sprung the tares which threaten the principles of that declaration
which made the Colonies independent States, and of that compact by
which the States were united by a bond to-day far more valuable than
when it was signed. You have among you politicians of a philosophic
turn, who preach a high morality; a system of which they are the
discoverers, and it is to be hoped will long remain the exclusive
possessors. They say, it is true the Constitution dictates this, the
Bible inculcates that; but there is a higher law than those, and call
upon you to obey that higher law, of which they are the inspired
givers. [Laughter and applause.] Men who are _traitors_ to the compact
of their fathers—_men who have perjured the oaths they have themselves
taken_—they who wish to steep their hands in the blood of their
brothers; these are the moral law-givers who proclaim a higher law than
the Bible, the Constitution, and the laws of the land. This higher-law
doctrine, it strikes me, is the most convenient one I ever heard of for
the _criminal_. You, no doubt, have a law which punishes a man for
stealing a horse or a bale of goods. But the thief would find more
convenient a higher law which would justify him in keeping the stolen
goods. The doctrine is now advanced to you only in its relation to
property of the Southern States, thus it is the pill gilded, to conceal
its bitterness; but it will re-act deeply upon yourselves if you accept
it. What security have you for your own safety if every man of vile
temper, of low instincts, of base purpose, can find in his own heart a
higher law than that which is the rule of society, the Constitution,
and the Bible? _These higher-law preachers should be tarred and
feathered, and whipped by those they have thus instigated. This, my
friends, is what was called in good old revolutionary times. Lynch
Law._ It is sometimes the very best law, because it deals summary
justice upon those who would otherwise escape from all other kinds of
punishment. The man who with sycophantic face and studied phrase, and
with assumed philosophic morality, preaches treason to the Constitution
and the dictates of all human society, is a fit object for a Lynch law
that would be higher than any he could urge. [Applause.]
My democratic friends, I am deeply gratified by the exhibition which is
before me. I see here a field of faces, assembled in the name of
Democracy, and over it high, bright and multiplied for the occasion, as
stars have been added by Democracy to the flag of our country, blaze
the lights which typify democratic principles, pointing upward, to
guide our country to that haven of prosperity which our fathers saw in
the distant future, and which they left it for their sons to attain. It
we are true to ourselves, true to the obligations which the
Constitution imposes upon us, and if we are wise and energetic in the
struggles which lie before us, our path is onward to more of national
greatness than ever people before possessed. We are held together by
that two-fold government, which is susceptible of being made perfect in
the small spheres of State limits, and capable of the greatest imperial
power, by the combination of these municipal powers into one for
foreign action. It is a form of government such as the wit of man never
devised until our fathers, with a wisdom that approached inspiration,
framed the Constitution, and transmitted it as a legacy to us. It
devolves upon every one of you, to see that each provision of that
Constitution is cordially and faithfully observed. If cordially and
faithfully observed, the powers of hell and of earth combined can never
shake the happiness and prosperity of the people of the United States.
[Applause.] With every revolving year there will arise new motives for
holding tenaciously to each other. With every revolving cycle there
will come new sources of pride and national sentiment to the people.
Year after your flag will grow more brilliant, by the addition of fresh
stars, recording the growth of our political family, and onward, over
land and over sea, the progress of American principles, of human
liberty illustrated, and protected by the power of the United States,
will hold its way to a triumph such as the earth has never witnessed.
[Applause.] On the other hand, what do we see? A picture so black that
if I could unveil it, I would not in this cheery moment expose a scene
so chilling to your enthusiasm, and revolting to your patriotic hearts.
My friends, feeling that I have already detained you too long, I now
return to you my cordial thanks for the kindness with which you have
received me to-night.
Speech Before the Mississippi Legislature.
Mississippians: Again it is my privilege and good fortune to be among
you, to stand before those whom I have loved, for whom I have labored,
by whom I have been trusted and honored, and here to answer for myself.
