Chapter II: Constitutional Government (3)

No sooner was the report laid on the table, than the vultures were flocking around their prey--the carcass of a great military establishment. Men of tainted reputation, of broken fortune (if they ever had any), and of battered constitutions, "choice spirits tired of the dull pursuits of civil life," were seeking after agencies and commissions, willing to doze in gross stupidity over the public fire; to light the public candle at both ends. Honorable men undoubtedly there are ready to serve their country; but what man of spirit, or of self-respect, will accept a commission in the present army? The gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Grundy) addressed himself yesterday exclusively to the "Republicans of the House." I know not whether I may consider myself as entitled to any part of the benefit of the honorable gentleman's discourse. It belongs not, however, to that gentleman to decide. If we must have an exposition of the doctrines of republicanism, I shall receive it from the fathers of the church, and not from the junior apprentices of the law. I shall appeal to my worthy friends from Carolina (Messrs. Macon and Stanford), "men with whom I have measured my strength," by whose side I have fought during the reign of terror; for it was indeed an hour of corruption, of oppression, of pollution. It was not at all to my taste--that sort of republicanism which was supported, on this side of the Atlantic, by the father of the sedition law, John Adams, and by Peter Porcupine on the other. Republicanism! of John Adams and William Cobbett! * * *

Gallant crusaders in the holy cause of republicanism. Such republicanism does, indeed, mean any thing or nothing. Our people will not submit to be taxed for this war of conquest and dominion. The government of the United States was not calculated to wage offensive foreign war; it was instituted for the common defence and the general welfare; and whosoever should embark it in a war of offence, would put it to a test which it is by no means calculated to endure. Make it out that Great Britain has instigated the Indians on a late occasion, and I am ready for battle, but not for dominion. I am unwilling, however, under present circumstances, to take Canada, at the risk of the Constitution, to embark in a common cause with France, and be dragged at the wheels of the car of some Burr or Bonaparte. For a gentleman from Tennessee, or Genesee, or Lake Champlain, there may be some prospect of advantage. Their hemp would bear a great price by the exclusion of foreign supply. In that, too, the great importers are deeply interested. The upper country of the Hudson and the lakes would be enriched by the supplies for the troops, which they alone could furnish. They would have the exclusive market; to say nothing of the increased preponderance from the acquisition of Canada and that section of the Union, which the Southern and Western States have already felt so severely in the Apportionment bill. * * *

Permit me now, sir, to call your attention to the subject of our black population. I will touch this subject as tenderly as possible. It is with reluctance that I touch it at all; but in cases of great emergency, the State physician must not be deterred by a sickly, hysterical humanity, from probing the wound of his patient; he must not be withheld by a fastidious and mistaken delicacy from representing his true situation to his friends, or even to the sick man himself, when the occasion calls for it. What is the situation of the slave-holding States? During the war of the Revolution, so fixed were their habits of subordination, that while the whole country was overrun by the enemy, who invited them to desert, no fear was ever entertained of an insurrection of the slaves. During a war of seven years, with our country in possession of the enemy, no such danger was ever apprehended. But should we, therefore, be unobservant spectators of the progress of society within the last twenty years; of the silent but powerful change wrought, by time and chance, upon its composition and temper? When the fountains of the great deep of abomination were broken up, even the poor slaves did not escape the general deluge. The French Revolution has polluted even them. * * *

Men, dead to the operation of moral causes, have taken away from the poor slave his habit of loyalty and obedience to his master, which lightened his servitude by a double operation; beguiling his own cares and disarming his master's suspicions and severity; and now, like true empirics in politics, you are called upon to trust to the mere physical strength of the fetter which holds him in bondage. You have deprived him of all moral restraint; you have tempted him to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge, just enough to perfect him in wickedness; you have opened his eyes to his nakedness; you have armed his nature against the hand that has fed, that has clothed him, that has cherished him in sickness; that hand which before he became a pupil of your school, he had been accustomed to press with respectful affection. You have done all this--and then show him the gibbet and the wheel, as incentives to a sullen, repugnant obedience. God forbid, sir, that the Southern States should ever see an enemy on their shores, with these infernal principles of French fraternity in the van. While talking of taking Canada, some of us are shuddering for our own safety at home. I speak from facts, when I say, that the night-bell never tolls for fire in Richmond, that the mother does not hug her infant more closely to her bosom. I have been a witness of some of the alarms in the capital of Virginia. * * *

