And yet, Sir, in zeal for this enormity, Senators announce their purpose to break down the recent legislation of States, calculated to shield the liberty of the citizen. "It is difficult," says Burke, "to frame an indictment against a whole people." But here in the Senate, where are convened the jealous representatives of the States, we hear whole States arraigned, as if already guilty of crime. The Senator from Louisiana [Mr. BENJAMIN], in plaintive tones sets forth the ground of proceeding, and more than one State is summoned to judgment. It would be easy to show, by critical inquiry, that this whole charge is without just foundation, and that all the legislation so much condemned is as clearly defensible under the Constitution as it is meritorious in purpose. Sir, the only crime of these States is, that Liberty is placed before Slavery. Follow the charge, point by point, and this is apparent. In securing to every person claimed as slave the protection of trial by jury and the _Habeas_ _Corpus_, they simply provide safeguards strictly within the province of every State, and rendered necessary by the usurpation of the Fugitive Act. In securing the aid of counsel to every person claimed as slave, they but perform a kindly duty, which no phrase or word in the Constitution can be tortured to condemn. In visiting with severe penalties every malicious effort to reduce a fellow-man to slavery, they respond to the best feelings of the human heart. In prohibiting the use of county jails and buildings as barracoons and slave-pens,--in prohibiting all public officers, holding the commission of the State, in any capacity, whether as Chief Justice or Justice of the Peace, whether as Governor or Constable, from any service as slave-hunter,--in prohibiting the _volunteer militia_ of the State, in its organized form, from any such service, the States simply exercise a power under the Constitution, recognized by the Supreme Court of the United States even while upholding Slavery in the fatal _Prigg_ case, by POSITIVE PROHIBITION, to withdraw its own officers from this offensive business.