A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention: For Proposing Amendments to the Constitution of the United States, Held at Washington, D.C., in February, A.D. 1861Chittenden, L. E. (Lucius Eugene)
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A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention: For Proposing Amendments to the Constitution of the United States, Held at Washington, D.C., in February, A.D. 1861
Chittenden, L. E. (Lucius Eugene)
Conference Convention (1861 : Washington, D.C.); United States -- Politics and government -- 1857-1861
Let us then go about the work like sensible men; let us stop making
long speeches and picking flaws in each other. It is a matter of
business, and pretty important business. Let us consider it as such,
and from this moment let us throw aside all feeling, and set about
coming to some understanding. We can do it to-day as well as next
week. I do not know that these propositions are the best that can be
made; but if they are not, let us talk the matter over like good Union
men, and see what is best. When we can find that out, let us agree. If
we stay here and make speeches until doomsday, we shall be no better
off. I am for action, and coming to an immediate decision.
Mr. COALTER:--If the vote of Missouri is to be taken as an evidence of
her devotion to the Union, it must also be understood with this
qualification: Her interests and her sympathies unite her closely with
the South. She feels, in common with others, her share of anxiety for
the future. She is devoted to the Union, and at the same time she
insists that it is fair and right that these guarantees should be
given.
It has been distinctly avowed on this floor that the people of certain
sections of the North _abhor_ slavery. Ought we not to be distrustful
when a party entertaining such sentiments comes into supreme power?
If Massachusetts abhors _slavery_, how long will it be before she will
abhor _slaveholders?_
Ignorance is the source of all our difficulties. The people of the
North know little of the condition of the negro in a state of slavery.
We know that the four millions of blacks in the South are better off
in all respects than any similar number of laborers anywhere.
But I rise only to correct a false impression in regard to Missouri. I
have only besides to express my full conviction that if the North will
not give us these guarantees, we are henceforth a divided people.
Mr. GOODRICH:--Mr. President, the object of this Convention, assembled
on the call or invitation of Virginia, is, as set forth in the
preamble and resolutions of her General Assembly,
"To restore the Union and Constitution in the spirit in
which they were established by the fathers of the Republic;"
or, as otherwise expressed, "to adjust the present unhappy
controversies in the spirit in which the Constitution was
originally made, and consistently with its principles."
This agrees, in substance, with the purpose of the Republican party,
which, in the words of the Philadelphia platform, is declared to be
that of "restoring the action of the Federal Government to the
principles of WASHINGTON and JEFFERSON."
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