Against whom are these charges brought? Against men, who in the war of the Revolution were in the councils of the nation, or fighting the battles of your country. And by whom are they made? By runaways chiefly from the British dominions, since the breaking out of the French troubles. It is insufferable. It cannot be borne. It must and ought, with severity, to be put down in this House; and out of it to meet the lie direct. We have no fellow-feeling for the suffering and oppressed Spaniards! Yet even them we do not reprobate. Strange! that we should have no objection to any other people or government, civilized or savage, in the whole world! The great autocrat of all the Russias receives the homage of our high consideration. The Dey of Algiers and his divan of pirates are very civil, good sort of people, with whom we find no difficulty in maintaining the relations of peace and amity. "Turks, Jews, and infidels"; Melimelli or the Little Turtle; barbarians and savages of every clime and color, are welcome to our arms. With chiefs of banditti, negro or mulatto, we can treat and trade. Name, however, but England, and all our antipathies are up in arms against her. Against whom? Against those whose blood runs in our veins; in common with whom, we claim Shakespeare, and Newton, and Chatham, for our countrymen; whose form of government is the freest on earth, our own only excepted; from whom every valuable principle of our own institutions has been borrowed: representation, jury trial, voting the supplies, writ of habeas corpus, our whole civil and criminal jurisprudence; against our fellow Protestants, identified in blood, in language, in religion, with ourselves. In what school did the worthies of our land, the Washingtons, Henrys, Hancocks, Franklins, Rutledges of America, learn those principles of civil liberty which were so nobly asserted by their wisdom and valor? American resistance to British usurpation has not been more warmly cherished by these great men and their compatriots; not more by Washington, Hancock, and Henry, than by Chatham and his illustrious associates in the British Parliament. It ought to be remembered, too, that the heart of the English people was with us. It was a selfish and corrupt ministry, and their servile tools, to whom we were not more opposed than they were. I trust that none such may ever exist among us; for tools will never be wanting to subserve the purposes, however ruinous or wicked, of kings and ministers of state. I acknowledge the influence of a Shakespeare and a Milton upon my imagination, of a Locke upon my understanding, of a Sidney upon my political principles, of a Chatham upon qualities which, would to God I possessed in common with that illustrious man! of a Tillotson, a Sherlock, and a Porteus upon my religion. This is a British influence which I can never shake off. I allow much to the just and honest prejudices growing out of the Revolution. But by whom have they been suppressed, when they ran counter to the interests of my country? By Washington. By whom, would you listen to them, are they most keenly felt? By felons escaped from the jails of Paris, Newgate, and Kilmainham, since the breaking out of the French Revolution; who, in this abused and insulted country, have set up for political teachers, and whose disciples give no other proof of their progress in republicanism, except a blind devotion to the most ruthless military despotism that the world ever saw. These are the patriots, who scruple not to brand with the epithet of Tory, the men (looking toward the seat of Col. Stewart) by whose blood your liberties have been cemented. These are they, who hold in such keen remembrance the outrages of the British armies, from which many of them are deserters. Ask these self-styled patriots where they were during the American war (for they are, for the most part, old enough to have borne arms), and you strike them dumb; their lips are closed in eternal silence. If it were allowable to entertain partialities, every consideration of blood, language, religion, and interest, would incline us toward England: and yet, shall they alone be extended to France and her ruler, whom we are bound to believe a chastening God suffers as the scourge of a guilty world! On all other nations he tramples; he holds them in contempt; England alone he hates; he would, but he cannot, despise her; fear cannot despise; and shall we disparage our ancestors?

But the outrages and injuries of England--bred up in the principles of the Revolution--I can never palliate, much less defend them. I well remember flying, with my mother and her new-born child, from Arnold and Philips; and we were driven by Tarleton and other British Pandours from pillar to post, while her husband was fighting the battles of his country. The impression is indelible on my memory; and yet (like my worthy old neighbor, who added seven buckshot to every cartridge at the battle of Guilford, and drew fine sight at his man) I must be content to be called a Tory by a patriot of the last importation. Let us not get rid of one evil (supposing it possible) at the expense of a greater; _mutatis mutandis_, suppose France in possession of the British naval power--and to her the trident must pass should England be unable to wield it--what would be your condition? What would be the situation of your seaports, and their seafaring inhabitants? Ask Hamburg, Lubec! Ask Savannah! * * *

Shall republicans become the instruments of him who has effaced the title of Attila to the "scourge of God!" Yet, even Attila, in the falling fortunes of civilization, had, no doubt, his advocates, his tools, his minions, his parasites, in the very countries that he overran; sons of that soil whereon his horse had trod; where grass could never after grow. If perfectly fresh, instead of being as I am, my memory clouded, my intellect stupefied, my strength and spirits exhausted, I could not give utterance to that strong detestation which I feel toward (above all other works of the creation) such characters as Gengis, Tamerlane, Kouli-Khan, or Bonaparte. My instincts involuntarily revolt at their bare idea. Malefactors of the human race, who have ground down man to a mere machine of their impious and bloody ambition! Yet under all the accumulated wrongs, and insults, and robberies of the last of these chieftains, are we not, in point of fact, about to become a party to his views, a partner in his wars? * * *

I call upon those professing to be republicans to make good the promises, held out by their republican predecessors, when they came into power; promises which, for years afterward, they honestly, faithfully fulfilled. We have vaunted of paying off the national debt, of retrenching useless establishments; and yet have now become as infatuated with standing armies, loans, taxes, navies, and war as ever were the Essex Junto!

