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plated, no hint was added that the Nebraska | I am willing now that the question shall be taken, region was opened thereby to Slavery. whether we will proceed to the consideration of the bill or not.

Several petitions for the organization of a Territory westward of Missouri and Iowa were presented at the session of 1851-2, but no decisive action taken thereon, until the next session, when,

Dec. 13th.-Mr. W. P. Hall, of Mo., pursuant to notice, submitted to the House a bill to organize the Territory of Platte, which was read twice, and sent to the Committee on Territories. From that Committee,

Feb. 2d, 1853.-Mr. W. A. Richardson, of Ill., reported a bill to organize the Territory of Nebraska, which was read twice and committed.

Feb. 9th. The bill was ordered to be taken out of Committee, on motion of W. P. Hall,

Feb. 10th.-The bill was reported from the Committee of the Whole to the House, with a recommendation that it do not pass.

Mr. Richardson moved the previous question, which prevailed.

Mr. Letcher, of Va., moved that the bill do lie on the table. Lost: Yeas, 49 (mainly Southern); Nays, 107.

The bill was then engrossed, read a third time, and passed. Yeas, 98; Nays, 43, (as before.)

Feb. 11th. The bill reached the Senate and was referred to the Committee on Territories.

Feb. 17th.-Mr. Douglas reported it without amendment.

March 2d.-(Last day but one of the session), Mr. Douglas moved that the bill be taken up Lost: Yeas, 20; (all Northern but Atchison and Geyer, of Mo.;) Nays, 25; (21 Southern, 4 Northern.)

March 3rd-Mr. Douglas again moved that the bill be taken up.

Mr. Borland, of Ark., moved that it do lie on the table, Carried: Yeas, 23; (all Southern but 4;) Nays, 17; (all Northern but Atchison and Geyer.) So the bill was put to sleep for the session.

On the motion to take up--Mr. Rusk of Texas objecting-Mr. Atchison said:

I must ask the indulgence of the Senate to say one word in relation to this matter. Perhaps there is not a State in the Union more deeply interested in this question than the State of Missouri. If not the largest, I will say the best, portion of that Territory, perhaps the only portion of it that in half a century will become a State, lies immediately west of the State of Missouri. It is only a question of time, whether we will organize the Territory at this session of Congress, or whether we will do it at the next session; and, for my own part, I acknowledge now that, as the Senator from Illinois well knows, when I came to this city, at the beginning of the last session, I was perhaps as much opposed to the proposition, as the Senator from Texas now is. The Senator from Iowa knows it; and it was for reasons which I will not now mention or suggest. But, sir, I have from reflection and investigation in my own mind, and from the opinions of others-my constituents, whose opinions I am bound to respect-come to the conclusion that now is the time for the organization of this Territory. It is the most propitious time. The treaties with the various Indian tribes, the titles to whose possessions must be extinguished, can better be made now than at any future time; for, as the question is agitated, and as it is understood, white men, speculators, will interpose, and interfere, and the longer it is postponed the more we will have to fear from them, and the more difficult it will be to extinguish the Indian title in that country, and the harder the terms to be imposed. Therefore, Mr. President, for this reason, without going into detail,

The meaning is here diplomatically veiled, yet is perfectly plain. Gen. Atchison had been averse to organizing this Territory until he could procure a relaxation of the Missouri Rehope of this, he was willing to waive the point, striction as to Slavery; but, seeing no present and assent to an organization under a bill silent with respect to Slavery, and of course leaving the Missouri Restriction unimpaired.

Gen. Pierce was inaugurated President on the 4th March, 1853.

