Returning home at the close of the session, he warned his personal friends and political associates that the American organization, which had acted with the anti-Nebraska men in the North, was to be seduced by the South, and betrayed by men in the North, who assumed to control its actions. On the 8th of May, he delivered an address before a large assemblage in the Metropolitan Theatre in New York, upon the development of the anti-slavery sentiment in America for twenty years, from 1835 to 1855. On this occasion he declared that:
"He owed it to truth to speak what he knew—that the anti-slavery cause was in extreme peril—that a demand was made upon us of the North to ignore the slavery question, to keep quiet, and go into power in 1856. If there were men in the free States who hoped to triumph in 1856 by ignoring the slavery issues now forced upon the nation by the slave propagandists, he would say to them, that the anti-slavery men cannot be reduced or driven into the organization of a party that ignores the question of slavery in Christian and Republican America. Let such men read and ponder the history of the Republic; let them contrast anti-slavery in 1835 and anti-slavery in 1855. Those periods are the grand epochs in the anti-slavery movement, and the contrast between them cannot fail to give us some faint conception of the mighty changes that twenty years of anti-slavery agitation have wrought in America. Anti-slavery in 1835 was in the nadir of its weakness; anti-slavery in 1855 is in the zenith of its power. Then, a few unknown, nameless men were its apostles and leaders; now, the most profound and accomplished intellects of America are its chiefs and champions. Then, a few proscribed and humble followers rallied around its banner; now, it has laid its grasp upon the conscience of the people, and hundreds of thousands rally under the folds of its flag. Then, not a single statesman in all America accepted its doctrines or defended its measures; now, it has a decisive majority in the national House of Representatives, and is rapidly changing the complexion of the American Senate. Then, every State in the Union was arrayed against it; now, it controls fifteen sovereign States by more than 300,000 popular majority. Then, the public press covered it with ridicule and contempt; now, the most powerful journals in America are its instruments. Then, the benevolent, religious and literary institutions of the land repulsed its advances, rebuked its doctrines and persecuted its advocates; now, it shapes, molds and fashions them at its pleasure, compelling the most powerful benevolent organizations of the western world, upon whose mission stations the sun never sets, to execute its decrees, and the oldest literary institution in America to cast from its bosom a professor who had surrendered a man to the slave hunters. Then, the political organizations trampled disdainfully upon it; now, it looks down with the pride of conscious power upon the wrecked political fragments that float at its feet. Then, it was impotent and powerless; now it holds every political organization in the hollow of its right hand. Then, the public voice sneered at and defied it; now it is the master of America and has only to be true to itself to grasp the helm and guide the ship of State hereafter in her course."
"This brief contrast," he said, "would show the men who hoped to win power by ignoring the transcendent issue of our age in America, how impotent would be the efforts of any class of men to withdraw the mighty questions involved in the existence and expansion of slavery on this continent, from the consideration of the people." To the idea of going into power by sacrificing the anti-slavery cause, he replied:
"Now, gentlemen, I say to you frankly, I am the last man to object to going into power [laughter], and especially to going into power over the present dynasty that is fastened upon the country. But I am the last man that will consent to go into power by ignoring or sacrificing the slavery question. [Applause.] If my voice could be heard by the whole country to-night—by the anti-slavery men of the country to-night of all parties, I would say to them, resolve it—write it over your door-posts—engrave it on the lids of your Bibles—proclaim it at the rising of the sun and the going down of the sun, and in the broad light of noon, that any party in America, be that party Whig, Democratic, or American, that lifts its finger to arrest the anti-slavery movement, to repress the anti-slavery sentiment, or proscribe the anti-slavery men, it surely shall begin to die—[loud applause]—it would deserve to die; it will die; and by the blessing of God I shall do what little I can to make it die."
This address was repeated in Boston, Worcester, Springfield, Lowell, Dorchester, and other places in Massachusetts, and General Wilson was branded as an agitator, traitor, and disorganizer, by men who had been for six months secretly and darkly intriguing to betray the liberty-loving men who had given the American organization power in the free States. This feeling of hostility was heightened by the publication of his speech, delivered on the 16th of May, at Brattleborough, Vt., "On the position and duty of the American party." In this speech he said that
"The time has come for the advocates of the American movement distinctly to define their principles and their policy.
