History of the Compromise Measures of 1850--Cessation of the Agitation in
Congress--The Fugitive Slave Law in the North--Repeal of the Missouri
Compromise--Narrative of the Difficulties in Kansas--Disunion Convention
in Massachusetts.
The next important move upon the political chessboard with reference to
slavery preceded the adoption of the celebrated measures familiarly known
by the above title, or as the "Omnibus Bill of 1850." The events which led
to this measure may be briefly stated thus:--
Ever since 1848, a storm had been lowering in the political horizon of the
country on the slavery question, threatening to dissolve the Union, which
necessarily burst over Congress in Legislating for the new Territories
brought into the Union by the result of the Mexican war. Probably no
subject has been presented since the adoption of the federal constitution
involving questions of such deep and vital importance to the inhabitants
of the different States of the confederacy as that in reference to the
territory thus acquired. Not only was the sentiment avowed of the
existence of danger to the Union, but in various quarters was heard an
open and undisguised declaration of a necessity and desire for its
dissolution. General Taylor was elected, a new administration came into
power, and being somewhat identified with the Northern anti-slavery
elements, as opposed to the Democratic party, a tremendous agitation was
at once created, and the whole question of slavery thrown again into the
crucible.
The Thirtieth Congress had adjourned without organizing the new
Territories, or settling any great principle as to their future government
and destiny. California had gone forth without asking leave, formed a
State government prohibiting slavery, and put its machinery in operation.
Utah was governed by a high and arbitrary spiritual despotism, and New
Mexico was under military rule, ordered from the seat of federal power at
Washington. In addition to this, it was discovered that Mexico had
abolished slavery, and consequently that the _lex loci_ of all the
countries ceded by Mexico to the United States excluded slavery. The
Wilmot Proviso had been carried in the House, but failed in the Senate,
and waited only for the admission of California, which would give sixteen
free States against fifteen slave States.
Of course the whole South rose in arms against the consequences of this
disappointment. They would not admit California; they declared that
slavery did exist in the territories acquired from Mexico; that in any
case the Constitution of the United States would carry it there and
protect it there; and that they would dissolve the Union if the Wilmot
Proviso became a law.
In this state of affairs, Henry Clay, on the 29th of January, brought
forward in the Senate his famous resolutions of compromise, and laid the
basis of an adjustment which might have lasted till this day but for the
repeal of the Missouri Compromise in 1854. Subsequently, a Committee of
Thirteen was appointed by the Senate, charged with the duty of considering
all the subjects, of which Mr. Clay was appointed chairman. On the 8th of
May, 1850, this committee reported a series of measures, differing but
inconsiderably from the original resolutions of Mr. Clay. These were:--
1. The admission of California as a free State, according to the
expression of the will of her people.
2. The establishment of Territorial governments, without the Wilmot
Proviso, for New Mexico and Utah, embracing all the territory recently
acquired by the United States from Mexico, not contained in the boundaries
of California. The question of slavery was left without any other
restriction than the will of the people.
3. The establishment of the western and northern boundary of Texas, and
the exclusion from her jurisdiction of all New Mexico, with the grant to
Texas of a pecuniary equivalent.
4. More effectual enactments for the recovery of fugitive slaves.
5. Abstaining from abolishing slavery, but under a heavy penalty
prohibiting the slave trade, in the District of Columbia.
Separate bills were drawn embodying all the main features of this
compromise, and eight months having been consumed in their discussion, the
two houses were at last brought to a vote on each bill by itself.
The Utah Territorial Bill passed the Senate, August 10, 1850, by a vote of
yeas 32, nays 18.
The Texas Boundary Bill passed the Senate, August 10, 1850, by a vote of
yeas 30, nays 20.
The bill for the admission of California passed the Senate, August 13,
1850, by a vote of 34 to 18.
The New Mexico Bill passed the Senate, August 14, 1850, by a vote of 27 to
10.
The Fugitive Slave Bill passed the Senate on the 23d of August, 1850, by a
vote of 27 to 12.
The bill abolishing the slave trade in the District of Columbia passed the
Senate, September 14, 1850, by a vote of 33 to 19.
In the House, the vote on the several bills was:--
New Mexico and Texas boundary, Sept. 6, 1850, yeas 180, nays 97.
