American Eloquence, Volume III. (of 4) by Various

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The several points of the Dred Scott decision, in connection with
Senator Douglas's "care-not" policy, constitute the piece of machinery
in its present state of advancement. This was the third point gained.
The working points of that machinery are: (1) That no negro slave,
imported as such from Africa, and no descendant of such slave, can ever
be a citizen of any State, in the sense of that term as used in the
Constitution of the United States. This point is made in order to
deprive the negro, in every possible event, of the benefit of that
provision of the United States Constitution, which declares that
"the citizens of each State shall be entitled to all privileges and
immunities of citizens in the several States." (2) That, "subject to the
Constitution of the United States," neither Congress nor a Territorial
Legislature can exclude slavery from any United States Territory. This
point is made in order that individual men may fill up the Territories
with slaves, without danger of losing them as property, and thus to
enhance the chances of permanency to the institution through all the
future. (3) That whether the holding a negro in actual slavery in a free
State makes him free, as against the holder, the United States courts
will not decide, but will leave to be decided by the courts of any slave
State the negro may be forced into by the master. This point is made,
not to be pressed immediately; but, if acquiesced in for a while, and
apparently indorsed by the people at an election, then to sustain the
logical conclusion that what Dred Scott's master might lawfully do with
Dred Scott, in the State of Illinois, every other master may lawfully do
with any other one or one thousand slaves, in Illinois, or in any other
free State.

Auxiliary to all this, and working hand in hand with it, the Nebraska
doctrine, or what is left of it, is to educate and mould public opinion,
at least Northern public opinion, not to care whether slavery is voted
down or voted up. This shows exactly where we now are, and partially,
also, whither we are tending.

It will throw additional light on the latter to go back, and run the
mind over the string of historical facts already stated. Several things
will now appear less dark and mysterious than they did when they were
transpiring. The people were to be left "perfectly free," "subject only
to the Constitution." What the Constitution had to do with it, outsiders
could not then see. Plainly enough now, it was an exactly fitted niche
for the Dred Scott decision to come in afterward, and declare the
perfect freedom of the people to be just no freedom at all. Why was
the amendment expressly declaring the right of the people voted down?
Plainly enough now, the adoption of it would have spoiled the niche for
the Dred Scott decision. Why was the court decision held up? Why even
a Senator's individual opinion withheld till after the Presidential
election? Plainly enough now: the speaking out then would have damaged
the "perfectly free" argument upon which the election was to be carried.
Why the outgoing President's felicitation on the indorsement? Why the
delay of a re-argument? Why the incoming President's advance exhortation
in favor of the decision? These things look like the cautious patting
and petting of a spirited horse preparatory to mounting him, when it
is dreaded that he may give the rider a fall. And why the hasty after
indorsement of the decision by the President and others?

We cannot absolutely know that all these exact adaptations are the
result of preconcert. But when we see a lot of framed timbers, different
portions of which we know have been gotten out at different times and
places, and by different workmen--Stephen, Franklin, Roger, and James,
for instance,--and when we see these timbers joined together, and see
that they exactly make the frame of a house or a mill, all the tenons
and mortices exactly fitting, and all the lengths and proportions of the
different pieces exactly adapted to their respective places, and not
a piece too many or too few--not omitting even scaffolding,--or, if a
single piece be lacking, we see the place in the frame exactly fitted
and prepared yet to bring such piece in,--in such a case, we find it
impossible not to believe that Stephen and Franklin and Roger and James
all understood one another from the beginning, and all worked upon a
common plan or draft drawn up before the first blow was struck.

