attracted people to it with unprecedented rapidity, so that on, or soon
after, the meeting of the new Congress in December, 1849, she already had
a population of nearly a hundred thousand, had called a convention, formed
a State constitution excluding slavery, and was knocking for admission
into the Union. The proviso men, of course, were for letting her in,
but the Senate, always true to the other side, would not consent to her
admission, and there California stood, kept out of the Union because
she would not let slavery into her borders. Under all the circumstances,
perhaps, this was not wrong. There were other points of dispute connected
with the general question of Slavery, which equally needed adjustment. The
South clamored for a more efficient fugitive slave law. The North clamored
for the abolition of a peculiar species of slave trade in the District
of Columbia, in connection with which, in view from the windows of the
Capitol, a sort of negro livery-stable, where droves of negroes were
collected, temporarily kept, and finally taken to Southern markets,
precisely like droves of horses, had been openly maintained for fifty
years. Utah and New Mexico needed territorial governments; and whether
slavery should or should not be prohibited within them was another
question. The indefinite western boundary of Texas was to be settled. She
was a slave State, and consequently the farther west the slavery men could
push her boundary, the more slave country they secured; and the farther
east the slavery opponents could thrust the boundary back, the less slave
ground was secured. Thus this was just as clearly a slavery question as
any of the others.
These points all needed adjustment, and they were held up, perhaps wisely,
to make them help adjust one another. The Union now, as in 1820, was
thought to be in danger, and devotion to the Union rightfully inclined
men to yield somewhat in points where nothing else could have so inclined
them. A compromise was finally effected. The South got their new fugitive
slave law, and the North got California, (by far the best part of our
acquisition from Mexico) as a free State. The South got a provision that
New Mexico and Utah, when admitted as States, may come in with or without
slavery as they may then choose; and the North got the slave trade
abolished in the District of Columbia.. The North got the western boundary
of Texas thrown farther back eastward than the South desired; but, in
turn, they gave Texas ten millions of dollars with which to pay her old
debts. This is the Compromise of 1850.
Preceding the Presidential election of 1852, each of the great political
parties, Democrats and Whigs, met in convention and adopted resolutions
indorsing the Compromise of '50, as a "finality," a final settlement, so
far as these parties could make it so, of all slavery agitation. Previous
to this, in 1851, the Illinois Legislature had indorsed it.
During this long period of time, Nebraska (the Nebraska Territory, not
the State of as we know it now) had remained substantially an uninhabited
country, but now emigration to and settlement within it began to take
place. It is about one third as large as the present United States,
and its importance, so long overlooked, begins to come into view. The
restriction of slavery by the Missouri Compromise directly applies to
it--in fact was first made, and has since been maintained expressly for
it. In 1853, a bill to give it a territorial government passed the House
of Representatives, and, in the hands of Judge Douglas, failed of passing
only for want of time. This bill contained no repeal of the Missouri
Compromise. Indeed, when it was assailed because it did not contain such
repeal, Judge Douglas defended it in its existing form. On January 4,
1854, Judge Douglas introduces a new bill to give Nebraska territorial
government. He accompanies this bill with a report, in which last he
expressly recommends that the Missouri Compromise shall neither be
affirmed nor repealed. Before long the bill is so modified as to make two
territories instead of one, calling the southern one Kansas.
Also, about a month after the introduction of the bill, on the Judge's own
motion it is so amended as to declare the Missouri Compromise inoperative
and void; and, substantially, that the people who go and settle there may
establish slavery, or exclude it, as they may see fit. In this shape the
bill passed both branches of Congress and became a law.
This is the repeal of the Missouri Compromise. The foregoing history
may not be precisely accurate in every particular, but I am sure it is
sufficiently so for all the use I shall attempt to make of it, and in
it we have before us the chief material enabling us to judge correctly
whether the repeal of the Missouri Compromise is right or wrong. I think,
and shall try to show, that it is wrong--wrong in its direct effect,
letting slavery into Kansas and Nebraska, and wrong in its prospective
principle, allowing it to spread to every other part of the wide world
where men can be found inclined to take it.