Admission of California, Sept. 7, 1850, yeas 150, nays 53.
Utah Bill, Sept. 7, 1850, yeas 97, nays 85.
Fugitive Slave Bill, Sept. 12, 1850, yeas 109, nays 76.
Slave trade in the District of Columbia, Sept. 17, 1850, yeas 124,
nays 59.
Out of Congress the abolitionists were aroused almost to a pitch of frenzy
by the passage of the Compromise measures and the Fugitive Slave Law.
Addresses were immediately issued by thousands, which were freely
circulated in all the Northern States, counseling resistance to the law
under every circumstance. Conventions were held of whites and negroes, in
which was proclaimed death to every slaveholder who attempted to carry out
the provisions of the infamous enactment. The tide of runaway slaves from
the South, which had been flowing for so many years, swelled into a flood.
Where one slave formerly made a successful escape, scores made good their
flight now. New England became the goal of the fugitives, and here they
found friends without number, who furnished them with the means of
extending their journey to the Canadian provinces.
One of the first and most successful attempts to resist the Fugitive Slave
Law was in Boston, in April, 1851, when one Thomas Sims, who had escaped
from Georgia, was taken in custody by the city authorities, on a warrant
issued by the United States Commissioner. A mob was the result. The
military was called out, and for several days the most intense excitement
ensued. The law finally triumphed, however, and amid the cry of "Sims,
preach liberty to your fellow slaves," he was put on a steamtug and sent
where he belonged.
Shortly after this, a meeting was called by the Vigilance Committee, which
was presided over by Hon. Horace Mann, when Anson Burlingame, Henry
Wilson, Remond, Higginson and several other negroes appeared and made
denunciatory speeches against the law and in favor of the resolutions,
which proclaimed the necessity of resistance to the uttermost.
On September 11, 1851, occurred the celebrated Christiana affair. Edward
Gorsuch, of Maryland, his son and a party of friends, accompanied by a
United States Commissioner, appeared in the neighborhood of Christiana,
Lancaster county, Pennsylvania, in pursuit of a slave. An attack was made
upon them by negroes, and both father and son were killed. The United
States marines were ordered to the spot, and for several days the place
was under martial law. The slave, of course, escaped. We might also refer
to the rescues of Shadrack, Anthony Burns, the slave Jerry at Syracuse,
and similar incidents that occurred in various parts of the Northern
States; but the circumstances are most of them too recent and familiar to
require more than a passing allusion.
It is only necessary to say that this kind of agitation--resistance to the
laws and disturbance of the peace--has been a part of the tactics of
abolitionists down to the present moment. They have never allowed an
opportunity to pass of showing their utter disregard for law and order,
and of interposing every obstacle in the way of those whose sincere desire
it is to promote the peace and prosperity of the country. The breeze has
become a gale, and the gale has swelled into a tempest, under the
influence of which the mind of a portion of the North has been lashed into
insane fury.
THE REPEAL OF THE MISSOURI COMPROMISE, AND FORMATION OF THE TERRITORIAL
GOVERNMENTS OF KANSAS AND NEBRASKA.
It was reserved for the years 1853 and 1854 to be a period of
agitation--revived under the auspices of such men as Stephen A. Douglas,
Franklin Pierce, Caleb Cushing, David Atchinson and other politicians
intent upon the Presidency--unrivalled in the annals of the country.
The new danger came up in the shape of a proposition to establish a
Territorial government in Nebraska (then embracing Kansas), a Territory
which, with Missouri, originally constituted the upper part of the
province of Louisiana, and was acquired from the French in 1803 by the
payment of 60,000,000 francs.
As early as Dec. 11, 1844, Mr. Douglas gave notice to the House of his
intention to introduce a bill for this purpose, which he did on the 17th
instant following. After being favorably reported upon, it was referred to
the Committee of the Whole, where, owing to the importance of other
measures pending, it was not again acted upon during the session. On the
15th of March, 1848, he introduced a similar bill, and again it met a
similar fate. In the Senate, in 1852, Mr. Dodge, of Iowa, early introduced
a resolution, which was passed, instructing the Committee on Territories
to inquire into the expediency of organizing the Territory; but no further
action was taken upon it until the House of Representatives had passed its
bill for that purpose. On December 17, the petition of Mr. Guthrie for a
seat as a delegate from Nebraska, was received and referred, and on the 2d
day of February, 1853, the Committee on Territories, through Mr.
