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Page 63
I shall not spend much time on the question that seems to give my
honorable friend (Mr. Crittenden) so much concern--the constitutional
right of a State to secede from this Union. Perhaps he will find out
after a while that it is a fact accomplished. You have got it in
the South pretty much both ways. South Carolina has given it to you
regularly, according to the approved plan. You are getting it just below
there (in Georgia), I believe, irregularly, outside of the law, without
regular action. You can take it either way. You will find armed men to
defend both. I have stated that the discontented States of this
Union have demanded nothing but clear, distinct, unequivocal,
well-acknowledged constitutional rights; rights affirmed by the highest
judicial tribunals of their country; rights older than the Constitution;
rights which are planted upon the immutable principles of natural
justice; rights which have been affirmed by the good and the wise of all
countries, and of all centuries. We demand no power to injure any man.
We demand no right to injure our confederate States. We demand no right
to interfere with their institutions, either by word or deed. We have
no right to disturb their peace, their tranquillity, their security. We
have demanded of them simply, solely--nothing else--to give us equality,
security, and tranquillity. Give us these, and peace restores itself.
Refuse them, and take what you can get.
I will now read my own demands, acting under my own convictions, and the
universal judgment of my countrymen. They are considered the demands of
an extremist. To hold to a constitutional right now makes one considered
as an extremist--I believe that is the appellation these traitors and
villains, North and South, employ. I accept their reproach rather than
their principles. Accepting their designation of treason and rebellion,
there stands before them as good a traitor, and as good a rebel as ever
descended from revolutionary loins.
What do the rebels demand? First, "that the people of the United States
shall have an equal right to emigrate and settle in the present or any
future acquired territories, with whatever property they may possess
(including slaves), and be securely protected in its peaceable enjoyment
until such Territory may be admitted as a State into the Union, with or
without slavery, as she may determine, on an equality with all existing
States." That is our territorial demand. We have fought for this
Territory when blood was its price. We have paid for it when gold
was its price. We have not proposed to exclude you, though you have
contributed very little of blood or money. I refer especially to New
England. We demand only to go into those Territories upon terms of
equality with you, as equals in this great Confederacy, to enjoy the
common property of the whole Union, and receive the protection of the
common government, until the Territory is capable of coming into the
Union as a sovereign State, when it may fix its own institutions to suit
itself.
The second proposition is, "that property in slaves shall be entitled to
the same protection from the Government of the United States, in all of
its departments, everywhere, which the Constitution confers the power
upon it to extend to any other property, provided nothing herein
contained shall be construed to limit or restrain the right now
belonging to every State to prohibit, abolish, or establish and protect
slavery within its limits." We demand of the common government to use
its granted powers to protect our property as well as yours. For this
protection we pay as much as you do. This very property is subject to
taxation. It has been taxed by you and sold by you for taxes. The title
to thousands and tens of thousands of slaves is derived from the United
States. We claim that the Government, while the Constitution recognizes
our property for the purposes of taxation, shall give it the same
protection that it gives yours. Ought it not to be so? You say no. Every
one of you upon the committee said no. Your Senators say no. Your House
of Representatives says no. Throughout the length and breadth of your
conspiracy against the Constitution, there is but one shout of no! This
recognition of this right is the price of my allegiance. Withhold it,
and you do not get my obedience. This is the philosophy of the armed
men who have sprung up in this country. Do you ask me to support a
government that will tax my property; that will plunder me; that
will demand my blood, and will not protect me? I would rather see the
population of my native State laid six feet beneath her sod than they
should support for one hour such a government. Protection is the price
of obedience everywhere, in all countries. It is the only thing that
makes government respectable. Deny it and you cannot have free subjects
or citizens; you may have slaves.
We demand, in the next place, "that persons committing crimes against
slave property in one State, and fleeing to another, shall be delivered
up in the same manner as persons committing crimes against other
property, and that the laws of the State from which such persons flee
shall be the test of criminality." That is another one of the demands of
an extremist and rebel. The Constitution of the United States, article
four, section two, says:
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