itsdomestic concerns for itself, and the duty of each to refrain frominterfering with the other in any of its local or domestic institutions. Let that be done, and the Union will be perpetual; let that be done, andthis Republic, which began with thirteen States and which now numbersthirty-two, which when it began, only extended from the Atlantic to theMississippi, but now reaches to the Pacific, may yet expand, North andSouth, until it covers the whole Continent, and becomes one vastocean-bound Confederacy. Then, my friends, the path of duty, of honor, of patriotism, is plain. There are a few simple principles to bepreserved. Bear in mind the dividing line between State rights andFederal authority; let us maintain the great principles of PopularSovereignty, of State rights and of the Federal Union as theConstitution has made it, and this Republic will endure forever. "

On the next evening, July 17th, at Springfield, both Douglas and Lincolnaddressed separate meetings. 

After covering much the same ground with regard to the history of theKansas-Nebraska struggle and his own attitude upon it, as he did in hisprevious speech, Mr. Douglas declined to comment upon Mr. Lincoln'sintimation of a Conspiracy between Douglas, Pierce, Buchanan, and Taneyfor the passage of the Nebraska Bill, the rendition of the Dred Scottdecision, and the extension of Slavery, but proceeded to dilate on the"uniformity" issue between himself and Mr. Lincoln, in much the samestrain as before, tersely summing up with the statement that "there is adistinct issue of principles--principles irreconcilable--between Mr. Lincoln and myself. He goes for consolidation and uniformity in ourGovernment. I go for maintaining the Confederation of the SovereignStates under the Constitution, as our fathers made it, leaving eachState at liberty to manage its own affairs and own internalinstitutions. "

He then ridiculed, at considerable length, Mr. Lincoln's proposedmethods of securing a reversal by the United States Supreme Court of theDred Scott decision--especially that of an "appeal to the People toelect a President who will appoint judges who will reverse the DredScott decision, " which he characterized as "a proposition to make thatCourt the corrupt, unscrupulous tool of a political party, " and asked, "when we refuse to abide by Judicial decisions, what protection is thereleft for life and property? To whom shall you appeal? To mob law, topartisan caucuses, to town meetings, to revolution? Where is the remedywhen you refuse obedience to the constituted authorities?" In otherrespects the speech was largely a repetition of his Bloomington speech. 

Mr. Lincoln in his speech, the same night, at Springfield, opened bycontrasting the disadvantages under which, by reason of an unfairapportionment of State Legislative representation and otherwise, theRepublicans of Illinois labored in this fight. Among otherdisadvantages--whereby he said the Republicans were forced "to fightthis battle upon principle and upon principle alone"--were those whichhe said arose "out of the relative positions of the two persons whostand before the State as candidates for the Senate. "

Said he: "Senator Douglas is of world-wide renown. All the anxiouspoliticians of his Party, or who have been of his Party for years past, have been looking upon him as certainly, at no distant day, to be thePresident of the United States. They have seen in his round, jolly, fruitful face, Post-offices, Land-offices, Marshalships, and Cabinetappointments, Chargeships and Foreign Missions, bursting and sproutingout in wonderful exuberance, ready to be laid hold of by their greedyhands. And as they have been gazing upon this attractive picture solong, they cannot, in the little distraction that has taken place in theparty, bring themselves to give up the charming hope; but with greedieranxiety they rush about him, sustain him, and give him marches, triumphal entries, and receptions, beyond what even in the days of hishighest prosperity they could have brought about in his favor. On thecontrary, nobody has ever expected me to be President. In my poor, lean, lank face, nobody has ever seen that any cabbages were sproutingout. "

Then he described the main points of Senator Douglas's plan of campaignas being not very numerous. "The first, " he said, "is PopularSovereignty. The second and third are attacks upon my speech made onthe 16th of June. Out of these three points-drawing within the range ofPopular Sovereignty the question of the Lecompton Constitution--he makeshis principal assault. Upon these his successive speeches aresubstantially one and the same. " Touching the first point, "PopularSovereignty"--"the great staple" of Mr. Douglas's campaign--Mr. Lincolnaffirmed that it was "the most arrant Quixotism that was ever enactedbefore a community. "

He said that everybody understood that "we have not been in acontroversy about the right of a People to govern themselves in theordinary matters of domestic concern in the States and Territories;"that, "in this controversy, whatever has been said has had reference tothe question of Negro Slavery;" and "hence, " said he, "when hereafter Ispeak of Popular Sovereignty, I wish to be understood as applying what Isay to the question of Slavery only; not to other minor domestic mattersof a Territory or a State. "

Having cleared away the cobwebs, Mr. Lincoln proceeded:

"Does Judge Douglas, when he says that several of the past years of hislife have been devoted to the question of 'Popular Sovereignty' * * *mean to say that he has been devoting his life to securing the People ofthe Territories the right to exclude Slavery from the Territories? Ifhe means so to say, he means to deceive; because he and every one knowsthat the decision of the Supreme Court, which he approves, and makesspecial ground of attack upon me for disapproving, forbids the People ofa Territory to exclude Slavery. 

