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SPEECH
J
ION. SOLOMON W, DOWNS,
OF LOUISIANA,
RESOLUTION SUBMITTED BY MR. FOOTE, OF MISSISSIPPI,
PF.CLARIN'G
THE COMPROMISE MEASUPvES
A DEFINITIVE AD.TUSTMENT OP THE AGITATING aUESTIONS GROWING
OUT OF THE INSTITUTION OF DOMESTIC SLAVERY.
EELnKRtn IK THE SENATE OF THE UNSTF.D STATES JAKl'ARY 1 0, 1853
WASHINGTON : ---^.^:^^-
PRINTF.D BY DONELSON AND ARMSTRONG.
18-52.
SPEECH.
Mr. DOWNS said : Mr. President, I had not arrived in this city whePi
the resolution under discussion was introduced, and, if I had been con-
suhed on the subject, I shou'd not have advised such a course. I do
not think there is much virtue in abstract resohitions in legislative bo-
dies ; I prefer actioHs to words ahva^rs ; and as Congress has acted on.
the subjects referred to in the resolution, and has evinced no disposition
to change the policy adopted in 1S50, but, on the contrary, as it seemed
to be sustained by more general approbation, both in and out of Con-
gress, and in all sections of the country, than when first adopted, aiid
has given peace, repose, and safety to the Union, I would not, if the
choice had been left to me, have renewed this discussion. However, as
it has been renewed without my agency, and has led to a general dis-
cussion of the compromise measures, in the course of which arguments
and opinions have been advanced, and facts stated, most erroneous and
dangerous to the country, and calculated to do injustice to those who are
responsible for those measures, I, too, find it my duty to address the
Senate on the subject. I appear not as the champion of ihe Com-
promise — I am willing that it should stand on its own merits — but to
defend it from the unjust assaults that have been mide against it. This
very discussion has shown that it is stronger in the affections of the peo-
ple than its best friends had supposed. Tlie clear, frank, and satisfactory
manner in which the honorable senator from Pennsylvania [Mr. Brod-
head] vindicated his State and the North generally from the charge of
obstructing the fugitive-slave law will calm and satisfy the minds of
many in other quarters of the Union who have had their misgivings on
the subject. This is just what we expected from that gentleman, from
h's previous course in the other end of the Capitol, and before the
people, and from his noble State, now, as she has ever been, literally
and truly the keystone in the arch of this our glorious Union. In
another way this discusson will do good : it will show that the opposi-
tion to the Compromise is much narrower, and embraces fewer indi-
viduals than it did in 1850. Who makes war on it now ? Not one from
the South, I believe, except the senator from South Carolina on my left,
[Mr. Rhett ;] for I do not understand his colleague, [Mr. Butler] —
whose manly and successful opposition to immediate secession, in my
opinion, entitles him to the thanks and gratitude of the whole nation — as
wishing to renew the struggle ; and none from the North, whatever their
course previously may have been, except some few agitators, whose pros-
pects, whose occupations, are gone when the peace and quiet of the
country are restored. The concert of action between the fanatics Norti^
and South on this pohcy has been so well and so forcibly characterized
by my friend from Alabama, [Mr. Cle.mexs.] in his eloquent speech the
other day, that 1 will not dwell on it. I will refer to only one illustra-
tion of the fact. While the senator from South Carolina [Mr. Rhett]
attacks the territorial judges, the senator from New Hampshire [Mr. Hale]
attacks most violently the Supreme Court of the United States. His
attack is the highest mark of approbation to that high tribunal. The
judges of that court have done their duty nobly, and as everybody
expected they would, in relation to tiie fugitive-slave law. Without the
faithful execution of the law, the peace and quiet of the country could
not have been secured, or the durability of the measure vouched for.
Much of the credit for its full execution is due to the judges of that
Court. Without their prompt and energetic action, its success in some
quarters may be well doubted. When the record of this dangerous
crisis of our government comes to be inscribed on the page of his-
tory, nothing that was said or done during its existence ought to, or
will, in my judgment, occupy a more conspicuous place, or be dwelt on
with more interest, than Judge Nelson's charge to the grand jury, anc^t
similar opinions of Judge Woodbury and other members of the court.
For these they are entitled to the thanks of every true patriot, and they
v.'ill receive them, not the less from the contortions and writhing of the
honorable senator from New Hampshire. This attack reminds me forci-
bly of the story of the viper biting the file, which only wounded itself.
He says the Supreme Court is the '' citadel of slavery." It is indeed a
citadel ; but it is the citadel of the Constitution — of the Union — firmly,
and I hope forever, founded on a rock, from whose solid walls of granite
such light missiles as the senator and his associates may hurl against it
will fall as harmless as the load of a boy's pop-gun from the walls of you
monument to the Father of his Country, or (what is a more apposite
simile, for he deals much in wind) as the light arrow from the blow-gun
of the Indian falls from the sturdy oak of his native forest.
I shall now proceed to the main object of my speech — a reply to some
of the arguments on the extraordinary positions assumed by the senator
from South Carolina [Mr. Rhett] in this debate ; and first I shall notice
his objections to the Compromise. He says :
" If these enormous pretensions [the disposal of the territory] were eubniitted to, it would
give the North tlie power of organizing and bringing into the Union sixty-four free States.
ar.i the South would retain but fifteen, includincr Delaware."
It might be a sufficient answer to this remark, that though these sixty-
four States — thirty two of which are, I beheve, to be west of the Rocky
mountains — may, hke some speculations in town lots or wild lands, look ■
very well on paper, it will be long, indeed, if ever, before the idea will be
realized. '' Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof." When we take into
consideration the thousands of miles of limitless, barren, desert, and inac-
cessible mountains, where the enterprise of even the American emigrant
will not perhaps for a century raise a log-cabin, this must be considered
at once the wildest chimera. But if it be true, how are we to prevent it?
The danger, it is said, will consist in the North having power to exclude
from the Union new slave States. But that power has existed from the
foundation of the government. Has it ever been exercised to the injury
of the South ? I think history will show that it has not. But why should
we complain so much about the admission of free States ? Is it so
unusual a tiling ? The South has held her own well on this point. We
stand now relatively as to numbers just as we did when the constitution
was adopted. Of the old thirteen States, at that time a majority of seven
to si.v were really and practically free. They stand in the same relative
position still at this day, even after the admission of California, so much
complained of; for there have been eighteen new States admitted — nine
slave and nine free. But this is not all: Of these new States, seven
were formed from territory acquired since the Union was established;
and of these seven, five (Florida, Louisiana, Arkansas, Missouri, and
Texas) are slave States, and only five or six years since every one of the
States thus formed from foreign territory were slave States ; the two
free States, Iowa and California, having been since that time both
admitted.
But might we not well inquire of the honorable senator how much
better we should have done had we obtained the Missouri Compromise,
which he and the Nashville convention were so willing to take, and
thought so desirable that they are disposed to break up the Union
because they did not get it ? The whole territory acquired from Mexico
was ------ 525,478 square miles.