It should not be overlooked that, by the Nebraska bill, the people of a
State, as well as Territory, were to be left "perfectly free," "subject
only to the Constitution." Why mention a State? They were legislating
for Territories, and not for or about States. Certainly, the people of
a State are and ought to be subject to the Constitution of the United
States; but why is mention of this lugged into this merely Territorial
law? Why are the people of a Territory and the people of a State therein
lumped together, and their relation to the Constitution therein
treated as being precisely the same? While the opinion of the court, by
Chief-Justice Taney, in the Dred Scott case, and the separate opinions
of all the concurring judges, expressly declare that the Constitution of
the United States permits neither Congress nor a Territorial Legislature
to exclude slavery from any United States Territory, they all omit to
declare whether or not the same Constitution permits a State, or the
people of a State, to exclude it. Possibly, this is a mere omission; but
who can be quite sure, if McLean or Curtis had sought to get into the
opinion a declaration of unlimited power in the people of a State to
exclude slavery from their limits, just as Chase and Mace sought to
get such declaration, in behalf of the people of a territory, into the
Nebraska bill--I ask, who can be quite sure that it would not have been
voted down in the one case as it had been in the other? The nearest
approach to the point of declaring the power of a State over slavery is
made by Judge Nelson. He approaches it more than once, using the
precise idea, and almost the language, too, of the Nebraska act. On
one occasion, his exact language is: "Except in cases when the power
is restrained by the Constitution of the United States, the law of the
State is supreme over the subjects of slavery within its jurisdiction."
In what cases the power of the States is so restrained by the United
States Constitution is left an open question, precisely as the same
question, as to the restraint on the power of the Territories, was
left open in the Nebraska act. Put this and that together, and we have
another nice little niche, which we may, ere long, see filled with
another Supreme Court decision, declaring that the Constitution of
the United States does not permit a State to exclude slavery from its
limits. And this may especially be expected if the doctrine of "care not
whether slavery be voted down or voted up," shall gain upon the public
mind sufficiently to give promise that such a decision can be maintained
when made.

Such a decision is all that slavery now lacks of being alike lawful in
all the States. Welcome or unwelcome, such decision is probably coming,
and will soon be upon us, unless the power of the present political
dynasty shall be met and overthrown. We shall lie down pleasantly
dreaming that the people of Missouri are on the verge of making their
State free, and we shall awake to the reality, instead, that the Supreme
Court has made Illinois a slave State. To meet and overthrow
that dynasty is the work before all those who would prevent that
consummation. That is what we have to do. How can we best do it?

There are those who denounce us openly to their own friends, and yet
whisper us softly that Senator Douglas is the aptest instrument there
is with which to effect that object. They wish us to infer all, from
the fact that he now has a little quarrel with the present head of the
dynasty; and that he has regularly voted with us on a single point, upon
which he and we have never differed. They remind us that he is a
great man, and that the largest of us are very small ones. Let this be
granted. "But a living dog is better than a dead lion." Judge Douglas,
if not a dead lion, for this work, is at least a caged and toothless
one. How can he oppose the advances of slavery? He don't care anything
about it. His avowed mission is impressing the "public heart" to
care nothing about it. A leading Douglas Democratic newspaper thinks
Douglas's superior talent will be needed to resist the revival of the
African slave-trade. Does Douglas believe an effort to revive that trade
is approaching? He has not said so. Does he really think so? But if it
is, how can he resist it? For years he has labored to prove it a sacred
right of white men to take negro slaves into the new Territories. Can he
possibly show that it is less a sacred right to buy them where they can
be bought cheapest? And unquestionably they can be bought cheaper in
Africa than in Virginia. He has done all in his power to reduce the
whole question of slavery to one of a mere right of property; and as
such, how can he oppose the foreign slave-trade? How can he refuse that
trade in that "property" shall be "perfectly free," unless he does it
as a protection to the home production? And as the home producers will
probably ask the protection, he will be wholly without a ground of
opposition. Senator Douglas holds, we know, that a man may rightfully be
wiser to-day than he was yesterday--that he may rightfully change when
he finds himself wrong. But can we, for that reason, run ahead, and
infer that he will make any particular change, of which he himself has
given no intimation? Can we safely base our action upon any such vague
inference? Now, as ever, I wish not to misrepresent Judge Douglas's
position, question his motives, or do aught that can be personally
offensive to him. Whenever, if ever, he and we can come together on
principle, so that our cause may have assistance from his great ability,
I hope to have interposed no adventitious obstacle. But, clearly, he is
not now with us--he does not pretend to be, he does not promise ever to
be.