The XXXIIId Congress assembled at Washington, Dec. 5th, 1853, with a large Adminis tration majority in either House. Linn Boyd of Ky., was chosen Speaker of the House. The President's Annual Message contained the following allusion to the subject of Slavery:

It is no part of my purpose to give prominence to any subject which may properly be regarded as set at rest by the deliberate judgment of the people. But, while the present is bright with promise, and the future full of de

mand and inducements for the exercise of active intelligence, the past can never be without useful lessons of admonition and instruction. If its dangers serve not as beacons, they will evidently fail to fulfill the object of a wise design. When the grave shall have closed over all, who are now endeavoring to meet the obligations of duty, the year 1850 will be recurred to as a period filled with anxious apprehension. A successful war had just terminated. Peace brought with it a vast augmentation of territory. Disturbing questions arose, bearing upon the domestic institutions of one portion of the confederacy, and involving the constitutional rights of the States, But, notwithstanding differences of opinion and sentiment

which then existed in relation to details, and specific provisions, the acquiescence of distinguished citizens, whose devotion to the Union can never be doubted, has given renewed vigor to our institutions, and restored a sense of repose and security to the public mind throughout the confederacy. That this repose is to suffer no shock during my official term, if I have power to avert it, those who placed me here may be assured.

Dec. 15.-Mr. A. C. Dodge of Iowa submitted to the Senate a bill (No. 22) "To organize the Territory of Nebraska," which was read twice, and referred to the Committee on Territories.

Jan. 4.-Mr. Douglas, from said Committee, reported said bill with amendments, which were printed. He said in his Report:

The principal amendments which your committee deem it their duty to commend to the favorable action of the Senate, in a special report, are those in which the principles established by the Compromise Measures of 1850, so far as they are applicable to territorial organiza. tions, are proposed to be affirmed, and carried into practical operation within the limits of the new Territory.

With a view of conforming their action to what they regard as the settled policy of the Government, sanetioned by the approving voice of the American People, your Committee have deemed it their duty to incorporate and perpetuate, in their territorial bill, the principles and spirit of those measures. If any other consideration were necessary to render the propriety of this course imperative upon the Committee, they may be found in the fact that the Nebraska country occupies the same relative position to the Slavery question, as did New Mexico and Utah, when those Territories were organized, It was a disputed point, whether Slavery was prohibited by law in the country acquired from Mexico. On the one hand, it was contended, as a legal proposition, that Slavery having been prohibited by the enactments of Mexico, according to the laws of nations, we received the country with all its local laws and domestic institutions attached to the soil, so far as they did not conflict with the Constitution of the United States; and that a law either protecting or prohibiting Slavery, was not repugnant to that instrument, as was evidenced by the fact that one-half of the States of the Union tolerated

while the other half prohibited, the institution of Slavery. On the other hand, it was insisted that, by virtue of the Constitution of the United States, every citizen had a right to remove to any Territory of the Union, and carry his property with him under the protection of law, whether that property consisted of persons or things. The difficulties arising from this diversity of opinion were greatly aggravated by the fact that there were many persons on both sides of the legal controversy, who were unwilling to abide the decision of the courts on the legal matters in dispute; thus, among those who claimed that the Mexican laws were still in force, and, consequently, that Slavery was already prohibited in those Territories by valid enactments, there were many who insisted upon Congress making the matter certain, by enacting another prohibition. In like manner, some of those who argued that Mexican law had ceased to have any binding force, and that the Constitution tolerated and protected Slave property in those Territories, were unwilling to trust the decision of the courts upon the point, and insisted that Congress should, by direct enactment, remove all legal obstacles to the introduction of Slaves into those Territories.

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Your Committee deem it fortunate for the peace of the country, and the security of the Union, that the controversy then resulted in the adoption of the Con.promise Measures, which the two great political parties, with singular unanimity, have affirmed as a cardinal article of their faith, and proclaimed to the world as a final settlement of the controversy and an end of the agitation. A due respect, therefore, for the avowed opinions of Senators, as well as a proper sense of patriotic duty, enjoins upon your Committee the propriety and necessity of a strict adherence to the principles, and even a literal adoption of the enactments of that adjust ment, in all their territorial bills, so far as the same are not locally inapplicable. These enactments embrace, among other things, less material to the matters under consideration, the following provisions:

When admitted as a State, the said Territory, or any portion of the same, shall be received into the Union, with or without Slavery, as their constitution may prescribe at the time of their admission;

That the legislative power and authority of said Territory shall be vested in the Governor and a Legislative Assembly.