Richardson, of Illinois, their chairman, reported their bill for
organizing Nebraska, which, after three days consideration, was passed on
the 10th, by a vote of 98 to 43. It was silent on the subject of the
repeal of the Missouri Compromise. The Senate received it the next day,
and on the 17th instant, the Committee on Territories reported it without
amendment. On the 3d of March, 1853, it was laid upon the table. In the
debate which immediately preceded this disposition, Senator Atchison, of
Missouri, openly avowed the ground of his opposition to be that the law
excluding slavery from the Territory of Louisiana, north of thirty-six
degrees and thirty minutes, would be enforced in the new Territory,
"unless specially rescinded." He did not appear, however, to entertain any
hope that this desirable object could be effected. He said he should,
therefore, oppose the organization, unless the whole South could go into
the Territory with rights and privileges, respecting property, equal to
other people of the Union. The idea of the possibility of a repeal of the
Missouri Compromise was thus, for the first time, thrown out and left to
take root in the minds of the nation, with the chance of growing up to
perfection. Even the most ultra among the Southerners then regarded this
as a thing rather to be hoped for than realized.
On the 4th of January, 1854, Mr. Douglas, from the Committee on
Territories, (which consisted of Messrs. Douglas, of Illinois; Houston, of
Texas; Johnson, of Arkansas; Bell, of Tennessee; Jones, of Iowa, and
Everett, of Massachusetts,) to whom had been referred the bill of Mr.
Dodge, reported back the same with amendments and a report which contained
the first open, and as it were official, declaration of the impending
_coup d'etat_. This report assumed as its basis that the Compromise acts
of 1850, which, it will be recollected, leave to the people of the
Territories to decide for themselves whether or not there shall be slavery
in their midst, were the supreme, authentic law of the land, and the
Missouri Compromise was cited and put aside as immaterial, because it came
in collision with this latest legislation and adjustment of the question.
This perpetual prohibition Mr. Douglas proposed incidentally to repeal by
the following provision in the bill:--
"And when admitted as a State or States, the said Territory, or any
portion of the same, shall be received in the Union with or without
slavery, as their constitutions may prescribe at the time of their
admission."
Later in this month the same committee submitted an amended bill by which
two Territories--Kansas and Nebraska--were to be created out of the domain
in question.
On the 22d of January, Messrs. Chase and Sumner, of the Senate, and
Messrs. Giddings, Wade, Dewitt and Gerrit Smith, of the House, issued a
stirring appeal to the people of the United States, urging and imploring
instant action to avert the pending calamity. This was circulated over the
whole country, and aided not a little in adding fuel to the already
furious flame of excitement.
The discussion of the bill in the Senate was continued from time to time
through January. It swallowed up all other interests, and was the
absorbing topic throughout the country. The vote was finally reached at
five o'clock in the morning of March 4, 1854, when the bill passed the
Senate by a vote of thirty-seven to fourteen. Fourteen of the votes in its
favor were given by Senators from the free States, and two of those
against it by Senators from the slave States--Messrs. Houston, of Texas,
and Bell, of Tennessee.
On the 14th of March Mr. Everett presented the famous mammoth memorial,
signed by 3,050 clergymen of New England, protesting against the passage
of the bill.
In the House of Representatives the bill was brought up on the 31st of
January, 1853. The debate upon it was closed on the 19th of May, 1854, and
on the 22d of May, 1854, it passed the House by the following vote:--Yeas,
113; nays, 100. The vote of the Senate on the final passage of the bill
was, yeas, 35; nays, 13.
On the 20th of December, 1854, the Hon. John H. Whitfield, delegate elect
from the Territory of Kansas, was sworn in and admitted to a seat in the
House. It was alleged that his election had been carried by an importation
of Missourians into the Territory, but no contest was made on his right,
and he held his position during the remainder of the Thirty-third
Congress.
During the recess between the 4th of March and the 1st of December, 1855,
the history of Kansas was marked by the most exciting events. The removal
of the seat of government by the Territorial Legislature from the place
which had been fixed by Governor Reeder, was deemed by the latter to have
made void, ab initio, all acts enacted by them subsequent to such removal,
on the ground that the power to locate the same was vested in him alone.