Tho State of California is - - - 158,000 «
Leaving in Utah and New Mexico, without
prohibition of slavery - - - 367,478
The quantity of the territory south of 36*^
30", which is - - - - 204,383
Being dedvicted, will leave this as the advan-
tage which the Compromise gives to the
South over the Missouri Com.promise line - 163,095
6
And this large area is left to the territorial bills in precisely the same situa-
tion as that south of 36° 30" would have been had that line been
adopted. But this is not all that may be said on this subject. If we add
to the - - - - - - - - 163,005
square mileS; as above stated, the area of Texas, which is - 325,520
it will make ...---. 4S8,615
square miles, which is the territory the South has got by the annexation
of Texas, and the acquisition oi territory from Mexico, in about two-thirds
of which slavery is established, and in the residue not prohibited ; while the
North got only 158,000 square miles (Cahfornia) out of the whole of the
recent acquisitions, amounting together to 850,998 square miles. Let it
not be supposed that I believe that full justice has been done the South
in the disposition of the new territory recently acquired. I believe it has
not. I fought against it on the Oregon bill; I fought against it on the
California bill, and would do so again. But what I do mean is: that
though not perfectly just, they are not sufficiently oppressive to justify
resistance and disunion; that like all other acts of legislation, par-
ticularly in a country so widely extended as ours, there must be ine-
quality m the operations of the laws; there must arise at times features of
injustice to some portions. But they do not show any settled purpose in
the North to oppress the South. California and Iowa, which gave tlie free
States a majority, have never yet aided in oppressing the South, and it
will be long before they will commence it. When they do, it will be
time enough to complain and to secede. It is a sufficient answer to the
reckless assertion so often made in the discussion of this subject, and on
this occasion repeated by tbe senator, that ''two States were wrested from
us in Texas" by the boundary bill, to state that by the Texas compro-
mise of 1845 slavery was prohibited forever in all the territory north of
36° 30"; while in the territory south of that line only the same option
was left — to admit or reject slavery — which is now extended by this
boundary bill from 36° 30" up to 42=', the Oregon boundary.
Objection has been made to the admission of California on constitu-
tional and other grounds. I cannot better reply to it than to read from a
speech made by nre on this subject in October last:
" I will now consider briefly the several measures called the Compromise ; and, first, the one
which has been most objected to — the admission of California as a State into the Union.
Although I voted against the bill as a separate measure, yet, as I was willing to vote for it as a
part of the Compromise, I will give you some of the reasons which brought me to this concUi-
s'on. I was disposed then to vote for this as a part of the Compromise, because my vote and
that of all of the members of the South against it would not prevent its passage. I knew it
would be passed in spite of us — and so in truth it was passed at last. But even if we could
have prevented the passage of it, that would have done us no good ; for slavery was prohibited
by her constitution, and her state government organized before this measure was brought before
us, and it would have remained so just the same whether she was admitted or not. The only-
difference would have been, that she would not have been a State in the Union, and entitled to
her senators and representatives in Congress. Slavery was excluded by her great distance from
us, by the doubt and agitation as to the right to carry slaves there, and by many other causes,
lono- before this prohibition was made, or the State admitted. But it is said the State was admitted
irregularly, and without passing through the usual state of territorial probation. It may well
be objected to this argument that there is no uniform rule on the subject. Some States were
admitted in one form, and some in another. The constitution provides no form ; nor does Con-
gress. The power is plenary, and without condition or limit, except in one particular, and it is
that 'Congress may admit new States.' The plan of territorial governments has been frequently
adopted, but has been departed from in many previous cases. The first two new States admitted
into the Union were admitted without this formality. The first (Vermont) was admitted in
1791, on the application of her commissioners, on a constitution formed in 1777, before the
present constitution was adopted, precisely in the same way California was admitted ; and the
very next one (Kentucky) was admitted before she had any constitution at all by an act of
Congress authorizing the President to declare her admitted when she should present herself with
a republican constitution— just as it was proposed to do with California at one time ; and thus
she came in. There have been several other departures from the usual course : even Texas was
one of thtm only a short time before. Mr. Polk, during his adminstration, despairing of
settling the question otherwise, approved of a plan to admit California, prospectively, as in
he case of Kentucky. Such a measure was proposed by Judge Douglas, and, being referred
to the Judiciary Committee, I made a minority report, accompanied by a bill, in favor of it, but
it did not pass. If it had, and California (as she no doubt would) had adopted a constitution
prohibiting slavery. Congress would have had no more right to refuse to admit, her than Ken-
■ tucky. Indeed, many members of Congress from the South, as well as the North, under this
idea, started by Mr. Polk, advised the Caiifornians to adopt this course. I think, indeed, it was
generally approved at first by southern men, until it began to be apprehended that slavery
would be abolished. Yet all must have known — as Mr. Calhoun declared in his resolution of
1S47 — that when the people of a new territory formed a constitution for themselves, they had
the 'unconditional righC to reject or admit slavery, as they might decide."
I do not deem it necessary to discuss the constitutional question j for
that was given up in the debate in the Senate on the protest in 1850.
The senator says the fugitive-slave law has not been executed, and he
mentions two or three instances in which its execution had been pre-
vented by the violence of mobs. But he ought to have recollected, as I
am sure the country will recollect, that, before the passage of this act, the
rule was that the law for the recapture of fugitives was not executed, and
the exceptions were where it was, and that now the rule is the other
way, and the few exceptions are where it has failed. It has been as fully
and as faithfully executed as any law ever was or will be. It has been
executed in every State in the West, and in other free States bordering
on slave States in every instance, except one in Pennsylvania. The
federal and State officers, civil and military, have done their duty. In no
instance has the State authority interposed to prevent its execution — not
even in Vermont, where alone a State legislature has attempted to inter-
fere since the passage of the act, and that in a moment of delusion, and
against the opinions of the ablest and best men even in that quarter of
8
the Union. I will not further discuss this point, but will conclude what
I have to say on the subject with brief quotations from the speech of the
honorable senator from Virginia [Mr. Mason] who sits near me, who
differed very widely from me on the measures of the Compromise, and to
whose able remarks on this subject, the other day, we all listened with
so much pleasure:
" Now, I am not aware of one of the southern States, except the State of South Carolina,
wliich continues to protest against them. I am not aware of one of tlie south.ern States,
except the State of South CaroHna, which has not declared, in the most emphatic manner, to
the majority in this government. If you will stop there, and execute in good faith die law for
tlie reclamation of fugitive slaves, we will acquiesce in what has been done."
" As to the fugitive-slave law, I do not entirely agree with the honorable senator from
South Carolina [Mr. Butler] as to the practical effect of the law. I am not aware (unless it
be in the first instance, which occurred at Boston) of Efny instance where the officers of the
federal government, in the execution of that law, have failed to do their duty."
" Sir, I do not sympathize in the slightest degree with what fell from the honorable senator
from South Carolina, [Mr. Rhett,] who addressed us yesterday and the day before, when
he declared himself for disunion."
But why should we further discuss the compromise measures, when
the senator has himself admitted that he does not find in them sufficient
reason to justify the disunion movement which he has set on foot, and is
so recklessly and so violently urging upon the people of South Caro-
lina? — for he says, speaking of the compromise measures :
" If this had been the first instance in the operation of the government in which it had
departed from that course of impartiality which should characterize its dealings with all its
members, we should have sufficient reason perhaps to let it pass, as it would not be a result
from the nature of the system itself, but an aberration which might be transient in its
character. ' '
This yields the point, and gives up all grounds of justification
of resistance, so far as the compromise measures are concerned.
It amounts to more than this : it is a solenni annunciation, made
for the first and I hope the last time in the Senate of the United
States by one of its members, that our system of government is a failure,
and ought to be abandoned j that we should give up at once those institu-
tions wnder which we have so much prospered, and are now so pros-
perous, and which are not only our dearest possessions, but, as was so
eloquently said the other day by the distinguished guest of the nation
now among us, offer the only hope to the rest of tlie world. 1 shall not
examine the other grounds of complaint stated by the senator, inasmuch
as I think they will have little weiglit with the public ; since it has been
so well remarked, in the course of this debate, that one of the most
objectionable of them, according to his arguments — the tarifl'of 1846 —
was voted for by him and all the other members of the South Carolina
delegation .