That the Legislative power of said Territory shall extend to all rightful subjects of legislation, consistent with the Constitution of the United States, and the provisions of this act; but no law shall be passed interfering with the primary disposal of the soil; no tax shall be imposed upon the property of the United States; nor shall the lands or other property of non-residents be taxed higher than the lands or other property of residents.

Jan. 24.-The bill thus reported was considered in Committee of the Whole and postponed to Monday next, when it was made the order of the day.

The bill was further considered Jan. 31st, Feb. 3d, Feb. 5th, and Feb. 6th, when an amendment reported by Mr. Douglas, declaring the Missouri Restriction on Slavery "inoperative and void," being under consideration, Mr. Chase, of Ohio, moved to strike out the assertion that said Restriction

"was superseded by the principles of the legislation of 1850, commonly called the Compromise Measures."

This motion was defeated by Yeas, 13; Nays, 30.

Feb. 15.-The bill having been discussed daily until now, Mr. Douglas moved to strike out of his amendment the words above quoted (which the Senate had refused to strike out on Mr. Chase's motion,) and insert instead the following:

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[NOTE.-Prior to this move of Mr. Douglas, Mr. Dixon, (Whig) of Kentucky, had moved to insert a clause directly and plainly repealing the Missouri Restriction. Mr. Dixon thought if that was the object, (and he was in favor of it,) it should be approached in a direct and manly way. He was assailed for this in The Union newspaper next morning; but his suggestion was substantially adopted by Douglas, after a brief hesitation. Mr. Dixon's proposition, having been made in Committee, does not appear in the journal of the Senate, or it would here be given in terms.]

The bill was further discussed daily until March 2nd, when the vote was taken on Mr. Chase's amendment, to add to Sec. 14 the following words:

Under which the people of the Territory, through their appropriate representatives, may, if they ses fit, prohibit the existence of Slavery thereinwhich was rejected: Yeas, 10; Nays, 36, as follows:

Yeas For Mr. Chase's amendment : Messrs. Chase,

Dodge, of Wisc., Fessenden,

Fish, Foot,

Hamlin,

Seward,

Smith,

Sumner,

Wade-10.

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Mr. Badger, of N. C., moved to add to the aforesaid section:

Which being inconsistent with the principle of Non-Intervention by Congress with Slavery in the States and Ponilel, That nothing herein contained shall b Territories, as recognized by the legislation of 1850, (com-construed to revive or put in force any law o regumonly calle i the Compromise Measures,) is hereby declared lation which may have existed prior to the act of 6th inoperative and void; it being the true intent and mean- of March, 1820, either protecting, establishing, proIng of this act not to legislate Slavery into any Territory or hibiting, or abolishing Slavery. State, nor to exclude it therefrom, but to leave the people thereof perfectly free to form and regulate their domestic

Carried: Yeas, 35; Nays, 6.

Mr. Clayton now moved to strike out so much

Institutions in their own way, subject only to the Constitu- of said Douglas amendment as permits emigrants

tion of the United States

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Slidell 23.

Dixon,
Evans,
Fitzpatrick,

Houston,

Hunter,

Johnson,

Jones, of Tenn.,
Mason,
Morton,
Pratt,
Sebastian,

Nays Against Clayton's amendment:

Messrs. Chase,

Norris,

Dodge, of Wisc.,

Pettit,

Dodge, of Iowa,

Seward,

Douglas,

Shields,

Fessenden,

Smith,

Fish,

Stuart,

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teen at the first, it will be fortunate if, among the ills and accidents which surround us, we shall maintain that num

ber to the end.

We are on the eve of the consummation of a great national transaction-a transaction which will close a cycle in the history of our country-and it is impossible not to desire to pause a moment and survey the scene around us, and the prospect before us. However obscure we may individually be, our connection with this great transaction will perpetuate our names for the praise or for the censure of future ages, and perhaps in regions far remote. If, then, we had no other motive for our actions than but that of the honest desire for a just fame, we could not be indifferent to that scene and that prospect. But individual interests and ambition sink into insignificance in view of the interests of our country and of mankind. These interests awaken, at least in me, an intense solicitude.