"This covers the whole ground from the settlement of a Territory till itreaches the degree of maturity entitling it to form a StateConstitution. * * * This being so, the period of time from the firstsettlement of a Territory till it reaches the point of forming a StateConstitution, is not the thing that the Judge has fought for, or isfighting for; but, on the contrary, he has fought for, and is fightingfor, the thing that annihilates and crushes out that same PopularSovereignty. Well, so much being disposed of, what is left? Why, he iscontending for the right of the People, when they come to make a StateConstitution, to make it for themselves, and precisely as best suitsthemselves. I say again, that is Quixotic. I defy contradiction when Ideclare that the Judge can find no one to oppose him on thatproposition. I repeat, there is nobody opposing that proposition onprinciple. * * * Nobody is opposing, or has opposed, the right of thePeople when they form a State Constitution, to form it for themselves. Mr. Buchanan and his friends have not done it; they, too, as well as theRepublicans and the Anti-Lecompton Democrats, have not done it; but onthe contrary, they together have insisted on the right of the People toform a Constitution for themselves. The difference between the Buchananmen, on the one hand, and the Douglas men and the Republicans, on theother, has not been on a question of principle, but on a question offact * * * whether the Lecompton Constitution had been fairly formed bythe People or not. * * * As to the principle, all were agreed. 

"Judge Douglas voted with the Republicans upon that matter of fact. Heand they, by their voices and votes, denied that it was a fair emanationof the People. The Administration affirmed that it was. * * * Thisbeing so, what is Judge Douglas going to spend his life for? Is hegoing to spend his life in maintaining a principle that no body on earthopposes? Does he expect to stand up in majestic dignity and go throughhis apotheosis and become a god, in the maintaining of a principle whichneither man nor mouse in all God's creation is opposing?"

After ridiculing the assumption that Judge Douglas was entitled to allthe credit for the defeat of the Lecompton Constitution in the House ofRepresentatives--when the defeating vote numbered 120, of which 6 wereAmericans, 20 Douglas (or Anti-Lecompton) Democrats, and 94 Republicans--and hinting that perhaps he placed "his superior claim to credit, onthe ground that he performed a good act which was never expected ofhim, " or "upon the ground of the parable of the lost sheep, " of which ithad been said, "that there was more rejoicing over the one sheep thatwas lost and had been found, than over the ninety and nine in the fold--" he added: "The application is made by the Saviour in this parable, thus: 'Verily, I say unto you, there is more rejoicing in Heaven overone sinner that repenteth, than over ninety and nine just persons thatneed no repentance. ' And now if the Judge claims the benefit of thisparable, let him repent. Let him not come up here and say: 'I am theonly just person; and you are the ninety-nine sinners!' Repentancebefore forgiveness is a provision of the Christian system, and on thatcondition alone will the Republicans grant his forgiveness. "

After complaining that Judge Douglas misrepresented his attitude asindicated in his 16th of June speech at Springfield, in charging that heinvited "a War of Sections;"--that he proposed that "all the localinstitutions of the different States shall become consolidated anduniform, " Mr. Lincoln denied that that speech could fairly bear suchconstruction. 

In that speech he (Mr. L. ) had simply expressed an expectation that"either the opponents of Slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it isin the course of ultimate extinction, or its advocates will push itforward till it shall become alike lawful in all the States, old as wellas new, North as well as South. " Since then, at Chicago, he had alsoexpressed a "wish to see the spread of Slavery arrested, and to see itplaced where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in thecourse of ultimate extinction"--and, said he: "I said that, because Isupposed, when the public mind shall rest in that belief, we shall havePeace on the Slavery question. I have believed--and now believe--thepublic mind did rest on that belief up to the introduction of theNebraska Bill. Although I have ever been opposed to Slavery, so far Irested in the hope and belief that it was in the course of ultimateextinction. For that reason, it had been a minor question with me. Imight have been mistaken; but I had believed, and now believe, that thewhole public mind, that is, the mind of the great majority, had restedin that belief up to the Repeal of the Missouri Compromise. But uponthat event, I became convinced that either I had been resting in adelusion, or the institution was being placed on a new basis--a basisfor making it Perpetual, National, and Universal. Subsequent eventshave greatly confirmed me in that belief. 

"I believe that Bill to be the beginning of a Conspiracy for thatpurpose. So believing, I have since then considered that question aparamount one. So believing, I thought the public mind would never resttill the power of Congress to restrict the spread of it shall again beacknowledged and exercised on the one hand, or, on the other, allresistance be entirely crushed out. I have expressed that opinion and Ientertain it to-night. "

Having given some pieces of evidence in proof of the "tendency, " he haddiscovered, to the Nationalization of Slavery in these States, Mr. Lincoln continued: "And now, as to the Judge's inference, that because Iwish to see Slavery placed in the course of ultimate extinction--placedwhere our fathers originally placed it--I wish to annihilate the StateLegislatures--to force cotton to grow upon the tops of the GreenMountains--to freeze ice in Florida--to cut lumber on the broad Illinoisprairies--that I am in favor of all these ridiculous and impossiblethings! It seems to me it is a complete answer to all this, to ask if, when Congress did have the fashion of restricting Slavery from FreeTerritory; when Courts did have the fashion of deciding that taking aSlave into a Free, Country made him Free--I say it is a sufficientanswer to ask, if any of this ridiculous nonsense, about consolidationand uniformity, did actually follow? Who heard of any such thing, because of the Ordinance of '87? because of the Missouri Restrictionbecause of the numerous Court decisions of that character?