The free State party backed up Governor Reeder, while the pro-slavery
party endorsed the action of the Legislature. Governor Reeder was in the
meantime removed from office.
The free State party met at Big Springs and resolved to repudiate the acts
of the Territorial Legislature and organize a State government. A
Convention was accordingly called and held at Topeka, on the 4th Tuesday
of October, framed what was called the Topeka Convention, and set on foot
a State Government which soon came in conflict with the regularly
constituted authorities, and resulted in the indictments against the
former for treason, which followed.
Meanwhile, finding opposition to the principles of the Kansas-Nebraska act
unavailing in Congress and under the forms of the Constitution,
combinations were entered into at the North to control the political
destinies and form and regulate the domestic institutions of these
Territories through the machinery of emigrant aid societies, by which
means large numbers of persons were forwarded to the debatable ground. In
order to give consistency to the movement and surround it with the color
of legal authority, an act of incorporation was procured from the
Legislature of Massachusetts for an association by the name of the
Massachusetts Emigrant Aid Society, the ostensible purpose of which was to
enable emigrants to settle in the West. It was a powerful corporation,
with a capital of five millions of dollars, invested in houses and lands,
in merchandise and mills, in cannons and rifles, in powder and lead--in
all the implements of art, agriculture and war, and employing a
corresponding number of men under the management of directors who remained
at home and pulled the wires of this immense political automaton. In a
measure they succeeded. Thousands of these emigrants poured into the
Territory, armed with Sharpe's rifles and the Word of God, and located
themselves wherever their votes were most necessary. The result might have
been anticipated. Under the influence of inflammatory appeals and stung by
the irritating threats of the free-state men, the most intense indignation
was aroused in the States near the Territory of Kansas, and especially in
Missouri, whose domestic peace was thus the most directly endangered.
Counter movements consequently ensued. Bands of men came over the State
border and appeared at the polls, and on both sides angry accusations
followed that the elections were carried by fraud and violence. In the
meantime, statements entirely unfounded or grossly exaggerated concerning
events within the Territory, were sedulously diffused through remote
States to feed the flame of sectional animosity there, and the agitators
in the States in turn exerted themselves to encourage and stimulate strife
within the Territory.
During the Presidential campaign of 1856 Kansas may be said to have been
in a state of civil war. Life was nowhere safe. Armed men espousing both
sides of the question roamed throughout the country, committing
depredations and atrocities which find their equal only in the records of
savage barbarity. Men, women and children were murdered in their beds, and
few could aver themselves either as free-state men or pro-slavery men
without danger of being shot down in their tracks. It was during this
period that the notorious John Brown, with his band, made his appearance
and commenced those villanies for which he has since met a just reward
upon the gallows.
To return to Congress, however: on the 7th of April, 1856, a memorial of
the Senators and Representatives of the so-called State of Kansas,
accompanied by the Constitution adopted at Topeka, praying the admission
of the same into the Union, was presented in the House of Representatives
and referred. The Committee on Territories reported a bill to that effect,
which was rejected on the 30th of June by a vote of yeas 106, nays 107.
On motion of Mr. Barclay, of Pennsylvania, the question was reconsidered,
and the vote being taken on the passage of the bill, it was carried by
yeas 107, nays 106, the abovenamed gentleman changing his ballot, and one
other voting aye who was not present before.
The bill being brought before the Senate, that body substituted for it a
bill of its own, which was returned to the House, where no action was
taken upon it. Several other attempts were subsequently made in both the
Senate and House, during 1856, to pass bills to authorise the people of
Kansas to form a Constitution and State government, but without
success--neither body endorsing the act of the other.
On the 29th of July, 1856, a bill reported by Mr. Grow, from the Committee
on Territories, "To annul certain acts of the Legislative Assembly of the
Territory of Kansas," being before the House, Mr. Dunn, of Indiana, moved
an amendment to the same, which substantially re-established the
compromise of 1820. This was carried by a vote of 89 yeas and 77 nays. The
bill reached the Senate, and a report upon it was made by the Committee on
Territories on the 11th of August, 1856, recommending that it be laid upon
the table, which was done, by a test vote of 35 to 12.
