"'The Territory of Texas is susceptible of a division into five States of convenient size and form. Of these, two only would be adapted to those peculiar institutions (slavery) to which I have referred; and the other three, lying west and north of San Antonio, being only adapted to farming and grazing purposes, from the nature of their soil, climate, and productions, would not admit of these institutions. In the end, therefore, there would be two slave and three free States probably added to the Union.'
"And here permit me to observe, that there is one defect in the treaty which ought to be amended if we all did not know that it is destined to be rejected. The treaty itself ought to determine how many free and how many slave States should be made out of this territory."
On the 11th of April, 1826, James Buchanan, who is now being supported by Southern slaveholders, made a speech in Congress, eleven years after his Fourth of July oration, from which the following is taken:
"Permit me here, Mr. Chairman, for a moment, to speak upon a subject to which I have never before adverted upon this floor, and to which, I trust, I may never again have occasion to advert. I mean the subject of slavery. I BELIEVE IT TO BE A GREAT POLITICAL AND A GREAT MORAL EVIL. I THANK GOD, MY LOT HAS BEEN CAST IN A STATE WHERE IT DOES NOT EXIST.... IT HAS BEEN A CURSE ENTAILED UPON US BY THAT NATION WHICH MAKES IT A SUBJECT OF REPROACH TO OUR INSTITUTIONS." (See Gales and Seaton's Register of Debates, page 2180, vol. ii., part 2.)
MORE BUCHANAN ANTECEDENTS.
When a "Uniform Bankrupt Law" was enacted by Congress, after the election of General Harrison, there were on the files of the Judiciary Committee of the Senate fifty-one petitions, praying for the passage of such a law. Twenty-nine of these were from New York, five from New Jersey, three from Ohio, two from Indiana, two from Massachusetts, and one from each of the States of Tennessee and Mississippi. There were twenty-five other petitions praying for "A General Bankrupt Law;" fifteen of which were from New York, and eight from Pennsylvania; and how will the Democracy like to see it hereafter proven that BUCHANAN presented these petitions, and voted for the law? If it shall turn out that "Old Buck" did really go for the "odious Bankrupt Law," let his friends defend him on the ground that his State desired it, and had always favored the measure!
In the House of Representatives, in Congress, January 3, 1815, Mr. Ingersoll, a notorious Democrat from Pennsylvania, and a Boy Tory of the war of the Revolution, from the Committee on the Judiciary, reported a bill to establish a uniform law of Bankruptcy throughout the United States! If these facts should not turn out to be a sufficient justification of Mr. Buchanan's course, provided he went for this Bankrupt Law, let his friends present these facts, and show that he was in good old Federal Democratic company:
NUMBER 1. On the 5th of September, 1837, Mr. Van Buren's Democratic Secretary of the Treasury made a report to Congress, praying the passage of a uniform Bankrupt Law, which was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary.
NUMBER 2. On the 13th day of January, 1840, Mr. Norvell, a Democratic Senator from Michigan, moved that the Judiciary be instructed to inquire into the expediency of reporting a bill for the establishment of a General Bankrupt Law.
NUMBER 3. On the 22d of April, 1840, Garret D. Wall, a flaming Democratic Senator in Congress, reported certain amendments to a Bankrupt Law, from a minority of the Committee; which were referred to the Senate's select Committee, and reported by Mr. Wall, and passed—21 to 19—and sent to the House.