If so, then I have a right to say that, in regard to this question, the Union is a house divided against itself; and when the Judge reminds me that I have often said to him that the institution of slavery has existed for eighty years in some States, and yet it does not exist in some others, I agree to the fact, and I account for it by looking at the position in which our fathers originally placed it,--restricting it from the new Territories where it had not gone, and legislating to cut off its source by the abrogation of the slave trade, thus putting the seal of legislation _against its spread_. The public mind _did_ rest in the belief that it was in the course of ultimate extinction. But lately, I think,--and in this I charge nothing on the Judge’s motives,--lately, I think that he, and those acting with him, have placed that institution on a new basis, which looks to the _perpetuity and nationalization of slavery_. And while it is placed upon this new basis, I say and I have said that I believe we shall not have peace upon the question until the opponents of slavery arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction; or, on the other hand, that its advocates will push it forward until it shall become alike lawful in all the States, old as well as new, North as well as South. Now I believe, if we could arrest the spread and place it where Washington and Jefferson and Madison placed it, it _would be_ in the course of ultimate extinction, and the public mind would, as for eighty years past, believe that it was in the course of ultimate extinction. The crisis would be past, and the institution might be let alone for a hundred years--if it should live so long--in the States where it exists, yet it would be going out of existence in the way best for both the black and the white races. [_A voice: “Then do you repudiate Popular Sovereignty?”_] Well, then, let us talk about popular sovereignty. What is Popular Sovereignty? Is it the right of the people to have slavery or not have it, as they see fit, in the Territories? I will state--and I have an able man to watch me--my understanding is that Popular Sovereignty, as now applied to the question of slavery, does allow the people of a Territory to _have_ slavery if they want to, but does not allow them _not_ to have it if they do not want it. I do not mean that, if this vast concourse of people were in a Territory of the United States, any one of them would be obliged to have a slave if he did not want one; but I do say that, as I understand the Dred Scott decision, if any one man wants slaves all the rest have no way of keeping that one man from holding them.