Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851Various
General
Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851
Various
American literature -- Periodicals; Civilization -- Periodicals; Culture -- Periodicals
A large Union meeting was held in Cincinnati, on the 14th of November,
at which resolutions were adopted declaring their approval of, and
determination to support, the measures of peace and compromise relative
to the admission of California as a State; the establishment of the
Territorial Governments of New Mexico and Utah; the settlement of the
boundary question of Texas; the abolition of the slave trade in the
district of Columbia; and the provision the more effectually to secure
the observance of the constitutional duty to deliver up fugitives owing
service or labor. They also declared that they condemned, and would
oppose all forcible resistance to the execution of the law of the
General Government for the re-capture of fugitives owing service or
labor; that they regard such law as constitutional--in accordance with
the compromise which formed the Union, and that they would sustain and
enforce it by all proper and legal means, as a matter of constitutional
compromise and obligation. And furthermore they declared that any effort
to re-open the delicate and distracting questions settled and
compromised by the Compromise and Peace measures passed during the late
session of Congress are factious, and should be disapproved and opposed.
During the past month letters and speeches, upon the engrossing topic of
the day, from some of the most eminent men in the country, have been
given to the public, and have attracted a good deal of attention. They
have been mainly on the side of the Compromise measures of the last
session of Congress; as the agitation upon the other side, in the
Northern States at least, has for the present almost wholly ceased. A
speech of very marked and characteristic ability was made by the Hon.
RUFUS CHOATE, at the Faneuil Hall Union meeting in Boston. Mr. C.
thought that the union of these States was in manifest peril, mainly
from a public opinion created by restless and unprincipled men. He
traced, with great skill and in very graphic and eloquent language, the
manner in which public opinion is moulded by the unceasing efforts of
the press and the orator, and that it is only by a prolonged and
voluntary educational process that the fine and strong spirit of
nationality is made to penetrate the great mass of the people, and the
full tide of American feeling to fill the mighty heart. He then depicted
the manner in which hostility of sentiment and sympathy between
different sections of the country has been created and is kept alive.
Coming, then, to the means by which danger to the Union can be best
averted, he said the first and foremost thing to be done was to accept
that whole body of measures of Compromise, by which the Government has
sought to compose the country, and then for every man to set himself to
suppress the further political agitation of this whole subject. These
measures were then referred to, one after the other, and the essential
justice and expediency of each were declared. The two great political
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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