This profligate drivel is uttered by the Nestor of the commonwealth, an infirm old man, with one foot in the grave. In order, however, to make the course pursued by this gentleman and the next speaker intelligible to the English reader, we may explain that, by the annexation of Texas, the Southern States have a majority of votes in Congress; the Northern States are therefore indifferent about war for Oregon, and the abolitionists among them frantic for it, in order that their domestic balance of power may be restored. Mr Giddings, a Whig representative from Ohio, and a red-hot abolitionist, indulges in the following most wicked and treasonable remarks:—
"This policy of adding territory to our original government is the offspring of the south. They have forced it upon the northern democracy. Their objects and ends are now answered. Texas is admitted. They have now attained their object, and now require the party to face about—to stop short, and leave the power of the nation in their hands. They now see before them the black regiments of the West India islands landed on their shores. They now call to mind the declarations of British statesmen, that a war with the United States will be a war of emancipation. They now see before them servile insurrections which torment their imaginations; murder, rapine, and bloodshed, now dance before their affrighted visions. Well, sir, I say to them, this is your policy, not mine. You have prepared the cup, and I will press it to your lips till the very dregs shall be drained. Let no one misunderstand me. Let no one say I desire a slave insurrection; but, sir, I doubt not that hundreds of thousands of honest and patriotic hearts will laugh at your calamity, and mock when your fear cometh. No, sir; should a servile insurrection take place, should massacre and blood mark the footsteps of those who have for ages been oppressed—my prayer to God shall be that justice—stern, unalterable justice—may be awarded to the master and the slave!" ... "A war with England in the present state of the two nations must inevitably place in our possession the Canadas, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick. Six states will be added to the northern portion of the union, to restore the balance of power to the Free States.... I demand of you not to leave the nation in its present state of subjugation to the south. I will vote to give you the means of doing so," &c.
We hold up the ferocious cant of this mock philanthropist to the scorn of all good men, whether in Europe or America. So, because "the domestic institution" of his happy land is not to the taste of this Giddings, thousands of white men are to imbrue their hands in each other's blood, and England, the great champion of the negro race, at her own expense, is to be driven by force of arms out of Oregon. It is consoling, however, to find at last by their own confession, that there is a weak place—and a very weak one too—in "the area of freedom."
Besides the acquisition of Canada, which is put down on all hands as a "gone 'coon," other brilliant results are to ensue from the possession of Oregon. Mr Ingersoll, (Whig,) "a drab-coloured man" from Pennsylvania—"flattered himself that two years would not elapse before the Chinese and Japanese—sober, industrious, and excellent people—would be attracted there to settle. It was only a short voyage across the Pacific Ocean. Millions of those starving workmen who, in point of sobriety, industry, and capacity, were among the best in the world—workmen from every isle in the Pacific—men able to outwork the English, would flock there."
In the same fine strain of prophecy, Mr Darragh, another "drab" of the Democratic school, observes—
"He was one of those who believed that there were men now here, who might yet live to see a continuous railroad extending from the mouth of the Columbia to the Atlantic. The country would soon be filled with a dense population, and would eventually control the China trade, and affect the whole commerce of the Pacific. He trusted in God there would be a beginning of this end. He trusted that this government would say to the despotisms of Europe—Stay on your own side of the water, and do not attempt to intermeddle with the balance of power on this continent. He believed it to be the design of God that our free institutions, or institutions like ours, should eventually cover this whole continent—a consummation which could not but affect every part of the world, and the prospect of which ought to fill with joy the heart of every philanthropic man!"
But it won't till you've paid your debts, O Darragh!
Mr Baker, (Whig,) another insolvent from Illinois, is very rich and rapacious—
"He (Mr B.) went for the whole of Oregon; for every grain of sand that sparkled in her moonlight, and every pebble on its wave-worn strand. It was ours—all ours; ours by treaty, ours by discovery.... There was such a thing as destiny for this American race—a destiny that would yet appear upon the great chart of human history. It was already fulfilling, and that was a reason why we could now refuse to Great Britain that which we had offered her in 1818 and 1824. Reasons existed now in our condition, which did not exist then. Who at that time could have divined that our boundary was to be extended to the Rio del Norte, if not to Zacatecas, to Potosi, to California? No, we had a destiny, and Mr B. felt it." ... "Cuba was the tongue which God had placed in the Gulf of Mexico to dictate commercial law to all who sought the Carribbean Sea. And England was not to be allowed to take Cuba or hold Oregon, because we, the people of the United States, had spread, were spreading, and intend to spread, and should spread, and go on to spread!" ... "Mr Speaker, if from this claim an echo shall come back, it may not come from Oregon, but it will come from the Canadas. Sir, it will be 'the last echo of a host o'erthrown.' The British power will be swept from this continent for ever, and though she may, 'like the sultan sun, struggle upon the fiery verge of heaven,' she must yield at last to the impulses of freedom, and to the touch of that destiny which shall crush her power in the western hemisphere!"
This may be considered bad to beat; yet, in our opinion, a choice spirit from Missouri, Sims by name, does it—