"They were accordingly placed in Mr. Brown's possession, who, when he published Jackson's letter to the Globe, alluding to this passage asserting that Erving had laid the foundation of a treaty with Spain, fixing the western limit at the Rio Grande, otherwise called the Rio del Norte, subjoined the following note: 'That this boundary could have been obtained was doubtless the belief of our minister; but the offer of the Spanish government was probably to the Colorado—certainly a line far west of the Sabine.'
"This is the note of Aaron Vail Brown, and my fellow-citizens will please to observe,—
"First, That it blows to atoms the whole statement of Andrew Jackson that Erving had laid the foundation of a treaty by which our western bounds upon the Spanish possessions should be at the Rio Grande; and, of course, grinds to impalpable powder his charge that our government did give up that important territory when it was at its option to retain it.
"Secondly, That this note of Aaron Vail Brown, while it so effectually demolishes Jackson's fable of Erving's treaty with Spain for the boundary of the Rio del Norte, and his libellous charge against our government for surrendering the territory which they had the option to retain, is, with this exception, as wide and as wilful a departure from the truth as the calumny of Jackson itself, which it indirectly contradicts."
Mr. Adams then enters into a lucid and elaborate statement of Erving's connection with this negotiation with the Spanish government, with minute and important illustrations, highly interesting and conclusive; severely animadverting upon the conduct of General Jackson and Mr. Brown. He says:
"The object of the publication of that letter of Andrew Jackson was to trump up a shadow of argument for a pretended reännexation of Texas to the United States, by a fabulous pretension that it had been treacherously surrendered to Spain, in the Florida treaty of 1819, by our government,—meaning thereby the Secretary of State of that day, John Quincy Adams,—in return for greater obligations than any one public servant of this nation was ever indebted for to another. The argument for the annexation, or reännexation, of Texas is as gross an imposture as ever was palmed upon the credulity of an honest people."
In conclusion Mr. Adams addresses in a serious and exciting strain of eloquence the young men of Boston; and, after recapitulating part of an oration which he delivered on the 4th of July, 1793, before their fathers and forefathers, in that city, he closes thus:
"Young men of Boston, the generations of men to whom fifty-one years bygone I gave this solemn pledge have passed entirely away. They in whose name I gave it are, like him who addresses you, dropping into the grave. But they have redeemed their and my pledge. They were your fathers, and they have maintained the freedom transmitted to them by their sires of the war of independence. They have transmitted that freedom to you; and upon you now devolves the duty of transmitting it unimpaired to your posterity. Your trial is approaching. The spirit of freedom and the spirit of slavery are drawing together for the deadly conflict of arms. The annexation of Texas to this Union is the blast of a trumpet for a foreign, civil, servile, and Indian war, of which the government of your country, fallen into faithless hands, have already twice given the signal: first by a shameless treaty, rejected by a virtuous Senate; and again by the glove of defiance hurled by the apostle of nullification at the avowed policy of the British empire peacefully to promote the extinction of slavery throughout the world. Young men of Boston, burnish your armor—prepare for the conflict; and I say to you, in the language of Galgacus to the ancient Britons, 'Think of your forefathers! think of your posterity!'"[49] ]
On the 30th of the same month Mr. Adams delivered to his constituents at Weymouth an address equally elaborate, comprehensive, and historical, in a like fervid and characteristic spirit,[50] ] which thus concludes:
"Texas and slavery are interwoven in every banner floating on the Democratic breeze. 'Freedom or death' should be inscribed on ours. A war for slavery! Can you enlist under such a standard? May the Ruler of the universe preserve you from such degradation! 'Freedom! Peace! Union!' be this the watchword of your camp; and if Ate, hot from hell, will come and cry 'Havoc!' fight—fight and conquer, under the banner of universal freedom."