"If the American party is to achieve anything for good, it must adopt a wise and humane policy consistent with our Democratic ideas—a policy which will reform existing abuses and guard against future ones—which shall combine in one harmonious organization moderate and patriotic men who love freedom and hate oppression. Upon the grand and overshadowing question of American slavery, the American party must take its position. If it wishes a speedy death and a dishonored grave, let it adopt the policy of neutrality upon that question or the policy of ignoring that question. If that party wishes to live, to impress its policy upon the nation, it must repudiate the sectional policy of slavery and stand boldly upon the broad and national basis of freedom. It must accept the position that 'Freedom is national and slavery is sectional.' It must stand upon the national idea embodied in the Declaration of Independence—that 'all men are created equal, and have an inalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.' It must accept these words as embracing the great central national idea of America, fidelity to which is national in New England and in South Carolina. It must recognize the doctrine that the Constitution of the United States was made 'to secure the blessing of liberty,'—that Congress has no right to make a slave or allow slavery to exist outside of the slave States, and that the Federal Government must be relieved from all connection with, and responsibility for slavery.
"In their own good time the Americans of Massachusetts have spoken for themselves. They have placed that old Commonwealth face to face to the slave oligarchy and its allies. Upon their banner they have written in letters of living light the words, 'No exclusion from the public schools on account of race or color.'—'No slave commissioners on the judicial bench.'—'No slave States to be carved out of Kansas and Nebraska.'—'The repeal of the unconstitutional fugitive slave act of 1850.'—'An act to protect personal liberty.' The men who have inscribed these glowing words upon their banner will go into the conflicts of the future like the Zouaves at Inkermann, 'with the light of battle on their faces,'—and if defeat comes, they will fall with their 'backs to the field, and their feet to the foe.'"
Early in June, 1855, the American National Council assembled at Philadelphia. General Wilson was a delegate, and his position in the Senate, and his avowed sentiments, opinions and policy, brought him at once into conflict with the men in and out of the council, who were intriguing to make the American organization an instrument of the slave power. An attempt was made to keep him out of the council, on account of the sentiments he had expressed, and to draw off the Massachusetts delegation from him; but they stood by him, and thus baffled the designs of the plotters. On taking his seat in the council, he was at once recognized by friends and foes as the leader of the North—the representative of the anti-slavery men of the free States. The National Council sat for more than one week, and during that time it was the scene of stormy, exciting and angry discussion upon the slavery question. Early in the debate, a delegate from Virginia made a fierce personal attack upon him, quoting from his speeches, and denouncing him as the leader of the anti-slavery men of the North, who had come into the council to rule or to destroy. General Wilson promptly replied to this assault, and defiantly told the delegate from Virginia and his compeers, that "his threats had no terrors for free men—that he was then and there ready to meet argument with argument—scorn with scorn—and if need, be, blow with blow, for God had given him an arm ready and able to protect his head! It was time the champions of slavery in the South should realize the fact, that the past was theirs—the future ours." The debate went on, and on the 12th of June, General Wilson made an elaborate speech in reply to the assaults made upon the North and upon the anti-slavery men, by both southern and northern delegates. To the assaults made upon Massachusetts by some of the delegates from New York, he said: "When Massachusetts pleads to any arraignment before the nation, she will demand that her accusers are competent to draw the bill." To the men of the South who had denounced the action of Massachusetts, he replied:
"But gentlemen of talents and of character have undertaken here to arraign Massachusetts. To those gentlemen I have to say, that Massachusetts means to go to the very verge of her constitutional powers, to protect the personal rights of her people! She means to exercise her constitutional rights, for the security of the liberties of her people, against what she deems to be unconstitutional, inhuman and unchristian legislation; and I tell you frankly, if any constitutional powers are in doubt, she will construe them in favor of liberty; not in favor of slavery. In the future, if she errs at all, in the interpretation of her reserved rights, as a sovereign State, I trust she will go a little beyond the limits of State sovereignty, rather than fall short of marching up to those limits. The personal liberties of her people demand that she should do so.