"Now, as to the Dred Scott decision; for upon that he makes his lastpoint at me. He boldly takes ground in favor of that decision. This isone-half the onslaught and one-third of the entire plan of the campaign. I am opposed to that decision in a certain sense, but not in the sensewhich he puts on it. I say that in so far as it decided in favor ofDred Scott's master, and against Dred Scott and his family, I do notpropose to disturb or resist the decision. I never have proposed to doany such thing. I think, that in respect for judicial authority, myhumble history would not suffer in comparison with that of JudgeDouglas. He would have the citizen conform his vote to that decision;the member of Congress, his; the President, his use of the veto power. He would make it a rule of political action for the People and all thedepartments of the Government. I would not. By resisting it as apolitical rule, I disturb no right of property, create no disorder, excite no mobs. "

After quoting from a letter of Mr. Jefferson (vol. Vii. , p. 177, of hisCorrespondence, ) in which he held that "to consider the judges as theultimate arbiters of all Constitutional questions, " is "a very dangerousdoctrine indeed; and one which would place us under the despotism of anOligarchy, " Mr. Lincoln continued: "Let us go a little further. Youremember we once had a National Bank. Some one owed the Bank a debt; hewas sued, and sought to avoid payment on the ground that the Bank wasunconstitutional. The case went to the Supreme Court, and therein itwas decided that the Bank was Constitutional. The whole Democraticparty revolted against that decision. General Jackson himself assertedthat he, as President, would not be bound to hold a National Bank to beConstitutional, even though the Court had decided it to be so. He fellin, precisely, with the view of Mr. Jefferson, and acted upon it underhis official oath, in vetoing a charter for a National Bank. 

"The declaration that Congress does not possess this Constitutionalpower to charter a Bank, has gone into the Democratic platform, at theirNational Conventions, and was brought forward and reaffirmed in theirlast Convention at Cincinnati. They have contended for thatdeclaration, in the very teeth of the Supreme Court, for more than aquarter of a century. In fact, they have reduced the decision to anabsolute nullity. That decision, I repeat, is repudiated in theCincinnati platform; and still, as if to show that effrontery can go nofurther, Judge Douglas vaunts in the very speeches in which he denouncesme for opposing the Dred Scott decision, that he stands on theCincinnati platform. 

"Now, I wish to know what the Judge can charge upon me, with respect todecisions of the Supreme Court, which does not lie in all its length, breadth, and proportions, at his own door? The plain truth is simplythis: Judge Douglas is for Supreme Court decisions when he likes, andagainst them when he does not like them. He is for the Dred Scottdecision because it tends to Nationalize Slavery--because it is a partof the original combination for that object. It so happens, singularlyenough, that I never stood opposed to a decision of the Supreme Courttill this. On the contrary, I have no recollection that he was everparticularly in favor of one till this. He never was in favor of any, nor (I) opposed to any, till the present one, which helps to NationalizeSlavery. Free men of Sangamon--Free men of Illinois, Free meneverywhere--judge ye between him and me, upon this issue!

"He says this Dred Scott case is a very small matter atmost--that it has no practical effect; that at best, or rather I supposeat worst, it is but an abstraction. * * * How has the planting ofSlavery in new countries always been effected? It has now been decidedthat Slavery cannot be kept out of our new Territories by any legalmeans. In what do our new Territories now differ in this respect fromthe old Colonies when Slavery was first planted within them?

"It was planted, as Mr. Clay once declared, and as history proves true, by individual men in spite of the wishes of the people; theMother-Government refusing to prohibit it, and withholding from thePeople of the Colonies the authority to prohibit it for themselves. Mr. Clay says this was one of the great and just causes of complaint againstGreat Britain by the Colonies, and the best apology we can now make forhaving the institution amongst us. In that precise condition ourNebraska politicians have at last succeeded in placing our own newTerritories; the Government will not prohibit Slavery within them, norallow the People to prohibit it. "

Alluding to that part of Mr. Douglas's speech the previous nighttouching the death-bed scene of Mr. Clay, with Mr. Douglas's promise todevote the remainder of his life to "Popular Sovereignty"--and to hisrelations with Mr. Webster--Mr. Lincoln said: "It would be amusing, ifit were not disgusting, to see how quick these Compromise breakersadminister on the political effects of their dead adversaries. If Ishould be found dead to-morrow morning, nothing but my insignificancecould prevent a speech being made on my authority, before the end ofnext week. It so happens that in that 'Popular Sovereignty' with whichMr. Clay was identified, the Missouri Compromise was expressly reserved;and it was a little singular if Mr. Clay cast his mantle upon JudgeDouglas on purpose to have that Compromise repealed. Again, the Judgedid not keep faith with Mr. Clay when he first brought in the NebraskaBill. He left the Missouri Compromise unrepealed, and in his reportaccompanying the Bill, he told the World he did it on purpose. Themanes of Mr. Clay must have been in great agony, till thirty days later, when 'Popular Sovereignty' stood forth in all its glory. "

Touching Mr. Douglas's allegations of Mr. Lincoln's disposition to makeNegroes equal with the Whites, socially and politically, the lattersaid: "My declarations upon this subject of Negro Slavery may bemisrepresented, but cannot be misunderstood. I have said that I do notunderstand the Declaration (of Independence) to mean that all men werecreated equal in all respects. They are not equal in color; but Isuppose that it does mean to declare that all men are equal in somerespects; they are equal in their right to 'Life, Liberty, and thepursuit of Happiness. ' Certainly the Negro is not our equal in color--perhaps not in many other respects; still, in the right to put into hismouth the bread that his own hands have earned, he is the equal of everyother man, White or Black. In pointing out that more has been givenyou, you cannot be justified in taking away the little which has beengiven him. All I ask for the Negro is that if you do not like him, lethim alone. If God gave him but little, that little let him enjoy. 

