There are persons who would impress on the southern states the belief that they have just cause of apprehending danger to a certain portion of their property from the present administration. It is not difficult to comprehend the object and the motive of these idle alarms. What measure of the present administration gives any just occasion for the smallest apprehension to the tenure by which that species of property is held? However much the president and the members of his administration may deprecate the existence of slavery among us, as the greatest evil with which we are afflicted, there is not one of them that does not believe that the constitution of the general government confers no authority to interpose between the master and his slave, none to apply an adequate remedy, if indeed there be any remedy within the scope of human power. Suppose an object of these alarmists wereaccomplished, and the slave-holding states were united in the sentiment, that the policy of this government in all time to come, should be regulated on the basis of the fact of slavery, would not union on the one side lead to union on the other? And would not such a fatal division of the people and states of this confederacy, produce perpetual mutual irritation and exasperation, and ultimately disunion itself? The slave-holding states cannot forget that they are now in a minority, which is in a constant relative diminution, and should certainly not be the first to put forth a principle of public action by which they would be the greatest losers.
I am but too sensible of the unreasonable trespass on your time which I have committed, and of the egotism of which my discourse has partaken. I must depend for my apology upon the character of the times, on the venom of the attacks which have been made upon my character and conduct, and upon the generous sympathy of the gentlemen here assembled. During this very journey a paper has been put into my hands, in which a member of the house of representatives is represented to have said that the distinguished individual at the head of the government, and myself, have been indicted by the people. If that is the case, I presume that some defence is lawful. By the bye, if the honorable member is to have the sole conduct of the prosecution without the aid of other counsel, I think that it is not difficult to predict that his clients will be nonsuited, and that they will be driven out of court with the usual judgment pronounced in such cases.
In conclusion, I beg leave to offer a toast which, if you are as dry as I am, will, I hope, be acceptable for the sake of the wine, if not the sentiment.
‘The continuation of the turnpike road which passes through Lewisburg, and success to the cause of internal improvement, under every auspice.’
He then took his seat amid the repeated cheers of the whole company.
ON AFRICAN COLONIZATION.
IN THE HALL OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, AT THE ANNUAL MEETING OF THE AMERICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY, AT WASHINGTON CITY, JANUARY 20, 1827.
[THE subject of colonizing the free people of color and emancipated slaves, became one of deep and profound interest, at an early period, in the history of the United States. The question was agitated in Virginia in 1800, and a resolution passed in the legislature of that state, requesting the governor to correspond with the president of the United States, on the subject of purchasing land for a colony; and president Jefferson made efforts, which, however, were unsuccessful, to obtain by negotiation an establishment within the British colonies, in Africa, or the Portuguese colonies, in South America. The movement which finally led to a successful result, in establishing an American colony on the coast of Africa, commenced in the legislature of Virginia, in December 1816, by instructing the executive of that state, and their members of congress, to coöperate with the United States government in endeavoring to obtain a territory on the before-mentioned coast, for an asylum for free persons of color. Through the instrumentality of the Rev. Robert Finley, an early and zealous friend of the cause, a meeting of public men and private citizens was held at Washington city, on the twenty-first of December, 1816, over which Mr. Clay, then speaker of the house of representatives, was called to preside. A constitution of the American Colonization Society was adopted, at an adjourned meeting on the twenty-eighth of December, and on the first of January, 1817, the officers of the society were chosen, judge Bushrod Washington being elected president, and Henry Clay, William H. Crawford, Andrew Jackson, Robert Finley, and others, vice-presidents. Mr. Clay has always taken a warm and decided interest in the promotion of the objects of this society, and at the annual meeting thereof, in 1827 (being then secretary of state), he delivered the following address.]
I CANNOT withhold the expression of my congratulations to the society, on account of the very valuable acquisition which we have obtained in the eloquent gentleman from Boston, (Mr. Knapp,) who has just before favored us with an address. He has told us of his original impressions, unfavorable to the object of the society, and of his subsequent conversion. If the same industry, investigation, and unbiased judgment, manifested by himself and another gentleman (Mr. Powell), who avowed at the last meeting of the society a similar change wrought in his mind, were carried, by the public at large, into the consideration of the plan of the society, the conviction of its utility would be universal.