Time and disease have frosted my hair, impaired my physical energies,
and furrowed my brow, but my heart remains unchanged, and its every
pulsation is as quick, as strong, and as true to your interests, your
honor, and fair fame, as in the period of my earlier years.
It is known to many of you, that at the close of the last session of
Congress, wasted by protracted, violent disease, I went, in accordance
with medical advice, to the Northeastern coast of the United States.
Against the opinion of my physician, I had remained at Washington until
my public duties were closed, and then adopted the only course which it
was believed gave reasonable hope for a final restoration to
health—that is, sought a region where I should be exempt from the heat
of summer, and from political excitement.
In one respect at least, this accorded with my own feelings, for
physically and mentally depressed, fearful that I should never again be
able to perform my part in the trials to which Mississippi might be
subjected, I turned away from my fellows with such feelings as the
wounded elk leaves his herd, and seeks the covert, to die alone.
Misrepresentation and calumny followed me even to the brink of the
grave, and with hyena instinct would have pursued me beyond it.
The political positions which I had always occupied, justified the
expectation that in New England I should be left in loneliness. In this
I was disappointed; courtesy and kindness met me on my first landing,
and attended me to the time of my departure. The manifestations of
comity and hospitality, given by the generous and the noble, aroused
the petty hostility of the more extreme of the Black Republicans, and
their newspapers assailed me with the low abuse which for years I had
been accustomed to receive at their hands. I had always despised their
malice and defied their enmity; their assaults did not surprise me, but
when I found them echoed in Southern papers, it did astonish, I will
confess, it did pain me, not for any injury apprehended to myself, but
for its evil effect upon the cause with which I was identified.
Was it expected that to public and private manifestations of kindness
by the people of Maine, I should return denunciation and repel their
generous approaches with epithets of abuse? If they had deserved such
reproach, they could not merit it at my hands. A guest hospitably
attended, it would have been inconsistent with the character of a
gentleman, to have done less than acknowledge their kindness, and it
was not in my nature to feel otherwise than grateful to them for the
many manifestations of a desire to render pleasant and beneficial the
sojourn of an invalid among them. But they did not deserve it, and I am
happy to state as the result of my acquaintance with them, that we have
a large body of true friends among them, men who maintain our
constitutional rights as explicitly and as broadly as we assert them,
and who have performed this service with the foreknowledge that they
were thereby to sacrifice their political prospects, at least, until
through years of patient exertion they should correct error, suppress
fanaticism, and build for themselves a structure on the basis of truth,
which had long been unwelcome and might not soon be understood.
But there were other evidences of regard more valuable to me than
exhibitions of personal kindness. Regard for the people of Mississippi,
founded on a special attention to their history; the gallant services
of your sons in the field, were publicly claimed as property which
Mississippi could not appropriate to herself; but which were part of
the common wealth of the nation, and belonged equally to the people of
Maine. Could I be insensible to such recognition of the honorable fame
of Mississippi? No, the memory of the gallant dead, who died at
Monterey and Buena Vista, forbade it.
At a subsequent period, when in Massachusetts, one of her distinguished
sons, (Gen. Cushing,) paid a compliment to the feat performed by the
Mississippi Regiment in checking the enemies cavalry on the field of
Buena Vista one Black Republican newspaper denied the originality of
the movement, and claimed it to have been previously performed by an
English regiment at Quatre Bras. This claim was unfounded; the service
performed by the British Regiment having been of a totally different
character and for a different purpose.—A Southern paper, however, has
gone one step beyond that of the Massachusetts paper, and denies the
merit claimed for the service rendered by saying that it was the result
of accident, growing out of the peculiar conformation of the ground on
which the regiment rallied and that it was necessary for the safety of
the regiment, being like the act of a man who leaps from a burning ship
and takes the chance of drowning.
