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Page 65
We demand these five propositions. Are they not right? Are they not
just? Take them in detail, and show that they are not warranted by the
Constitution, by the safety of our people, by the principles of eternal
justice. We will pause and consider them; but mark me, we will not let
you decide the question for us. * * *
Senators, the Constitution is a compact. It contains all our obligations
and the duties of the Federal Government. I am content and have ever
been content to sustain it. While I doubt its perfection, while I do
not believe it was a good compact, and while I never saw the day that I
would have voted for it as a proposition _de novo_, yet I am bound to it
by oath and by that common prudence which would induce men to abide by
established forms rather than to rush into unknown dangers. I have given
to it, and intend to give to it, unfaltering support and allegiance,
but I choose to put that allegiance on the true ground, not on the false
idea that anybody's blood was shed for it. I say that the Constitution
is the whole compact. All the obligations, all the chains that fetter
the limbs of my people, are nominated in the bond, and they wisely
excluded any conclusion against them, by declaring that "the powers not
granted by the Constitution to the United States, or forbidden by it to
the States, belonged to the States respectively or the people." Now I
will try it by that standard; I will subject it to that test. The law
of nature, the law of justice, would say--and it is so expounded by the
publicists--that equal rights in the common property shall be enjoyed.
Even in a monarchy the king cannot prevent the subjects from enjoying
equality in the disposition of the public property. Even in a despotic
government this principle is recognized. It was the blood and the
money of the whole people (says the learned Grotius, and say all the
publicists) which acquired the public property, and therefore it is
not the property of the sovereign. This right of equality being, then,
according to justice and natural equity, a right belonging to all
States, when did we give it up? You say Congress has a right to pass
rules and regulations concerning the Territory and other property of the
United States. Very well. Does that exclude those whose blood and money
paid for it? Does "dispose of" mean to rob the rightful owners? You must
show a better title than that, or a better sword than we have.
But, you say, try the right. I agree to it. But how? By our judgment?
No, not until the last resort. What then; by yours? No, not until the
same time. How then try it? The South has always said, by the Supreme
Court. But that is in our favor, and Lincoln says he "will not stand that
judgment." Then each must judge for himself of the mode and manner
of redress. But you deny us that privilege, and finally reduce us to
accepting your judgment. The Senator from Kentucky comes to your aid,
and says he can find no constitutional right of secession. Perhaps not;
but the Constitution is not the place to look for State rights. If that
right belongs to independent States, and they did not cede it to the
Federal Government, it is reserved to the States, or to the people. Ask
your new commentator where he gets the right to judge for us. Is it in
the bond?
The Northern doctrine was, many years ago, that the Supreme Court was
the judge. That was their doctrine in 1800. They denounced Madison
for the report of 1799, on the Virginia resolutions; they denounced
Jefferson for framing the Kentucky resolutions, because they were
presumed to impugn the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United
States; and they declared that that court was made, by the Constitution,
the ultimate and supreme arbiter. That was the universal judgment--the
declaration of every free State in this Union, in answer to the Virginia
resolutions of 1798, or of all who did answer, even including the State
of Delaware, then under Federal control.
The Supreme Court have decided that, by the Constitution, we have a
right to go to the Territories and be protected there with our property.
You say, we cannot decide the compact for ourselves. Well, can the
Supreme Court decide it for us? Mr. Lincoln says he does not care what
the Supreme Court decides, he will turn us out anyhow. He says this in
his debate with the honorable member from Illinois [Mr. Douglas]. I have
it before me. He said he would vote against the decision of the Supreme
Court. Then you did not accept that arbiter. You will not take my
construction; you will not take the Supreme Court as an arbiter; you
will not take the practice of the government; you will not take the
treaties under Jefferson and Madison; you will not take the opinion of
Madison upon the very question of prohibition in 1820. What, then, will
you take? You will take nothing but your own judgment; that is, you will
not only judge for yourselves, not only discard the court, discard our
construction, discard the practice of the government, but you will drive
us out, simply because you will it. Come and do it! You have sapped the
foundations of society; you have destroyed almost all hope of peace. In
a compact where there is no common arbiter, where the parties finally
decide for themselves, the sword alone at last becomes the real, if not
the constitutional, arbiter. Your party says that you will not take the
decision of the Supreme Court. You said so at Chicago; you said so in
committee; every man of you in both Houses says so. What are you going
to do? You say we shall submit to your construction. We shall do it,
if you can make us; but not otherwise, or in any other manner. That is
settled. You may call it secession, or you may call it revolution; but
there is a big fact standing before you, ready to oppose you--that fact
is, freemen with arms in their hands. The cry of the Union will not
disperse them; we have passed that point; they demand equal rights; you
had better heed the demand. * * *
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