"It is clear that the ordinance did not go into operation by virtue of the authority of the confederation, but by reason of its modification and adoption by Congress under the Constitution. It seems to be supposed, in the opinion of the court, that the articles of cession placed it on a different footing from territories subsequently acquired. I am unable to perceive the force of this distinction. That the ordinance was intended for the government of the northwestern territory, and was limited to such territory, is admitted. It was extended to southern territories, with modifications by acts of Congress, and to some northern territories. But the ordinance was made valid by the act of Congress, and without such act could have been of no force. It rested for its validity on the act of Congress, the same, in my opinion, as the Missouri Compromise line.
"If Congress may establish a territorial government in the exercise of its discretion, it is a clear principle that a court cannot control that discretion. This being the case, I do not see on what ground the act is held to be void. It did not purport to forfeit property, or take it for public purposes. It only prohibited slavery; in doing which, it followed the ordinance of 1787."
In 1840, Judge McLean lost his wife, and in 1843, married his present wife, Mrs. Sara Bella Gerrard of Cincinnati. In his personal appearance, Judge McLean is imposing, for he is tall and well proportioned, and his face is one of the finest among the list of American jurists. As a judge, he is above reproach; and as a Christian—he is a member of a Christian church—he has won the esteem of all who know him in that relation.
HENRY A. WISE.
Governor Wise is certainly one of the ablest of the southern democrats. He may lack judgment and that balance of character which is necessary in the truly great man; but he is a decided genius. Whatever he has attempted he has accomplished, thus far, from his wonderful energy and activity. Whether he has reached that bound in his political triumphs beyond which he cannot pass, remains to be seen. We will very briefly glance at his past history and his present views upon the great political issues of the country.
Henry A. Wise was born in Drummond Town, Accomack County, Virginia, December 3, 1806. He was a precocious lad, for he graduated at Washington College, Pa., when he was but nineteen years old. He then studied law, and was admitted to the bar of Winchester, Va., in 1828. With a western fever in his bones, and desirous of a new field in a new country, he emigrated to Nashville, Tennessee, where he practised law for two years. He soon grew homesick for old Virginia, and returned to Accomack County. The district showed its estimation of the young man by returning him to Congress in 1833. He continued to represent it in the House of Representatives for ten years. In 1843, he resigned his place and took the mission to Brazil. He remained there for a Presidential term. In 1848, he was a Presidential elector in Virginia; in 1850, was a member of the Reform Convention which adopted the present constitution of the State. In 1852, he was again a Presidential elector, and in 1855 was nominated by his party as their candidate for Governor. This caucus will always be remembered and will give him unfading political laurels. The contest was probably one of the most exciting, close, and bitter, which ever took place, even in Virginia. The Know Nothings, or Americans, were then in the height of power and were sanguine of success. Mr. Wise took the stump with the prophets against him, and in fact with a general impression abroad that he would be defeated. He carried on the year's canvass as no other man beside Henry A. Wise could have done it. He bearded Americanism in its den—forced it upon its own territory—and triumphed in the popular vote by thousands. However rash and extravagant his speeches were, he had that overwhelming enthusiasm and vigor, which carried down all opposition, and placed him in the Governor's chair.
As a politician, Governor Wise has always been true to the Virginian school. Rigidly in favor of State rights, and as rigidly opposed to protective tariffs—in short, bitterly anti-Whig in all his opinions. On the slavery question, from the outset, he has been ultra pro-slavery, though he was opposed to the Lecompton policy of Mr. Buchanan's administration. He has favored internal improvements in Virginia, and has in this respect differed from Mr. Hunter. This is the bright feature in Governor Wise's political character. He never was an old fogy, but is brimful of originality and reform. To see what is Governor Wise's position on many of the issues of the day, we will quote a few passages from his letter of January 3, 1859, to Hon. David Hubbard:
"Now, I have raised my warning of late against this weakness and wickedness on our part. I have tried to protect my widowed mother, the South, by giving honest filial counsel against the whole household. The Reubens have tried to sell me into Egypt for my 'dreaming.' But I am, nevertheless, loyal to the house of my father and loving to my misguided brethren, and I mean to redouble my efforts the more to save the house of Israel. If I must be driven out as a dreamer, I will, at least, preserve 'mine integrity,' and time and the day of famine will show whose counsel and whose course will have saved the household and fed it, and all the land of the stranger too. Aye; and is democracy as well as the South to have no out-spoken, honest counsellor? Are we to be given over to the federal gods of Pacific railroads? Are we to out-Yazoo Yazoo? To out-Adams Adams in putting internal improvements by the General Government on the most Omnipotent and indefinitely stretching power of all powers of the Federal Government—the war power? Are we to abolish ad valorem and adopt the specific duties to supply a tariff for revenue, the standard of which is already eighty-one millions of expenditure on three hundred and twenty-one millions average rate of importations? Are we to increase eighty-one millions of expenditure to the unknown limitless amount required for railroads across this continent; for post-offices that don't pay expenses; for pensions unheard of in character and amount; for a land office which gives away three acres for every one sold, and brings us in debt; for increase of a standing army such as our frontiers and Indian wars and protectorates of foreign territory propose; and, therefore, for such a navy as Isthmian wars with no less than eight powers of the earth—England, Spain, France, Mexico, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, New Granada, and Paraguay—demand if threatened only? Is protection to be turned into prohibition? If so, what is a 'direct tax?' Is land tax the only one which can be 'apportioned?' Are the landowners to pay all the cost of the crusade of Congress and manifest destiny? Is strict construction and are State rights to be abandoned, and are we to give up State corporations to the bankruptcies of a federal commission? Where would have been our people and their effects last year if a federal power could have put our State banks into a course of liquidation under a commission of bankruptcy? Is the South, is any portion of our community, in a situation to rush into wars—wars invited by the President with three European and five American powers? And are we to be a grand consolidated, elective, North and South American imperialism? The question is not, 'Will the Union be dissolved?' That is a settled question. But the question is, 'Is the old Virginia democratic faith to be abandoned, and are we to rush on with the President into a full scheme of federal policy which in its outline and filling up, exceeds any federalism, in all its points, which a Hamilton, or Adams, or any other latitudinarian, ever dared to project or propose?
"For my part, I take ground now firmly and at once against the war power. I am for the Washington policy of peace, and against all entangling alliances and protectorates, and the Jackson rule of 'demanding nothing but what is right, and submitting to nothing that is wrong,' and for preserving and protecting the South and whole country from ambitious and buccaneering wars, of which the landed and planting interests would have to bear the burden, at a great sacrifice of present prosperity. I am against internal improvements by the General Government, more than ever since their construction is put on the war power. If we could beard England up to 54° 40', ten years ago, without a road or known route to Oregon, why can't we wait for emigrants to beat a path on their way to gold mines, and hold California, without cutting a military road in time of peace? I am for retrenchment and reform of all expenditures, and for revenue only for economical administration, on a scale of pure, old-fashioned republican simplicity, discriminating no more than is necessary to prevent prohibition on non-dutiable articles. I am for free trade, and the protection it affords is demonstrably ample for a people of enterprise and art like ours. I am against State-bank bankruptcy, and all sorts of bankruptcy whatever. The Federal Government shall never declare again that honest debts shall be paid by gulping and oaths, with my consent. But my paper is run out.