This declared indifference, but, as I must think, covert real zeal,
for the spread of slavery, I cannot but hate. I hate it because of the
monstrous injustice of slavery itself. I hate it because it deprives our
republican example of its just influence in the world; enables the enemies
of free institutions with plausibility to taunt us as hypocrites; causes
the real friends of freedom to doubt our sincerity; and especially because
it forces so many good men among ourselves into an open war with the very
fundamental principles of civil liberty, criticizing the Declaration of
Independence, and insisting that there is no right principle of action but
self-interest.
Before proceeding let me say that I think I have no prejudice against the
Southern people. They are just what we would be in their situation. If
slavery did not now exist among them, they would not introduce it. If it
did now exist among us, we should not instantly give it up. This I believe
of the masses North and South. Doubtless there are individuals on both
sides who would not hold slaves under any circumstances, and others who
would gladly introduce slavery anew if it were out of existence. We know
that some Southern men do free their slaves, go North and become tip-top
abolitionists, while some Northern ones go South and become most cruel
slave masters.
When Southern people tell us that they are no more responsible for the
origin of slavery than we are, I acknowledge the fact. When it is said
that the institution exists, and that it is very difficult to get rid of
it in any satisfactory way, I can understand and appreciate the saying. I
surely will not blame them for not doing what I should not know how to do
myself. If all earthly power were given me, I should not know what to do
as to the existing institution. My first impulse would be to free all the
slaves, and send them to Liberia, to their own native land. But a moment's
reflection would convince me that whatever of high hope (as I think
there is) there may be in this in the long run, its sudden execution is
impossible. If they were all landed there in a day, they would all perish
in the next ten days; and there are not surplus shipping and surplus money
enough to carry them there in many times ten days. What then? Free them
all, and keep them among us as underlings? Is it quite certain that this
betters their condition? I think I would not hold one in slavery at any
rate, yet the point is not clear enough for me to denounce people upon.
What next? Free them, and make them politically and socially our equals?
My own feelings will not admit of this, and if mine would, we well know
that those of the great mass of whites will not. Whether this feeling
accords with justice and sound judgment is not the sole question, if
indeed it is any part of it. A universal feeling, whether well or ill
founded, cannot be safely disregarded. We cannot then make them equals. It
does seem to me that systems of gradual emancipation might be adopted, but
for their tardiness in this I will not undertake to judge our brethren of
the South.
When they remind us of their constitutional rights, I acknowledge
them--not grudgingly, but fully and fairly; and I would give them any
legislation for the reclaiming of their fugitives which should not in
its stringency be more likely to carry a free man into slavery than our
ordinary criminal laws are to hang an innocent one.
But all this, to my judgment, furnishes no more excuse for permitting
slavery to go into our own free territory than it would for reviving the
African slave trade by law. The law which forbids the bringing of slaves
from Africa, and that which has so long forbidden the taking of them
into Nebraska, can hardy be distinguished on any moral principle, and the
repeal of the former could find quite as plausible excuses as that of the
latter.
The arguments by which the repeal of the Missouri Compromise is sought to
be justified are these:
First. That the Nebraska country needed a territorial government.
Second. That in various ways the public had repudiated that compromise and
demanded the repeal, and therefore should not now complain of it.
And, lastly, That the repeal establishes a principle which is
intrinsically right.
I will attempt an answer to each of them in its turn.
First, then: If that country was in need of a territorial organization,
could it not have had it as well without as with a repeal? Iowa and
Minnesota, to both of which the Missouri restriction applied, had, without
its repeal, each in succession, territorial organizations. And even the
year before, a bill for Nebraska itself was within an ace of passing
without the repealing clause, and this in the hands of the same men who
are now the champions of repeal. Why no necessity then for repeal? But
still later, when this very bill was first brought in, it contained
no repeal. But, say they, because the people had demanded, or rather
commanded, the repeal, the repeal was to accompany the organization
whenever that should occur.