I proceed now to his arguments -on secession. He opens this branch
of his subject by a denunciation of southern pusillanimity, of which he
speaks as flippantly and as coolly as if he had the sole right to vule in
questions of honor and propriety for our portion of the Union, and as if
liis doctrines had not been repudiated by all the most patriotic and
distinguished men of the South, and in his own State, and then proceeds
to the argument by an assumption as little sustained by our past history
as any that was ever made perhaps on this floor. He said :
. " The policy of the Union is under the control of northern sentiments and northern
interests."
Let us see how a few facts in our history will show the incorrectness of
this assumption : The commander-in-chief of the army of the revolution
was from the South ; the permanent seat of government was establie-hed
in the South ; an extent of seacoast has been acquired in the South
(embracing, too, the great outlet of the valley of the Mississippi) greater
than our whole extent of coast at the close of the revolution, while none
has been acquired in the North, on the Atlantic. Of the eleven Presi-
dents elected, seven were from the South and four from the North ; five
from the South served two terms— not one from the North. The South
has had the presidency nearly fifty out of sixty-four years that the present
government will have existed at the close of the present term. The office
of Chief Justice of the Supreme Court has been held by two southern
men for more than half a century continuously. As it was in the past,
so it is at present : a southern man presides here, and in the other house,
and did during the last Congress ; the chairman of the most important
committees, in this and the other house, are southern men ; the com-
mander-in-chief of the army is a native of the South ; all three of the
commanders in the war with Mexico were natives, and two of them resi-
dents of the South.
I notice these things in no boastful spirit; they were, I know, brought
about without design, in the natural course of events, but they certainly
go far to show that the South are not that oppressed people which some
would represent them to be.
For the double purpose of illustrating the opinion I have here ad-
vanced, and to show that Mr. Jefferson rejected with horror such violent
remedies for injuries to the South as the senator has been propagating, I
beg leave to read an extract from a speech delivered by me in June last:
" More than a quarter of a century since (1825) Mr. Jefferson (I need apply no epithets to
him, his name is enough) tl ough there was at leaitas much reason to complain of the action
of the general government as any southern man can think now exists ; yet he, in the most de-
cided terms, disapproved of the remedy proposed by South Carolina, and those who concur
with her. He said in his letter to Mr. Giles :
10
" ' I see as you do, and with the greatest affliction, the rapid strides with which the federal
branch of our government is advancing towards the usurpation of all the rights reserved to the
States, and the consolidation in itself of all powers, foreign and domestic; and that, too, by
construclions which, if legitimate, leave no limits to their power.'
"' And what is our resource for the preservation of the constitution? Reason and argument.
You might as well reason and argue to the marble columns encircling them!'
" ' Are we, then, to stand to our onus with the hot-headed Georgian ? No ! This must be the
last resource, not to be thought of unti' much longer and greater sufferings. If any infraction of a
compact of so many parties is to be resisted at once, as a dissolution of it, none could ever be form-
ed which could last one year. We must have patience and longer endurance with our brothers
while under delusion; give them time for reflection and experience of consequences ; keep our- ^
selves in a situation to profit by the chapter of accidents, a.nii separate from our companions only
when the sole alternatives left are the dissolution of the Union with them, or submission to a
government without limitation of powers.' "
" Never came from his pen wiser or more pati-iotic words than these ! With what foresight
his philosopic mind dwelt on events favorable to the South that have already come to pass ! It
se^ms like prophecy ! Little more than a quarter of a century has elapsed ; yet what, in that
short space in the life of a nation, have been the ' chapter of accidents ' already recorded in our
history favorable to State rights and southern interests ! Five Presidents have since been elected,
and two acting Presidents ; three of the Presidents were from the South, as was also one of the
acting Presidents ; and one of the Presidents from the North was a native of the South. The
office of President has been actually held seventeen out of the last twenty-five years by southern
Presidents, and onlyeight years by northern Presidents.
" During the administration of three of these southern Presidents — one of them too by acci-
dent — three of the greatest limitations ever imposed on the constructive powers of the federal
government have been adopted in two cases by the executive power alone. President Jackson
restrained by the Maysville veto the power claimed for a general system of internal improve-
ments — the one at which Mr. Jefferson was more alarmed than any other — and Mr. Polk con-
firmed itin the yeto of the harbor bill in 184G. Mr. Tyler vetoed a Bank of the United States,
and made it an obsolete idea forever ; and the high tariff, which drove South Carolina to
nullification in 1832, was so much reduced under the advice of Mr. Polk, and his southern
Secretary of the Treasury, as to leave no cause of complaint on that score, even on the part
of South Carolina. Since 1825 seven new States have been admitted into the Union — four
free, and three slave States ; but the slave States thus admitted contain an area greater than
the four free States, and there is a clause in the act admitting Texas providing for four addi-
tional States within her boundaries. There are, too, ahead some ' accidents ' for the acquisi-
tion and admission of new States of the South which are not unworthy of consideration. I
think, then, after all, we have stood our ground pretty well for the last quarter of century,
and have no great reason to despair. Yes, we of the South have prospered greatly during that
time. The North has also prospered greatly, perhaps more than we have, but we ought not
to envy them, or quarrel with them for their good fortune. If they have made more money
than we have, we have had, as has been the case through the whole history of the government,
at least our share of the honor and power."
But if secession were a wise and safe remedy, have the States a right,
under the constitution, as the senator and, I regret to say, some others
of higher authority supposed, to resort to it ? I think not, except as a
revohitionary remedy. It is said to be a reserved right of the States; but
that cannot be, because many rights, and this among others, are pro-
hibited, as they would annul the grant of supreme power to the national
government, and be inconsistent with other special prohibitions to the
11
States. An important part of tke 10th amendment of the constitution,
so often referred to, is the ^'powers prohibited to the States." Here it is
in full:
" The powers not delegfited to the United States by the constitution, nor prohibiledby it to
the Slates, are reserved to the States or to the people."
Are not both the powers delegated to the United States, and those
prohibited to the States wholly incompatible with such a right?
The senator says :
" It [the right of secession] is a necessary incident connected with the reserved sovereignty
of the States. One State could not give to another, and ihe constitution could not give to the
States, the right to secede. They have it originally."
Well, suppose they had: why could not the constitution take it away?
Was not one great object of the new constitution to take away certain
powers from the States, and give them to the national government?
And did it not take away State sovereignty, in a great degree at least?—
for to lessen it is to destroy it. Must it not exist in its totality, or exist
not at all? As there cannot exist in the same government two supreme
powers, so it would seem there cannot exist two sovereignties. There
are strong reasons to conclude it was taken away. The word is not, I
believe, mentioned in the constitution. Certainly no such right is ex-
pressly reserved to the States in that instrument. There was, though,
such an express reservation in the articles of confederation. Those
articles were the first organic and pre-existing law of the nation. The
constitution amended and enlarged them. A provision, dien, that was
in the first and omitted in the second, especially if inconsistent with the
new powers granted, must be considered as abrogated. The second
article of the confederation is :
" Each State regains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdic-
tion, and right, which is not by this confederation expressly delegated to the United States in
Congress arsembled."