It was said by some in the beginning, and it has been said by others later in this debate, that it was doubtful whether it would be the cause of Slavery or the cause of Freedom that would gain advantages from the passage of this bill. I do not find it necessary to be censorious, nor even unjust to others, in order that my own course may be approved. I am sure that the honorable Senator from Illinois [Mr. Douglas] did not mean that the Slave States should gain an advantage over the Free States; for he disclaimed it when he introduced the bill. I believe in all candor, that the honorable Senator from Georgia, [Mr. Toombs,] who comes out at the close of the battle as one of the chiefest leaders of the victorious party, is sincere in declaring his own opinion that the Slave States will gain Mr. Chase moved to amend, by providing for no unjust advantage over the Free States, because he disthe appointment of three Commissioners resid- claims it as a triumph in their behalf. Notwithstanding all this, however, what has occurred here and in the ing in the Territory to organize the Territory, country, during this contest, has compelled a conviction divide it into election districts, notify an election that Slavery will gain something, and Freedom will endure on the first Monday in September then ensuing, a severe, though I hope not an irretrievable, loss. The etc, at which election the people should choose and satisfied with the prospective boon; and the Free slaveholding States are passive, quiet, and content, their own Governor, as well as a Territorial Legis-States are excited and alarmed with fearful forebodings lature-the Governor to serve for two years, and the Legislature to meet not later than May, 1855. This extension of the principle of "Squatter Sovereignty" was defeated-Yeas, 10; Nays, 30. Mr. Douglas's amendment was then agreed to, and the bill reported from the Committee of the Whole to the Senate.

The question on the engrossment of the bill was now reached, and it was carried: Yeas, 29; Nays, 12.

March 3.-The rule assigning Fridays for the consideration of private bills having been suspended, on motion of Mr. Badger, the Senate proceeded to put the Nebraska-Kansas bill on its final passage, when a long and earnest debate ensued. At a late hour of the night Mr. Seward, of New York, addressed the Senate, in opposition to the bill, as follows:

MR. PRESIDENT: I rise with no purpose of further resisting or even delaying the passage of this bill. Let its advocates have only a little patience, and they will soon reach the object for which they have struggled so earnestly and so long. The sun has set for the last time upon the guaranteed and certain liberties of all the unsettled and unorganized portions of the American continent that lie within the jurisdiction of the United States. To-morrow's sun will rise in dim eclipse over them. How long that obscuration shall last, is known only to the Power that directs and controls all human events. For myself, I know only this that now no human power will prevent its coming on, and that its passing off will be hastened and secured by others than those now here, and perhaps by only those belonging to future generations.

Sir, it would be almost factious to offer further resistance to this measure here. Indeed, successful resistance was never expected to be made in this Hall. The Senatefloor is an old battle-ground, on which have been fought many contests, and always, at least since 1820, with fortune adverse to the cause of equal and universal freedom. We were only a few here who engaged in that cause in the beginning of this contest. All that we could hope to do -all that we did hope to do-was to organize and prepare the issue for the House of Representatives, to which the country would look for its decision as authoritative, and to awaken the country that it might be ready for the appeal which would be made, whatever the decision of Congress might be. We are no stronger now. Only four

and apprehensions. The impatience for the speedy pasknowledge that this is the condition of public sentiment in sage of the bill, manifested by its friends, betrays a the Free States. They thought in the beginning that it was necessary to guard the measure by inserting the foreign inhabitants of the Territories from the right of Clayton amendment, which would exclude unnaturalized suffrage. And now they seem willing, with almost perfect unanimity, to relinquish that safeguard, rather than to delay the adoption of the principal measure for at most a year, perhaps for only a week or a day. Suppose that the Senate should adhere to that condition, which so lately was thought so wise and so important-what then? The bill could only go back to the House of Representatives, which must either yield or insist! In the one case or in the other, a decision in favor of the bill would be secured; for even if the House should disagree, the Senate would have time to recede. But the majority will hazard nothing, even on a prospect so certain as this. They will recede at once, without a moment's further struggle, from the condition, and thus secure the passage of this bill now, to-night. Why such haste? Even if the question were to go to the country before a final decision here, what would there be wrong in that? There is no man living who will say that the country anticipated, or that he anticipated, the agitation of this measure in Congress, when this Congress was elected, or even when it assembled in December last.

