Speeches, Addresses, And Occasional Sermons

Speeches, Addresses, and Occasional Sermons.

Volume 3.

by Theodore Parker.

I.

SPEECH AT A MEETING OF THE CITIZENS OF BOSTON, IN FANEUIL HALL, MARCH 25, 1850, TO CONSIDER THE SPEECH OF MR. WEBSTER.

Mr. President and Fellow Citizens: It is an important occasion which has brought us together. A great crisis has occurred in the affairs of the United States. There is a great question now before the people. In any European country west of Russia and east of Spain, it would produce a revolution, and be settled with gunpowder. It narrowly concerns the material welfare of the nation. The decision that is made will help millions of human beings into life, or will hinder and prevent millions from being born. It will help or hinder the advance of the nation in wealth for a long time to come. It is a question which involves the honor of the people. Your honor and my honor are concerned in this matter, which is presently to be pa.s.sed upon by the people of the United States. More than all this, it concerns the morality of the people. We are presently to do a right deed, or to inflict a great wrong on others and on ourselves, and thereby entail an evil upon this continent which will blight and curse it for many an age.

It is a great question, comprising many smaller ones:--Shall we extend and foster Slavery, or shall we extend and foster Freedom? Slavery, with its consequences, material, political, intellectual, moral; or Freedom, with the consequences thereof?

A question so important seldom comes to be decided before any generation of men. This age is full of great questions, but this of Freedom is the chief. It is the same question which in other forms comes up in Europe.

This is presently to be decided here in the United States by the servants of the people, I mean, by the Congress of the nation; in the name of the people; for the people, if justly decided; against them, if unjustly. If it were to be left to-morrow to the naked votes of the majority, I should have no fear. But the public servants of the people may decide otherwise. The political parties, as such, are not to pa.s.s judgment. It is not a question between whigs and democrats; old party distinctions, once so sacred and rigidly observed, here vanish out of sight. The party of Slavery or the party of Freedom is to swallow up all the other parties. Questions about tariffs and banks can hardly get a hearing. On the approach of a battle, men do not talk of the weather.

Four great men in the Senate of the United States have given us their decision; the four most eminent in the party politics of the nation--two great whigs, two great democrats. The Shibboleth of their party is forgotten by each; there is a strange unanimity in their decision. The Herod of free trade and the Pilate of protection are "made friends,"

when freedom is to be crucified. All four decide adverse to freedom; in favor of slavery; against the people. Their decisions are such as you might look for in the politicians of Austria and Russia. Many smaller ones have spoken on this side or on that. Last of all, but greatest, the most ill.u.s.trious of the four, so far as great gifts of the understanding are concerned, a son of New England, long known, and often and deservedly honored, has given his decision. We waited long for his words; we held our peace in his silence; we listened for his counsel.

Here it is; adverse to freedom beyond the fears of his friends, and the hopes even of his foes. He has done wrong things before, cowardly things more than once; but this, the wrongest and most cowardly of them all: we did not look for it. No great man in America has had his faults or his failings so leniently dealt with; private scandal we will not credit, public shame we have tried to excuse, or, if inexcusable, to forget. We have all of us been proud to go forward and honor his n.o.ble deeds, his n.o.ble efforts, even his n.o.ble words. I wish we could take a mantle big and black enough, and go backward and cover up the shame of the great man who has fallen in the midst of us, and hide him till his honor and his conscience shall return. But no, it cannot be; his deed is done in the face of the world, and nothing can hide it.

We have come together to-night in Faneuil Hall, to talk the matter over, in our New England way; to look each other in the face; to say a few words of warning, a few of counsel, perhaps something which may serve for guidance. We are not met here to-night to "calculate the value of the Union," but to calculate the worth of freedom and the rights of man; to calculate the value of the Wilmot Proviso. Let us be cool and careful, not violent, not rash; true and firm, not hasty or timid.

Important matters have brought our fathers here many times before now.