Mr. Madison, in his letter to Mr. Randolph, just before th(i meeting of
the convention in 1787, clearly thought the sovereignty must be given
up. He wrote :
" I hold it for a fundamental point that an individual independence of the States is utterly
in-econcilable with the idea of an aggregate sovereignty. I think, at the same time, that a con-
solidation of the States into one simple republic is not less unattainable than it would be m-
expedient. Let it be tried, then, whether any middle ground can be taken which will at once
support a due suppremacy of the national authority, and leave in force the local authorities,
so far as they can be siibordi7iately useful."
General Washington took a similar view of the subject in his letter as
president of the convention, in transmitting the constitution to Congress.
He used this language :
" It is obviously impracticable in the federal government of these States to secure all rights
of independent sovereignty to each, and yet provide for the interest and safety of all. Indi-
12
■s'uUials CRtering into society must give up a share of liberty to preserve the rest. The mag-
nitude of the sacrifice must depend as well on situation and circumstance as on the object to
be attained. 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
tliis difficulty was increased by a difference among the several States as to their situation,
extent, habits, and particular interests. In all our deliberations on this sultject, we kept
steadily in our view that which appears to us the greatest interest of every true American —
the consolidation of our Union — in which is involved our prosperity, felicity, safety — perhaps
our national existence. This important consideration, seriously and deeply impressed on
our minds, led each State in the convention to be less rigid on points of inferior magnitude
than might have been otherwise expected ; and thus the constitution which we now present is
the result of a spirit of amity and of that mutual deference and concession which the pecu-
liarity of our political situation rendered indispensable."
Mr. Jefferson did not believe die States retained their entire sover-
eignty. I cannot find that he ever uses the word in speaking of State
rights ; and it is certainly to be inferred from his writings that he
thought it did not exist under our present constitution, but, on the con-
trary, he speaks of the genera) government as "acting on the citizens
directly and forcibli/.'^ (Letter to Mr. Livingston, p. 39L)
General Jackson's opinions accorded with General Washington's, Mr.
Jefferson's, and Mr. Madison's on this principle. Here is what he said
about it in the proclamation of the 10th December, 1832, and it applies
to the question of secession as well as that of State sovereignty :
" Men of the best intentions and the soundest views may differ in their construction of some
parts of the constitution ; but there are others on which dispassionate reflection can have no
doubt. Of this nature appears to be the assumeJ right of sere^sion.
" It rests, as we have seen, on the alleged undivided sovereignty of the States, and on their
having formed, in this sovereign capacity, a compact which is called the constitution, from
which, because they made it, tir.ey have the right to sei-ede. Both of these positions are erro-
neous, and some of the arguments to prove them so have been anticipated.
" The States severally have not retained their entire sovereignty.
" It has been shown that, in becoming parts of a nation, not members of a league, they sur-
rendered many of their essential parts of sovereignty. The right to make trea ies, declare war,
levy taxes, exercise exclusive judicial and legtflative powers, were all of them functions of sov-
ereign power. The States, then, for all these purposes, were no longer sovereign. The
allegiance of their citizens was transferred, in the first instance, to the government of the
United States ; they became American citizens, and owed obedience to the constitution of the
United States, and to laws made in conformity with the powers it vested in Congress. This
last position has not been, and cannot be, denied. How, then, can that State be said to be
sovereign and independent whose citizsns owe obedience to laws not made by it, and whose
magistrates are sworn to disregard those laws when they come in conflict with those passed by
another? What shows conclusively that the States cannot be said to have reserved an undi-
vided sovereignty is, that they expressly ceded the right to punish treason— not treason
against their separate power, but treason against the United States. Treason is an offence
against sovereignty, and sovereignty must reside with the power to punish it. But the reserved
rights of the States are not less sacred because they have, for their common interest, made the
general government the depository of those rights.
" So obvious are the reasons which forbid this secrssion, that it is only necessary to allude to
them. The Union was formed for the benefit of all. It was produced by mutual sacrifices of
18
interests and opinions. Can those sacrifi es be recallerl ? Can the States who mngnanimnns'y
surrendered their title to the Territories of the West recall the grant ? Will the inhabitynts .)f
the inland States ogree to pay all the d ities that may be imiosed without their assent by those
on the Atlantic or the Gulf, for their own bentfi ? Shall there be a tree port in one State imd
onerous duties in another? No one believes that any right exists in a single Slate to involve
another in these and countless other evils, contrary to the engagement solemnly made. Eve^y
one must see that the other States, in self-defence, must oppose it at all hazards."
Bat the senator has discovered a recognition of tlie sovereignty of tlie
States in that provision of the constitution relating to treason. He has,
in his quotation, interpolated words to help him ont ; but even that wi!}
not do. It is precisely this provision, and others on the same subject,
that induced General Jackson to conclude that the States had not re-
tained their entire sovereignty.
He [Mr. Rhett] quotes the constitution in these words :
" Treason against the United States shall consist only in levying \v;ir ngainst them (ihe
Stales) or in adhering to their enemies, {ihe enemies of Vie Stales,) giving them aid and comfuit."
In \he project of the constitution reported by the committee of detail in
the convention, and taken up as the basis of discussion, the words after
the United States "or any of them" was inserted in two places, b\u
struck ont on debate, which shows that treason was intended to be pro-
vided for against the United States alone. On the discussion of this
article in the convention, Governcur Morris said :
" He was for giving to the Union an exclusive right to declare what should be treason. In
case of a contest between the Unite 1 States and a particular S:ate, the people of the latter must;
under the disjunctive terms of the clause, be traitors to one or the other authority."
Dr. Johnson said:
" That treason could not be both against the United States and individual States, being an
offence against the sovereignty, which can be but one and the same community."
Mr. Madison said :
" That as the defiiitinn here was of treason against Ihe United Slates, it would seem that the
individual Stales would be left in possession of a concurrent power so far as to define and puiiish
treason, particularly against themselves, which might involve a dou''le punishment."
Mr. Wilson and Dr. Johnson moved that "or any of them," after the
"United States," be struck out, in order to remove the embarrassment;
which was agreed to nemcon.
Mr. Madison said:
*' This has not removed the embarrassment. The same act might be treason against the
United States, as now defined, and against a particular State according to its laws."
Mr. Ellsworth said:
"There can be no danger to the government authority from this, as the laws of the United
States are to be paramount."
Dr. Johnson was still of opinion —
"Thete could be no trea^o.i against a particular State."
14
Colonel Mason said :
"The Uiii;ed States wi!l have a qualified sovereignly only. The individual States willra
tai'i a part of the sovereignty. An act may be tnason against a particular State vi'hich is
not so against the United States. He cited the rebellion of Bcicon in Virginia as an illustration
of the dortrine."
Dr. Johnson said:
"That case wmild amount to treason against the sovereign — the supreme sovereign, the
United S'ates."
Mr. King observed:
" That t'le controversy relating to treason might be of less magnitude than was supposed, as
the legislature might punish capitally under other names than treason."
Mr. Wilson said:
"In cases of a general nature treason can only ba against the United States ; and in such they
should have the sole right to declare the punishment of trfason."
The words "against the United Slates" were stricken out and after-
wards inserted, and the clause left as it now stands. The wisdom that
gnided the convention on tliis subject is shown by the fact that in all
our subsequent history, treason has been declared and punished by the
United States oidy, and that no difficulty has arisen from it or objection
made.