Under such circumstances, and in the midst of agitation, and excitement, and debates, it is only fair to say, that certainly the country has not decided in favor of the bill. The refusal, then, to let the question go to the country, is a conclusive proof that the Slave States, as represented here, expect from the passage of this bill what the Free States insist that they will lose by it-an advantage, a material advantage, and not a mere abstraction. There are men in the Slave States, as in the Free States, who insist always too pertinaciously upon mere abstractions. But that is not the policy of the Slave States to-day. They are in earnest in seeking for, and securing, an object, and an important one. I believe they are going to have it. I do not know how long the advantage gained will last, nor how great or comprehensive it will be. Every Senator who agrees with me in opinion must feel as I do that under such circumstances he can forego nothing that can be done decently, with due respect to difference of opinion, and consistently with the constitutional and settled rules of legislation, to place the true merits of the question before the country. Questions sometimes occur which seem to have two right sides. Such were the questions that divided the English nation between Pitt and Fox-such the contest between the assailant and the defender of Quebec. The judgment of the world was suspended by its sympa

thies, and seemed ready to descend in favor of him who should be most gallant in conduct. And so, when both fell with equal chivalry on the same field, the survivors united in raising a common monument to the glorious but rival memories of Wolfe and Montcalm. But this contest involves a moral question. The Slave States so present it. They maintain that African Slavery is not erroneous, not unjust, not inconsistent with the advancing cause of human nature. Since they so regard it, I do not expect to see statesmen representing those States indifferent about a vindication of this system by the Congress of the United States. On the other hand, we of the Free States regard Slavery as erroneous, unjust, oppressive, and therefore absolutely inconsistent with the principles of the American Constitution and Government. Who will expect us to be indifferent to the decisions of the American people and of mankind on such an issue?

Sir, I am surprised at the pertinacity with which the honorable Senator from Delaware, mine ancient and honorable friend, [Mr. Clayton,] perseveres in opposing the granting of the right of suffrage to the unnaturalized foreigner in the Territories. Congress cannot deny him that right. Here is the third article of that convention by which Louisiana, including Kansas and Nebraska, was ceded to the United States:

"The inhabitants of the ceded territory shall be incorporated in the Union of the United States, and admitted as soon as possible, according to the principles of the Federal Constitution, to the enjoyment of the rights, privileges, and immunities of the citizens of the United States; and in the meantime they shall be maintained and protected in the free enjoyment of their liberty, property, and the religion they profess."