Now, I deny that the public ever demanded any such thing--ever repudiated
the Missouri Compromise, ever commanded its repeal. I deny it, and call
for the proof. It is not contended, I believe, that any such command has
ever been given in express terms. It is only said that it was done in
principle. The support of the Wilmot Proviso is the first fact mentioned
to prove that the Missouri restriction was repudiated in principle, and
the second is the refusal to extend the Missouri line over the country
acquired from Mexico. These are near enough alike to be treated together.
The one was to exclude the chances of slavery from the whole new
acquisition by the lump, and the other was to reject a division of it, by
which one half was to be given up to those chances. Now, whether this was
a repudiation of the Missouri line in principle depends upon whether the
Missouri law contained any principle requiring the line to be extended
over the country acquired from Mexico. I contend it did not. I insist
that it contained no general principle, but that it was, in every sense,
specific. That its terms limit it to the country purchased from France is
undenied and undeniable. It could have no principle beyond the intention
of those who made it. They did not intend to extend the line to country
which they did not own. If they intended to extend it in the event of
acquiring additional territory, why did they not say so? It was just as
easy to say that "in all the country west of the Mississippi which we now
own, or may hereafter acquire, there shall never be slavery," as to say
what they did say; and they would have said it if they had meant it. An
intention to extend the law is not only not mentioned in the law, but is
not mentioned in any contemporaneous history. Both the law itself, and the
history of the times, are a blank as to any principle of extension; and
by neither the known rules of construing statutes and contracts, nor by
common sense, can any such principle be inferred.
Another fact showing the specific character of the Missouri law--showing
that it intended no more than it expressed, showing that the line was not
intended as a universal dividing line between Free and Slave territory,
present and prospective, north of which slavery could never go--is the
fact that by that very law Missouri came in as a slave State, north of the
line. If that law contained any prospective principle, the whole law must
be looked to in order to ascertain what the principle was. And by this
rule the South could fairly contend that, inasmuch as they got one slave
State north of the line at the inception of the law, they have the right
to have another given them north of it occasionally, now and then, in the
indefinite westward extension of the line. This demonstrates the absurdity
of attempting to deduce a prospective principle from the Missouri
Compromise line.
When we voted for the Wilmot Proviso we were voting to keep slavery out
of the whole Mexican acquisition, and little did we think we were thereby
voting to let it into Nebraska lying several hundred miles distant. When
we voted against extending the Missouri line, little did we think we were
voting to destroy the old line, then of near thirty years' standing.
To argue that we thus repudiated the Missouri Compromise is no less absurd
than it would be to argue that because we have so far forborne to acquire
Cuba, we have thereby, in principle, repudiated our former acquisitions
and determined to throw them out of the Union. No less absurd than it
would be to say that because I may have refused to build an addition to
my house, I thereby have decided to destroy the existing house! And if
I catch you setting fire to my house, you will turn upon me and say I
instructed you to do it!
The most conclusive argument, however, that while for the Wilmot Proviso,
and while voting against the extension of the Missouri line, we never
thought of disturbing the original Missouri Compromise, is found in the
fact that there was then, and still is, an unorganized tract of fine
country, nearly as large as the State of Missouri, lying immediately west
of Arkansas and south of the Missouri Compromise line, and that we never
attempted to prohibit slavery as to it. I wish particular attention to
this. It adjoins the original Missouri Compromise line by its northern
boundary, and consequently is part of the country into which by
implication slavery was permitted to go by that compromise. There it has
lain open ever s, and there it still lies, and yet no effort has been made
at any time to wrest it from the South. In all our struggles to prohibit
slavery within our Mexican acquisitions, we never so much as lifted a
finger to prohibit it as to this tract. Is not this entirely conclusive
that at all times we have held the Missouri Compromise as a sacred thing,
even when against ourselves as well as when for us?
Senator Douglas sometimes says the Missouri line itself was in principle
only an extension of the line of the Ordinance of '87--that is to say, an
extension of the Ohio River. I think this is weak enough on its face. I
will remark, however, that, as a glance at the map will show, the Missouri
line is a long way farther south than the Ohio, and that if our Senator in
proposing his extension had stuck to the principle of jogging southward,
perhaps it might not have been voted down so readily.
