These delegates, under the presidence of WASHINGTON, aided by the counsels of MADISON and FRANKLIN, considered the very questions with which we are now dealing, and they refused to put into the Constitution which they were making, such guarantees to slavery as you now ask from their descendants. That is my interpretation of their action. Either these guarantees are in the Constitution, or they are not. If they are there, let them remain there. If they are not there, I can conceive of no possible state of circumstances under which I would consent to admit them. Mr. MOREHEAD:--Not to save the Union? Mr. FIELD:--No, sir, no! That is my comprehensive answer. Mr. MOREHEAD:--Then you will let the Union slide. Mr. FIELD:--No, never! I would let slavery slide, and save the Union. Greater things than this have been done. This year has seen slavery abolished in all the Russias. Mr. ROMAN:--Do you think it better to have the free and slave States separated, and to have the Union dissolved? Mr. FIELD:--I would sacrifice all I have; lay down my life for the Union. But I will not give these guarantees to slavery. If the Union cannot be preserved without them, it cannot long be preserved with them. Let me ask you, if you will recommend to the people of the southern States, in case these guarantees are conceded, to accept them, and abide by their obligations to the Union? You answer, Yes! Do you suppose you can induce the seceded States to return? You answer: We do not know! What will you yourselves do if, after all, they refuse? Your answer is, "_We will go with them!_" We are to understand, then, that this is the language of the slave States, which have not seceded, toward the free States: "If you will support our amendments, we will try to induce the seceded States to return to the Union. We rather think we can induce them to return; but if we cannot, then we will go with them." What is to be done by the Government of the United States while you are trying this experiment? The seceded States are organizing a Government with all its departments. They are levying taxes, raising military forces, and engaging in commerce with foreign nations, in plain violation of the provisions of the Constitution. If this condition of affairs lasts six months longer, France and England will recognize theirs as a Government _de facto_. Do you suppose we will submit to this, that we can submit to it? I speak only for myself. I undertake to commit no one but myself; but I here assert, that an administration which fails to assert by force its authority over the whole country will be a disgrace to the nation. There is no middle ground; we must keep this country unbroken, or we give it up to ruin! We are told that one State has an hundred thousand men ready for the field, and that if we do not assent to these propositions she will fight us. If I believed this to be true, I would not consent to treat on any terms.