ADMISSION OF LOUISIANA.

JOSIAH QUINCY,

--OF MASSACHUSETTS.' (BORN 1772, DIED 1864.)

ON THE ADMISSION OF LOUISIANA--HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, JAN. 14, 1811.

MR. SPEAKER:

I address you, sir, with anxiety and distress of mind, with me, wholly unprecedented. The friends of this bill seem to consider it as the exercise of a common power; as an ordinary affair; a mere municipal regulation, which they expect to see pass without other questions than those concerning details. But, sir, the principle of this bill materially affects the liberties and rights of the whole people of the United States. To me it appears that it would justify a revolution in this country; and that, in no great length of time it may produce it. When I see the zeal and perseverance with which this bill has been urged along its parliamentary path, when I know the local interests and associated projects which combine to promote its success, all opposition to it seems manifestly unavailing. I am almost tempted to leave, without a struggle, my country to its fate. But, sir, while there is life, there is hope. So long as the fatal shaft has not yet sped, if Heaven so will, the bow may be broken and the vigor of the mischief-meditating arm withered. If there be a man in this House or nation, who cherishes the Constitution, under which we are assembled, as the chief stay of his hope, as the light which is destined to gladden his own day, and to soften even the gloom of the grave, by the prospects it sheds over his children, I fall not behind him in such sentiments. I will yield to no man in attachment to this Constitution, in veneration for the sages who laid its foundations, in devotion to those principles which form its cement and constitute its proportions. What then must be my feelings; what ought to be the feelings of a man, cherishing such sentiments, when he sees an act contemplated which lays ruin at the foot of all these hopes? When he sees a principle of action about to be usurped, before the operation of which the bands of this Constitution are no more than flax before the fire, or stubble before the whirlwind? When this bill passes, such an act is done; and such a principle is usurped.

Mr. Speaker, there is a great rule of human conduct, which he who honestly observes, cannot err widely from the path of his sought duty. It is, to be very scrupulous concerning the principles you select as the test of your rights and obligations; to be very faithful in noticing the result of their application; and to be very fearless in tracing and exposing their immediate effects and distant consequences. Under the sanction of this rule of conduct, I am compelled to declare it as my deliberate opinion, that, if this bill passes, the bonds of this union are, virtually, dissolved; that the States which compose it are free from their moral obligations, and that as it will be the right of all, so it will be the duty of some, to prepare, definitely, for a separation: amicably, if they can; _violently, if they must_.

(Mr. Quincy was here called to order by Mr. Poindexter, delegate from the Mississippi territory, for the words in italics. After it was decided, upon an appeal to the House, that Mr. Quincy was in order, he proceeded.)

I rejoice, Mr. Speaker, at the result of this appeal. Not from any personal consideration, but from the respect paid to the essential rights of the people, in one of their representatives. When I spoke of the separation of the States, as resulting from the violation of the Constitution contemplated in this bill, I spoke of it as a necessity, deeply to be deprecated; but as resulting from causes so certain and obvious as to be absolutely inevitable, when the effect of the principle is practically experienced. It is to preserve, to guard the Constitution of my country, that I denounce this attempt. I would rouse the attention of gentlemen from the apathy with which they seem beset. These observations are not made in a corner; there is no low intrigue; no secret machination. I am on the people's own ground; to them I appeal concerning their own rights, their own liberties, their own intent, in adopting this Constitution. The voice I have uttered, at which gentlemen startle with such agitation, is no unfriendly voice. I intended it as a voice of warning. By this people, and by the event, if this bill passes, I am willing to be judged, whether it be not a voice of wisdom.

The bill which is now proposed to be passed has this assumed principle for its basis; that the three branches of this national government, without recurrence to conventions of the people in the States, or to the Legislatures of the States, are authorized to admit new partners to a share of the political power, in countries out of the original limits of the United States. Now, this assumed principle, I maintain to be altogether without any sanction in the Constitution. I declare it to be a manifest and atrocious usurpation of power; of a nature, dissolving, according to undeniable principles of moral law, the obligations of our national compact; and leading to all the awful con-sequences which flow from such a state of things. Concerning this assumed principle, which is the basis of this bill, this is the general position, on which I rest my argument; that if the authority, now proposed to be exercised, be delegated to the three branches of the government by virtue of the Constitution, it results either from its general nature, or from its particular provisions. I shall consider distinctly both these sources, in relation to this pretended power.