The inhabitants of Kansas and Nebraska are citizens already, and by force of this treaty must continue to be, and as such to enjoy the right of suffrage, whatever laws you make to the contrary. My opinions are well known, to wit: That Slavery is not only an evil, but a local one, injurious and ultimately pernicious to society, wherever it exists, and in conflict with the constitutional principles of society in this country. I am not willing to extend nor to permit the extension of that local evil into regions now free within our empire. I know that there are some who differ from me, and who regard the Constitution of the United States as an instrument which sanctions Slavery as well as Freedom. But if I could admit a proposition so incongruous with the letter and spirit of the Federal Constitution, and the known sentiments of its illustrious founders, and so should conclude that Slavery was national, I must still cherish the opinion that it is an evil; and because it is a national one, I am the more firmly held and bound to prevent an increase of it, tending, as I think it manifestly does, to the weakening and ultimate overthrow of the Constitution itself, and therefore to the injury of all mankind. I know there have been States which have endured long, and achieved much, which tolerated Slavery; but that was not the slavery of caste, like African Slavery. Such Slavery tends to demoralize equally the subjected race and the superior one. It has been the absence of such Slavery from Europe that has given her nations their superiority over other countries in that hemisphere. Slavery, wherever it exists, begets fear, and fear is the parent of weakness. What is the secret of that eternal, sleepless anxiety in the legislative halls, and even at the firesides of the Slave States, always asking new stipulations, new compromises and abrogation of compromises, new assumptions of power and abnegations of power, but fear? It is the apprehension, that, even if safe now, they will not always or long be secure against some invasion or some aggression from the Free States. What is the secret of the humiliating part which proud old Spain is acting at this day, trembling between alarms of American intrusion into Cuba on one side, and British dictation on the other, but the fact that she has cherished Slavery so long and still cherishes it, in the last of her American colonial possessions? Thus far Kansas and Nebraska are safe, under the laws of 1820, against the introduction of this element of national debility and decline. The bill before us, as we are assured, contains a great principle, a glorious principle; and yet that principle, when fully ascertained, proves to be nothing less than the subversion of that security not only within the Territories of Kansas and Nebraska, but within all the other present and future Territories of the United States. Thus it is quite clear that it is not a principle alone that is involved, but that Chose who crowd this measure with so much zeal and earnestness must expect that either Freedom or Slavery shall gain something by it in those regions. The case, then, stands thus in Kansas and Nebraska: Freedom may lose, but certainly can gain nothing; while Slavery may gain, but as certainly can lose nothing.

So far as I am concerned, the time for looking on the

dark side has passed. I feel quite sure that Slavery at
most can get nothing more than Kansas; while Nebras
ka-the wider northern region-will, under existing
circumstances, escape, for the reason that its soil and
climate are uncongenial with the staples of slave culture
I rice, sugar, cotton, and tobacco. Moreover, since the
public attention has been so well and so effectually
directed toward the subject, I cherish a hope that
Slavery may be prevented even from gaining a foothold
in Kansas. Congress only gives consent, but it does not
and cannot introduce Slavery there. Slavery will be
embarrassed by its own overgrasping spir.t. No one, I
am sure, anticipates the possible reestablishment of the
African Slave-trade. The tide of emigration to Kansas
is therefore to be supplied there solely by the domestic
fountain of slave production. But Slavery has also other
regions besides Kansas to be filled from that fountain.
There are all of New Mexico and all of Utah already
within the United States; and then there is Cuba, that
consumes slave labor and life as fast as any one of the
slaveholding States can supply it; and besides these
regions, there remains all of Mexico down to the
Isthmus. The stream of slave labor flowing from so
small a fountain, and broken into several divergent
channels will not cover so great a field; and it is rea-
sonably to be hoped that the part of it nearest to the
North Pole will be the last to be inundated. But African
slave emigration is to compete with free emigration of
white men, and the source of this latter tide is as ample
as the civilization of the two entire continents. The
honorable Senator from Delaware mentioned, as if it
were a startling fact, that twenty thousand European
immigrants arrived in New-York in one month. Sir, he
has stated the fact with too much moderation. On my
return to the capital a day or two ago, I met twelve
thousand of these emigrants who had arrived in New-
York on one morning, and who had thronged the
churches on the following Sabbath, to return thanks for
deliverance from the perils of the sea, and for their arrival
in the land, not of Slavery but of Liberty. I also thank
God for their escape, and for their coming. They are
now on their way westward, and the news of the passage
of this bill, preceding them, will speed many of them
toward Kansas and Nebraska. Such arrivals are not
extraordinary-they occur almost every week; and the
immigration from Germany, from Great Britain, and
from Norway, and from Sweden, during the European
war, will rise to six or seven hundred thousand souls in
a year. And with this tide is to be mingled one rapidly
swelling from Asia and from the islands of the South
Seas. All the immigrants under this bill. as the House
of Representatives overruling you have ordered, will be
good, loyal, Liberty-loving, Slavery-fearing citizens.
Come on, then, gentlemen of the Slave States. Since
there is no escaping your challenge, I accept it in behalf
of the cause of Freedom. We will engage in competition
for the virgin soil of Kansas, and God give the victory
to the side which is stronger in numbers as it is in right.

