CHAPTER IV

THE WILMOT PROVISO

[DEBATES ON THE PROHIBITION OF SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES]

David Wilmot [Pa.] Introduces in the House, as an Amendment to Bill Appropriating Money to Buy Mexican Territory, the Proviso That Slavery Shall Be Excluded from the Purchase-Senator Lewis Cass [Mich.] Advances Doctrine of "Popular Sovereignty"-Debate: in Favor, Mr. Wilmot, Timothy Jenkins [N. Y.], Joshua R. Giddings [0.]; Opposed, William H. Brockenbrough [Fla.]-John C. Calhoun [S. C.] Introduces in Senate Resolutions Denying the Right of Congress to Prohibit Slavery in the Territories; His Argument on the ResolutionsReply by Thomas H. Benton [Mo.]-Resolutions of Daniel Webster [Mass.] Against Prosecuting the Mexican War for Territorial Aggrandizement Senator Benton's Commentary on the Calhoun Resolutions— Cession by Mexico to United States of California and New MexicoBill to Organize These Territories and Oregon, Leaving Slavery to Be Settled by the Supreme Court-Debate in the Senate: in Favor, John M. Clayton [Del.], John H. Clarke [R. I.], Sidney Breese [Ill.], Samuel S. Phelps [Vt.], Joseph R. Underwood [Ky.], Andrew P. Butler [S. C.], Henry S. Foote [Miss.], Alfred Iverson [Ga.], Reverdy Johnson [Md.]; Opposed, Jacob W. Miller [N. J.], Thomas Fitzgerald [Mich.]; Thomas Corwin [O.], George E. Badger [N. C.], John A. Dix. [N. Y.]—Bill Is Passed in the Senate, but Tabled in the House on Motion of Alexander H. Stephens [Ga.]; Stephens's Argument-House Organizes Oregon Territory Without Slavery-Free Soil Party Declares Against Slavery in All the Territories-Debate in the Senate on the Oregon Bill: Pro-Slavery Speakers, James M. Mason [Va.], Senator Butler, Senator Calhoun, John Bell [Tenn.], General Samuel Houston [Tex.]; Anti-Slavery Speakers, William L. Dayton (N. J.], Senator Webster, John M. Niles [Ct.]Bill Is Passed-President Polk on "Popular Sovereignty"—President Polk Recommends a Compromise on the Question of Slavery in the Territories Acquired from Mexico-The House Adopts the Wilmot Proviso in Organizing the Territories-California Applies for Admission to the Union-Senator Stephen A. Douglas [Ill.] Reports Bill for Its Admission with Implicit Recognition of the Principle of "Popular Sovereignty' Senator Robert M. T. Hunter [Va.] Presents and Supports a Protest of the Virginia Legislature Against the Wilmot Proviso and

Abolition of Slavery or the Slave Trade in the District of ColumbiaIsaac P. Walker [Wis.] Moves in the Senate to Extend the Constitution Over the Territories: Debate on the Subject Between Daniel Webster [Mass.] and John C. Calhoun [S. C.]; Senator Walker's Motion Modified by John M. Berrien [Ga.], and Passed-Contest for Speaker of the House of Representatives: Howell Cobb [Ga.] Elected-Threats of Disunion Made by Richard K. Meade [Va.], Robert Toombs [Ga.], Alexander H. Stephens [Ga.], William F. Colcock [S. C.], Thomas L. Clingman [N. C.].

O

N August 8, 1846, a bill was introduced in the House to appropriate $2,000,000 for defraying extraordinary expenses which might be incurred in the intercourse between the United States and foreign nations (i. e., in connection with the Mexican War) to be applied by the President. To this David Wilmot, a Democrat from Pennsylvania, offered as an amendment a proviso which had been drafted by Judge H. R. Brinckerhoff [O.]: that, if any part of the appropriation were to be used to purchase Mexican territory, "neither slavery nor involuntary servitude shall ever exist in any part of said territory except for crime, whereof the party shall first be duly convicted." The amendment was adopted by a vote of 83 to 64, and the bill as amended was passed by a vote of 85 to 79. The bill, with, of course, the proviso, failed to come to a vote in the Senate owing to the closing of the session.

During the recess of Congress the legislatures of every Northern State from New Hampshire to Ohio inclusive, and also Delaware, approved the proviso, both parties voting in its favor. It was expected that at the next session it would pass both Houses.

Early in this session (December 24, 1847), therefore, Senator Lewis Cass [Mich.], in order to defeat the proviso, enunciated a new doctrine in a letter to Alfred O. P. Nicholson, a Representative from Tennessee, saying that the principle of the Wilmot Proviso "should be kept out of the national legislature, and left to the people of the Confederacy in their respective local governments." This became known as the doctrine of "popular sovereignty." It was eagerly accepted by the Southern Democrats and pro-slavery Democrats in the

North, such as Stephen A. Douglas [Ill.], and they read anti-slavery Democrats, such as Wilmot, out of the party.

A bill appropriating $3,000,000 with the proviso was introduced in both Houses. It passed in the House on February 15 (115 yeas to 106 nays) with the proviso, but the proviso was stricken out in the Senate on March 1, and in this form the bill was accepted by the House on March 3, 115 yeas to 81 nays.

