may oppose it, and in whatever way, as long as grace and strength are given me to stand up for anything. But if the question were now to arise, for the first time, whether such a people should be invited to share in the government of this Union, I should answer No. If the question were whether the public treasury should pour forth money to buy the consent of such a people to come into the Union, I should say No. Still more, if the proposition were to conquer such a people to bring them into the Union, I should resist it to the last. But these questions have all gone by. You have conquered these people. You have covenanted to bring them into the Union; and to bring them into the Union, not as a territory, not as a province, but as a state. And you can no longer protect or defend them in the rights they enjoy, unless you fulfil that treaty immediately and to the letter. They are, by the testimony of all historians and of all travellers, an inoffensive, harmless, timorous, and docile people. They must have protection and government. You owe them both. It is now painfully apparent that you can secure them neither in any other way than by allowing them the constitution of a state, and that immediately, too. This bill betrays on its face-this whole debate this entire proceeding, betrays the truth of the proposition.

Sir, New Mexico is obliterated from the memory of the Senate and of the Congress of the United States. It is a name no longer to be spoken here. What was the territory of New Mexico, as a distinct territory, has ceased to be spoken of here, otherwise than as an unoccupied, an unappropriated, an undefined part of the domain of the United States. But New Mexico had just exactly the same individuality and the same rights in coming into this Union that Texas had. New Mexico was annexed by conquest, and Texas by treaty. But Texas was admitted into the Union by treaty as a state; and New Mexico was admitted into the Union, after conquest, by treaty, with the agreement that it should be a state. Now, there is a question in dispute between New Mexico and Texas-a boundary question. That question is vital to New Mexico, because the boundary claimed by Texas would include the capital, and all the most valuable and most densely settled portions of New Mexico. Congress is engaged in settling that boundary question, and proposes to settle it by a commission. Congress appoints commissioners to treat with Texas, and invites Texas to appoint commissioners, equal in authority with those of the United VOL. 1-9.

States. So far, so well. But here is New Mexico, the other party in interest, the equal of Texas in rights, in justice, in position, in everything except what you withhold from her-the sovereignty of a state. She is unrepresented here. She has no voice here. And while she has no representative, no voice here, you deny her a share in the commission. I ask you now to fulfil your treaty obligations. Bring New Mexico in here as a state, that she may meet Texas as a state. Let her take part in this debate. Let us hear her present her wrongs and her rights. I have no doubt that she will speak as eloquently, and with as much justice on her side, as the state of Texas does on her side. Bring New Mexico in here. Before you decide upon her fate, give her a hearing. She appeals to you. Strike, if you will, but hear.

If you bring New Mexico in as a state, you will then have a security that justice can be done by the commissioners. Amendments which I have prepared, and shall submit, provide for the appointment of commissioners by New Mexico.

When Texas and New Mexico shall have appointed commissioners equal in number and in authority, the United States will then stand, where the parental government ought to stand, equal and impartial between the two contesting parties. Who can object, who will object, to a proposition conceived in fairness and justice like this? How can you pass this bill, with this commission of boundaries, excluding New Mexico, without denying to New Mexico the justice you are so anxious to award to Texas?

But, sir, bring New Mexico into the Union, and you will no longer have any need of a commission at all. The Constitution and the laws of the United States provide a remedy for the settlement of this question, without the interposition of the executive arm of the United States, and without any commission whatever, and without any delay. Texas will find a respondent whenever she chooses to file her bill in the Supreme Court of the United States, to assert a claim to the territory in dispute; and New Mexico, before that august tribunal, will maintain an attitude of equality and independence. There the law of the land will regard her as equal to Texas, equal in position even to the United States themselves. Here, her representative, appointed by herself, is seen only, as he presents himself unobtrusively in the lobbies and corridors of the capitol-refused admission by the House of Representatives as a delegate. In the Supreme Court, New Mexico

would be an acknowledged party, allowed to speak for and defend herself. Senators, the fact is before you; it is known to you, confessed by you, and acknowledged to the world; it has been acknowledged in this very debate to-day, that the people of New Mexico are on their way here with a constitution, borne by two senators and one representative, to lay open their rights and their wrongs before you. You, on the other hand, are consuming the long hours of this day and of every day, in hastening the passage of this bill, in endeavoring to anticipate the arrival of New Mexico by the passage of this bill, in order that you may tell her the door was shut before she came.