Our cause, then, must be entrusted to, and conducted by its own
undoubted friends--those whose hands are free, whose hearts are in the
work--who do care for the result. Two years ago the Republicans of the
nation mustered over thirteen hundred thousand strong. We did this under
the single impulse of resistance to a common danger. With every external
circumstance against us, of strange, discordant, and even hostile
elements, we gathered from the four winds, and formed and fought the
battle through, under the constant hot fire of a disciplined, proud, and
pampered enemy. Did we brave all then, to falter now?--now, when that
same enemy is wavering, dissevered, and belligerent! The result is not
doubtful. We shall not fail--if we stand firm, we shall not fail. Wise
counsels may accelerate, or mistakes delay it; but, sooner or later, the
victory is sure to come.

STEPHEN ARNOLD DOUGLAS,

OF ILLINOIS. (BORN 1813, DIED 1861.)

IN REPLY TO MR. LINCOLN;

FREEPORT, ILLS., AUGUST 27, 1858.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN:

I am glad that at last I have brought Mr. Lincoln to the conclusion
that he had better define his position on certain political questions
to which I called his attention at Ottawa. * * * In a few moments I
will proceed to review the answers which he has given to these
interrogatories; but, in order to relieve his anxiety, I will first
respond to those which he has presented to me. Mark you, he has not
presented interrogatories which have ever received the sanction of the
party with which I am acting, and hence he has no other foundation for
them than his own curiosity.

First he desires to know, if the people of Kansas shall form a
constitution by means entirely proper and unobjectionable, and ask
admission as a State, before they have the requisite population for a
member of Congress, whether I will vote for that admission. Well, now,
I regret exceedingly that he did not answer that interrogatory himself
before he put it to me, in order that we might understand, and not
be left to infer, on which side he is. Mr. Trumbull, during the last
session of Congress, voted from the beginning to the end against the
admission of Oregon, although a free State, because she had not the
requisite population for a member of Congress. Mr. Trumbull would not
consent, under any circumstances, to let a State, free or slave, come
into the Union until it had the requisite population. As Mr. Trumbull is
in the field fighting for Mr. Lincoln, I would like to have Mr. Lincoln
answer his own question and tell me whether he is fighting Trumbull on
that issue or not. But I will answer his question. * * * Either Kansas
must come in as a free State, with whatever population she may have, or
the rule must be applied to all the other Territories alike. I therefore
answer at once that, it having been decided that Kansas has people
enough for a slave State, I hold that she has enough for a free State.
I hope Mr. Lincoln is satisfied with my answer; and now I would like to
get his answer to his own interrogatory--whether or not he will vote
to admit Kansas before she has the requisite population. I want to
know whether he will vote to admit Oregon before that Territory has the
requisite population. Mr. Trumbull will not, and the same reason that
commits Mr. Trumbull against the admission of Oregon commits him against
Kansas, even if she should apply for admission as a free State. If there
is any sincerity, any truth, in the argument of Mr. Trumbull in the
Senate against the admission of Oregon, because she had not 93,420
people, although her population was larger than that of Kansas, he
stands pledged against the admission of both Oregon and Kansas until
they have 93,420 inhabitants. I would like Mr. Lincoln to answer this
question. I would like him to take his own medicine. If he differs
with Mr. Trumbull, let him answer his argument against the admission of
Oregon, instead of poking questions at me.

The next question propounded to me by Mr. Lincoln is, Can the people of
the Territory in any lawful way, against the wishes of any citizen
of the United States, exclude slavery from their limits prior to the
formation of a State Constitution? I answer emphatically, as Mr. Lincoln
has heard me answer a hundred times from every stump in Illinois, that
in my opinion the people of a Territory can, by lawful means,
exclude slavery from their limits prior to the formation of a State
Constitution. Mr. Lincoln knew that I had answered that question over
and over again. He heard me argue the Nebraska bill on that principle
all over the State in 1854, in 1855, and in 1856; and he has no excuse
for pretending to be in doubt as to my position on that question. It
matters not what way the Supreme Court may hereafter decide as to the
abstract question whether slavery may or may not go into a Territory
under the Constitution; the people have the lawful means to introduce it
or exclude it as they please, for the reason that slavery cannot exist
a day or an hour anywhere unless it is supported by local police
regulations. Those police regulations can only be established by the
local Legislature; and, if the people are opposed to slavery, they will
elect representatives to that body who will by unfriendly legislation
effectually prevent the introduction of it into their midst. If, on the
contrary, they are for it, their legislation will favor its extension.
Hence, no matter what the decision of the Supreme Court may be on
that abstract question, still the right of the people to make a slave
Territory or a free Territory is perfect and complete under the Nebraska
bill. I hope Mr. Lincoln deems my answer satisfactory on that point.