Touching the general nature of the instrument called the Constitution of the United States there is no obscurity; it has no fabled descent, like the palladium of ancient Troy, from the heavens. Its origin is not confused by the mists of time, or hidden by the darkness of passed, unexplored ages; it is the fabric of our day. Some now living, had a share in its construction; all of us stood by, and saw the rising of the edifice. There can be no doubt about its nature. It is a political compact. By whom? And about what? The preamble to the instrument will answer these questions.

"We, the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution, for the United States of America."

It is, we the people of the United States, for ourselves and our posterity; not for the people of Louisiana; nor for the people of New Orleans or of Canada. None of these enter into the scope of the instrument; it embraces only "the United States of America." Who these are, it may seem strange in this place to inquire. But truly, sir, our imaginations have, of late, been so accustomed to wander after new settlements to the very ends of the earth, that it will not be time ill spent to inquire what this phrase means, and what it includes. These are not terms adopted at hazard; they have reference to a state of things existing anterior to the Constitution. When the people of the present United States began to contemplate a severance from their parent State, it was a long time before they fixed definitely the name by which they would be designated. In 1774, they called themselves "the Colonies and Provinces of North America." In 1775, "the Representatives of the United Colonies of North America." In the Declaration of Independence, "the Representatives of the United States of America." And finally, in the articles of confederation, the style of the confederacy is declared to be "the United States of America." It was with reference to the old articles of confederation, and to preserve the identity and established individuality of their character, that the preamble to this Constitution, not content, simply, with declaring that it is "we the people of the United States," who enter into this compact, adds that it is for "the United States of America." Concerning the territory contemplated by the people of the United States, in these general terms, there can be no dispute; it is settled by the treaty of peace, and included within the Atlantic Ocean, the St. Croix, the lakes, and more precisely, so far as relates to the frontier, having relation to the present argument, within "a line to be drawn through the middle of the river Mississippi, until it intersect the northernmost part of the thirty-first degree of north latitude, thence within a line drawn due east on this degree of latitude to the river Apalachicola, thence along the middle of this river to its junction with the Flint River, thence straight to the head of the St. Mary's River, and thence down the St. Mary's to the Atlantic Ocean."

I have been thus particular to draw the minds of gentlemen, distinctly, to the meaning of the terms used in the preamble; to the extent which "the United States" then included; and to the fact, that neither New Orleans, nor Louisiana, was within the comprehension of the terms of this instrument. It is sufficient for the present branch of my argument to say, that there is nothing, in the general nature of this compact, from which the power, contemplated to be exercised in this bill, results. On the contrary, as the introduction of a new associate in political power implies, necessarily, a new division of power, and consequent diminution of the relative proportion of the former proprietors of it, there can, certainly, be nothing more obvious, than that from the general nature of the instrument no power can result to diminish and give away, to strangers, any proportion of the rights of the original partners. If such a power exist, it must be found, then, in the particular provisions in the Constitution. The question now arising is, in which of these provisions is given the power to admit new States, to be created in territories beyond the limits of the old United States. If it exist anywhere, it is either in the third section of the fourth article of the Constitution, or in the treaty-making power. If it result from neither of these, it is not pretended to be found anywhere else.

That part of the third section of the fourth article, on which the advocates of this bill rely, is the following: "New States may be admitted by the Congress, into this Union; but no new State shall be formed or erected within the jurisdiction of any other State, nor any State be formed by the junction of two or more States, or parts of States, without the consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned, as well as of the Congress."

I know, Mr. Speaker, that the first clause of this paragraph has been read, with all the superciliousness of a grammarian's triumph--"New States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union,"--accompanied with this most consequential inquiry: "Is not this a new State to be admitted? And is there not here an express authority?" I have no doubt this is a full and satisfactory argument to every one who is content with the mere colors and superficies of things. And if we were now at the bar of some stall-fed justice, the inquiry would insure the victory to the maker of it, to the manifest delight of the constables and suitors of his court. But, sir, we are now before the tribunal of the whole American people; reasoning concerning their liberties, their rights, their Constitution. These are not to be made the victims of the inevitable obscurity of general terms; nor the sport of verbal criticism. The question is concerning the intent of the American people, the proprietors of the old United States, when they agreed to this article. Dictionaries and spelling-books are here of no authority. Neither Johnson, nor Walker, nor Webster, nor Dilworth, has any voice in this matter. Sir, the question concerns the proportion of power reserved, by this Constitution, to every State in this Union. Have the three branches of this government a right, at will, to weaken and out-weigh the influence, respectively secured to each State in this compact, by introducing, at pleasure, new partners, situate beyond the old limits of the United States? The question has not relation merely to New Orleans. The great objection is to the principle of the bill. If this principle be admitted, the whole space of Louisiana, greater, it is said, than the entire extent of the old United States, will be a mighty theatre, in which this government assumes the right of exercising this unparalleled power. And it will be; there is no concealment, it is intended to be exercised. Nor will it stop until the very name and nature of the old partners be overwhelmed by new-corners into the confederacy. Sir, the question goes to the very root of the power and influence of the present members of this Union. The real intent of this article, is, therefore, an injury of most serious import; and is to be settled only by a recurrence to the known history and known relations of this people and their Constitution. These, I maintain, support this position, that the terms "new States," in this article, do not intend new political sovereignties, with territorial annexations, to be created without the original limits of the United States. * * *