In the debates in the House leading speakers in behalf of the proviso were Wilmot, Timothy Jenkins [N. Y.], and Joshua R. Giddings [O.] William H. Brockenbrough [Fla.] was the principal speaker in opposition.

THE WILMOT PROVISO

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, FEBRUARY 8-MARCH 3, 1847

MR. WILMOT.-Sir, it will be recollected by all present that, at the last session of this Congress, an amendment was moved to a bill of a similar character by me, in the form of a proviso, by which slavery should be forever excluded from any territory that might be subsequently acquired by the United States from the Republic of Mexico.

Sir, permit me to say that upon that occasion that proviso was sustained by a very decided majority of this House. Nay, sir, more; it was sustained, if I mistake not, by a majority of the Republican party on this floor. And I am prepared to show, I think, that the entire South were then willing to acquiesce in what appeared to be, and, so far as the action of this House is concerned, in what was, the legislation, will, and declaration of this Union on the subject. It passed in this House. Sir, there were no threats of disunion sounded in our ears. It passed here, and it went to the Senate, and it was the judgment of the public, and of many men well informed, that, had it not been defeated there for the want of time, it would have passed that body and become the established law of the land.

Sir, the friends of this Administration, of whom I am one, did not then charge upon me, did not throw the whole burden upon me, nor upon those who acted with me, of having, by the introduction and support of that proviso at an untimely period of the question, defeated a measure especially necessary for the establishment of peace between this country and Mexico.

Yes! no anathemas were fulminated against me then. I was not then denounced as an abolitionist. And there was then no cry that the Union was to be severed in consequence of the proviso. But I fear that the hesitation and the warning of Northern men on this question have induced the South to assume a bolder attitude. Why, sir, in God's name, should the Union be dissolved for this? What do we ask in this matter? We ask but sheer justice and right. Sir, we ask the neutrality of this Government on this question of slavery. I have stood up at home and fought, time and again, against the abolitionists of the North. I stand by every compromise of the Constitution. I adhere to its letter and its spirit. And I would never invade one single right of the South. So far from it am I that I stand ready, at all times and upon all occasions, as do nearly the entire North, to sustain the institutions of the South as they exist, with our money and with our blood, when that day comes, as many-many Southern men-fear it may come. When that day comes, sir, the North stands with them. We go for every compromise of the Constitution.

Sir, we But, we

But, sir, this is another question-entirely another question. We ask that this Government preserve the integrity of free territory against the aggressions of slavery-against its wrongful usurpations. Sir, I was in favor of the annexation of Texas. I supported it with the whole influence which I possessed, and I was willing to take Texas in as she was. I sought not to change the character of her institutions. Texas was a slave country, and, although it was held out to us, that two slave and two free States might be made out of it, yet the whole of Texas was given up to slavery, every inch. We voted for the annexation of Texas. The Democracy of the North was for it, to a man. We are for it now-firmly for it. are fighting this war for Texas, and for the South. are told, California is ours. And all we ask in the North is that the character of its territory be preserved. It is free, and it is part of the established law of nations, and all public law, that, when it shall come into this Union, all laws there existing, not inconsistent with its new allegiance, will remain in force. This fundamental law, which prohibits slavery in California, will be in force; this fundamental law, which prohibits slavery in New Mexico, will be in force. Shall the South. invade it? Shall the South make this Government an instrument for the violation of its neutrality, and for the establishment of slavery in these territories, in defiance of law? That is the question. There is no question of abolition here, sir. It

is a question whether the South shall be permitted, by aggression, by invasion of right, by subduing free territory and planting slavery upon it, to wrest this territory to the accomplishment of its own sectional purposes and schemes? That is the question. And shall we of the North submit to it? Must he yield this? It is not, sir, in the spirit of the compact; it is not, sir, in the Constitution.

MR. JENKINS denounced the war as a presidential war, and a war of conquest, and would vote for the "Wilmot Proviso" as the most effectual means, if carried, of bringing it to a speedy termination. The object of the Administration was to acquire new territory to make it slave territory, and if this prohibition of slavery were imposed by Congress, their warlike spirit would quickly subside.

MR. BROCKENBROUGH said, upon the subject of the "Wilmot Proviso," unlike many gentlemen from the South, he had no fears for the institution of slavery, or for the dissolution of the Union; not from any wilful blindness, but because, after calm reflection, it appeared to him that whenever the governments of this country, either State or Federal, had undertaken to legislate in advance of public opinion, and prescribe rules for public opinion, their enactments were but a dead letter on the statute book. Any legislation at this time, declaring that lands which may hereafter be acquired by the United States shall be occupied by one portion of the country to the exclusion of the other, would be perfectly futile and ineffectual. From the beginning of the Government down to the present day, the North and the South had been advancing with giant and equal stride toward the West, and no arbitrary line could restrain the advances of the institutions of either. The Missouri compromise line had only been acquiesced in by the South because north of that line slavery could not go, from the nature of the case, so as to be for the interest of the people.

But granting that the principles of the amendment could be enforced (in case it were adoptéd), Mr. B. presented a picture of the blighting influences it would entail upon the South, resulting finally in the extermination of the entire white race in that section; a consequence disastrous in the extreme to the North and all sections of our country.

On the other hand, if this institution were allowed to take its natural course, and to spread southward and westward, by diffusion it would lose its strength, and in the course of a century, he prophesied, its very existence itself. It was already beginning to ebb in the Southern States, he asserted, and white