If this only affected myself, I should leave it, like other
misrepresentations, unnoticed, but it concerns the hard earned
reputation of the regiment I commanded. It affects the fame of
Mississippi, and propagates an error which may pollute the current of
history.
We live in an age of progress, and it requires a progressive age to
produce a military critic who should discover that a soldier deserved
no credit for availing himself of the accidents of ground. One half of
the science of war consists in teaching how to take advantage of the
irregularities of the ground on which military movements are to be
made, or defensive works are to be constructed. The highest reputation
of Generals in every age has resulted in their skill in military
topography. The most marked compliment ever paid by one General to
another, was that of Napoleon to Cæsar, when he halted on his
encampments without a previous reconnoisance. But the regiment did not
rally as stated, for it had not been dispersed; neither was their
movement the result of their own necessity, or adopted for their own
safety. They were marching by the flank, on the side of a ravine, when
the enemy’s cavalry were seen approaching. They could have halted on
the side of the ravine, which was so precipitous that they would have
been there as sate from a charge as if they had been in Mississippi.
They could have gone down into the ravine, and have been concealed even
from the sight of the cavalry. The necessity was to prevent the cavalry
from passing to the rear of our line of battle, where they might have
attacked, and probably carried our batteries, which were then without
the protection of our infantry escort. It was our country’s necessity
and not our own which prompted the service there performed. For this
the regiment was formed square across the plain, and there stood
motionless as a rock, silent as death, and eager as a greyhound for the
approach of the enemy, at least nine times, numerically, their
superiors. Some Indiana troops were formed on the brink of the ravine
with the right flank of the Mississippi Regiment, constituting one
branch of what has been called the “V”. When the enemy had approached
as near as he dared and seemed to shrink from contact with the
motionless, resolute living wall which stood before him, the angry
crack of the Mississippi rifle was heard, and as the smoke rose and the
dust fell, there remained of the host which so lately stood before us
but the fallen and the flying. The rear of our line of battle was again
secured, and a service had been rendered which in no small degree
contributed to the triumph which finally perched upon the banner of the
United States.
I am not a disinterested, and may not be a competent judge, but I know
how I thought, and still believe, that your sons, given by you to the
public service in the war with Mexico, have not received the full
measure of the credit which was their due. They, however, received so
much that we might be content to rest on the history as it has been
written. But it constitutes a reason why we should not permit any of
the leaves to be unjustly torn away.
To return to the consideration of the less important subject, the
misrepresentation of myself; I will again express the surprise I felt
that when abolition papers were assailing me with a view to destroy any
power which I might acquire to correct the error which had been
instilled into the minds of the people of the North in relation to
Southern sentiments and Southern institutions, that they should have
received both aid and comfort from Southern newspapers, and been
bolstered up in the attempt to misrepresent my political position. When
the charge was made, which was copied in Northern papers, that I had
abandoned those with whom I co-operated in 1852, to produce a
separation of the States, my friend, the editor of the Mississippian,
seeing the misrepresentation of my position, and naturally supposing,
as we had no discussion in 1852, the reference must have been made to
the canvass of 1851, quoted from the resolutions of the State-Rights
Democratic Convention, and from an address published by myself to the
people, to show that my position was the reverse of that assigned to
me. Before proceeding, I will advert to a reference which has been made
to him, as my “organ.” He is no more my “organ” than I am his. We have
generally concurred, I and have been able to understand and anticipate
his positions as he has mine. I am indebted to him for many favors. He
is indebted to me for nothing. As Democrats, as gentlemen, as friends,
we occupy to each other the relation of exact equality.