But there is an argument stronger even than all those which have been produced, to be drawn from the nature of the power here proposed to be exercised. Is it possible that such a power, if it had been intended to be given by the people, should be left dependent upon the effect of general expressions, and such, too, as were obviously applicable to another subject, to a particular exigency contemplated at that time? Sir, what is this power we propose now to usurp? Nothing less than a power changing all the proportions of the weight and influence possessed by the potent sovereignties composing this Union. A stranger is to be introduced to an equal share without their consent. Upon a principle pretended to be deduced from the Constitution, this government, after this bill passes, may and will multiply foreign partners in power at its own mere motion; at its irresponsible pleasure; in other words, as local interests, party passions, or ambitious views may suggest. It is a power that from its nature never could be delegated; never was delegated; and as it breaks down all the proportions of power guaranteed by the Constitution to the States, upon which their essential security depends, utterly annihilates the moral force of this political conduct. Would this people, so wisely vigilant concerning their rights, have transferred to Congress a power to balance, at its will, the political weight of any one State, much more of all the States, by authorizing it to create new States, at its pleasure, in foreign countries, not pretended to be within the scope of the Constitution, or the conception of the people at the time of passing it? This is not so much a question concerning the exercise of sovereignty, as it is who shall be sovereign--whether the proprietors of the good old United States shall manage their own affairs in their own way; or whether they, and their Constitution, and their political rights, shall be trampled under foot by foreigners, introduced through a breach of the Constitution. The proportion of the political weight of each sovereign State constituting this Union depends upon the number of the States which have voice under the compact. This number the Constitution permits us to multiply at pleasure within the limits of the original United States, observing only the expressed limitations in the Constitution. But when, in order to increase your power of augmenting this number, you pass the old limits, you are guilty of a violation of the Constitution in a fundamental point; and in one, also, which is totally inconsistent with the intent of the contract and the safety of the States which established the association. What is the practical difference to the old partners whether they hold their liberties at the will of a master, or whether by admitting exterior States on an equal footing with the original States, arbiters are constituted, who, by availing themselves of the contrariety of interests and views, which in such a confederacy necessarily will arise, hold the balance among the parties which exist and govern us by throwing themselves into the scale most comformable to their purpose? In both cases there is an effective despotism. But the last is the more galling, as we carry the chain in the name and gait of freemen.

I have thus shown, and whether fairly, I am willing to be judged by the sound discretion of the American people, that the power proposed to be usurped in this bill, results neither from the general nature nor the particular provisions of the Federal Constitution; and that it is a palpable violation of it in a fundamental point; whence flow all the consequences I have indicated.

"But," says the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Rhea), "these people have been seven years citizens of the United States." I deny it, sir. As citizens of New Orleans, or of Louisiana, they never have been, and by the mode proposed they never will be, citizens of the United States. They may girt upon us for a moment, but no real cement can grow from such an association. What the real situation of the inhabitants of those foreign countries is, I shall have occasion to show presently. "But," says the same gentleman: "if I have a farm, have not I a right to purchase another farm, in my neighborhood, and settle my sons upon it, and in time admit them to a share in the management of my household?" Doubtless, sir. But are these cases parallel? Are the three branches of this government owners of this farm, called the United States? I desire to thank heaven they are not. I hold my life, liberty, and property, and the people of the State from which I have the honor to be a representative hold theirs, by a better tenure than any this National Government can give. Sir, I know your virtue. And I thank the Great Giver of every good gift, that neither the gentleman from Tennessee, nor his comrades, nor any, nor all the members of this House, nor of the other branch of the Legislature, nor the good gentleman who lives in the palace yonder, nor all combined, can touch these my essential rights, and those of my friends and constituents, except in a limited and prescribed form. No, sir. We hold these by the laws, customs, and principles of the commonwealth of Massachusetts. Behind her ample shield, we find refuge, and feel safety. I beg gentlemen not to act upon the principle, that the commonwealth of Massachusetts is their farm.

