In the debate which ensued, Mr. Powell, of Kentucky, taunted Mr. Sumner with desiring the negroes of Missouri to be “freed quickly, so that Governor Andrew can recruit there to fill up the Massachusetts quota.” Mr. Sumner replied: “I would have a musket put in the hands of every one of these negroes in Missouri.”
Mr. Sumner moved to amend by striking out “three hundred” and inserting “two hundred” dollars, as the measure of value of a slave. Here he said:—
I object to the enormous valuation. I object to it in the present bill, and also as a precedent. We shall be bound by it hereafter. The next bill will have this same value of three hundred dollars for each slave. I would begin by putting it at two hundred dollars, and that is my motion.
This amendment was adopted,—Yeas 19, Nays 17.
Mr. Sumner then moved to strike out the word “gradual,” so that the money should be paid only on immediate Emancipation. Here he remarked, that he did not understand a war measure which was to go into effect ten years from now,—that he did not understand a gradual war measure,—that it was an absurdity in terms, and utterly indefensible.
The motion was lost,—Yeas 11, Nays 27.
The question then recurred on the adoption of the substitute, when Mr. Sumner spoke as follows.
MR. PRESIDENT,—If I speak tardily in this debate, I hope for the indulgence of the Senate. Had I been able to speak earlier, I should have spoken; but, though present in the Chamber, and voting when this bill was under consideration formerly, I was at the time too much of an invalid to take an active part in the debate. In justice to myself and to the great question, I cannot be silent.
I have already voted to give Missouri twenty million dollars to secure freedom at once for her slaves, and to make her at once a Free State. I am ready to vote more, if more be needed for this good purpose; but I will not vote money to be sunk and lost in an uncertain scheme of Prospective Emancipation, where Freedom is a jack-o’-lantern, and the only certainty is the Congressional appropriation. For money paid down, Freedom must be delivered.
Notwithstanding all differences of opinion on this important question, there is much occasion for congratulation in the progress made.