Notwithstanding that irrefutable answer to the charge, it has been
reiterated, and, as before, located in the year 1852. It is known to
you all that our discussions were in 1851. I then favored a convention
of the Southern States, that we might take counsel together, as to the
future which was to be anticipated, from the legislation of 1850. The
decision of the State was to acquiesce in the legislation of that year,
with a series of resolutions in relation to future encroachments. I
submitted to the decision of the people, and have in good faith adhered
to the line of conduct which it imposed. Therefore in 1852 there is no
record from which to disprove any allegation, but you know the charge
to be utterly unfounded, and charity alone can suppose its reiteration
was innocently made. Neither in that year nor in any other, have I ever
advocated a dissolution of the Union, or the separation of the State of
Mississippi from the Union, except as the last alternative, and have
not considered the remedies which lie within that extreme as exhausted,
or ever been entirely hopeless of their success. I hold now, as
announced on former occasions, that whilst occupying a seat in the
Senate, I am bound to maintain the Government of the Constitution, and
in no manner to work for its destruction; that the obligation of the
oath of office, Mississippi’s honor and my own, require that, as a
Senator of the United States, there should be no want of loyalty to the
Constitutional Union. Whenever Mississippi shall resolve to separate
from the Confederacy, I will expect her to withdraw her representatives
from the General Government, to which they are accredited. If I should
ever, whilst a Senator, deem it my duty to assume an attitude of
hostility to the Union, I should, immediately thereupon, feel bound to
resign the office, and return to my constituency to inform them of the
fact. It was this view of the obligations of my position, which caused
me, on various occasions, to repel, with such indignation, the
accusation of being a disunionist, while holding the office of Senator
of the United States.
I have been represented as having, advocated “Squatter Sovereignty” in
a speech made at Bangor, in the State of Maine, A paragraph has been
published purporting to be an extract from that speech, and
vituperative criticism, and forced construction have exhausted
themselves upon it, with deductions which are considered authorized,
because they are not denied in the paragraph published.
In this case, as in that of the charge in relation to my position in
1852, there is no record with which to answer. I never made a speech at
Bangor. And a fair mind would have sought for the speech to see how far
the general context explained the paragraph, before indulging in
hostile criticism.
Senator Douglas, in a speech at Alton, adopting the paragraph
published, and evidently drawing his opinion from the unfair
construction which had been put upon it, claims to quote from a speech
made by me at Bangor, to sustain the position taken by him at Freeport.
He says:
“You will find in a recent speech, delivered by that able and eloquent
statesman, Hon. Jefferson Davis, at Bangor, Maine, that he took the
same view of this subject that I did in my Freeport speech. He there
said:”
“‘If the inhabitants of any territory should refuse to enact such laws
and police regulations as would give security to their property and
his, it would be rendered more or less valueless, in proportion to the
difficulty of holding it without such protection. In the case of
property in the labor of a man, or what is usually called slave
property, the insecurity would be so great that the owner could not
ordinarily retain it. Therefore, though the right would remain, the
remedy being withheld, it would follow that the owner would be
practically debarred, by the circumstances of the case, from taking
slave property into a Territory where the sense of the inhabitants was
opposed to its introduction. So much for the oft repeated fallacy of
forcing slavery upon any community.’”
It is fair to suppose, if the Senator had known where to find the
speech from which this extract was taken, that he would have examined
it before proceeding to make such use of it. And I can but believe, if
he had taken the paragraph free from the distortion which it had
undergone from others, that he must have seen it bore no similitude to
his position at Freeport, and could give no countenance to the doctrine
he then announced. He there said:
“The next question Mr. Lincoln propounded to me is: ‘Can the people of
a territory exclude slavery from their limits by any fair means, before
it comes into the Union as a State?’ I answer emphatically, as Mr.
Lincoln has heard me answer a hundred times, on every stump in
Illinois, that in my opinion, the people of a territory can, by lawful
means, exclude slavery before it comes ill as a State. [Cheers.] Mr.
