170 



CONGKESS, U. S. 



having despaired of that reversal of judgment 

 and that change of conduct, they are proceed- 

 ing in the only mode left them to vindicate 

 their rights and their honor. I cannot vote for 

 the resolution of my friend from Kentucky, he- 

 cause it would be an intimation darkly given, 

 it is true, but yet an intimation to my State 

 which is moving, that there is a hope of recon- 

 ciliation. I do not believe there is any such 

 hope. I see no evidence upon which to base a 

 hope. I see, through this dark cloud that sur- 

 rounds us, no ray of light. To me it is all 

 darkness midnight gloom. I therefore, stand- 

 ing here as one of the Senators from my State 

 to report faithfully what is going on, will hold 

 out no false hope. I will not say to them, even 

 by implication, that I believe that which, upon 

 my soul, I do not believe." 



Mr. Pugh, of Ohio, denied the conclusion of 

 the preceding speaker, saying : " After more 

 than seventy years of liberty and happiness and 

 prosperity as a confederation of States, must 

 we now acknowledge that our constituents, 

 some thirty million in all, with every advantage 

 that men could desire for self-government, are 

 unable to decide their differences in a satisfac- 

 tory manner ? "Why, sir, what hope is left for 

 mankind anywhere? Will you pretend that 

 the Southern people are capable of free govern- 

 ment hereafter, if they cannot now commune 

 with their Northern brethren upon fair and 

 honorable terms of adjustment? Or shall we, 

 on our side, indulge a pretension equally vain ? 

 We stultify ourselves, all of us, in saying that 

 we cannot hear, cannot discuss, and cannot 

 compromise the controversy with which we are 

 threatened. That is to say, in so many words, 

 that our experiment of the Union is a failure ; 

 and, more than that, your Southern confederacy 

 will be a failure, and all other confederacies to 

 the end of time. Mr. President, I have not at- 

 tained any such conclusion ; I am not of opinion, 

 as yet, that a majority, or any considerable 

 number of the people, South or North, desire 

 the bonds of this Confederacy to be torn asun- 

 der. There has been crimination upon both 

 sides ; there have been outrages on both sides ; 

 there have been things which ought to be re- 

 dressed, some by the arm of the law, some by 

 a more faithful administration of our Federal 

 and State Governments; but there has been 

 nothing which cannot be redressed promptly, 

 fairly, and in the most efficacious manner. I 

 believe, before God and my country, that nine- 

 ty-nine hundredths of the people in every State, 

 North and South, are anxious this day to re- 

 dress all outrages and all causes of reasonable 

 complaint." 



Mr. Mason, of Virginia, stated that he should 

 vote for the resolution, "but without an idea 

 that it is possible for any thing that Congress 

 can do to reach the dangers with which we are 

 threatened." He said : " What is the evil ? 

 Gentlemen have well said, it is not the failure 

 to execute this fugitive slave law ; it is not the 

 passage of these liberty bills, as they are called, 



in various of the States ; it is a social war so 

 far not a war of arms a war of sentiment, of 

 opinion ; a war by one form of society against 

 another form of society. I possibly may have 

 a misinformed judgment, but I rely upon it 

 until corrected.; and my judgment is satisfied 

 that, for some reason, the population in the 

 States having no slaves, feeling their great nu- 

 merical majority, and having nursed this senti- 

 ment, this mere opinion about social forms ex- 

 isting elsewhere, have in some manner unfor- 

 tunately brought themselves to a determination 

 to extinguish it. I do not mean by any imme- 

 diate blow by any present law ; but it is their 

 purpose, having obtained possession of the Fed- 

 eral power, to use that power in every form to 

 bring that social condition to a close. 



" I look upon it then, sir, as a war of senti- 

 ment and opinion by one form of society against 

 another form of society. How that will end, I 

 will not undertake to predict ; but if there be 

 a remedy for it, it is not here ; it must be at 

 home in their own State councils ; and I should 

 regret extremely if any vote I am to give here 

 should mislead public judgment so far as to lead 

 them to suppose that they are to look here for 

 safety. If the people would go into convention 

 in all those States, as we are driven into con- 

 vention, take up the subject, probe it, analyze 

 it, look back to history and see what it is, they 

 would have it in their power to apply a remedy. 

 The remedy rests in their hands, not in Con- 

 gress; in the State councils of the several 

 States; in the political society of the several 

 States ; and if we induce them, by any act of 

 ours here, to look to Congress for safety, wo 

 shall mislead them." 



Mr. Iverson, of Georgia, after discussing the 

 various measures of conciliation, which might 

 be proposed under the resolution : such as the 

 effort to remove the objections of the Southern 

 States by congressional legislation alteration 

 of the Constitution, &c., declared that the South 

 would never be satisfied with any concession 

 " that does not fully recognize, not only the 

 existence of slavery in its present form, but the 

 right of the Southern people to emigrate to the 

 common territories with their slave property, 

 and their right to congressional protection, 

 while the territorial existence lasts." " No one 

 expects such a remedy will ever be accorded 

 by Congress. The Eepublican party is a unit 

 against any such provision: I tell you, Mr. 

 President, that the question is settled in rela- 

 tion to this great movement which is now pro- 

 gressing in certain of the Southern States. I 

 know the efforts that are now being made to 

 stay the hand of the Southern people, and to 

 cool down the patriotism which is burning 

 within the Southern heart ; but it will be in- 

 effectual, sir. When the arbitrary monarchi- 

 cal government of Louis Philippe, in 1848, had 

 aroused the people of Paris to a sense of their 

 danger and to rebellion, and the barricades of 

 Paris were raised, and the masses of that great 

 city were upheaving in their majesty against 