Before the Revolution, they came here to talk about the Mola.s.ses Act, or the Sugar Act, or the Stamp Act, the Boston Port Bill, and the long list of grievances which stirred up their manly stomachs to the Revolution; afterwards, they met to consult about the Embargo, and the seizure of the Chesapeake, and many other matters. Not long ago, only five years since, we came here to protest against the annexation of Texas. But before the Revolution or after it, meetings have seldom been called in Faneuil Hall on such solemn occasions as this. Not only is there a great public wrong contemplated, as in the annexation of Texas, but the character and conduct of a great public servant of the people come up to be looked after. This present conduct of Mr. Webster is a thing to be solemnly considered. A similar thing once happened before. In 1807, a senator from Ma.s.sachusetts was disposed to accept a measure the President had advised, because he had "recommended" it "on his high responsibility." "I would _not consider_," said the senator, "I would _not deliberate_, I would _act_."[1] He did so; and with little deliberation, with small counsel, as men thought at the time, he voted for the Embargo, and the Embargo came. This was a measure which doomed eight hundred thousand tons of shipping to rot at the wharf. It touched the pockets of New England and all the North. It affected the daily meals of millions of men. There was indignation, deep and loud indignation; but it was political in its nature and personal in its form; the obnoxious measure was purely political, not obviously immoral and unjust. But, long as John Quincy Adams lived, much as he did in his latter years for mankind, he never wholly wiped off the stain which his conduct then brought upon him. Yet it may be that he was honest in his vote; it may have been an error of judgment, and nothing more; nay, there are men who think it was no error at all, but a piece of political wisdom.

A senator of Ma.s.sachusetts has now committed a fault far greater than was ever charged upon Mr. Adams by his most inveterate political foes.

It does not directly affect the shipping of New England and the North: I wish it did. It does not immediately concern our daily bread; if it were so, the contemplated wrong would receive a speedy adjustment. But it concerns the liberty of millions of men yet unborn.

Let us look at the matter carefully.

Here is a profile of our national action on the subject now before the people.

In 1774, we agreed to import no more slaves after that year, and never finally repealed this act of agreement.

In 1776, we declared that all men are created equal, and endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

In 1778, we formed the Confederacy, with no provision for the surrender of fugitive slaves.

In 1787, we shut out slavery from the Northwest Territory for ever, by the celebrated proviso of Mr. Jefferson.

In 1788, the Const.i.tution was formed, with its compromises and guarantees.

In 1808, the importation of slaves was forbidden. But,

In 1803, we annexed Louisiana, and slavery along with it.

In 1819, we annexed Florida, with more slavery.

In 1820, we legally established slavery in the territory west of the Mississippi, south of 36 deg. 30 min.

In 1845, we annexed Texas, with three hundred and twenty-five thousand five hundred and twenty square miles, as a slave State.

In 1848, we acquired, by conquest and by treaty, the vast territory of California and New Mexico, containing five hundred and twenty-six thousand and seventy-eight square miles. Of this, two hundred and four thousand three hundred and eighty-three square miles are south of the slave line--south of 36 deg. 30 min. Here is territory enough to make more than thirty slave States of the size of Ma.s.sachusetts.

At the present day, it is proposed to have some further action on the matter of slavery. Connected with this subject, four great questions come up to be decided:--

1. Shall four new slave States at any time be made out of Texas? This is not a question which is to be decided at present, yet it is one of great present importance, and furnishes an excellent test of the moral character and political conduct of politicians at this moment. The other questions are of immediate and pressing concern. Here they are:--

2. Shall Slavery be prohibited in California?

3. Shall Slavery be prohibited in New Mexico?

4. What laws shall be pa.s.sed relative to fugitive slaves?

Mr. Webster, in this speech, defines his position in regard to each of these four questions.

1. In regard to the new States to be made hereafter out of Texas, he gives us his opinion, in language well studied, and even with an excess of caution. Let us look at it, and the resolution which annexed Texas.

That declares that "new States ... not exceeding four in number, in addition to said State of Texas ... may hereafter, by the consent of said State, be formed out of the territory thereof, which shall be ent.i.tled to admission under the provisions of the Federal Const.i.tution.

And such States ... shall be admitted with or without slavery, as the people of each State asking admission may desire."

