These facts are stated to show that a contest with a people who believe themselves right and one with a government are very different things. It would have been very gratifying to me to have been informed by some one of the gentlemen who support the amendment what is intended to be done if it be adopted, and the people of Missouri will not yield, but go on and form a State government (having the requisite number of inhabitants agreeably to the ordinance), as Tennessee did, and then apply for admission into the Union. Will she be admitted, as Tennessee was, on an equal footing with the original States, or will the application be rejected as the British government did the petitions of the old Congress?
If you do not admit her, and she will not return to the territorial government, will you declare the people rebels, as Great Britain did us, and then order them to be conquered for contending for the same rights that every State in the Union now enjoys? Will you for this, order the father to march against son and brother against brother? God forbid! It would be a terrible sight to behold these near relations plunging the bayonet into each other for no other reason than because the people of Missouri wish to be on equal footing with the people of Louisiana. When Territories they were equal. Those who remember the Revolution will not desire to see another civil war in our land. They know too well the wretched scenes it will produce. If you should declare them rebels and conquer them, will that attach them to the Union? No one can expect this. Then do not attempt to do that for them which was never done for others, and that which no State would consent for Congress to do for it. If the United States are to make conquests, do not let the first be at home. Nothing is to be got by American conquering American. Nor ought we to forget that we are not legislating for ourselves, and that the American character is not yielding when rights are concerned. But why depart from the old way, which has kept us in quiet, peace and harmony, every one living under his own vine and fig-tree and none to make him afraid? Why leave the road of experience, which has satisfied all and made all happy, to take this new way, of which we have no experience? This way leads to universal emancipation, of which we have no experience. The Eastern and Middle States furnish none. For years before these States emancipated their slaves they had but few, and of them a part were sold to the South. We have no more experience or book-learning on this subject than the French Convention had which turned the slaves of Santo Domingo loose. Nor can we foresee the consequences which may result from this new motion clearer than the Convention did in their decree.
A clause in the Declaration of Independence has been read declaring that "all men are created equal." Follow that sentiment, and does it not lead to universal emancipation? If it will justify putting an end to slavery in Missouri, will it not justify it in the old States? Suppose the plan followed and all the slaves turned loose, and the Union to continue, is it certain that the present Constitution would last long? The rich would in such circumstances want titles and hereditary distinctions, the negro food and raiment, and they would be as much or more degraded than in their present condition. The rich might hire these wretched people, and with them attempt to change the government by trampling on the rights of those who have only property enough to live comfortably. Opinions have greatly changed in some of the States in a few years. The time has been when those now called slaveholding States were thought to be the firm and steadfast friends of the people and of liberty. Then they were opposing an administration and a majority in Congress supported by a sedition law; then there was not a word heard, at least from one side, about those who actually did most toward changing the administration and the majority in Congress, and they were from slaveholding States. And now it would be curious to know how many members of Congress actually hold seats in consequence of their exertions at the time alluded to. Past services are always forgotten when new principles are to be introduced.
It is a fact that the people who move from the non-slaveholding to slaveholding States, when they became slaveholders, by purchase or marriage, expect more labor from them than those do who are brought up among them.
To the gentleman from Rhode Island (Mr. Burrill) I tender my hearty thanks for his liberal and true statement of the treatment of slaves in the Southern States. His observations leave but little for me to add, which is this, that the slaves gained as much by independence as the free. The old ones are better taken care of than any poor in the world, and treated with decent respect by their white acquaintances. I sincerely wish that he and the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Roberts) would go home with me, or some other Southern member, and witness the meeting between slaves and owner and see the glad faces and hearty shaking of hands. This is well described in General Moultrie's Memoirs of the American Revolution, in which he gives the account of his reception by his slaves the first time he went home after he was exchanged. He was made prisoner at the surrender of Charleston. Could he (Mr. Macon) have procured the book in the city he intended to have read it to show the attachment of the slave to his owner. A fact shall be stated. An excellent friend of mine—he too, like the other characters which have been mentioned in the debate, was a Virginian—had business in England which made it necessary that he should go to that country himself or send a trusty agent. He could not go conveniently, so he sent one of his slaves, who remained there near a year. Upon his return he was asked by his owner how he liked the country, and if he would have liked to stay there? He replied that to oblige him he would have stayed; the country was the finest he ever saw; the land was worked as nice as a square in a garden; they had the finest horses and carriages, and houses, and everything; but that the white servants abused his country. What did they say? They said we owed them (the English) a heap of money, and would not pay; to which he added, their chief food was mutton; he saw very little bacon there. The owner can make more free in conversation with his slave and be more easy in his company than the rich man, where there is no slave, with the white hireling who drives his carriage. He has no expectation that the slave will, for the free and easy conversation, expect to call him fellow-citizen or act improperly.
Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Virginia have been mentioned by Senators in this debate, and it has frequently been said that the two first had emancipated their slaves; from which an inference seems to be drawn that the other might have done so: emancipation to these gentlemen seems to be quite an easy task. It is so when there are but very few slaves; and would be more easy did not the color everywhere place the blacks in a degraded state. Where they enjoy the most freedom they are there degraded. The respectable whites do not permit them to associate with them or to be of their company when they have parties. But if it be so easy a task, how happens it that Virginia, which before the Revolution endeavored to put an end to the African slave-trade, has not attempted to emancipate? It will not be pretended that the great men of other States were superior or greater lovers of liberty than her Randolph, the first President of the first Congress, her Washington, her Henry, her Jefferson, or her Nelson. None of these ever made the attempt, and their voices ought to convince every one that it is not an easy task in that State. And is it not wonderful, that if the Declaration of Independence gave authority to emancipate, the patriots who made it never proposed any plan to carry it into execution? This motion, whatever is pretended by its friends, must lead to it. And is it not equally wonderful that if the Constitution gives the authority, this is the first attempt ever made, under either, by the Federal Government to exercise it? For if under either the power is given, it will apply as well to States as to Territories. If either intended to give it, is it not still more wonderful that it is not given in direct terms? The gentleman would not then be put to the trouble of searching the Articles of Confederation, the Constitution and the laws for a sentence or a word to form a few doubts. If the words of the Declaration of Independence be taken as part of the Constitution (and that they are no part of it is as true as that they are no part of any other book), what will be the condition of the Southern country when this shall be carried into execution? Take the most favorable view which can be supposed, that no convulsion ensue, that nothing like massacre or war of extermination take place as in Santo Domingo, but that whites and blacks do not marry and produce mulatto States, will not the whites be compelled to move and leave their lands and houses and abandon the country to the blacks? And are you willing to have black members of Congress? But if the scenes of Santo Domingo should be re-acted, would not the tomahawk and the scalping-knife be mercy?
ARCHIBALD D. MURPHY.