But next it is said that the compromises of '50, and the ratification of
them by both political parties in '52, established a new principle which
required the repeal of the Missouri Compromise. This again I deny. I deny
it, and demand the proof. I have already stated fully what the compromises
of '50 are. That particular part of those measures from which the virtual
repeal of the Missouri Compromise is sought to be inferred (for it is
admitted they contain nothing about it in express terms) is the provision
in the Utah and New Mexico laws which permits them when they seek
admission into the Union as States to come in with or without slavery, as
they shall then see fit. Now I insist this provision was made for Utah
and New Mexico, and for no other place whatever. It had no more direct
reference to Nebraska than it had to the territories of the moon. But,
say they, it had reference to Nebraska in principle. Let us see. The
North consented to this provision, not because they considered it right in
itself, but because they were compensated--paid for it.
They at the same time got California into the Union as a free State. This
was far the best part of all they had struggled for by the Wilmot Proviso.
They also got the area of slavery somewhat narrowed in the settlement
of the boundary of Texas. Also they got the slave trade abolished in the
District of Columbia.
For all these desirable objects the North could afford to yield something;
and they did yield to the South the Utah and New Mexico provision. I do
not mean that the whole North, or even a majority, yielded, when the law
passed; but enough yielded--when added to the vote of the South, to
carry the measure. Nor can it be pretended that the principle of this
arrangement requires us to permit the same provision to be applied to
Nebraska, without any equivalent at all. Give us another free State; press
the boundary of Texas still farther back; give us another step toward the
destruction of slavery in the District, and you present us a similar case.
But ask us not to repeat, for nothing, what you paid for in the first
instance. If you wish the thing again, pay again. That is the principle of
the compromises of '50, if, indeed, they had any principles beyond their
specific terms--it was the system of equivalents.
Again, if Congress, at that time, intended that all future Territories
should, when admitted as States, come in with or without slavery at their
own option, why did it not say so? With such a universal provision, all
know the bills could not have passed. Did they, then--could they-establish
a principle contrary to their own intention? Still further, if they
intended to establish the principle that, whenever Congress had control,
it should be left to the people to do as they thought fit with slavery,
why did they not authorize the people of the District of Columbia, at
their option, to abolish slavery within their limits?
I personally know that this has not been left undone because it was
unthought of. It was frequently spoken of by members of Congress, and by
citizens of Washington, six years ago; and I heard no one express a doubt
that a system of gradual emancipation, with compensation to owners,
would meet the approbation of a large majority of the white people of the
District. But without the action of Congress they could say nothing; and
Congress said "No." In the measures of 1850, Congress had the subject of
slavery in the District expressly on hand. If they were then establishing
the principle of allowing the people to do as they please with slavery,
why did they not apply the principle to that people?
Again it is claimed that by the resolutions of the Illinois Legislature,
passed in 1851, the repeal of the Missouri Compromise was demanded. This
I deny also. Whatever may be worked out by a criticism of the language of
those resolutions, the people have never understood them as being any
more than an indorsement of the compromises of 1850, and a release of our
senators from voting for the Wilmot Proviso. The whole people are living
witnesses that this only was their view. Finally, it is asked, "If we
did not mean to apply the Utah and New Mexico provision to all future
territories, what did we mean when we, in 1852, indorsed the compromises
of 1850?"
For myself I can answer this question most easily. I meant not to ask a
repeal or modification of the Fugitive Slave law. I meant not to ask
for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia. I meant not to
resist the admission of Utah and New Mexico, even should they ask to come
in as slave States. I meant nothing about additional Territories, because,
as I understood, we then had no Territory whose character as to slavery
was not already settled. As to Nebraska, I regarded its character as being
fixed by the Missouri Compromise for thirty years--as unalterably fixed
as that of my own home in Illinois. As to new acquisitions, I said,
"Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." When we make new
acquisitions, we will, as heretofore, try to manage them somehow. That is
my answer; that is what I meant and said; and I appeal to the people to
say each for himself whether that is not also the universal meaning of the
free States.