I will not stop to consider the const.i.tutionality of the joint resolution which annexed Texas. Mr. Webster"s opinion on that subject is well known. But the resolution does two things: 1. It confers a power, the power to make four new States on certain conditions; a qualified power, restricted by the terms of the act. 2d. It imposes an obligation, namely, the obligation to leave it to the people of the new State to keep slaves or not, when the State is admitted. The words _may be_, etc., indicate the conferring of a power: the words _shall be_, etc., the imposing of an obligation. But as the power is a qualified power, so is the obligation a qualified obligation; the _shall be_ is dependent on the _may be_, as much as the _may be_ on the _shall_.

Admitting in argument what Mr. Webster has denied, that Congress had the const.i.tutional right to annex Texas by joint resolution, and also that the resolution of one Congress binds the future Congress, it is plain Congress may admit new States from Texas, on those conditions, or refuse to admit them. This is plain, by any fair construction of the language.

The resolution does not say, they _shall_ be formed, only "_may_ be formed," and "shall be ent.i.tled to admission, under the provisions of the Federal Const.i.tution"--not in spite of those provisions. The provisions of the Const.i.tution, in relation to the formation and admission of new States, are well known, and sufficiently clear.

Congress is no more bound to admit a new slave State formed out of Texas, than out of Kentucky. But Mr. Webster seems to say that Congress is bound to make four new States out of Texas, when there is sufficient population to warrant the measure, and a desire for it in the States themselves, and to admit them with a Const.i.tution allowing slavery. He says, "Its guaranty is, that new States shall be made out of it,... and that such States ... may come in as slave States," etc. Quite the contrary. It is only said they "_may be_ formed," and admitted "under the provisions of the Const.i.tution." The _shall be_ does not relate to the fact of admission.

Then he says, there is "a solemn pledge," "that if she shall be divided into States, those States may come in as slave States." But there is no "solemn pledge" that they _shall come_ in at all. I make a "solemn pledge" to John Doe, that if ever I give him any land, it shall be a thousand acres in the meadows on Connecticut River; but it does not follow from this that I am bound to give John Doe any land at all. This solemn pledge is worth nothing, if Congress says to new States, You shall not come in with your slave Const.i.tution. To make this "stipulation with Texas" binding, it ought to have provided that "new States ... shall be formed out of the territory thereof ... such States shall be ent.i.tled to admission, in spite of the provisions of the Const.i.tution." Even then it would be of no value; for as there can be no moral obligation to do an immoral deed, so there can be no const.i.tutional obligation to do an unconst.i.tutional deed. So much for the first question. You see that Mr. Webster proposes to do what we never stipulated to do, what is not "so nominated in the bond." He wrests the resolution against freedom, and for the furtherance of the slave power!

2 and 3. Mr. Webster has given his answer to the second and third questions, which may be considered as a single question, Shall slavery be legally forbidden by Congress in California and New Mexico? Mr.

Webster is opposed to the prohibition by Congress. Here are his words: "Now, as to California and New Mexico, I hold slavery to be excluded from those territories by a law even superior to that which admits and sanctions it in Texas. I mean the law of nature, of physical geography, the law of the formation of the earth."... "I will say further, that if a resolution or a law were now before us to provide a territorial government for New Mexico, I would not vote to put any prohibition into it whatever. The use of such a prohibition would be idle, as it respects any effect it would have upon the territory: and I would not take pains to reaffirm an ordinance of nature, nor to reenact the will of G.o.d."

"The gentlemen who belong to the Southern States would think it a taunt, an indignity; they would think it an act taking away from them what they regard as a proper equality of privilege" ... "a plain theoretic wrong,"

"more or less derogatory to their character and their rights."

"African slavery," he tells us, "cannot exist there." It could once exist in Ma.s.sachusetts and New Hampshire. Very little of this territory lies north of Mason and Dixon"s line, the northern limit of Maryland; none above the parallel of forty-two degrees; none of it extends fifty miles above the northern limit of Virginia; two hundred and four thousand three hundred and fifty-three square miles of it lie south of the line of the Missouri Compromise, south of 36 30". Almost all of it is in the lat.i.tude of Virginia and the Carolinas. If slavery can exist on the west coast of the Atlantic, I see not why it cannot on the east of the Pacific, and all the way between. There is no reason why it cannot. It will, unless we forbid it by positive laws, laws which no man can misunderstand. Why, in 1787, it was thought necessary to forbid slavery in the Northwest Territory, which extends from the Ohio River to the forty-ninth parallel of north lat.i.tude.