The authority of Mr. Jefferson and General Jackson are relied on to
sustain secession — with what justice may be seen from what follows:
" In his first inaugural address, Air. Jefferson sets down as among the vital principles of our
system, 'the freservatidn of Ihe general govcrnmtnl in its xohole constilutionnl vigor, as the shett-
anchsr of our peace at home and safely abroad ; a jealuus care of the rights of tlection by tht people ; a
mild and safe corrective of abuses whicfi are lopped off by the sword of revolution, where peaceable reme-
dies are unprovided ; absolute acquiescenc! 171 the decisions of the majority, the vital principles frc'
publics, from lohich is no appeal but to force, the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism.'' "
And this is not all. Afterwards he told us what were his opinions,
upon a later occasion, when he had retired to private life. In 1824,
when this subject was again, as in 1799, to be brought up before the
Virginia legislature, in reference to the subject of internal improvements,
he drew up a project, or a set of resolutions, which he thought ought to
be adopted by the Virginia legislature under the circumstances. But did
he profess secession ? Not at all. But in the proposed resolutions, sent
in a letter to Mr. Madison, that tht^y should wait patiently, but protest
against this violation of the constitution by these resolutions, and then
postpone the question, and send these resolutions to other States, and
rouse up the nation upon the subject, as we had done in 1798 and 1799.
He never thought of secession. How, then, can he be quoted as
authority for secession?
He said :
" Whilst the general assembly thus declares the rights retained by the States — rights which
they have never yielded, and which this State will never voluntarily yield — they do not mean
15
to raise the banner of disaffection or of separation from their sister States, c^-parti* s with them-
selves to this cmpact. They know and value too highly the blessings of their Union, as to
foreign nations and questions arising among themselves, to consider every infraction as to be
met by KCtual resistance. They respect too affectionately the opinions of those possessing the
same rights under the same instrument to make every difference of construction a ground of im-
mediate rupture. They vwould, indeed, consider such a rupture as among the greatest calami-
ties which could befall them, but not the greatest. There is yet one greater — submission to a
government of unlimited powers. It is only when the hope of avoiding this shall become abso-
lutely desperate, that further forbearance could not be indulged. Should a majority of the co-
parties, therefore, contrary to the expectation and hope of this assembly, prefer at this time
acquiescence in these assumptions of power by the federal member of the government, we will
be patient and suffer much, under the confidence that time, ere it be too late, will prove to them
also the bitter consequences in which that usurpation will involve us all. In the meanwhile we
will breast with them, rather than separate from them, every misfortune, save that only of living
under a government of unlimited powers. We owe every other sacrifice to ourselves, to our
federal brethren, and to the world at large, to pursue with temper and perseverance the great
experiment which shall prove that man is capaMe of living in society, governing itself by laws
self-imposed, and securing to its members the enjoyment of life, liberty, property, and peace ;
and further, to show that even when the government of its choice shall manifest a tendency to
degeneracy, we are not at once to despair but that the will and the watchfulness of its sounder
parts will reform iis aberrations, recall it to original and legitimate principles, and restrain it
■within the rightful limits ef self-government. And these are the objects of this declaration and
protest."
I will not refer to the authority of Mr. Madison, for it is too well known
to need any such reference. The senator from Alabama [Mr. Clemens]
has already referred to him, and it would be useless for me to do so. But
I will say that he equally disclaimed that doctrine. These names are
worthy of some consideration and respect.
It is said sometimes that General Jackson's proclamation went further
than he intended, and that there were explanations and retractions in
regard to it given afterwards in the Globe or some other paper. I take a
very different view of that proclamation. It was published on the 10th
of December, while Congress was in session, and was discussed in the
G'obe and elsewhere. But I have examined those discussions, and I
find no such retraction or explanation as it has been said was made. But
if there was anything like that, still there is another document, Avhich
came from him some time afterwards, which supports my position. It is
his celebrated nullification message, sent in to Congress on the 16th of
January, more than a month after his proclamation. In that is the senti-
ment so often quoted against the secessionists.
General Jackson, in emphatic language, opposed the project of seces-
sion and nullification in 1833, and stated the principle involved as
follows :
" The right of the people of a single State to absolve themselves at will, and without the con-
Fent of the other States, from their most solemn obligations, and hazard the liberties md hap-
piness of the millions composing this Union, cannot be acknowledged. Such authority is be-
16
iieveJ to be utterly repugnant botli to the principles upon which the c;enoral government is
constituted, and to the objects whieli it was expressly formed to attain.
" Against all acts which may be alleged to transcend the constitutional power of the govern-
ment, or which maybe inconvenient or oppressive in their operation, the constitution itwelf
has prescribed the modes of redress. It is the acknowledged attributt of free institutions,
that, under them, the empire of reason and law is substituted for tjiiat of the sword. To no
otlier source can appeals for supposed wrongs be made consistently with tlie obligations o*
South Carolina. To no other can such appeals be made with safety at any time ; and to their
decisions, when constitutionally pronounced, it becomes the duty no less of the public
authorities than of the people in every case to yield a patriotic submission.
" That £1 State, or any other great portion of the people suffering under long and intoleraljle
oppression, and having tried all constitutional remedies without the hope of redress, may
have a natural right, when their happiness can be no otherwise secured, and when they can
do so without greater injury to others, to absolve themselves from their obligations to the
government and appeal to the last resort, need not on the present, occasion be denied.
" The existence of this right, however, must depend upon the causes which may justify its
exercise. It is the uUima ratio, which presupposes that the proper appeals to all other means:
of redress have been made in good faith, and which can never be rightfully resorted to unless
it be unavoidable. It is not the right of the Stiite, but of the individual, and of all the indi-
viduals in the State. It is the right of mankind generally to secure, by all means in their
power, the blessings of liberty and happiness; but when, for these purposes, any body of
men have voluntarily associated themselves under a particular form of government, no portion
of them can dissolve the association without acknowledging tlie correlative right in the
remainder to decide whether that dissolution can be permitted consistently with the general
happiness. In this view, it is a right dependent upon the power to enforce it."
The gentleman has endeavored to weaken the force and aiitliority of
General Jackson in his celebrated proclamation and nullification message,
by suggesting that that proclamation was drawn up by Mr. Livingston,
and that, although Mr. liivingston was a republican once, he afterwards
became a federahst. This statement of the senator from South Carolina
[Mr. Rhett] in regard to this matter is full of errors and anachronisms.
He said that Mr. Jefferson wrote Mr. Livingston a letter in appro\'al of
his speech upon Foot's resolution. But that could not be so, as Mr.
Jefferson was dead four years before that speech was delivered. Mr.
Livingston had made the speech in 1830, and Mr. Jefferson died in 1S26.
Mr. Jetferson did write him a letter in 1S24, in relation to his speech
upon the subject of internal improvements. And he did not then approve
of his opinion; but, on the contrary, he disapproved of it *
* The Hon. Mr. Rhett, of South Carolina. — It ought not, perhaps, to surprise us that
this gentleman should continue to persevere in a course of policy whicli has been repudiated
by the people of his State, and is obviously at war with the best interests of his country, as
they are understood by the patriots and statesmen of both the great parties which have been
developed by our public experience. Those who have watched the course of the Southern
Preis, located in this city for the professed purpose of guarding what it deems southern inter-
ests, cannot have failed to see that the honorable senator from South Carolina has but faith-
fully echoed the notes of that organ. Disunion rather than acquiescence in the Compro-
mise — secession, not as a revolutionary remedy, but as a constitutional right — and the organ-
ization of the South in the attitude of resistance, suspending or nullifying the regular action
of the laws, until those laws can be made to take the form j>rescribeu by Mr, Rhett and his
followers— are the great and prominent grounds upon which these new lights would seek to
17
But the gentleman has committed a still greater error in alleging that
at one time of his life Mr. Livingston was a federalist, or one who favored
the giving the strongest powers to the government of the United States.