On the 11th of July, 1856, the committee appointed by the House to proceed
to Kansas and investigate all matters connected with the contested
election case between A. H. Reeder and John W. Whitfield, each of whom
claimed to have been elected a delegate to Congress, made a majority and
minority report, Messrs. W. A. Howard, of Michigan, and Lewis Campbell, of
Ohio, affirming that everything connected with the Territorial Legislature
and the election of Whitfield was wrong; and Mr. Mordecai Oliver, of
Missouri, affirming that everything was right, and that Mr. Reeder was not
duly elected according to law.
These reports were acted upon on the 29th of July, when Mr. Whitfield was
declared not to be entitled to a seat in the House by a vote of 110 yeas
to 92 nays, and Mr. Reeder was likewise declared not to be entitled to a
seat by a vote of 88 yeas and 113 nays. On the 1st Of December, 1856,
however, Mr. Whitfield, having again been elected a delegate, was sworn in
by a vote of 112 yeas to 108 nays.
The effect of this agitation in Congress upon the people was immense, and
every power that could be brought to bear to influence the result one way
or another was unsparingly employed. It was almost the sole hinge upon
which, for a time, swung the welfare of the country. The immediate
admission of Kansas, with her free constitution, formed at Topeka, was
engrafted upon the republican platform of 1856, and men were arraigned at
the bar of public opinion and proved guilty or innocent by their standing
with reference to this great question. Happily, however, the election of
Mr. Buchanan threw oil upon the troubled waters, and with his inauguration
the country relapsed once more into a state of comparative quiet. The
predatory bands engaged in Kansas in acts of rapine, under cover of
existing political disturbances, were arrested or dispersed, the troops
were withdrawn, and tranquillity was once more restored to the hitherto
agitated territory.
On the first Monday of September, 1857, a Convention was called together
by virtue of an act of the Territorial Legislature, whose lawful existence
had been recognized by various enactments of Congress, to frame a
constitution for Kansas. A large proportion of the citizens did not think
proper to register their names and vote at the election for delegates; but
an opportunity to do this having been afforded, in the language of Mr.
Buchanan, "their refusal to avail themselves of their right, could in no
manner affect the legality of the Convention." But little difficulty
occurred except on the question of slavery, and after an excited and angry
debate on this subject, by a majority of only two, it was decided to
submit the question of slavery to the people.
This was the famous Lecompton Convention. They adopted a constitution, and
the form of submission was "constitution with slavery," or "constitution
without slavery." A great many people were indignant because the
constitution was made thus imperative, and more than one-half stayed away
from the polls. The constitution was consequently adopted by the party
voting for it with slavery. In that form it was submitted to the
President, and the President submitted it to Congress. After a protracted
discussion in both houses, the admission of Kansas under that instrument
was defeated, and a compromise was adopted to submit the Lecompton
constitution back to the people, with the condition that if accepted they
should immediately come into the Union by a proclamation of the President,
and that, if rejected, they should wait until they had ninety-three
thousand inhabitants, to be ascertained by a census. They rejected the
constitution by some ten thousand majority. In the meantime, under the
operation of the Territorial Legislature and the Lecompton Convention
acting in conjunction with each other, the anti-slavery elements rallied
and elected an anti-slavery Legislature. There were, however, bogus
returns from two or three counties, which, if admitted, would have changed
the complexion of the Legislature into a pro-slavery body; but these were
cast out by Governor Walker, and the Legislature was thus left in the
possession of the free-soil party.
After the rejection of the Lecompton constitution, the people called
another Convention, which assembled at Wyandot, and adopted an
anti-slavery constitution. This they laid before Congress, and at the same
time elected a Legislature and a member of Congress, the Legislature in
turn electing two Senators, in anticipation of the admission of the State
under the Wyandot constitution. The bill for the admission of the State
was taken up in Congress during the present session and passed, and on
Wednesday, the 30th of January, was returned to Congress with the
signature of the President, thus forever setting at rest a question which
has so long disturbed the country.
The following are the State officers of Kansas elected under the Wyandot
constitution, and who will assume to administer the new State
government:--
_Governor_--Charles Robinson, formerly of Massachusetts.