There are, however, earnest advocates of this bill, who do not expect, and who, I suppose, do not desire, that Slavery shall gain possession of Nebraska. What do they expect to gain? The honorable Senator from Indiana (Mr. Pettit) says that by thus obliterating the Missouri Compromise restriction, they will gain a tabula rasa, on which the inhabitants of Kansas and Nebraska may write whatever they will. This is the great principle of the bill, as he understands it. Well, what gain is there in that? You obliterate a Constitution of Freedom. If they write a new constitution of freedom, can the new be better than the old? If they write a Constitution of Slavery, will it not be a worse one? I ask the honorable Senator that. But the honorable Senator says that the people of Nebraska will have the privilege of establishing institutions for themselves. They have now the privilege of establishing free institutions. Is it a privilege, then, to establish Slavery? If so, what a mockery are all our Constitutions, which prevent the inhabitants from capriciously subverting free institutions and establishing institutions of Slavery! Sir, it is a sophism, a subtlety, to talk of conferring upon a country, already secure in the blessings of Freedom, the power of self-destruction.

What mankind everywhere want, is not the removal of the Constitutions of Freedom which they have, that they may make at their pleasure Constitutions of slavery or of Freedom, but the privilege of retaining Constitutions of Freedom when they already have them, and the removal of Constitutions of Slavery when they have them, that they may establish Constitutions of Freedom in their place. We hold on tenaciously to all existing Constitutions of Freedom. Who denounces any man for diligently adhering to such Constitutions? Who would dare to denounce any one for disloyalty to our existing Constitutions, if they we. e Constitutions of Despotism and

Slavery? But it is supposed by some that this principle is less important in regard to Kansas and Nebraska than as a general one-a general principle applicable to all other present and future Territories of the United States. Do honorable Senators then indeed suppose they are establishing a principle at all? If so, I think they egregiously err, whether the principle is either good or bad, right or wrong. They are not establishing it, and cannot establish it in this way. You subvert one law capriciously, by making another law in its place. That is all. Will your law have any more weight, authority, solemnity, or binding force on future Congresses, than the first had? You abrogate the law of your predecessors-others will have equal power and equal liberty to abrogate yours. You allow no barriers around the old law, to protect it from abrogation. You erect none around your new law, to stay the hand of future innova

tors.

Sir, in saying that your new principle will not be established by this bill, I reason from obvious, clear, well settled principles of human nature. Slavery and Freedom are antagonistical elements in this country. The founders of the Constitution framed it with a knowledge of that antagonism, and suffered it to continue, that it might work out its own ends. There is a commercial antagonism, an irreconcilable one, between the systems of f.ee labor and slave labor. They have been at war

with each other ever since the Government was estabLshed, and that war is to continue forever. The contest, when it ripens between these two antagonistic elements, is to be settled somewhere; it is to be settled in the seat of central power, in the Federal Legislature. The Constitution makes it the duty of the central Government to determine questions, as often as they shall arise, in favor of one or the other party, and refers the decision of them to the majority of the votes in the two Houses of Congress. It will come back here, then, in spite of all the efforts to escape from it.

This antagonism must end either in a separation of the antagonistic parties-the Slaveholding States and the Free States-or, secondly, in the complete establishment of the influence of the Slave power over the Free-or else, on the other hand, in the establishment of the superior influence of Freedom over the interests of Slavery. It will not be terminated by a voluntary secession of either party. Commercial interests bind the Slave States and the Free States together in links of gold that are riveted with iron, and they cannot be broken by passion or by ambition. Either party will submit to the ascendency of the other, rather than yield the commercial advantages of this Union. Political ties bind the Union together-a common necessity, and not me.ely

