Mr. Webster, in this speech, defines his position in regard to each of these four questions.
1. In regard to the new States to be made hereafter out of Texas, he gives us his opinion, in language well studied, and even with an excess of caution. Let us look at it, and the resolution which annexed Texas. That declares that "new States ... not exceeding four in number, in addition to said State of Texas ... may hereafter, by the consent of said State, be formed out of the territory thereof, which shall be entitled to admission under the provisions of the Federal Constitution. And such States ... shall be admitted with or without slavery, as the people of each State asking admission may desire."
I will not stop to consider the constitutionality of the joint resolution which annexed Texas. Mr. Webster's opinion on that subject is well known. But the resolution does two things: 1. It confers a power, the power to make four new States on certain conditions; a qualified power, restricted by the terms of the act. 2d. It imposes an obligation, namely, the obligation to leave it to the people of the new State to keep slaves or not, when the State is admitted. The words may be, etc., indicate the conferring of a power: the words shall be, etc., the imposing of an obligation. But as the power is a qualified power, so is the obligation a qualified obligation; the shall be is dependent on the may be, as much as the may be on the shall. Admitting in argument what Mr. Webster has denied, that Congress had the constitutional right to annex Texas by joint resolution, and also that the resolution of one Congress binds the future Congress, it is plain Congress may admit new States from Texas, on those conditions, or refuse to admit them. This is plain, by any fair construction of the language. The resolution does not say, they shall be formed, only "may be formed," and "shall be entitled to admission, under the provisions of the Federal Constitution"—not in spite of those provisions. The provisions of the Constitution, in relation to the formation and admission of new States, are well known, and sufficiently clear. Congress is no more bound to admit a new slave State formed out of Texas, than out of Kentucky. But Mr. Webster seems to say that Congress is bound to make four new States out of Texas, when there is sufficient population to warrant the measure, and a desire for it in the States themselves, and to admit them with a Constitution allowing slavery. He says, "Its guaranty is, that new States shall be made out of it,... and that such States ... may come in as slave States," etc. Quite the contrary. It is only said they "may be formed," and admitted "under the provisions of the Constitution." The shall be does not relate to the fact of admission.
Then he says, there is "a solemn pledge," "that if she shall be divided into States, those States may come in as slave States." But there is no "solemn pledge" that they shall come in at all. I make a "solemn pledge" to John Doe, that if ever I give him any land, it shall be a thousand acres in the meadows on Connecticut River; but it does not follow from this that I am bound to give John Doe any land at all. This solemn pledge is worth nothing, if Congress says to new States, You shall not come in with your slave Constitution. To make this "stipulation with Texas" binding, it ought to have provided that "new States ... shall be formed out of the territory thereof ... such States shall be entitled to admission, in spite of the provisions of the Constitution." Even then it would be of no value; for as there can be no moral obligation to do an immoral deed, so there can be no constitutional obligation to do an unconstitutional deed. So much for the first question. You see that Mr. Webster proposes to do what we never stipulated to do, what is not "so nominated in the bond." He wrests the resolution against freedom, and for the furtherance of the slave power!
2 and 3. Mr. Webster has given his answer to the second and third questions, which may be considered as a single question, Shall slavery be legally forbidden by Congress in California and New Mexico? Mr. Webster is opposed to the prohibition by Congress. Here are his words: "Now, as to California and New Mexico, I hold slavery to be excluded from those territories by a law even superior to that which admits and sanctions it in Texas. I mean the law of nature, of physical geography, the law of the formation of the earth."... "I will say further, that if a resolution or a law were now before us to provide a territorial government for New Mexico, I would not vote to put any prohibition into it whatever. The use of such a prohibition would be idle, as it respects any effect it would have upon the territory: and I would not take pains to reaffirm an ordinance of nature, nor to reënact the will of God." "The gentlemen who belong to the Southern States would think it a taunt, an indignity; they would think it an act taking away from them what they regard as a proper equality of privilege" ... "a plain theoretic wrong," "more or less derogatory to their character and their rights."