But, Mr. President, the charge is made in order to lessen the weight of
the proclamation, that Mr. Livingston was the author of it. Bat that
matter has been so fully explained, that I will not now enter into it at any
length. It has been fully explained by one who was the private secre-
place our hopes to pi-eserve our republican institutions and transmit them unimpaii-ed to our
posterity.
But it is not so much our purpose on this occasion to point out the glaring enormities, both
in doctrine and argument, which render the position of the honorable senator referred to
offensive to the patriotic spirit of our people, as to correct an error into which he has fallen
respecting the views entertained by General Jackson during the nullification crisis of 1832.
The proclamation issued at that time, the honorable senator was understood to say, v/as not
written by the President, but by Mr. Livingston — who was represented as a changeling in
politics, and an acknowledged federalist. In making such statements the honorable senator
can find no pretext outside of the irresponsible declarations of the heretic organs whose airn
it was at that day to break up the government, and destroy tlie influence of the patriot who
threw himself into the breach, and risked all his character and fame in overthrowing a combi-
nation which was far more dangerous to the constitution than the invasion of the British in
1815 had been to our liberties. We defy the honorable senator to produce any respectable
authority for invalidating the declaration we now make respecting the preparation and issue
of that proclamation as a public document.
It is true that the document issued from the State Department, where all such papers are
recorded, and that Mr. Livingston, who was the Secretary of State, was the cabinet min-
ister chiefly consulted in its preparation. But it is utterly untrue that Mr. Livingston did
more than give form to sentiments cai-efidly drawn by the General's own hand, or by his pri-
vate secretary, or that the paper did not undergo the usual cabinet revision and consultation
before it was published. The writer of this article was that private secretary, and there ia
now in the Senate one of the cabinet oflicers of General .Jackson who took part in the consul-
tations on that paper, and who cannot have foi-gotten the careful attention which was given to
every word of it whilst in a state of preparation. At the last meeting of the cabinet on this
subject several passages in the paper were materially changed, in order that there miglit be
nothing in it, of either phraseology or sentiment, at whicli exception could be taken, or which
could give rise to the impression, now so anxiously sought to be created, that it was a docu-
ment which did not represent the opinions or feelings of the President. The following is one
among other passages that can be enumerated which was accepted as a substitute for the orig-
inal paragraph on the same subject, to which exception was taken by one of the cabinet.
"The people of the United States formed the constitution, acting through the State legis-
legislatures in making the compact, to meet and discuss its provisions, and acting in separate
conventions when they ratified those provisions ; but the terms used in its construction show
it to be a government in which the people of all the States collectively are represented. We
are one people in the choice of the President and Vice President. Here the States have no
other agency than to direct the mode in which the votes shall be given. The candidates
having the majority of the votes are chosen. The electors of a majority of States may have
given their votes for one candidate, and yet another may be chosen. The people, then, and
not the States, are represented in the executive branch."
This paragraph had the sanction of the lamented Woodbury, at whose instance it was
offered as a substitute for the original, which he deemed not quite guarded enough in the his-
torical account it gave of the manner in which the constitution came into existence as a com-
pact between the States. Mr. Woodbury referred to the language of Mr. Madison on this
subject, and thought it would be safer to adopt it than any other general terms which could
be framed ; and accordingly his suggestions prevailed, and superseded other expressions
which, though tantamount in substance, might have left room for cavillers to insinuate tha.t
there was a desire to evade or weaken the authority of the great statesman who had taken so
prominent a part in the debates on the adoption of the constitution, and of the Virginia reso-
lutions of 1798-'99.
Other passages could be pointed to in the proclamation which mark a change of the original
draught, but it is deemed unnecessary to notice them more particularly. We sliall hereafter
recur to the subject, and demonstrate that the explanations which afterwards appeared in the
G/o6e, and have been termed by some of the southern politicians recantations of the procla-
mation, were intended by General Jackson to show that his opinions, as expressed in that
2
18
taiy of General Jackson at the timC; and I shall merely attempt to show
how utterly erroneous was the idea that General Jackson would allow
any other person to dictate for him anything of that kind . It is a great mis-
take to suppose that General Jackson drew his ideas from other men. No
doubt he had an able cabinet at that time, and no doubt Mr. Livingston
was a prominent member of it. General Jackson consulted with other
meu; and they may have induced him to make alterations; but the
character of the work is pre eminently his own.
To show how little foundation there is for the charge that Mr. Living-
ston inculcated the federal doctrines of Alexander Hamilton, I will refer
you to his celebrated speech on Mr. Foot's resolutions. It was well that
the gentleman tried to get clear of his authority, for it was a powerful
authority against him. It was necessary to devise some scheme to get
rid of it; and it will appear from the extracts from that speech, which I
shall read, that he inculcated the most liberal and pure principles of State-
rio-hls democracy. Mr. Livingston made upon those resolutions a most
eloquent speech, in which he differed from Mr. Webster, Mr. Hayne, Judge
Rowan, and others. The only person with whom he did agree in that
debate was a gentleman Avho I regret is now no mure, but then a distin-
guished member of the Senate— Judge Woodbury. And he never, to the
end of his life, retracted a single idea in that great speech. Yet the gen-
tleman says he was a federalist, and inculcated the principle of Alexander
document, were unaltered and unalterable. We remember to have heard Mr. Livingston
often speak of the advantageous impressions he received from the General when discussing
with him the difficulties created by the ordinance of South Carolina, an»J the practical mode of
counteracting them by the constitutional action of the federal authortty. He adverted to the
scenes at New Orleans, when he, as one of the most prominent legal advisers of the General,
felt overwhelmed by the declaration of martial law, and was startled at the summary proceed-
ings which followed the resort to that extreme measure. He declared that, until he read the
grounds of defence prepared by the General himself, he was not aware of the strength of his
case, and that there was not a lawyer in the city of New Orleaus who could have given the
masterly exposition which the General gave wiihout the aid of a single book. On that occa-
sion, and in'writing that defence, Mr. Livingston did no more than reduce into form the sub-
stance of the views hastily prepared by the General. It was the same with the proclamation,
except that the latter document had all the consideration and reflection that were proper to
secure it the lights which could be supplied by consultation with the most eminent statesmen
and by the most careful examinaion of our public records and authorities.
The Hon. Mr. Rhett has perhaps forgotten that General Jackson was a prominent politician
in 18U0, and understood perhaps quite as well the views of Jefferson and Madison as those
who now pretend to follow them when stirring up the South to organize resistance against
the Compromise. General Jackson was the friend of Mr. Jefferson in those days, came to
the Senate as a State-i-ights democrat, and never, by any act or deed, sanctioned a sentiment
which he deemed inconsistent with the original doctriiies of which Mr. Jefferson became the
honored champion and expounder. It was in those days, too, that he became acquainted
with Mr. Livingston, and learned to appreciate the consideration which entitled him, as a
distinguished jurist, to the friendship and confidence of Mr. Jefferson. The reproach of fed-
eralism, before it will tarnish the memory of such a man, must come from a source that is
kss questionable than that which proclaims disunion the policy of the southern half of our
confederacy, tuid the constitution a compact which can be dissolved by any of our States,
whenever they choose, and for whatever cause they may be pleased to assign for such an
extreme resort. If to oppose such violence be federalism, then was Wasliington a fedeialist,
and so were also Jefferson, Madison, Jackson, and all our most eminent patriots and states-
men . — Washington Union.
