On the other hand, the Abolitionists and the anti-slavery-extensionists insisted upon the immediate admission of California, with its anti-slavery constitution; upon the insertion of the principle of the Wilmot proviso in the Territorial organization of the remainder of the acquisition from Mexico; upon the contraction of the Texan limits, without any compensation to Texas; upon the abolition of the slave-trade in the District of Columbia, and a declaration of the power of Congress to deal with slavery in the District; and upon a jury trial, at the place of apprehension, for every claimed fugitive from labor. [Sidenote: California's application for admission.] The contradiction between these views appeared irreconcilable. We may say, however, that a start toward an approach was caused by the transmission of California's application to Congress for admission, as a Commonwealth, into the Union. This happened on February 13th. On the following day, Mr. Douglas moved to take up the President's message accompanying the application, and thus to consider the California question separately from the others. Mr. Clay agreed to this. Mr. Foote, of Mississippi, scolded Mr. Clay for thus betraying the South, but the {358} Southerners were made to feel that they must modify their opposition to Mr. Clay's plan, if they desired to avoid something like this. [Sidenote: Mr. Calhoun's last speech.] On March 4th, Mr. Calhoun made his last great speech upon the whole political situation, its threatening character, and its possible rectification. He was too feeble to pronounce it himself, and it was read for him by Senator Mason. Mr. Calhoun's propositions were, that the Union was endangered; that the immediate cause of the danger was the universal discontent prevailing in the South from the feeling that the South could no longer remain with safety and honor in the Union; and that the cause of this feeling was the fact that the balance of power between the two sections of the country in the Government was gone, and the stronger section was endeavoring to make the Government an unlimited centralized democracy, and use it for interfering in the internal affairs of the weaker, and for absorbing the substance, as well as destroying the rights, of the weaker. He suggested as remedies for the evils, which he thought existed and impended, an equal division of the territory to the Pacific between the North and the South, an amendment to the Constitution restoring the balance of power between the two sections, proper laws for the rendition of fugitives from labor, and cessation of the agitation of the slavery question.