"But," the gentleman adds, "what shall we do, if we do not admit the people of Louisiana into our Union? Our children are settling that country." Sir, it is no concern of mine what he does. Because his children have run wild and uncovered into the woods, is that a reason for him to break into my house, or the houses of my friends, to filch our children's clothes, in order to cover his children's nakedness. This Constitution never was, and never can be, strained to lap over all the wilderness of the West, without essentially affecting both the rights and convenience of its real proprietors. It was never constructed to form a covering for the inhabitants of the Missouri and Red River country. And whenever it is attempted to be stretched over them, it will rend asunder. I have done with this part of my argument. It rests upon this fundamental principle, that the proportion of political power, subject only to internal modifications, permitted by the Constitution, is an unalienable, essential, intangible right. When it is touched, the fabric is annihilated; for, on the preservation of these proportions, depend our rights and liberties.

If we recur to the known relations existing among the States at the time of the adoption of this Constitution, the same conclusions will result. The various interests, habits, manners, prejudices, education, situation, and views, which excited jealousies and anxieties in the breasts of some of our most distinguished citizens, touching the result of the proposed Constitution, were potent obstacles to its adoption. The immortal leader of our Revolution, in his letter to the President of the old Congress, written as president of the convention which formed this compact, thus speaks on this subject: "It is at all times difficult to draw, with precision, the line between those rights which must be surrendered, and those which may be reserved; and on the present occasion this difficulty was increased by a difference among the several States, as to their situation, extent, habits, and particular interests."

The debates of that period will show that the effect of the slave votes upon the political influence of this part of the country, and the anticipated variation of the weight of power to the West, were subjects of great and just jealousy to some of the best patriots in the Northern and Eastern States. Suppose, then, that it had been distinctly foreseen that, in addition to the effect of this weight, the whole population of a world beyond the Mississippi was to be brought into this and the other branch of the Legislature, to form our laws, control our rights, and decide our destiny. Sir, can it be pretended that the patriots of that day would for one moment have listened to it? They were not madmen. They had not taken degrees at the hospital of idiocy. They knew the nature of man, and the effect of his combinations in political societies. They knew that when the weight of particular sections of a confederacy was greatly unequal, the resulting power would be abused; that it was not in the nature of man to exercise it with moderation. The very extravagance of the intended use is a conclusive evidence against the possibility of the grant of such a power as is here proposed. Why, sir, I have already heard of six States, and some say there will be, at no great distance of time, more. I have also heard that the mouth of the Ohio will be far to the east of the centre of the contemplated empire. If the bill is passed, the principle is recognized. All the rest are mere questions of expediency. It is impossible such a power could be granted. It was not for these men that our fathers fought. It was not for them this Constitution was adopted. You have no authority to throw the rights and liberties and property of this people into "hotch-pot" with the wild men on the Missouri, nor with the mixed, though more respectable, race of Anglo-Hispano-Gallo-Americans, who bask on the sands in the mouth of the Mississippi. I make no objection to these from their want of moral qualities or political light. The inhabitants of New Orleans are, I suppose, like those of all other countries, some good, some bad, some indifferent.* * *

I will add only a few words, in relation to the moral and political consequences of usurping this power. I have said that it would be a virtual dissolution of the Union; and gentlemen express great sensibility at the expression. But the true source of terror is not the declaration I have made, but the deed you propose. Is there a moral principle of public law better settled, or more conformable to the plainest suggestions of reason, than that the violation of a contract by one of the parties may be considered as exempting the other from its obligations? Suppose, in private life, thirteen form a partnership, and ten of them undertake to admit a new partner without the concurrence of the other three, would it not be at their option to abandon the partnership, after so palpable an infringement of their rights? How much more, in the political partnership, where the admission of new associates, without previous authority, is so pregnant with obvious dangers and evils! Again, it is settled as a principle of morality, among writers on public law, that no person can be obliged, beyond his intent at the time of contract. Now who believes, who dare assert, that it was the intention of the people, when they adopted this Constitution, to assign, eventually, to New Orleans and Louisiana, a portion of their political power; and to invest all the people those extensive regions might hereafter contain, with an authority over themselves and their descendants? When you throw the weight of Louisiana into the scale, you destroy the political equipoise contemplated at the time of forming the contract. Can any man venture to affirm that the people did intend such a comprehension as you now, by construction, give it? Or can it be concealed that, beyond its fair and acknowledged intent, such a compact has no moral force? If gentlemen are so alarmed at the bare mention of the consequences, let them abandon a measure which, sooner or later, will produce them. How long before the seeds of discontent will ripen, no man can foretell. But it is the part of wisdom not to multiply or scatter them. Do you suppose the people of the Northern and Atlantic States will, or ought to, look on with patience and see Representatives and Senators, from the Red River and Missouri, pouring themselves upon this and the other floor, managing the concerns of a sea-board fifteen hundred miles, at least, from their residence; and having a preponderancy in councils, into which, constitutionally, they could never have been admitted? I have no hesitation upon this point. They neither will see it, nor ought to see it, with content. It is the part of a wise man to foresee danger and to hide himself. This great usurpation, which creeps into this House, under the plausible appearance of giving content to that important point, New Orleans, starts up a gigantic power to control the nation. Upon the actual condition of things, there is, there can be, no need of concealment. It is apparent to the blindest vision. By the course of nature, and conformable to the acknowledged principles of the Constitution, the sceptre of power, in this country, is passing toward the Northwest. Sir, there is to this no objection. The right belongs to that quarter of the country. Enjoy it; it is yours. Use the powers granted as you please. But take care, in your haste after effectual dominion, not to overload the scale by heaping it with these new acquisitions. Grasp not too eagerly at your purpose. In your speed after uncontrolled sway, trample not down this Constitution. * * *