Lincoln knew that I had given that answer over and over again. He heard
me argue the Nebraska bill on that principle all over the State, in
1854, and ’55, and ’56, and he has now no excuse to pretend to have any
doubt upon that subject. Whatever the Supreme Court may hereafter
decide as on the abstract question of whether slavery may go in under
the Constitution or not, the people of a territory have the lawful
means to admit or exclude it as they please for the reason that slavery
cannot exist a day or an hour anywhere unless supported by local police
regulations, furnishing remedies aid means of enforcing the right of
holding slaves. Those local aid police regulations can only be
furnished by the local Legislature. If the people of the Territory are
opposed to slavery they will elect members to the Legislature who will
adopt unfriendly legislation to it. If they are for it, they will adopt
the legislative measures friendly to slavery. Hence no matter what may
be the decision of the Supreme Court, on that abstract questions still
the right of the people to make it a slave territory or a free
territory, is perfect and complete under the Nebraska Bill. I hope Mr.
Lincoln will deem my answer satisfactory on this point.” This is the
distinct assertion of the power of territorial legislation to admit or
exclude slavery; of the first in the race of migration who reach a
territory, the common property of the people of the United States to
enact laws for the exclusion of other joint owners of the territory,
who may in the exercise of their equal right to enter the common
property, choose to take with them property recognized by the
Constitution, built not acceptable to the first emigrants to the
Territory. That Senator had too often and too fully discussed with me
the question of “squatter sovereignty” to be justified in thus
mistaking my opinion. The difference between us is as wide as that of
one who should assert the right to rob from him who admitted the power.
It is true, as I stated it at that time, all property requires
protection from the society in the midst of which it is held. This
necessity does not confer a right to destroy, but rather creates an
obligation to protect. It is true as I stated it, that slave property
peculiarly requires the protection of society, and would ordinarily
become valueless in the midst of a community, which would seek to
seduce the slave front his master, and conceal him whilst absconding,
and as jurors protect each other in any suit which the master might
bring for damages. The laws of the United States, through the courts of
the United States, might enable the master to recover the slave
wherever he could find him. But you all know, in such a community as I
have supposed, that a slave inclined to abscond would become utterly
useless, and that was the extent of the admission.
The extract on which reliance has been placed was taken from a speech
made at Portland, and both before and after the extract, the language
employed conclusively disproves the construction, which unfriendly
criticism has put upon the detached passage. Immediately preceding it,
the following language was used:
“The Territory being the common property of States, equals in the
Union, and bound by the Constitution which recognizes property in
slaves, it is an abuse of terms to call aggression the migration into
that Territory of one of its joint owners, because carrying with him
any species of property recognized by the Constitution of the United
States. The Federal Government has no power to declare what is property
enywhere.{sic} The power of each State cannot extend beyond its own
limits. As a consequence, therefore, whatever is property in any of the
States, must be so considered in any of the territories of the United
States until they reach to the dignity of community independence, when
the subject matter will be entirely under the control of the people,
and be determined by their fundamental law. If the inhabitants of any
territory should refuse to enact such laws and police regulations as
would give security to their property or to his, it would be rendered
more or less valueless, in proportion to the difficulty of holding it
without such protection. In the case of property in the labor of man,
or what is usually called slave property, the insecurity would be so
great that the owner could not ordinarily retain it. Therefore, though
the right would remain, the remedy being withheld, it would follow that
the owner would be practically debarred by the circumstances of the
case, from taking slave property into a territory where the sense of
the inhabitants was opposed to its introduction. So much for the oft
repeated fallacy of forcing slavery upon any community.”
And in a subsequent part of the same speech, the matter was treated of
in this wise:
“The South had not asked Congress to extend slavery into the
territories, and he in common with most other Southern statesmen,
denied the existence of any power to do so. He held it to be the creed
of the Democracy, both in the North and the South, that the general
government had no constitutional power either to establish or prohibit
slavery anywhere; a grant of power to do the one must necessarily have
involved the power to do the other. Hence it is their policy not to
interfere on the one side or the other, but protecting each individual
in his constitutional rights, to leave every independent community to
determine and adjust all domestic questions as in their wisdom may seem
best.”