19
Hamilion. Let me proceed to read from that speech, in which there was
so much wisdom, so much eloquence, and so much good doctrine:
" I have given the subject the most anxious and painful attention ; and differing, as I have
the misfortune to do, in a greater or less degree, from all the senators who have preceded me, I
feel an obligation to give my views on the subject.
" My friend from New Hampshire, [Mr. Woodbury,] of whose luminous argument I cannot
speak too highly, and to the greatest part of which I agree, does not coincide in the assertion of
a constitutional right of preventing the execution of a law believed to be unconstitutional, but
refers opposition to the inalienable right of resistance to oppression.
" All these senators consider the constitution as a compact between the States in their sover-
eign capacity, and one of them [Mr. Rowan] has contended that sovereignty cannot be divided ;
from which it may be inferred that no part of the sovereign power has been transferred to the
general government.
" The arguments, on the one sidp, to show that the constitution is the result of a compact
between the States, cannot, I think, be controverted ; and those which go to show that it is
founded on the consent of the people, and, in one sense of the word, a popular government, are
equally incontrovertible.
" Both of the positions, seemingly so contradictory, are true, and both of them are false — true
as respects one feature in the constitution — erroneous if applied to the whole.
" But with all these proofs (and I think them incontrovertible) that the government could
have been brought into being without a compact, yet I am far from admitting that because this
entered so largely into its origin, therefore there are no characteristics of another kind, which
impress on it a more intimate union and amalgamation of the interests of the citizens of the dif-
ferent Slates, which give to them the general character of citizens of the united nation. This
single fact will show that the entire sovereignty of the States individually has not been retained.
The relation of citizen and sovereign is reciprocal. To whatever power the citizen ow^es allegi-
ance, that power is his sovereign. There cannot be a double, although there may be a subor-
dinate fealty. The government, also, for the most part, (except in the election of senators?
representatives, and President, and some others,) act in the exercise of its legitimate powers
directly upon individuals, and not through the medium of State authorities. This is an essentia
character of a popular government.
" This government, then, is neither such a federative one, founded on a compact, as leaves to
all the parties their full sovereignty, nor such a consolidated popular government as deprives
them of the whole of that sovereign power.
" As to all these attributes of sovereignty, which, by the federal compact, v;ere transferred to
the general government, that government is sovereign and supreme ; the States have abandoned
and can never reclaim them. As to all other sovereign powers the States retain them.
" What is to be done ? The right of the State, says the gentleman, must be respected ; but,
unfortunately for the argument, the constitution does not say so ; unfoitunately, it says directly
the contrary. The President is bound by his oath to cause every constitntional law to be exe-
cuted. But he has approved this law ; therefore he believes it to be constitutional : but both
houses have passed it ; therefore they believed it so : but the judges have decreed it shall be
executed ; therefore they, too, have believed it to be constitutional. Must the President yield
his own conviction, fortified as it is by tliese authorities, to the opinion of a majority — perhaps
a small majority — in the legislature of a single State? If he must, again I say, show me tL
v/ritten authority — I cannot find it ; I cannot conceive it. I am not asking for the expression
of the reserved rights — I know that they are not enumerated — but I ask for the obligation to
obey that right. I ask for the written instruction to the Executive to respect it ; I ask for a pro-
vision that nothing but the grossest inattention or the most consummate folly could have omitted,
if the doctrine contended for be true.
" No, sir, adopt this as a part of our constitution, and we need no prophet to predict its fall.
The oldest of us may live long enough to weep over its ruins — to deplore the failure of the faires-
20
experiment that was ever made of securing public prosperity and private happiness, based on
equal rights and fair representation — to die with the expiring liberties of our country, and trans,
mit to our children, instead of the fair inheritance of freedom received from our fathers, a legacy
of war, slavery, and contention.
" As 1 understand them, they assert the right of a State, in the case of a law palpably uncon-
etitutional and dangerous, to remonstrate against it, to call on the other States to co-operate in
procuring its repeal ; and, in doing this, they must of necessity call it unconstitutional, and,
if so, in their opinion null and void. Thus far I agree entirely with the language and substance
of the resolutions. This, I suppose, is meant by the expression, interpose for the purpose of
arresting the progress of the evil. I see in these resolutions no assertion of the right contended
for — as a constitutional and peaceable exercise of a veto — followed out by the doctrine that it is
to continue until, on the application of Congress for an amendment, the States are to decide.
If these are the true deductions from the "Virginia resolutions, I cannot agree to them, much as I
revere the authority of the great statesman whose production they are — I cannot consent to
them : and it is because I revere him and admire his talents that I cannot believe he intended to
go this length. I cannot believe it for another reason : He thought, and he conclusively proved,
the alien and sedition laws to be deliberate, unconstitutional, and dangerous acts— he declared
them so in his resolutions. Yet. sir, he never proposed that their execution should be resisted.
" I think that the constitution is the result of a compact entered into by the several States, by
which they surrendered a part of their sovereignty to the Union, and vested the part so surrend-
ered in a general government ; that the government is partly popular, acting directly on the
citizens of the diiferent Slates— partly federative, depending for its existence and action on the
existence and action of the several States.
" That by the institution of this government the States have unequivocally surrendered every
constitutional right of impeding or resisting the execution of any decree or judgment of the
Supreme Court, in any case of law and equity between persons or on matters of whom or on
which that court has jurisdiction, even if such decree or judgment should, in the opinion of the
States, be unconstitutional.
"That in cases in which a law of the United States may infringe the constitutional right of a
State, but which in its operation cannot be brought before the Supreme Court under the terms
of the Jurisdiction expressly given to it over particular persons or matters, that court is not
created the umpire between a State that may deem itself aggrieved and the general government.
"That, among the attributes of sovereignty retained by the States is that of watching over the
operations of the general government, and protecting its citizens against their unconstitutional
abuses; and that this can be done legally —
" First, in the case of an act in the opinion of the State palpably unconstitutional, but affirmed
in the Supreme Court in the legal exercise of its functions ;
" By remonstrating against it to Congress ;
" By an address to the people, in their elective functions, to change or instruct their repre-
sentatives ;
" By a similar address to the other States, ia which they will have a right to declare that they
consider the act as unconstitutional, and therefore void ;
" By proposing amendments to the constitution, in the manner pointed out by that instrument ;
" And, finally, if the act be intolerably oppressive, and they find the general government perse-
vere in enforcing it, by a resort to the natural right which every people have to resist extreme
oppression.
" Secondly, if the act be one of those few which in its operation cannot be submitted to the
Suprenae Court, and be one that will, in the opinion of the State, justify the risk of a withdrawal
frera the Union, that this last extreme remedy may be at once resorted to.
"That the right of resistance to the operation of an act of Congress, in the extreme cases
above alluded to, is not a right derived from the constitution, but can be justified only on the
Euppesition that the coostitution has been broken, and the State absolved from its obligation j
21
and that whenever resorted to, it must be at the risk of all the penalties attached to an unsuc-
cessful resistance to established authority.
" That the alleged right of a State to put a veto on the execution of a law of the United
States which such State may declare to be unconstitutional, attended (as, if it exist, it must)
with a correlative obligation on the part of the general government to refrain from executing it,
and the further alleged obligation, upon the part of that government, to submit the question of
the States, by proposing amendments, are not given by the constitution, nor do they grow out
of any of the reserved powers.
"That the exercise of the powers last mentioned would introduce a feature in our govern-
ment not expressed in the constitution, not implied from any right of sovereignty reserved to
the States, not suspected to exist by the friends or enemies of the constitution, when it was
framed or adopted, not warranted by practice or contemporaneous exposition, nor implied by
the true construction of the Virginia resolutions of '98.