And now, in turn, let me ask a few questions. If, by any or all these
matters, the repeal of the Missouri Compromise was commanded, why was not
the command sooner obeyed? Why was the repeal omitted in the Nebraska
Bill of 1853? Why was it omitted in the original bill of 1854? Why in the
accompanying report was such a repeal characterized as a departure from
the course pursued in 1850 and its continued omission recommended?
I am aware Judge Douglas now argues that the subsequent express repeal is
no substantial alteration of the bill. This argument seems wonderful to
me. It is as if one should argue that white and black are not different.
He admits, however, that there is a literal change in the bill, and that
he made the change in deference to other senators who would not support
the bill without. This proves that those other senators thought the
change a substantial one, and that the Judge thought their opinions worth
deferring to. His own opinions, therefore, seem not to rest on a very firm
basis, even in his own mind; and I suppose the world believes, and will
continue to believe, that precisely on the substance of that change this
whole agitation has arisen.
I conclude, then, that the public never demanded the repeal of the
Missouri Compromise.
I now come to consider whether the appeal with its avowed principles, is
intrinsically right. I insist that it is not. Take the particular case. A
controversy had arisen between the advocates and opponents of slavery,
in relation to its establishment within the country we had purchased of
France. The southern, and then best, part of the purchase was already in
as a slave State. The controversy was settled by also letting Missouri
in as a slave State; but with the agreement that within all the remaining
part of the purchase, north of a certain line, there should never be
slavery. As to what was to be done with the remaining part, south of the
line, nothing was said; but perhaps the fair implication was, it should
come in with slavery if it should so choose. The southern part, except a
portion heretofore mentioned, afterward did come in with slavery, as the
State of Arkansas. All these many years, since 1820, the northern part
had remained a wilderness. At length settlements began in it also. In due
course Iowa came in as a free State, and Minnesota was given a territorial
government, without removing the slavery restriction. Finally, the
sole remaining part north of the line--Kansas and Nebraska--was to be
organized; and it is proposed, and carried, to blot out the old dividing
line of thirty-four years' standing, and to open the whole of that country
to the introduction of slavery. Now this, to my mind, is manifestly
unjust. After an angry and dangerous controversy, the parties made friends
by dividing the bone of contention. The one party first appropriates her
own share, beyond all power to be disturbed in the possession of it, and
then seizes the share of the other party. It is as if two starving men had
divided their only loaf, the one had hastily swallowed his half, and then
grabbed the other's half just as he was putting it to his mouth.
Let me here drop the main argument, to notice what I consider rather
an inferior matter. It is argued that slavery will not go to Kansas and
Nebraska, in any event. This is a palliation, a lullaby. I have some hope
that it will not; but let us not be too confident. As to climate, a glance
at the map shows that there are five slave States--Delaware, Maryland,
Virginia, Kentucky, and Missouri, and also the District of Columbia, all
north of the Missouri Compromise line. The census returns of 1850 show
that within these there are eight hundred and sixty-seven thousand two
hundred and seventy-six slaves, being more than one fourth of all the
slaves in the nation.
It is not climate, then, that will keep slavery out of these Territories.
Is there anything in the peculiar nature of the country? Missouri adjoins
these Territories by her entire western boundary, and slavery is already
within every one of her western counties. I have even heard it said that
there are more slaves in proportion to whites in the northwestern county
of Missouri than within any other county in the State. Slavery pressed
entirely up to the old western boundary of the State, and when rather
recently a part of that boundary at the northwest was moved out a little
farther west, slavery followed on quite up to the new line. Now, when the
restriction is removed, what is to prevent it from going still farther?
Climate will not, no peculiarity of the country will, nothing in nature
will. Will the disposition of the people prevent it? Those nearest the
scene are all in favor of the extension. The Yankees who are opposed to it
may be most flumerous; but, in military phrase, the battlefield is too far
from their base of operations.