"The framers of the Constitution, " continued Mr. Lincoln, "found theinstitution of Slavery amongst their other institutions at the time. They found that by an effort to eradicate it, they might lose much ofwhat they had already gained. They were obliged to bow to thenecessity. They gave Congress power to abolish the Slave Trade at theend of twenty years. They also prohibited it in the Territories whereit did not exist. They did what they could, and yielded to thenecessity for the rest. I also yield to all which follows from thatnecessity. What I would most desire would be the separation of theWhite and Black races. "

Mr. Lincoln closed his speech by referring to the "New Departure" ofthe Democracy--to the charge he had made, in his 16th of June speech, touching "the existence of a Conspiracy to Perpetuate and NationalizeSlavery"--which Mr. Douglas had not contradicted--and, said he, "on hisown tacit admission I renew that charge. I charge him with having beena party to that Conspiracy, and to that deception, for the sole purposeof Nationalizing Slavery. "

This closed the series of preliminary speeches in the canvass. But theyonly served to whet the moral and intellectual and political appetite ofthe public for more. It was generally conceded that, at last, in theperson of Mr. Lincoln, the "Little Giant" had met his match. 

On July 24, Mr. Lincoln opened a correspondence with Mr. Douglas, which eventuated in an agreement between them, July 31st, forjoint-discussions, to take place at Ottawa, Freeport, Jonesboro, Charleston, Galesburgh, Quincy, and Alton, on fixed dates in August, September and October--at Ottawa, Mr. Douglas to open and speak onehour, Mr. Lincoln to have an hour and a half in reply, and Mr. Douglasto close in a half hour's speech; at Freeport, Mr. Lincoln to open andspeak for one hour, Mr. Douglas to take the next hour and a half inreply, and Mr. Lincoln to have the next half hour to close; and so on, alternating at each successive place, making twenty-one hours of jointpolitical debate. 

To these absorbingly interesting discussions, vast assemblages listenedwith breathless attention; and to the credit of all parties be it said, with unparalleled decorum. The People evidently felt that the greatestof all political principles--that of Human Liberty--was hanging on theissue of this great political contest between intellectual giants, thusopenly waged before the World--and they accordingly rose to the dignityand solemnity of the occasion, vindicating by their very example thesacredness with which the Right of Free Speech should be regarded at alltimes and everywhere. 

 CHAPTER V. 

 THE PRESIDENTIAL CONTEST OF 1860 THE CRISIS APPROACHING. 

The immediate outcome of the remarkable joint-debate between the twointellectual giants of Illinois was, that while the popular vote stood124, 698 for Lincoln, to 121, 130 for Douglas--showing a victory forLincoln among the People--yet, enough Douglas-Democrats were elected tothe Legislature, when added to those of his friends in the IllinoisSenate, who had been elected two years before, and "held over, " to givehim, in all, 54 members of both branches of the Legislature on jointballot, against 46 for Mr. Lincoln. Lincoln had carried the people, butDouglas had secured the Senatorial prize for which they had striven--andby that Legislative vote was elected to succeed himself in the UnitedStates Senate. This result was trumpeted throughout the Union as agreat Douglas victory. 

During the canvass of Illinois, Douglas's friends had seen to it thatnothing on their part should be wanting to secure success. What withspecial car trains, and weighty deputations, and imposing processions, and flag raisings, the inspiration of music, the booming of cannon, andthe eager shouts of an enthusiastic populace, his political journeythrough Illinois had been more like a Royal Progress than anything theCountry had yet seen; and now that his reelection was accomplished, theyproposed to make the most of it--to extend, as it were, the sphere ofhis triumph, or vindication, so that it would include not the Statealone, but the Nation--and thus so accentuate and enhance hisavailability as a candidate for the Democratic Presidential nominationof 1860, as to make his nomination and election to the Presidency of theUnited States an almost foregone conclusion. 

The programme was to raise so great a popular tidal-wave in hisinterest, as would bear him irresistibly upon its crest to the WhiteHouse. Accordingly, as the idol of the Democratic popular heart, Douglas, upon his return to the National Capital, was triumphantlyreceived by the chief cities of the Mississippi and the Atlanticsea-board. Hailed as victor in the great political contest in Illinois--upon the extended newspaper reports of which, the absorbed eyes of theentire nation, for months, had greedily fed--Douglas was received withmuch ostentation and immense enthusiasm at St. Louis, Memphis, NewOrleans, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington. Like the"Triumphs" decreed by Rome, in her grandest days, to the greatest of hervictorious heroes, Douglas's return was a series of magnificent popularovations. 

In a speech made two years before this period, Mr. Lincoln, whilecontrasting his own political career with that of Douglas, and modestlydescribing his own as "a flat failure" had said: "With him it has beenone of splendid success. His name fills the Nation, and is not unknowneven in foreign lands. I affect no contempt for the high eminence hehas reached. So reached, that the oppressed of my species might haveshared with me in the elevation, I would rather stand on that eminencethan wear the richest crown that ever pressed a monarch's brow. " Andnow the star of Douglas had reached a higher altitude, nearing itsmeridian splendor. He had become the popular idol of the day. 

But Douglas's partial victory--if such it was--so far from settling thepublic mind and public conscience, had the contrary effect. It added tothe ferment which the Pro-Slavery Oligarchists of the South--andespecially those of South Carolina--were intent upon increasing, untilso grave and serious a crisis should arrive as would, in their opinion, furnish a justifiable pretext in the eyes of the World for thecontemplated Secession of the Slave States from the Union. 

Under the inspiration of the Slave Power, and in the direct line of theDred Scott decision, and of the "victorious" doctrine of SenatorDouglas, which he held not inconsistent therewith, that the people ofany Territory of the United States could do as they pleased as to theinstitution of Slavery within their own limits, and if they desired theinstitution, they had the right by local legislation to "protect andencourage it, " the Legislature of the Territory of New Mexico at once(1859) proceeded to enact a law "for the protection of property inSlaves, " and other measures similar to the prevailing Slave Codes in theSouthern States. 

