to advance it, do now plant ourselves upon the national platform of freedom, in opposition to the sectional platform of slavery.

"2. Resolved, That slavery in the several States of this Union. which recognize its existence depends upon the State laws alone, which cannot be repealed or modified by the Federal government, and for which laws that government is not responsible. We therefore propose no interference by Congress with slavery within the limits of any State.

"3. Resolved, That the proviso of Jefferson, to prohibit the existence of slavery after 1800 in all the Territories of the United States, southern and northern; the votes of six States and sixteen delegates. in the Congress of 1784 for the proviso, to three States and seven delegates against it; the actual exclusion of slavery from the Northwestern Territory by the Ordinance of 1787, unanimously adopted by the States in Congress; and the entire history of that period,— clearly show that it was the settled policy of the nation not to extend, nationalize, or encourage, but to limit, localize, and discourage slavery; and to this policy, which should never have been departed from, the government ought to return.

"4. Resolved, That our fathers ordained the Constitution of the United States in order, among other great national objects, to establish justice, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty; but expressly denied to the Federal government, which they created, a constitutional power to deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due legal process.

"5. Resolved, That in the judgment of this convention Congress has no more power to make a slave than to make a king; no more power to institute or establish slavery than to institute or establish a monarchy. No such power can be found among those specifically conferred by the Constitution, or derived by just implication from them.

"6. Resolved, That it is the duty of the Federal government to relieve itself from all responsibility for the existence or continuance of slavery wherever the government possesses constitutional power to legislate on that subject and is thus responsible for its existence.

"7. Resolved, That the true and, and in the judgment of this

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convention, the only safe means of preventing the extension of slavery into territory now free is to prohibit its extension in all such territory by an act of Congress.

"8. Resolved, That we accept the issue which the slave power has forced upon us, and to their demand for more slave States and more slave territory our calm but final answer is: No more slave States and no more slave territory. Let the soil of our extensive domain be kept free for the hardy pioneers of our own land and the oppressed and banished of other lands seeking homes of comfort and fields of enterprise in the new world.

"9. Resolved, That the bill1 lately reported by the committee of eight in the Senate of the United States was no compromise, but an absolute surrender of the rights of the non-slaveholders of all the States; and while we rejoice to know that a measure which, while opening the door for the introduction of slavery into Territories now free, would also have opened the door to litigation and strife among the future inhabitants thereof, to the ruin of their peace and prosperity, was defeated in the House of Representatives, its passage in hot haste [in the Senate] by a majority embracing several Senators who voted in open violation of the known will of their constituents should warn the people to see to it that their representatives be not suffered to betray them. There must be no more compromises with slavery; if made, they must be repealed.

"10. Resolved, That we demand freedom and established institutions for our brethren in Oregon now exposed to hardships, peril, and massacre by the reckless hostility of the slave power to the establishment of free government for free Territories; and not only for them, but for our brethren in California and New Mexico.

"11. Resolved, That it is due not only to this occasion, but to the whole people of the United States, that we should also declare ourselves on certain other questions of national policy; therefore,

1The bill here referred to was the "Clayton Compromise" of July, 1848 (named for Senator John M. Clayton, of Delaware), which provided for organizing the Territorial governments of Oregon, New Mexico, and California on the fundamental plan of referring disputed matters about slavery to the Supreme Court.

"12. Resolved, That we demand cheap postage for the people; a retrenchment of the expenses and patronage of the Federal government; the abolition of all unnecessary offices and salaries; and the election by the people of all civil officers in the service of the government so far as the same may be practicable.

"13. Resolved, That river and harbor improvements, when demanded by the safety and convenience of commerce with foreign nations, or among the several States, are objects of national concern, and it is the duty of Congress, in the exercise of its constitutional power, to provide therefor.

"14. Resolved, That the free grant to actual settlers, in consideration of the expenses they incur in making settlements in the wilderness, which are usually fully equal to their actual cost, and of the public benefits resulting therefrom, of reasonable portions of the public lands under suitable limitations, is a wise and just measure of public policy which will promote, in various ways, the interest of all the States of the Union; and we therefore recommend it to the favorable consideration of the American people.

"15. Resolved, That the obligations of honor and patriotism require the earliest practical payment of the national debt, and we are therefore in favor of such a tariff of duties as will raise revenue adequate to defray the expenses of the Federal government and to pay annual installments of our debt and the interest thereon.

"16. Resolved, That we inscribe on our banner Free Soil, Free Speech, Free Labor, and Free Men, and under it we will fight on, and fight ever, until a triumphant victory shall reward our exertions."

The Election

Again the slavery issue decided the result. This time the Democratic party was the sufferer. In New York, which had been normally Democratic, the popular vote stood: Taylor (Whig), 218,603; Cass (Democrat), 114,318; Van Buren (Free Soil), 120,510. If New York had gone for Cass he would have been elected. The Free Soil party proved a consider

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able factor in several other northern States. On this occasion the "Free Democrats" took the national question of slavery more seriously than the anti-slavery Whigs; the Wilmot Proviso was still much in people's minds, and it was a Democratic measure. Many Democrats went to the extremity of voting the Whig ticket; the usually Democratic State of Pennsylvania gave Taylor a clear majority over both Cass and Van Buren. On the other hand, the Whig opponents of slavery found it very difficult, upon reflection, to support Van Buren, who had long been one of the great leaders of the Democratic party; and at the last moment they largely preferred to sustain their own national ticket.

But the most striking feature of the general result was Taylor's strength in the south. He was successful in eight slave States which together cast 66 Electoral votes; Cass carried seven slave States, with 55 Electoral votes.

For President and Vice-President, Electoral vote:

Zachary Taylor and Millard Fillmore, Whigs:-Connecticut, 6; Delaware, 3; Florida, 3; Georgia, 10; Kentucky, 12; Louisiana, 6; Maryland, 8; Massachusetts, 12; New Jersey, 7; New York, 36; North Carolina, 11; Pennsylvania, 26; Rhode Island, 4; Tennessee, 13; Vermont, 6. Total, 163. Elected.

Lewis Cass and William O. Butler, Democrats:-Alabama, 9; Arkansas, 3; Illinois, 9; Indiana, 12; Iowa, 4; Maine, 9; Michigan, 5; Mississippi, 6; Missouri, 7; New Hampshire, 6; Ohio, 23; South Carolina, 9; Texas, 4; Virginia, 17; Wisconsin, 4. Total, 127.

Popular vote:

Taylor, 1,360,101; Cass, 1,220,544; Van Buren, 291,263.

1852

As we have seen, during Polk's administration the only positive results concerning slavery were the admission of Texas as a slave State (1845) and the creation of Oregon as a free Territory (1848). The "equiponderance" of the north and south was in 1849 perfect, each section having fifteen States.1 For the future, anti-slavery was still understood to have an impregnable title to all the territory north of 36° 30' agreeably to the Missouri Compromise of 1820; but slavery was as yet without any assured footing west of Texas, Arkansas, and Missouri. The diverse measures of slavery extension presented and discussed in Congress up to the early summer of 1848, although conceived in the greatest seriousness, were only tentative actually because of the protraction of the official state of war with Mexico. On July 4, 1848, the peace treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was proclaimed to the country by President Polk; but, aside from the passage of the Oregon bill and the ineffectual attempt to enact the Clayton Compromise (referred to in the Free Soil platform of 1848), no new move of any consequence was made until the opening, in December, 1849, of the first regular session of Congress under the new administration.

1The border States of Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri were in those times always classed with the south on account of their permission of slavery.