"African slavery," he tells us, "cannot exist there." It could once exist in Massachusetts and New Hampshire. Very little of this territory lies north of Mason and Dixon's line, the northern limit of Maryland; none above the parallel of forty-two degrees; none of it extends fifty miles above the northern limit of Virginia; two hundred and four thousand three hundred and fifty-three square miles of it lie south of the line of the Missouri Compromise, south of 36° 30´. Almost all of it is in the latitude of Virginia and the Carolinas. If slavery can exist on the west coast of the Atlantic, I see not why it cannot on the east of the Pacific, and all the way between. There is no reason why it cannot. It will, unless we forbid it by positive laws, laws which no man can misunderstand. Why, in 1787, it was thought necessary to forbid slavery in the Northwest Territory, which extends from the Ohio River to the forty-ninth parallel of north latitude.
Not exclude slavery from California and New Mexico, because it can never exist there! Why, it was there once, and Mexico abolished it by positive law. Abolished, did I say! We are not so sure of that; I mean, not sure that the Senate of the United States is sure of it. Not a month before Mr. Webster made this very speech, on the 13th and 14th of last February, Mr. Davis, the Senator from Mississippi, maintained that slavery is not abolished in California and New Mexico. He denies that the acts abolishing slavery in Mexico were made by competent powers; denies that they have the force of law. But even if they have, he tells us, "Suppose it be conceded that by law it was abolished—could that law be perpetual? Could it extend to the territory after it became the property of the United States? Did we admit territory from Mexico, subject to the Constitution and laws of Mexico? Did we pay fifteen million dollars for jurisdiction over California and New Mexico, that it might be held subordinate to the laws of Mexico?" The Commissioners of Mexico, he tells us, did not think that "we were to be bound by the edicts and statutes of Mexico." They pressed this point in the negotiation, "the continuation of their law for the exclusion of slavery;" and Mr. Trist told them he could not make a treaty on that condition; if they would "offer him the land covered a foot thick with pure gold, upon the single condition that slavery should be excluded therefrom, I could not entertain the offer for a moment." Does not Mr. Webster know this? He knows it too well.
But Mr. Davis goes further. He does not think slavery is excluded by legislation stronger than a joint resolution. This is his language: "I believe it is essential, on account of the climate, productions, soil, and the peculiar character of cultivation, that we shall, during its first settlement, have that slavery [African slavery] in a part, at least, of California and New Mexico." Now on questions of "A law of nature and physical geography," the Senator from Mississippi is as good authority as the Senator from Massachusetts, and a good deal nearer to the facts of the case.
In the House of Representatives, Mr. Clingman, of North Carolina, amongst others, wants New Mexico for slave soil. Pass the Wilmot Proviso over this territory, and the question is settled, disposed of for ever. Omit to pass it, and slavery will go there, and you may get it out if you can. Once there, it will be said that the "Compromises of the Constitution" are on its side, and we have no jurisdiction over the slavery which we have established there.
Hear what Mr. Foote said of a similar matter on the 26th of June, 1848, in his place in the Senate: "Gentlemen have said this is not a practical question, that slaves will never be taken to Oregon. With all deference to their opinion, I differ with them totally. I believe, if permitted, slaves would be carried there, and that slavery would continue, at least, as long as in Maryland or Virginia. ['The whole of Oregon' is north of forty-two degrees.] The Pacific coast is totally different in temperature from the Atlantic. It is far milder.... Green peas are eaten in the Oregon city at Christmas. Where is the corresponding climate to be found on this side the continent? Where we sit—near the thirty-ninth? No, sir; but to the south of us." "The latitude of Georgia gives, on the Pacific, a tropical climate." "The prohibition of slavery in the laws of Oregon was adopted for the express purpose of excluding slaves." "A few had been brought in; further importations were expected; and it was with a view to put a stop to them, that the prohibitory act was passed."