The aggressive attitude of the South--as thus evidenced anew--naturallystirred, to their very core, the Abolition elements of the North; on theother hand, the publication of Hinton Rowan Helper's "Impending Crisis, "which handled the Slavery question without gloves, and supported itsviews with statistics which startled the Northern mind, together withits alleged indorsement by the leading Republicans of the North, exasperated the fiery Southrons to an intense degree. Nor was thecapture, in October, 1859, of Harper's Ferry, Virginia, by John Brownand his handful of Northern Abolitionist followers, and his subsequentexecution in Virginia, calculated to allay the rapidly intensifyingfeeling between the Freedom-loving North and the Slaveholding South. When, therefore, the Congress met, in December, 1859, the sectionalwrath of the Country was reflected in the proceedings of both branchesof that body, and these again reacted upon the People of both theNorthern and Southern States, until the fires of Slavery Agitation werestirred to a white heat. 

The bitterness of feeling in the House at this time, was shown, in part, by the fact that not until the 1st of February, 1860, was it able, upona forty-fourth ballot, to organize by the election of a Speaker, andthat from the day of its meeting on the 5th of December, 1859, up tosuch organization, it was involved in an incessant and stormy wrangleupon the Slavery question. 

So also in the Democratic Senate, the split in the Democratic Party, between the Lecompton and Anti-Lecompton Democracy, was widened, at thesame time that the Republicans of the North were further irritated, bythe significantly decisive passage of a series of resolutions proposedby Jefferson Davis, which, on the one hand, purposely and deliberatelyknifed Douglas's "Popular Sovereignty" doctrine and read out of theParty all who believed in it, by declaring "That neither Congress nor aTerritorial Legislature, whether by direct legislation, or legislationof an indirect and unfriendly character, possesses power to annul orimpair the Constitutional right of any citizen of the United States totake his Slave-property into the common Territories, and there hold andenjoy the same while the Territorial condition remains, " and, on theother, purposely and deliberately slapped in the face the Republicans ofthe North, by declaring-among other things "That in the adoption of theFederal Constitution, the States adopting the same, acted severally asFree and Independent sovereignties, delegating a portion of their powersto be exercised by the Federal Government for the increased security ofeach against dangers, domestic as well as foreign; and that anyintermeddling by any one or more States or by a combination of theircitizens, with the domestic institutions of the others, on any pretextwhatever, political, moral, or religious, with a view to theirdisturbance or subversion, is in violation of the Constitution, insulting to the States so interfered with, endangers their domesticpeace and tranquillity--objects for which the Constitution was formed--and, by necessary consequence, tends to weaken and destroy the Unionitself. "

Another of these resolutions declared Negro Slavery to be recognized inthe Constitution, and that all "open or covert attacks thereon with aview to its overthrow, " made either by the Non-Slave-holding States ortheir citizens, violated the pledges of the Constitution, "are amanifest breach of faith, and a violation of the most solemnobligations. "

This last was intended as a blow at the Freedom of Speech and of thePress in the North; and only served, as was doubtless intended, to stillmore inflame Northern public feeling, while at the same time endeavoringto place the arrogant and aggressive Slave Power in an attitude ofinjured innocence. In short, the time of both Houses of Congress wasalmost entirely consumed during the Session of 1859-60 in the heated, and sometimes even furious, discussion of the Slavery question; andeverywhere, North and South, the public mind was not alone deeplyagitated, but apprehensive that the Union was founded not upon a rock, but upon the crater of a volcano, whose long-smouldering energies mightat any moment burst their confines, and reduce it to ruin anddesolation. 

On the 23rd of April, 1860, the Democratic National Convention met atCharleston, South Carolina. It was several days after the permanentorganization of the Convention before the Committee on Resolutionsreported to the main body, and not until the 30th of April did it reacha vote upon the various reports, which had in the meantime beenmodified. The propositions voted upon were three:

First, The Majority Report of the Committee, which reaffirmed theCincinnati platform of 1856--with certain "explanatory" resolutionsadded, which boldly proclaimed: That the Government of a Territoryorganized by an Act of Congress, is provisional and temporary; and, during its existence, all citizens of the United States have an equalright to settle with their property in the Territory, without theirrights, either of person or property, being destroyed or impaired byCongressional or Territorial Legislation;" that "it is the duty of theFederal Government, in all its departments, to protect, when necessary, the rights of persons and property in the Territories, and wherever elseits Constitutional authority extends;" that "when the settlers in aTerritory, having an adequate population, form a State Constitution, theright of Sovereignty commences, and, being consummated by admission intothe Union, they stand on an equal footing with the people of otherStates, and the State thus organized ought to be admitted into theFederal Union, whether its Constitution prohibits or recognizes theinstitution of Slavery;" and that "the enactments of State Legislaturesto defeat the faithful execution of the Fugitive Slave Law, are hostilein character, subversive of the Constitution, and revolutionary ineffect. " The resolutions also included a declaration in favor of theacquisition of Cuba, and other comparatively minor matters. 

Second, The Minority Report of the Committee, which, after re-affirmingthe Cincinnati platform, declared that "Inasmuch as differences ofopinion exist in the Democratic party as to the nature and extent of thepowers of a Territorial Legislature, and as to the powers and duties ofCongress, under the Constitution of the United States, over theinstitution of Slavery within the Territories * * * the Democratic Partywill abide by the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States onthe questions of Constitutional law. "

Third, The recommendation of Benjamin F. Butler, that the platformshould consist simply of a re-affirmation of the Cincinnati platform, and not another word. 

The last proposition was first voted on, and lost, by 105 yeas to 198nays. The Minority platform was then adopted by 165 yeas to 138 nays. 