New States are intended to be formed beyond the Mississippi. There is no limit to men's imaginations, on this subject, short of California and Columbia River. When I said that the bill would justify a revolution and would produce it, I spoke of its principle and its practical consequences. To this principle and those consequences I would call the attention of this House and nation. If it be about to introduce a condition of things absolutely insupportable, it becomes wise and honest men to anticipate the evil, and to warn and prepare the people against the event. I have no hesitation on the subject. The extension of this principle to the States contemplated beyond the Mississippi, cannot, will not, and ought not to be borne. And the sooner the people contemplate the unavoidable result the better; the more hope that the evils may be palliated or removed.

Mr. Speaker, what is this liberty of which so much is said? Is it to walk about this earth, to breathe this air, to partake the common blessings of God's providence? The beasts of the field and the birds of the air unite with us in such privileges as these. But man boasts a purer and more ethereal temperature. His mind grasps in its view the past and future, as well as the present. We live not for ourselves alone. That which we call liberty is that principle on which the essential security of our political condition depends. It results from the limitations of our political system, prescribed in the Constitution. These limitations, so long as they are faithfully observed, maintain order, peace, and safety. When they are violated, in essential particulars, all the concurrent spheres of authority rush against each other; and disorder, derangement, and convulsion are, sooner or later, the necessary consequences.

With respect to this love of our Union, concerning which so much sensibility is expressed, I have no fears about analyzing its nature. There is in it nothing of mystery. It depends upon the qualities of that Union, and it results from its effects upon our and our country's happiness. It is valued for "that sober certainty of waking bliss" which it enables us to realize. It grows out of the affections, and has not, and cannot be made to have, any thing universal in its nature. Sir, I confess it: the first public love of my heart is the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. There is my fireside; there are the tombs of my ancestors.

"Low lies that land, yet blest with fruitful stores,
Strong are her sons, though rocky are her shores;
And none, ah! none, so lovely to my sight,
Of all the lands which heaven o'erspreads with light."

The love of this Union grows out of this attachment to my native soil, and is rooted in it. I cherish it, because it affords the best external hope of her peace, her prosperity, her independence. I oppose this bill from no animosity to the people of New Orleans; but from the deep conviction that it contains a principle incompatible with the liberties and safety of my country. I have no concealment of my opinion. The bill, if it passes, is a death-blow to the Constitution. It may, afterward, linger; but, lingering, its fate will, at no very distant period, be consummated.

HENRY CLAY

--OF KENTUCKY. (BORN 1777, DIED 1852.)

ON THE WAR OF 1812--HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, JAN. 8, 1813.

SIR, gentlemen appear to me to forget that they stand on American soil; that they are not in the British House of Commons, but in the chamber of the House of Representatives of the United States; that we have nothing to do with the affairs of Europe, the partition of territory and sovereignty there, except so far as these things affect the interests of our own country. Gentlemen transform themselves into the Burkes, Chathams, and Pitts of another country, and, forgetting, from honest zeal, the interests of America, engage with European sensibility in the discussion of European interests. If gentlemen ask me whether I do not view with regret and horror the concentration of such vast power in the hands of Bonaparte, I reply that I do. I regret to see the Emperor of China holding such immense sway over the fortunes of millions of our species. I regret to see Great Britain possessing so uncontrolled a command over all the waters of the globe. If I had the ability to distribute among the nations of Europe their several portions of power and of sovereignty, I would say that Holland should be resuscitated and given the weight she enjoyed in the days of her De Witts. I would confine France within her natural boundaries, the Alps, Pyrenees, and the Rhine, and make her a secondary naval power only. I would abridge the British maritime power, raise Prussia and Austria to their original condition, and preserve the integrity of the Empire of Russia. But these are speculations. I look at the political transactions of Europe, with the single exception of their possible bearing upon us, as I do at the history of other countries and other times. I do not survey them with half the interest that I do the movements in South America. Our political relation with them is much less important than it is supposed to be. I have no fears of French or English subjugation. If we are united we are too powerful for the mightiest nation in Europe or all Europe combined. If we are separated and torn asunder, we shall become an easy prey to the weakest of them. In the latter dreadful contingency our country will not be worth preserving.