This is the justice, this the magnanimity of the United States of America. This is the magnanimity which is shown to a conquered, a defenceless, and a harmless people. Sir, there is not in the history of the Roman Empire an ambition for aggrandizement so marked as that which has characterized the American people. There is not in its whole history a transaction so unjust to a conquered people as this. But what is the apology for it? Is there any need or cause for such intemperate haste, such violent haste? The question we are upon is not about New Mexico. It does not concern New Mexico. New Mexico is a stranger to it. The question really before us, from the beginning, has been, not the settlement of the boundary of New Mexico, but the right of California to be admitted into the Union. Detach, then, this question of New Mexico and her boundary from the bill, and leave the bill to contain only its legitimate subject, that of California alone. You will thus secure New Mexico a right to be heard. Having heard her, if you pronounce against her, she must submit, because from that decision there can be no appeal.

But another apology is offered for violating the rights of New Mexico. You desire to preserve peace, to prevent civil war on the banks of the Rio Grande. But how can you preserve peace by such a measure as this? You exclude New Mexico from the commission. You deny her a hearing. You reject her constitution, even before it is presented. All this you do now. After the lapse of a year, or two or three years, your commission will come back, bringing with it all the excitement of this hour, with excitement increased beyond your control, by new and additional injustice. Sir, those who make peace in this way, are like him

"Who stems the stream with sand,
Or binds the flame with flaxen band

There will be no peace until, I do not say justice, but until a hearing is given to New Mexico. I repeat, that I know the Constitution of New Mexico is not here. It is not her fault, nor mine. It is enough that she has a constitution, a constitution of her own choice, and that the fact is known. It is well known. It is historical. Her constitution is known to the world, and just as well and as distinctly known to us as the constitution of any state in this Union. An election has been appointed to take the sense of the people of New Mexico upon adopting that constitution. My amendment provides for ascertaining officially whether it has been adopted; and it provides for admitting New Mexico as a state, as soon as the constitution thus adopted shall have been brought here and filed in the archives of the Department of State. Although it would be more regular to have that constitution before us officially, yet if the question must be whether New Mexico shall be admitted now, waiving the formality of authentic documentary testimony, or excluded forever, then I say, admit her now conditionallyupon her constitution, already known and adopted, being presented. No one can deny that if the commission proposed to be instituted shall be executed, that it will involve the imminent risk of the rejection of New Mexico forever, by reason of the absorption of the most important part of that territory and that community by the state of Texas.

Now, it is due to myself to say, that while I present this claim in behalf of New Mexico, it has not been my choice, nor my wish, to bring this great question into this bill, so called, of "compromise and adjustment." Even the admission of New Mexico as a state, under the circumstances, by this bill, would be in conflict with the arguments which I have used against it. But if the bill is to proceed and be passed with the amendment offered by the Senator from Maine, [Mr. BRADBURY,] then I ask you to adopt my amendment for the protection and security of New Mexico. I do not seek to affirm or deny the boundaries of New Mexico, as she has defined them in her constitution. I do not desire to disturb the boundary question. My amendment leaves the boundary question to the commissioners, only providing that New Mexico shall be represented in the commission.

Nor do I intend to involve the fate of New Mexico in the fate of this bill. My proposition is only an amendment to the amendment of the Senator from Maine; and I shall in any event vote

against that and against the whole bill. But if it pass in the form contemplated by the Senator from Maine, New Mexico will be protected if mine is adopted. If, on the other hand, the bill shall be lost altogether, New Mexico will have lost nothing by means of the effort made by me in her behalf.

Several senators having spoken, Mr. SEWARD replied

If there is any proposition I have ever made, any measure I have ever proposed, which I am willing to stand by here, before the country and before the world, it is the proposition I have now submitted. Therefore, though I stand alone, I shall be content, convinced that I stand right.

I do not propose to reply to what is personal in the remarks of the honorable Senator from Maryland. I have nothing of a personal character to say. There is no man in this land who is of sufficient importance to this country and to mankind, to justify his consumption of five minutes of the time of the Senate of the United States, with personal explanations relating to himself. When the senator made his remarks, I rose to express to him the fact that he was under a misapprehension. The speeches which I have made here, under a rule of the Senate, are recorded, and what is recorded has gone before the people, and will go, worthy or not, into history. I leave them to mankind. I stand by what I have said. That is all I have to say upon that subject.

The senator proposes to expel me. I am ready to meet that trial too; and if I shall be expelled, I shall not be the first man subjected to punishment for maintaining that there is a power higher than human law, and that power delights in justice; that rulers, whether despots or elected rulers of a free people, are bound to administer justice for the benefit of society. Senators, when they please to bring me for trial, or otherwise, before the Senate of the United States, will find a clear and open field. I ask no other defence than the speeches upon which they propose to condemn me. The speeches will read for themselves, and they will need no comment from me.

Mr. President, the objection which is made to the proposition. which I have submitted to the Senate is this: That it may bring into the United States a royal or kingly government. Sir, here is the Constitution of New Mexico, sent to me by one who attended the convention of New Mexico. I have just as good evidence to satisfy me that this is the real Constitution of New Mexico, as I