Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1: From Lincoln to Garfield, with a Review of the Events Which Led to the Political Revolution of 1860Blaine, James Gillespie
History
Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1: From Lincoln to Garfield, with a Review of the Events Which Led to the Political Revolution of 1860
Blaine, James Gillespie
United States -- History; United States -- History -- 1865-1898
In his message to the Confederate Congress, Mr. Davis apparently
attempted to cure the defects of his Inaugural address, and to give
a list of measures which he declared to have been hostile to Southern
interests. But it is to be observed that not one of these measures
had been completed. They were merely menaced or foreshadowed. As
matter of fact, emphasized by Mr. Buchanan in his message, and
known to no one better than to Mr. Davis, not a single measure
adverse to the interests of slavery had been passed by the Congress
of the United States from the foundation of the government. If
the Missouri Compromise of 1820 be alleged as an exception to this
sweeping assertion, it must be remembered that that compromise was
a Southern and not a Northern measure, and was a triumph of the
pro-slavery members of Congress over the anti-slavery members; and
that its constitutionality was upheld by the unanimous voice of
the Cabinet in which Mr. Crawford of Georgia and Mr. Calhoun of
South Carolina were leading members.
On the other hand, the policy of the government had been steadily
in favor of slavery; and the measures of Congress which would
strengthen it were not only numerous, but momentous in character.
They are familiar to every one who knows the simplest elements of
our national history. The acquisition of Louisiana, the purchase
of Florida, the Mexican war, were all great national movements
which resulted in strengthening the slave power. Every demand
which the South made for protection had been conceded. More
stringent provisions for the return of fugitive slaves were asked,
and a law was enacted trampling under foot the very spirit of
liberty, and putting in peril the freedom of men who were citizens
of Northern States. The Missouri Compromise, passed with the
consent and support of the South, was repealed by Southern dictation
the moment its operation was found to be hostile to the spread of
slavery. The rights of slavery in the Territories required judicial
confirmation, and the Supreme Court complied by rendering the famous
decision in the case of Dred Scott. Against all these guaranties
and concessions for the support of slavery, Mr. Davis could quote,
not anti-slavery aggressions which had been made, but only those
which might be made in the future.
SOUTHERN RESISTANCE TO LAW.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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