The aggressive Slave-holders (Majority) platform, and the ButlerCompromise do-nothing proposition, being both defeated, and the Douglas(Minority) platform adopted, the Alabama delegation, under instructionsfrom their State Convention to withdraw in case the National Conventionrefused to adopt radical Territorial Pro-Slavery resolutions, at oncepresented a written protest and withdrew from the Convention, and werefollowed, in rapid succession, by; the delegates from Mississippi, Louisiana (all but two), South Carolina, Florida, Texas, Arkansas (inpart), Delaware (mostly), and Georgia (mostly)--the seceding delegatesafterwards organizing in another Hall, adopting the above Majorityplatform, and after a four days' sitting, adjourning to meet atRichmond, Virginia, on the 11th of June. 

Meanwhile, the Regular Democratic National Convention had proceeded toballot for President--after adopting the two-thirds rule. Thirty-sevenballots having been cast, that for Stephen A. Douglas being, on thethirty-seventh, 151, the Convention, on the 3d of May, adjourned to meetagain at Baltimore, June 18th. 

After re-assembling, and settling contested election cases, thedelegates (in whole or in part) from Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, California, Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland and Massachusetts, withdrew from the Convention, the latter upon the ground mainly thatthere had been "a withdrawal, in part, of a majority of the States, "while Butler, who had voted steadily for Jefferson Davis throughout allthe balloting at Charleston, gave as an additional ground personal tohimself, that "I will not sit in a convention where the African SlaveTrade--which is piracy by the laws of my Country--is approvinglyadvocated"--referring thereby to a speech, that had been much applaudedby the Convention at Charleston, made by a Georgia delegate (Gaulden), in which that delegate had said: "I would ask my friends of the South tocome up in a proper spirit; ask our Northern friends to give us all ourrights, and take off the ruthless restrictions which cut off the supplyof Slaves from foreign lands. * * * I tell you, fellow Democrats, thatthe African Slave Trader is the true Union man (cheers and laughter). Itell you that the Slave Trading of Virginia is more immoral, moreunchristian in every possible point of view, than that African SlaveTrade which goes to Africa and brings a heathen and worthless man here, makes him a useful man, Christianizes him, and sends him and hisposterity down the stream of Time, to enjoy the blessings ofcivilization. (Cheers and laughter. ) * * * I come from the firstCongressional District of Georgia. I represent the African Slave Tradeinterest of that Section. (Applause. ) I am proud of the position Ioccupy in that respect. I believe that the African Slave Trader is atrue missionary, and a true Christian. (Applause. ) * * * Are youprepared to go back to first principles, and take off yourunconstitutional restrictions, and leave this question to be settled byeach State? Now, do this, fellow citizens, and you will have Peace inthe Country. * * * I advocate the repeal of the laws prohibiting theAfrican Slave Trade, because I believe it to be the true Union movement. * * * I believe that by re-opening this Trade and giving us Negroes topopulate the Territories, the equilibrium of the two Sections will bemaintained. "

After the withdrawal of the bolting delegates at Baltimore, theConvention proceeded to ballot for President, and at the end of thesecond ballot, Mr. Douglas having received "two-thirds of all votesgiven in the Convention" (183) was declared the "regular nominee of theDemocratic Party, for the office of President of the United States. "

An additional resolution was subsequently adopted as a part of theplatform, declaring that "it is in accordance with the trueinterpretation of the Cincinnati platform, that, during the existence ofthe Territorial Governments, the measure of restriction, whatever it maybe, imposed by the Federal Constitution on the power of the TerritorialLegislatures over the subject of the domestic relations, as the same hasbeen, or shall hereafter be, finally determined by the Supreme Court ofthe United States, should be respected by all good citizens, andenforced with promptness and fidelity by every branch of the GeneralGovernment. "

On the 11th of June, pursuant to adjournment, the Democratic Bolters'Convention met at Richmond, and, after adjourning to meet at Baltimore, finally met there on the 28th of that month--twenty-one States being, inwhole or in part, represented. This Convention unanimously readoptedthe Southern-wing platform it had previously adopted at Charleston, and, upon the first ballot, chose, without dissent, John C. Breckinridge ofKentucky, as its candidate for the Presidential office. 

In the meantime, however, the National Conventions of other Parties hadbeen held, viz. : that of the Republican Party at Chicago, which, with asession of three days, May 16-18, had nominated Abraham Lincoln ofIllinois and Hannibal Hamlin of Maine, for President and Vice-Presidentrespectively; and that of the "Constitutional Union" (or NativeAmerican) Party which had severally nominated (May 19) for suchpositions, John Bell of Tennessee, and Edward Everett of Massachusetts. 

The material portion of the Republican National platform, adopted withentire unanimity by their Convention, was, so far as the Slavery andDisunion questions were concerned, comprised in these declarations:

First, That the history of the nation, during the last four years, hasfully established the propriety and necessity of the organization andperpetuation of the Republican Party; and that the causes which calledit into existence are permanent in their nature, and now, more than everbefore, demand its peaceful and Constitutional triumph. 

Second, That the maintenance of the principle, promulgated in theDeclaration of Independence, and embodied in the Federal Constitution, "that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creatorwith certain inalienable rights; that among these are Life, Liberty andthe pursuit of Happiness; that to secure these rights, governments areinstituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of thegoverned, " is essential to the preservation of our Republicaninstitutions; and that the Federal Constitution, the Rights of theStates, and the Union of the States must and shall be preserved. 