_Lieutenant Governor_--J. P. Root, formerly of Connecticut.
_Secretary of State_--J. W. Robinson, formerly of Maine.
_Treasurer_--William Tholen, formerly of New York.
_Auditor_--George W. Hillyer, formerly of Ohio.
_Superintendent of Public Instruction_--W. R. Griffith, formerly of
Illinois.
_Chief Justice_--Thomas Ewing, Jr., formerly of Ohio.
_Associate Justices_--Samuel D. Kingham, formerly of Kentucky, and
Lawrence Bailey, formerly of New Hampshire.
In the Supreme Court, under the Dred Scott decision, the right has been
established of every citizen to take his property of every kind, including
slaves, into the common Territories, belonging equally to all the States
of the confederacy, and to have it protected there under the Constitution.
It is hardly necessary to advert further to the progress of the
anti-slavery element in Congress than to merely recal the tumults excited
at the beginning of every session by the election of a Speaker, and the
constant ebb and flow of agitation upon the one absorbing theme which has
at last, through the efforts of the abolitionists and their allies, come
to be the single sentiment, upon which hang suspended the destiny and
hopes of a nation.
* * * * *
In 1857, a State Convention assembled in Worcester, Mass., "to consider
the practicability, probability and expediency of a separation of the free
and slave States." In the language of one of the orators, they felt that
the time had come when they should "sever for ever the bloody bond which
united them to the slaveholders, slave-breeders and slave-traders of the
nation." The meeting found its sympathizers, and made converts in every
portion of the North, and from that day to the present, have been
spreading among a certain class the following sentiments, with which
Wendell Phillips closed one of his speeches:--
"If the slaveholder loves the Union, I hate it. The love of so
sagacious a tyrant is authority enough for my hate. If the
slaveholder clings to the Union, it is instinct. When they set horses
to run in the Roman races, each horse bears about him a little
network of pointed pricks, that the faster he goes, make him run yet
faster. I would set the slaveholder running with four millions of
slaves for the pricks. Dissolution is my method for that race.
Dissolution, in other words, is only another method of letting
natural causes have free play. I would take down the dam of the Union
and let loose the torrent of God's own water-courses, and, like every
current, you may be sure it will clear every channel for itself."
In an address delivered by Wm. Lloyd Garrison, July 20, 1860, at the
Framingham celebration, he declares:
"Our object is the abolition of slavery _throughout the land_; and
whether in the prosecution of our object, this party goes up, or the
other party goes down, it is nothing to us. We cannot alter our
course one hair's breadth, nor accept a compromise of our principles,
for the hearty adoption of our principles. I am for _meddling with
slavery everywhere--attacking it by night and by day, in season and
out of season_--(no, it can never be out of season)--in order to
_effect its overthrow_. (Loud applause.) Higher yet will be my cry.
Upward and onward. No union with slaveholders. Down with this
slaveholding government. Let this covenant 'with death and agreement
with hell' be annulled. _Let there be a free, independent, Northern
republic_, and _the speedy abolition of slavery_ will inevitably
follow. (Loud applause.) So I am laboring to dissolve this
blood-stained Union, as a work of paramount importance. Our mission
is to regenerate public opinion."
This has been the point, end and object at which the practical
abolitionists of the country have aimed from the start. If they have
advocated a measure, its purpose has been dissolution. If they have
prevented the execution of the laws, the purpose has been dissolution; if
they have made war or made peace, or taken any step during their unholy
career, the one end and object has been the overthrow of the government
and the freedom of the slave, no matter what may be the consequence.
The conventions of the abolitionists are now held every year, and they
have gathered about them a galaxy of congenial followers--
"Black spirits and white,
Red spirits and gray"--
well worthy of the cause they espouse. No stone remains unturned that
obstructs the accomplishment of their designs. Until of late their agents
have circulated in every nook and corner of the country, and from Maine to
Texas these serpents of society have been distilling their venom among
the people. We have seen the result within the past two years in poisoned
families, executed slaves, a John Brown insurrection, and all the
enormities which attend the movement of a band of infatuated individuals
who are spurred on to deeds of desperation by those who stay at home to
preach that which they leave their deluded victims to practise.
As a party they have become so strong that,
"Having both the key
Of officer and office, they set all hearts
To what tune they please."