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common necessity, but the common interests of empire of such empire as the world has never before seen. The control of the national power is the control of the great Western Continent; and the control of this continent is to be, in a very few years, the controlling influence in the world. Who is there, North, that hates Slavery so much, or who, South, that hates emancipation so intensely, that he can attempt, with any hope of success, to break a Union thus forged and welded together? I have always heard, with equal pity and disgust, threats of disunion in the Free States, and similar threats in the Slaveholding States. I know that men may rave in the heat of passion, and under great political excitement; but I know that when it comes to a question whether this Union shall stand, either with Freedom or with Slavery, the masses will uphold it, and it will tand until some inherent vice in its Constitution, not yet lisclosed, shall cause its dissolution. Now, entertaining hese opinions, there are for me only two alternatives, viz. either to let Slavery gain unlimited sway, or so to exert what little power and influence I may have, as to secure, if I can, the ultimate predominance of Freedom.

Sir, I have always said that I should not despond, even if this fearful measure should be effected: nor do I

now despond. Although, reasoning from my present convictions, I should not have voted for the compromise of 1520, I have labored, in the ve y spirit of those who established it, to save the landmark of Freedom which it assigned. I have not spoken irreve. ently even of the comp.omise of 1850, which, as all men know, I opposed earnestly and with diligence. Nevertheless, I have always prefer ed the compromises of the Constitution, and have wanted no others. I feared all others. This was a leading principle of the great statesman of the South, (Mr. Calhoun). Said he:

States. It is a firm and stable ground, on which we can totter stand in opposition to fanaticism than on the shifting sands of compromise. Let us be done with compromises. Let us go back and stand upon the Constitution."

I stood upon this ground in 1850, defending Freedom upon it as Mr. Calhoun did in defending Slavery. I was overruled then, and I have waited since without proposing to abrogate any compromises.

It has been no proposition of mine to abrogate them now; but the proposition has come from another quarter-from an adverse one. It is about to prevail. The shifting sands of compromise are passing from under my feet, and they are now, without agency of my own, taking hold again on the rock of the Constitution. It shall be no fault of mine if they do not remain firm. This seems to me auspicious of better days and wiser legislation. Through all the darkness and gloom of the present hour, bright stars are breaking, that inspire me with They show that hope, and excite me to perseverance. the day of compromises has past forever, and that henceforward all great questions between Freedom and Slavery legitimately coming here-and none other can come-shall be decided, as they ought to be, upon their merits, by a fair exercise of legislative power, and not by bargains of equivocal prudence, if not of doubtful morality.

Mr. Douglas closed the debate, reiterating and enforcing the views set forth in his Report already referred to; and at last the vote was taken, and the bill passed: Yeas, 37; Nays, 14; as follows:

Yeas-For the Kansas-Nebraska bill:
Messrs. Adams,
Hunter,
Atchison,
Johnson,
Badger,

Bayard,

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Jones, of Iowa,
Jones, of Tenn.,
Mason,

Morton,

Norris,

Pettit,

Pratt,

Clay, of Ala.,
Dawson,
Dixon,

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Williams-37.

Nays-Against the said bill:

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So the bill was passed, and its title declared to be "An Act to organize the Territories of Nebraska and Kansas," and the Senate adjourned over to the Tuesday following.

In the House, a bill to organize the Territory of Nebraska had been noticed on the first day of the session, by Mr. John G. Miller, of Mo., who introduced it December 22d.

Jan. 24th.-Mr. Giddings gave notice of a bill to organize said Territory.

Jan. 30.-Mr. Pringle, of N Y., endeavored to have the bill passed at the last session (leaving the Missouri Restriction intact), reported by the Committee on Territories; but debate arose, and his resolution lay over.

Jan. 31.-Mr. Richardson, of Ill., chairman of the Committee on Territories, reported a bill "To organize the Territories of Nebraska and Kansas," which was read twice and committed.

"I see my way in the Constitution; I cannot in a compromise. A compromise is but an act of Congress. It may be Mr. Richardson's bill was substantially Mr. overruled at any time. It gives us no security. But the Consti- Douglas's last bill, and was accompanied by no tudio is stable. It is a rock on which we can stand, and on which we can meet our friends from the non-slaveholding report. Mr. English, of Ind., submitted the

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