"That the introduction of this feature in our government would totally change its nature
make it inefficient, invite to discussion, and end, at no distant period, in separation ; and that if
it had been proposed in the form of an explicit provision in the constitution, it would have been
unanimously rejected, both in the convention which framed that mstrumeiit and in those which
adopted it.
" That the theory of the federal government, being the result of the general will of the people
of the United States in their aggregate capacity, and founded in no degree on compact between
the States, would tend to the most disastrous practical results ; that it would place three-fourths
of the States at the mercy of one-fourth, and lead inevitably to a consolidated government, and
finally to monarchy if the doctiine were generally admitted ; and if partially so, and opposed
to civil dissension.
" Arguments for and against the dissolution of the Union are canvassed in the public paper?
form the topic of dinner speeches, are condensed into toasts, and treated in every respect as if it
v/ere ' a knot of policy that might be unloosed familiar as a garter.' Sir, it is a Gordian knot
that can be severed only with the sword. The band cannot be unloosed until it is wet with the
blood of brothers. I cannot, therefore, conscientiously be silent : and, humbly as I think of
my influence or powers of persuasion, I should feel myself guilty if they were not exerted in
admonition to both prrties in this eventful controversy.
" Menace is unwise, because it is generally ineffectual ; and of all menaces, that which strikes
at the existence of the Union is most irritating. Have those who thus rashly used, who en-
deavor to familiarize the people to the idea — have they themselves ever done what they recom-
mend? Have they calculated, have they considered, what one, two, or three States would be
disjointed from the rest? Are they sure that they would not be disjointed themselves — that
parts of any State which might try the hazardous experiment might not prefer their allegiance
to the whole ? Even if civil war should not be the consequence of such disunion — an exemp-
tion from which 1 cannot conceive the possibility — what must be the state of such detached parts
of the mighty whole? Dependence on foreign alliances for protection against brothers and
friends ; degradation in the scale of nations ; disposed of by the protocols of allied monarchs to
one of their dependents like the defenceless Greeks. But I will not enlarge on ihis topic, so
fruitful of the most appalling apprehensions. Disunion ! The thought itself, the means by
which it may be effected, its frightful and degrading consequences, the idea, the very mention
of it, ought to be banished from our debates, from our minds. God deliver us from this worst,
this greatest evil !"
As a last and conclusive proof that a State has not the right peaceahly
to secede from the Union, I refer to the empliatic language used ratifying
the articles of confederation. It was stipulated in the most formal and
solemn manner that the Union formed by that instrument should be per-
22
peiual. The States certainly had no right to secede under it. But the
present constitution was intended for and did estabhsh " a more perfect
imion.''^ How, then; can a State secede under it? Here is the article
referred to :
"Art. 13. Every State shall abide by the determinationa of the United States in Congress
assembled on all questions which, by this confederation, are submitted to them. And the arti-
cles of this confederation shall be inviolabhj observed by every State, and (he union shall be pei-jjehial^
nor shall any alteration, at any time hereafter, be made in any of them, unless such alteration
be agreed to in a Congress of the United States, and be afterwards confirmed by the legislature
of every State. And whereas it has pleased the great Governor of the World to incline the
hearts of the legislatures we respectively represent in Congress to approve of and to authorize
us to ratify the said articles of confederation and pei-pelual union : know ye that we, the under-
sitrned delegates, by virtue of the power and authority to us given for that purpose, do, by
these presents, in the name and in behalf of our respective constituents, fully and entirely ratify
and confirm each and every of the said articles of coiifederation and perpetual union, and all and
tiiigular the matters and things therein contained. And we do further solemnly plight and engage
the faith oj our nspective co7\slituents, that tluy shall abide by the determinations of the United States in
Congress oisev.bled on all questions which, by the said confederation, are submitted to them ;
and that the articles thereof shall be inviolably observed by the States we respectfully represent,
and that the Union shall be pe»ye(unL"
From these authorities, and from these considerations, I conclude that
a State has no right peaceably to secede from the Union; that, as a revo-
hUionaty right, it may be resorted to in cases of extreme oppression: but
even then it finds its warrant, not in the constitution, but in the opinion
of mankind.
Let it not be supposed from what I have here said that 1 undervalue
or would diminish the powers and rights of the States. I would guard
and defend their rights as earnestly as 1 would the powers of the general
government. I believe they are equally as important and as necessary to
our safety and happiness and the duration of the Union. I am a strict
constructionist of the power granted to the national government, and
would not extend it by construction. Any power not written iu the
charter I would not see exercised. But at the same time I would not,
with approbation, see powers expressly given, or necessarily implied from
those granted, denied to the united government of all, or assumed by the
States. I would not make that a nullity which our ancestors, with
Washington, and Franklin, and Madison at their head, thought they had
constituted an efficient and self sustaining government. I am a State-
rights man — not in the modern sense, perhaps, which gives everything to
the States, and takes everything from the Union — but in the sense in
which .TefTerson and Madison, Jackson, Livingston, Woodbury, and Polk
understood it, that the powers of our government were by our constitu-
tion divided between the State and national authorities, and that our only
23
safe and wise course is to preserve this division sacred and inviolate, and
permit neither set of functions to encroach on the other.
I have now conchided what I felt it my duty to say on the compro-
mise resokition before the Senate, and hope the discussion will soon be
closed, and the question involved put at rest forever. During the last
two years we have been exposed to a political storm such as our govern-
ment has seldom been exposed to; such as few governments, especially,
composed of different States widely separated in distance, in interest,
and in feeling, would have had the strength to ride out in safety. The
clouds are f.ist disappearing; and as they do, the heart of every true
patriot thrills with delight at seeing that not a star has paled or shot
from its orbit in our glorious constellation. A great crisis has been
passed. A nation of nearly twenty-five millions of people, thirty-
one States, ?.nd almost boundless territory, stretching from one great
ocean of the world to the other, and from the tropics to the frozen regions
of the North, differing in climate, in interests, in opinions, and in local
institutions, in this age of agitation and turmoil — for almost all the world
besides has been excited in the highest degree — yet not a hostile shot
has been fired, a funeral dium beaten, or an execution taken place, a
widow or an orphan made, or a homestead given to the flames. Yes,
licre we stand on the great platform of our Union, in peace and pros-
perity, looking down with sympathy, it is true, but with a proud con-
sciousness of our superior advantages, on the other less fortunnate por-
tions of the globe, struggling through all the miseries of revolution.
In the scenes through which we have just passed, though an humble, I
have not been an idle spectator. I have thought of the South and the
Union alone, and devoted all my feeble energies to sustain them.
Though a party-man all my life, I forgot my party and myself, and
thought only of my country. I was at no time unconscious of the
political danger and responsibility I incurred, and often adverted to it.
When I thought the President and other distinguished men of his party
did their duty — not better, but as well as others of my own party — in the
great crisis, I said so. I thought not of the effect on myself. 1 have
nothing to retract or regret on this subject in all the past. That
I have committed errors I do not doubt. But I have the proud con-
sciousness of feeling that I acted from good motives, and that the people
of my State, and the public generally, will award me this merit, though
politicians may not sustain me. If, from peculiar circumstances, I should
not be re-elected, be it so. I shall retire cheerfully to the shades of
private life, there to enjoy that peace and prosperity of the country which
my own course as a public man will have, in some degree, contributed
24
to produce. But if I was ambitious, or not content with private life, 1
should desire nothing more than such a defeat to re-establish myself and
my party more iirmly than ever in the affections of the people of my State
in the great national and State elections approaching.
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