Third, That to the Union of the States, this Nation owes itsunprecedented increase in population, its surprising development ofmaterial resources, its rapid augmentation of wealth, its happiness athome, and its honor abroad; and we hold in abhorrence all schemes forDisunion, come from whatever source they may: And we congratulate theCountry that no Republican member of Congress has uttered orcountenanced the threats of Disunion, so often made by Democraticmembers, without rebuke, and with applause, from their politicalassociates; and we denounce those threats of Disunion, in case of apopular overthrow of their ascendancy, as denying the vital principlesof a free Government, and as an avowal of contemplated Treason, which itis the imperative duty of an indignant People, sternly to rebuke andforever silence. 

Fourth, That the maintenance inviolate of the rights of the States, andespecially the right of each State, to order and control its owndomestic institutions according to its own judgment exclusively, isessential to that balance of powers on which the perfection andendurance of our political fabric depend; and we denounce the lawlessinvasion, by armed force, of any State or Territory, no matter underwhat pretext, as among the gravest of crimes. 

Fifth, That the present Democratic Administration has far exceeded ourworst apprehensions, in its measureless subserviency to the exactions ofa Sectional interest, as especially evinced in its desperate exertionsto force the infamous Lecompton Constitution upon the protesting peopleof Kansas; in construing the personal relation between master andservant to involve an unqualified property in persons; in its attemptedenforcement, everywhere, on land and sea, through the intervention ofCongress and of the Federal Courts, of the extreme pretensions of apurely local interest; and in its general and unvarying abuse of thepower intrusted to it by a confiding People. 

* * * * * * *

Seventh, That the new dogma that the Constitution, of its own force, carries Slavery into any or all of the Territories of the United States, is a dangerous political heresy, at variance with the explicitprovisions of that instrument itself, with contemporaneous exposition, and with legislation and judicial precedent; is revolutionary in itstendency and subversive of the peace and harmony of the Country. 

Eighth, That the normal condition of all the territory of the UnitedStates is that of Freedom; that as our Republican fathers, when they hadabolished Slavery in all our National Territory, ordained that "Noperson should be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without dueprocess of law, " it becomes our duty, by legislation, whenever suchlegislation is necessary, to maintain this provision of the Constitutionagainst all attempts to violate it; and we deny the authority ofCongress, of a Territorial Legislature, or of any individuals, to givelegal existence to Slavery in any Territory of the United States. 

Ninth, That we brand the recent re-opening of the African Slave-tradeunder the cover of our National flag, aided by perversions of judicialpower, as a crime against humanity and a burning shame to our Countryand Age; and we call upon Congress to take prompt and efficient measuresfor the total and final suppression of that execrable traffic. 

Tenth, That in the recent vetoes, by their Federal Governors, of theacts of the Legislatures of Kansas and Nebraska, prohibiting Slavery inthose Territories, we find a practical illustration of the boastedDemocratic principle of Non-Intervention and Popular Sovereigntyembodied in the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, and a demonstration of thedeception and fraud involved therein. 

Eleventh, That Kansas should, of right, be immediately admitted as aState, under the Constitution recently formed and adopted by the Houseof Representatives. 

 * * * * * * * * * *

The National platform of the "Constitutional Union" Party, was adopted, unanimously, in these words:

"Whereas, experience has demonstrated that platforms adopted by thepartisan Conventions of the Country have had the effect to mislead anddeceive the People, and at the same time to widen the politicaldivisions of the Country, by the creation and encouragement ofgeographical and Sectional parties; therefore, "Resolved, That it is both the part of patriotism and ofduty to recognize no political principle other than the Constitution ofthe Country, the Union of the States, and the Enforcement of the Laws, and that, as representatives of the Constitutional Union men of theCountry, in National Convention assembled, we hereby pledge ourselves tomaintain, protect, and defend, separately and unitedly, these greatprinciples of public liberty and national safety, against all enemies, at home and abroad; believing that thereby peace may once more berestored to the Country, the rights of the people and of the Statesre-established, and the Government again placed in that condition ofjustice, fraternity, and equality which, under the example andConstitution of our fathers, has solemnly bound every citizen of theUnited States to maintain a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defense, promotethe general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselvesand our posterity. "

Thus, by the last of June, 1860, the four National Parties with theirplatforms and candidates were all in the political field prepared forthe onset. 

Briefly, the attitude of the standard-bearers representing theplatform-principles of their several Parties, was this:

Lincoln, representing the Republicans, held that Slavery is a wrong, tobe tolerated in the States where it exists, but which must be excludedfrom the Territories, which are all normally Free and must be kept Freeby Congressional legislation, if necessary; and that neither Congress, nor the Territorial Legislature, nor any individual, has power to giveto it legal existence in such Territories. 

Breckinridge, representing the Pro-Slavery wing of the Democracy, heldthat Slavery is a right, which, when transplanted from the Slave-Statesinto the Territories, neither Congressional nor Territorial legislationcan destroy or impair, but which, on the contrary, must, when necessary, be protected everywhere by Congress and all other departments of theGovernment. 

Douglas, representing the Anti-Lecompton wing of Democracy, held thatwhether Slavery be right or wrong, the white inhabitants of theTerritories have the sole right to determine whether it shall or shallnot exist within their respective limits, subject to the Constitutionand Supreme Court decisions thereon; and that neither Congress nor anyState, nor any outside persons, must interfere with that right. 

