proceeding originally from vain effort to avoid the impending question between Freedom and Slavery,—assuming a delusive phrase of Freedom as a cloak for Slavery,—speaking with the voice of Jacob, while its hands are the hands of Esau,—and, by plausible nickname, enabling politicians sometimes to deceive the public, and sometimes even to deceive themselves,—may be dismissed with other kindred pretensions for Slavery; while the Senator from Illinois [Mr. Douglas], who, if not inventor, has been its boldest defender, will learn that Slave-Masters, for whom he has done so much, cannot afford to be generous,—that their gratitude is founded on what they expect, and not on what they receive,—and that, having its root in desire rather than in fruition, it necessarily withers and dies with the power to serve them. The Senator, revolving these things, may confess the difficulty of his position, and perhaps
“remember Milo’s end,
Wedged in that timber which he strove to rend.”[137]
The pretension that in the Territories Slavery may be “voted up” or “voted down,” as the few people there see fit, is a novelty, and its partisans, besides a general oblivion of great principles, most strangely forget the power of Congress “to regulate commerce with foreign nations and among the several States,” limited only by temporary exception in favor of “the migration or importation of such persons as any of the States now existing shall think proper to admit” until 1808. These express words, solemnly accepted as part of the Constitution, attest the power of Congress to prevent “the migration” of slaves into the Territories. The migration or importation of slaves into any State existing at the adoption of the Constitution was tolerated until 1808; but from that date the power of Congress became plenary to prohibit their “importation” from abroad or “migration” among existing States, while from the beginning this power was plenary to prevent their “migration” into the Territories. And as early as 1804 Congress exercised this power, by providing that no slave should be introduced into the Territory of Orleans, except by a citizen of the United States removing thither for actual settlement, and at the time bonâ fide owner of such slave; and every slave imported or brought into the Territory, contrary to this provision, is declared free.[138] In this unquestioned exercise of a beneficent power, at a time when the authors of the Constitution were still on the stage, and the temporary exception in favor of existing States was in force, we have a precedent of unanswerable authority, establishing the power of Congress to exclude Slavery from the Territories, even if it be assumed, that, under the Constitution, this five-headed Barbarism can find place anywhere within the exclusive jurisdiction of the Nation.
Here I close this branch of the argument, which I have treated less fully than the first, partly because time and strength fail me, but chiefly because the Barbarism of Slavery, when fully established, supersedes all other inquiry. Enough is done on this head. At the risk of repetition, I gather it together. The assumption, that Slave-Masters, under the Constitution, may take their slaves into Territories and continue to hold them as in States, stands on two pretensions,—first, that man may hold property in man, and, secondly, that this property is recognized in the Constitution. But we have seen that the pretended property in man stands on no reason, while the two special arguments by which it is asserted—first, an alleged inferiority of race, and, secondly, the ancient curse of Ham—are grossly insufficient to uphold such pretension. And we have next seen that this pretension has as little support in the Constitution as in reason; that Slavery is of such an offensive character, that it can find support only in “positive” sanction, and words of “irresistible clearness”; that this benign rule, questioned in the Senate, is consistent with the principles of an advanced Civilization; that no such “positive” sanction, in words of “irresistible clearness,” can be found in the Constitution, while, in harmony with the Declaration of Independence, and the Address of the Continental Congress, the contemporaneous declarations in the Convention, and especially the act of the Convention substituting “service” for “servitude,” on the ground that the latter expressed “the condition of slaves,” all attest that the pretension that man can hold property in man was carefully, scrupulously, and completely excluded from the Constitution, so that it has no semblance of support in that sacred text; nor is this pretension, which is unsupported in the Constitution, helped by the two arguments, one in the name of State Equality, and the other in the name of Popular Sovereignty, both of which are properly put aside.
Sir, the true principle, which, reversing all assumptions of Slave-Masters, makes Freedom national and Slavery sectional, while every just claim of the Slave States is harmonized with the irresistible predominance of Freedom under the Constitution, was declared at Chicago.[139] Not questioning the right of each State, whether South Carolina or Turkey, Virginia or Russia, to order and control its domestic institutions according to its own judgment exclusively, the Convention there assembled has explicitly announced Freedom to be “the normal condition of all the territory of the United States,” and has explicitly denied “the authority of Congress, of a Territorial Legislature, or of any individuals, to give legal existence to Slavery in any Territory of the United States.” Such is the triumphant response by the aroused millions of the North to the assumption of Slave-Masters, that the Constitution, of its own force, carries Slavery into the Territories, and also to the device of politicians, that the people of the Territories, in the exercise of a dishonest Popular Sovereignty, may plant Slavery there. This response is complete at all points, whether the Constitution acts upon the Territories before their organization, or only afterward; for, in the absence of a Territorial Government, there can be no “positive” law in words of “irresistible clearness” for Slavery, as there can be no such law, when a Territorial Government is organized, under the Constitution. Thus the normal condition of the Territories is confirmed by the Constitution, which, when extended over them, renders Slavery impossible, while it writes upon the soil and engraves upon the rock everywhere the law of impartial Freedom, without distinction of color or race.
Mr. President, this argument is now closed. Pardon me for the time I have occupied. It is long since I made any such claim upon your attention. Pardon me, also, if I have said anything I ought not to have said. I have spoken frankly and from the heart,—if severely, yet only with the severity of a sorrowful candor, calling things by their right names, and letting historic facts tell their unimpeachable story. I have spoken in patriotic hope of contributing to the welfare of my country, and also in assured conviction that this utterance to-day will find response in generous souls. I believe that I have said nothing which is not sustained by well-founded argument or well-founded testimony, nothing which can be controverted without direct assault upon reason or upon truth.