The Great Conspiracy, Volume 2Logan, John Alexander
History
The Great Conspiracy, Volume 2
Logan, John Alexander
Slavery -- United States; United States -- Politics and government -- 1861-1865
"Section 7. Congress shall provide by law that the United States shall
pay to the owner the full value of the Fugitive from Labor, in all cases
where the Marshal, or other officer, whose duty it was to arrest such
Fugitive, was prevented from so doing by violence or intimidation from
mobs or riotous assemblages, or when, after arrest, such Fugitive was
rescued by like violence or intimidation, and the owner thereby deprived
of the same; and the acceptance of such payment shall preclude the owner
from further claim to such Fugitive. Congress shall provide by law for
securing to the citizens of each State the privileges and immunities of
citizens in the several States."
To spurn such propositions as these--with all the concessions to the
Slave Power therein contained--was equivalent to spurning any and all
propositions that could possibly be made; and by doing this, the
Seceding States placed themselves--as they perhaps desired--in an
utterly irreconcilable attitude, and hence, to a certain extent, which
had not entered into their calculations, weakened their "Cause" in the
eyes of many of their friends in the North, in the Border States, and in
the World. They had become Implacables. Practically considered, this
was their great mistake. The Crittenden Compromise Resolutions covered
and yielded to the Slaveholders of the South all and even more than they
had ever dared seriously to ask or hope for, and had they been open to
Conciliation, they could have undoubtedly carried that measure through
both Houses of Congress and three-fourths of the States.
["Its advocates, with good reason, claimed a large majority of the
People in its favor, and clamored for its submission to a direct
popular vote. Had such a submission been accorded, it is very
likely that the greater number of those who voted at all would have
voted to ratify it. * * * The 'Conservatives,' so called, were
still able to establish this Crittenden Compromise by their own
proper strength, had they been disposed so to do. The President
was theirs; the Senate strongly theirs; in the House, they had a
small majority, as was evidenced in their defeat of John Sherman
for Speaker. Had they now come forward and said, with authority:
'Enable us to pass the Crittenden Compromise, and all shall be
peace and harmony,' they would have succeeded without difficulty.
It was only through the withdrawal of pro-slavery members that the
Republicans had achieved an unexpected majority in either House.
Had those members chosen to return to the seats still awaiting
them, and to support Mr. Crittenden's proposition, they could have
carried it without difficulty."--Vol. 360, Greeley's Am. Conflict.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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