Not exclude slavery from California and New Mexico, because it can never exist there! Why, it was there once, and Mexico abolished it by positive law. Abolished, did I say! We are not so sure of that; I mean, not sure that the Senate of the United States is sure of it. Not a month before Mr. Webster made this very speech, on the 13th and 14th of last February, Mr. Davis, the Senator from Mississippi, maintained that slavery is not abolished in California and New Mexico. He denies that the acts abolishing slavery in Mexico were made by competent powers; denies that they have the force of law. But even if they have, he tells us, "Suppose it be conceded that by law it was abolished--could that law be perpetual? Could it extend to the territory after it became the property of the United States? Did we admit territory from Mexico, subject to the Const.i.tution and laws of Mexico? Did we pay fifteen million dollars for jurisdiction over California and New Mexico, that it might be held subordinate to the laws of Mexico?" The Commissioners of Mexico, he tells us, did not think that "we were to be bound by the edicts and statutes of Mexico." They pressed this point in the negotiation, "the continuation of their law for the exclusion of slavery;" and Mr. Trist told them he could not make a treaty on that condition; if they would "offer him the land covered a foot thick with pure gold, upon the single condition that slavery should be excluded therefrom, I could not entertain the offer for a moment." Does not Mr.

Webster know this? He knows it too well.

But Mr. Davis goes further. He does not think slavery is excluded by legislation stronger than a joint resolution. This is his language: "I believe it is essential, on account of the climate, productions, soil, and the peculiar character of cultivation, that we shall, during its first settlement, have that slavery [African slavery] in a part, at least, of California and New Mexico." Now on questions of "A law of nature and physical geography," the Senator from Mississippi is as good authority as the Senator from Ma.s.sachusetts, and a good deal nearer to the facts of the case.

In the House of Representatives, Mr. Clingman, of North Carolina, amongst others, wants New Mexico for slave soil. Pa.s.s the Wilmot Proviso over this territory, and the question is settled, disposed of for ever.

Omit to pa.s.s it, and slavery will go there, and you may get it out if you can. Once there, it will be said that the "Compromises of the Const.i.tution" are on its side, and we have no jurisdiction over the slavery which we have established there.

Hear what Mr. Foote said of a similar matter on the 26th of June, 1848, in his place in the Senate: "Gentlemen have said this is not a practical question, that slaves will never be taken to Oregon. With all deference to their opinion, I differ with them totally. I believe, if permitted, slaves would be carried there, and that slavery would continue, at least, as long as in Maryland or Virginia. ["The whole of Oregon" is north of forty-two degrees.] The Pacific coast is totally different in temperature from the Atlantic. It is far milder.... Green peas are eaten in the Oregon city at Christmas. Where is the corresponding climate to be found on this side the continent? Where we sit--near the thirty-ninth? No, sir; but to the south of us." "The lat.i.tude of Georgia gives, on the Pacific, a tropical climate." "The prohibition of slavery in the laws of Oregon was adopted for the express purpose of excluding slaves." "A few had been brought in; further importations were expected; and it was with a view to put a stop to them, that the prohibitory act was pa.s.sed."

Now, Mr. Foote of Mississippi--"Hangman Foote," as he has been called--understands the laws of the formation of the earth as well as the distinguished senator from Ma.s.sachusetts. Why, the inhabitants of that part of the Northwest Territory, which now forms the States of Indiana and Illinois, repeatedly asked Congress to allow them to introduce slaves north of the Ohio; and but for the ordinance of "87, that territory would now be covered with the mildew of slavery!

But I have not yet adduced all the testimony of Mr. Foote. Last year, on the 23d of February, 1849, he declared: "No one acquainted with the vast mineral resources of California and New Mexico, and who is aware of the peculiar adaptedness of slave labor to the development of mineral treasures, can doubt for a moment, that were slaves introduced into California and New Mexico, being employed in the mining operations there in progress, their labor would result in the acquisition of pecuniary profits not heretofore realized by the most successful cotton or sugar planter of this country?" Does not Mr. Webster know this? Perhaps he did not hear Mr. Foote"s speech last year; perhaps he has a short memory, and has forgotten it. Then let us remind the nation of what its Senator forgets. Not know this--forget it? Who will credit such a statement? Mr.