In this connection, I will notice the charge which he has introduced
in relation to Mr. Chase's amendment. I thought that I had chased that
amendment out of Mr. Lincoln's brain at Ottawa; but it seems that it
still haunts his imagination, and that he is not yet satisfied. I had
supposed that he would be ashamed to press that question further. He is
a lawyer, and has been a member of Congress, and has occupied his time
and amused you by telling you about parliamentary proceedings. He ought
to have known better than to try to palm off his miserable impositions
upon this intelligent audience. The Nebraska bill provided that the
legislative power and authority of the said Territory should extend to
all rightful subjects of legislation, consistent with the organic act
and the Constitution of the United States. It did not make any exception
as to slavery, but gave all the power that it was possible for Congress
to give, without violating the Constitution, to the Territorial
Legislature, with no exception or limitation on the subject of slavery
at all. The language of that bill, which I have quoted, gave the
full power and the fuller authority over the subject of slavery,
affirmatively and negatively, to introduce it or exclude it, so far as
the Constitution of the United States would permit. What more could Mr.
Chase give by his amendment? Nothing! He offered his amendment for
the identical purpose for which Mr. Lincoln is using it, to enable
demagogues in the country to try and deceive the people. His amendment
was to this effect. It provided that the Legislature should have power
to exclude slavery; and General Cass suggested: "Why not give the power
to introduce as well as to exclude?" The answer was--they have the power
already in the bill to do both. Chase was afraid his amendment would be
adopted if he put the alternative proposition, and so made it fair both
ways, and would not yield. He offered it for the purpose of having it
rejected. He offered it, as he has himself avowed over and over again,
simply to make capital out of it for the stump. He expected that it
would be capital for small politicians in the country, and that they
would make an effort to deceive the people with it; and he was not
mistaken, for Lincoln is carrying out the plan admirably. * * *

The third question which Mr. Lincoln presented is--If the Supreme Court
of the United States shall decide that a State of this Union cannot
exclude slavery from its own limits, will I submit to it? I am amazed
that Mr. Lincoln should ask such a question. Mr. Lincoln's object is to
cast an imputation upon the Supreme Court. He knows that there never was
but one man in America, claiming any degree of intelligence or decency,
who ever for a moment pretended such a thing. It is true that the
_Washington Union_, in an article published on the 17th of last
December, did put forth that doctrine, and I denounced the article on
the floor of the Senate. * * * Lincoln's friends, Trumbull, and Seward,
and Hale, and Wilson, and the whole Black Republican side of the Senate
were silent. They left it to me to denounce it. And what was the
reply made to me on that occasion? Mr. Toombs, of Georgia, got up and
undertook to lecture me on the ground that I ought not to have deemed
the article worthy of notice, and ought not to have replied to it; that
there was not one man, woman, or child south of the Potomac, in any
slave State, who did not repudiate any such pretension. Mr. Lincoln
knows that reply was made on the spot, and yet now he asks this
question! He might as well ask me--Suppose Mr. Lincoln should steal a
horse, would I sanction it; and it would be as genteel in me to ask him,
in the event he stole a horse, what ought to be done with him. He casts
an imputation upon the Supreme Court of the United States, by supposing
that they would violate the Constitution of the United States. I tell
him that such a thing is not possible. It would be an act of moral
treason that no man on the bench could ever descend to. Mr. Lincoln
himself would never, in his partisan feelings, so far forget what was
right as to be guilty of such an act.