Bell, representing the remaining political elements, held that it wasall wrong to have any principles at all, except "the Constitution of theCountry, the Union of the States, and the Enforcement of the Laws"--aplatform which Horace Greeley well described as "meaning anything ingeneral, and nothing in particular. "

The canvass that ensued was terribly exciting--Douglas alone, of all thePresidential candidates, bravely taking the field, both North and South, in person, in the hope that the magnetism of his personal presence andpowerful intellect might win what, from the start--owing to the adversemachinations, in the Northern States, of the Administration orBreckinridge-Democratic wing--seemed an almost hopeless fight. In theSouth, the Democracy was almost a unit in opposition to Douglas, holding, as they did, that "Douglas Free-Soilism" was "far moredangerous to the South than the election of Lincoln; because it seeks tocreate a Free-Soil Party there; while, if Lincoln triumphs, the resultcannot fail to be a South united in her own defense;" while the old Whigelement of the South was as unitedly for Bell. In the North, theDemocracy were split in twain, three-fourths of them upholding Douglas, and the balance, powerful beyond their numbers in the possession ofFederal Offices, bitterly hostile to him, and anxious to beat him, evenat the expense of securing the election of Lincoln. 

Douglas's fight was that the candidacy and platform of Bell weremeaningless, those of both Lincoln and Breckinridge, Sectional, and thathe alone bore aloft the standard of the entire Union; while, on theother hand, the supporters of Lincoln, his chief antagonist, claimedthat--as the burden of the song from the lips of Douglas men, Bell men, and Breckinridge men alike, was the expression of a "fear that, " in thelanguage of Mr. Seward, "if the people elected Mr. Lincoln to thePresidency, they would wake up and find that they had no Country for himto preside over"--"therefore, all three of the parties opposing Mr. Lincoln were in the same boat, and hence the only true Union party, wasthe party which made no threats of Disunion, to wit, the Republicanparty. "

The October elections of 1860 made it plain that Mr. Lincoln would beelected. South Carolina began to "feel good" over the almost certaintythat the pretext for Secession for which her leaders had been hoping invain for thirty years, was at hand. On the 25th of October, at Augusta, South Carolina, the Governor, the Congressional delegation, and otherleading South Carolinians, met, and decided that in the event of Mr. Lincoln's election, that State would secede. Similar meetings, to thesame end, were also held about the same time, in others of the SouthernStates. On the 5th of November--the day before the Presidentialelection--the Legislature of South Carolina met at the special call ofGovernor Gist, and, having organized, received a Message from theGovernor, in which, after stating that he had convened that Body inorder that they might on the morrow "appoint the number of electors ofPresident and Vice-President to which this State is entitled, " heproceeded to suggest "that the Legislature remain in session, and takesuch action as will prepare the State for any emergency that may arise. "He went on to "earnestly recommend that, in the event of AbrahamLincoln's election to the Presidency, a Convention of the people of thisState be immediately called, to consider and determine for themselvesthe mode and measure of redress, " and, he continued: "I am constrainedto say that the only alternative left, in my judgment, is the Secessionof South Carolina from the Federal Union. The indications from many ofthe Southern States justify the conclusion that the Secession of SouthCarolina will be immediately followed, if not adopted simultaneously, bythem, and ultimately by the entire South. The long-desired cooperationof the other States having similar institutions, for which so many ofour citizens have been waiting, seems to be near at hand; and, if we aretrue to ourselves, will soon be realized. The State has, with greatunanimity declared that she has the right peaceably to Secede, and nopower on earth can rightfully prevent it. "

 [Referring to the Ordinance of Nullification adopted by the people of South Carolina, November 24, 1832, growing out of the Tariff Act of 1832--wherein it was declared that, in the event of the Federal Government undertaking to enforce the provisions of that Act: "The people of this State will thenceforth hold themselves absolved from all further obligation to maintain or preserve their political connection with the people of the other States, and will forthwith proceed to organize a separate government, and do all other acts and things which Sovereign and independent States may of right do. "]

He proceeded to say that "If, in the exercise of arbitrary power, andforgetful of the lessons of history, the Government of the United Statesshould attempt coercion, it will become our solemn duty to meet force byforce"--and promised that the decision of the aforesaid Convention"representing the Sovereignty of the State, and amenable to no earthlytribunal, " should be, by him, "carried out to the letter. " Herecommended the thorough reorganization of the Militia; the arming ofevery man in the State between the ages of eighteen and forty-five; andthe immediate enrollment of ten thousand volunteers officered bythemselves; and concluded with a confident "appeal to the Disposer ofall human events, " in whose keeping the "Cause" was to be entrusted. 

That same evening (November 5), being the eve of the election, atAugusta, South Carolina, in response to a serenade, United StatesSenator Chestnut made a speech of like import, in which, afterpredicting the election of Mr. Lincoln, he said: "Would the South submitto a Black Republican President, and a Black Republican Congress, whichwill claim the right to construe the Constitution of the Country, andadminister the Government in their own hands, not by the law of theinstrument itself, nor by that of the fathers of the Country, nor by thepractices of those who administered seventy years ago, but by rulesdrawn from their own blind consciences and crazy brains? * * * ThePeople now must choose whether they would be governed by enemies, orgovern themselves. "

He declared that the Secession of South Carolina was an "undoubtedright, " a "duty, " and their "only safety" and as to himself, he would"unfurl the Palmetto flag, fling it to the breeze, and, with the spiritof a brave man, live and die as became" his "glorious ancestors, andring the clarion notes of defiance in the ears of an insolent foe!"

So also, in Columbia, South Carolina, Representative Boyce of thatState, and other prominent politicians, harangued an enthusiastic crowdthat night--Mr. Boyce declaring: "I think the only policy for us is toarm, as soon as we receive authentic intelligence of the election ofLincoln. It is for South Carolina, in the quickest manner, and by themost direct means, to withdraw from the Union. Then we will not submit, whether the other Southern States will act with us or with our enemies. They cannot take sides with our enemies; they must take sides with us. When an ancient philosopher wished to inaugurate a great revolution, hismotto was to dare! to dare!"