Next to the notice which the opposition has found itself called upon to bestow upon the French Emperor, a distinguished citizen of Virginia, formerly President of the United States, has never for a moment failed to receive their kindest and most respectful attention. An honorable gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Quincy), of whom I am sorry to say it becomes necessary for me, in the course of my remarks, to take some notice, has alluded to him in a remarkable manner. Neither his retirement from public office, his eminent services, nor his advanced age, can exempt this patriot from the coarse assaults of party malevolence. No, sir. In 1801 he snatched from the rude hand of usurpation the violated Constitution of his country, and that is his crime. He preserved that instrument, in form, and substance, and spirit, a precious inheritance for generations to come, and for this he can never be forgiven. How vain and impotent is party rage, directed against such a man. He is not more elevated by his lofty residence, upon the summit of his own favorite mountain, than he is lifted, by the serenity of his mind, and the consciousness of a well-spent life, above the malignant passions and bitter feelings of the day. No! his own beloved Monticello is not less moved by the storms that beat against its sides than is this illustrious man by the howlings of the whole British pack, set loose from the Essex kennel. When the gentleman to whom I have been compelled to allude shall have mingled his dust with that of his abused ancestors, when he shall have been consigned to oblivion, or, if he lives at all, shall live only in the treasonable annals of a certain junto, the name of Jefferson will be hailed with gratitude, his memory honored and cherished as the second founder of the liberties of the people, and the period of his administration will be looked back to as one of the happiest and brightest epochs of American history; an oasis in the midst of a sandy desert. But I beg the gentleman's pardon; he has already secured to himself a more imperishable fame than I had supposed; I think it was about four years that he submitted to the House of Representatives an initiative proposition for the impeachment of Mr. Jefferson. The house condescended to consider it. The gentleman debated it with his usual temper, moderation, and urbanity. The house decided upon it in the most solemn manner, and, although the gentleman had somehow obtained a second, the final vote stood one for, and one hundred and seventeen against, the proposition. * * *

But sir, I must speak of another subject, which I never think of but with feelings of the deepest awe. The gentleman from Massachusetts, in imitation of some of his predecessors of 1799, has entertained us with a picture of cabinet plots, presidential plots, and all sorts of plots, which have been engendered by the diseased state of the gentleman's imagination. I wish, sir, that another plot, of a much more serious and alarming character--a plot that aims at the dismemberment of our Union--had only the same imaginary existence. But no man, who has paid any attention to the tone of certain prints and to transactions in a particular quarter of the Union, for several years past, can doubt the existence of such a plot. It was far, very far from my intention to charge the opposition with such a design. No, I believe them generally incapable of it. But I cannot say as much for some who have been unworthily associated with them in the quarter of the Union to which I have referred. The gentleman cannot have forgotten his own sentiment, uttered even on the floor of this house, "peaceably if we can, forcibly if we must," nearly at the very time Henry's mission was undertaken. The flagitiousness of that embassy had been attempted to be concealed by directing the public attention to the price which, the gentleman says, was given for the disclosure. As if any price could change the atrociousness of the attempt on the part of Great Britain, or could extenuate, in the slightest degree, the offence of those citizens, who entertained and deliberated on a proposition so infamous and unnatural * * * But, sir, I will quit this unpleasant subject. * * *

The war was declared because Great Britain arrogated to herself the pretension of regulating our foreign trade, under the delusive name of retaliatory orders in council--a pretension by which she undertook to proclaim to American enterprise, "thus far shalt thou go, and no further"--orders which she refused to revoke after the alleged cause of their enactment had ceased; because she persisted in the practice of impressing American seamen; because she had instigated the Indians to commit hostilities against us; and because she refused indemnity for her past injuries upon our commerce. I throw out of the question other wrongs. So undeniable were the causes of the war, so powerfully did they address themselves to the feelings of the whole American people, that when the bill was pending before this House, gentlemen in the opposition, although provoked to debate, would not, or could not, utter one syllable against it. It is true, they wrapped themselves up in sullen silence, pretending they did not choose to debate such a question in secret session. While speaking of the proceedings on that occasion I beg to be permitted to advert to another fact which transpired--an important fact, material for the nation to know, and which I have often regretted had not been spread upon our journals. My honorable colleague (Mr. McKee) moved, in committee of the whole, to comprehend France in the war; and when the question was taken upon the proposition, there appeared but ten votes in support of it, of whom seven belonged to this side of the house, and three only to the other. * * *