The fourth question of Mr. Lincoln is--Are you in favor of acquiring
additional territory in disregard as to how such acquisition may affect
the Union on the slavery question? This question is very ingeniously and
cunningly put. The Black Republican crowd lays it down expressly that
under no circumstances shall we acquire any more territory unless
slavery is first prohibited in the country. I ask Mr. Lincoln whether he
is in favor of that proposition? Are you opposed to the acquisition
of any more territory, under any circumstances, unless slavery is
prohibited in it? That he does not like to answer. When I ask him
whether he stands up to that article in the platform of his party, he
turns, Yankee fashion, and, without answering it, asks me whether I am
in favor of acquiring territory without regard to how it may affect
the Union on the slavery question. I answer that, whenever it becomes
necessary, in our growth and progress, to acquire more territory, I am
in favor of it without reference to the question of slavery, and when
we have acquired it, I will leave the people free to do as they please,
either to make it slave or free territory, as they prefer. It is idle
to tell me or you that we have territory enough. * * * With our natural
increase, growing with a rapidity unknown in any other part of the
globe, with the tide of emigration that is fleeing from despotism in the
old world to seek refuge in our own, there is a constant torrent pouring
into this country that requires more land, more territory upon which
to settle; and just as fast as our interest and our destiny require
additional territory in the North, in the South, or in the islands of
the ocean, I am for it, and, when we acquire it, will leave the people,
according to the Nebraska bill, free to do as they please on the subject
of slavery and every other question.

I trust now that Mr. Lincoln will deem him-self answered on his four
points. He racked his brain so much in devising these four questions
that he exhausted himself, and had not strength enough to invent the
others. As soon as he is able to hold a council with his advisers,
Love-joy, Farnsworth, and Fred Douglas, he will frame and propound
others ("Good," "good!"). You Black Republicans who say "good," I have
no doubt, think that they are all good men. I have reason to recollect
that some people in this country think that Fred Douglas is a very good
man. The last time I came here to make a speech, while talking from
a stand to you, people of Freeport, as I am doing to-day, I saw a
carriage, and a magnificent one it was, drive up and take a position on
the outside of the crowd; a beautiful young lady was sitting on the box
seat, whilst Fred Douglas and her mother reclined inside, and the owner
of the carriage acted as driver. I saw this in your own town. ("What
of it?") All I have to say of it is this, that if you Black Republicans
think that the negro ought to be on a social equality with your wives
and daughters, and ride in a carriage with your wife, whilst you drive
the team, you have a perfect right to do so. I am told that one of Fred
Douglas' kinsmen, another rich black negro, is now travelling in this
part of the State making speeches for his friend Lincoln as the champion
of black men. ("What have you to say against it?") All I have to say on
that subject is, that those of you who believe that the negro is your
equal, and ought to be on an equality with you socially, politically,
and legally, have a right to entertain those opinions, and of course
will vote for Mr. Lincoln.

WM. H. SEWARD,

OF NEW YORK. (BORN 1801, DIED 1872.)

ON THE IRREPRESSIBLE CONFLICT;

ROCHESTER, OCTOBER 25, 1858.

THE unmistakable outbreaks of zeal which occur all around me, show that
you are earnest men--and such a man am I. Let us therefore, at least
for a time, pass all secondary and collateral questions, whether of a
personal or of a general nature, and consider the main subject of the
present canvass. The Democratic party, or, to speak more accurately, the
party which wears that attractive name--is in possession of the Federal
Government. The Republicans propose to dislodge that party, and dismiss
it from its high trust.

The main subject, then, is, whether the Democratic party deserves to
retain the confidence of the American people. In attempting to prove
it unworthy, I think that I am not actuated by prejudices against that
party, or by pre-possessions in favor of its adversary; for I have
learned, by some experience, that virtue and patriotism, vice and
selfishness, are found in all parties, and that they differ less in
their motives than in the policies they pursue.

Our country is a theatre, which exhibits, in full operation, two
radically different political systems; the one resting on the basis of
servile or slave labor, the other on voluntary labor of freemen. The
laborers who are enslaved are all negroes, or persons more or less
purely of African derivation. But this is only accidental. The principle
of the system is, that labor in every society, by whomsoever performed,
is necessarily unintellectual, grovelling and base; and that the
laborer, equally for his own good and for the welfare of the State,
ought to be enslaved. The white laboring man, whether native or
foreigner, is not enslaved, only because he cannot, as yet, be reduced
to bondage.

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