Slave States, had not those States | resisted and protested, but only to been precipitated into their great be overborne by inexorable logic, and Rebellion. Individuals would have even more inexorable majorities.

VII.

THE MISSOURI STRUGGLE.

WHEN the State of Louisiana, previously known as the Territory of Orleans, was admitted into the Union,' the remainder of the Louisiana purchase, which had formerly borne the designation of Louisiana Territory, was renamed the Territory of Missouri. The people of a portion of this Territory, stretching westward from the Mississippi on both sides of the river Missouri, petitioned Congress for admission into the Union as the State of Missouri; and their memorials were referred by the House to a Select Committee, whereof Mr. Scott, their delegate, was chairman. This Committee reported a bill in accordance with their prayer, which was read twice and committed; but no further action was taken thereon during that session.

"And provided, That the introduction of Slavery, or involuntary servitude, be prohibited, except for the punishment of crimes, whereof the party has been duly convicted; and that all children born within the said State, after the admission thereof into the

Union, shall be declared free at the age of twenty-five years."

On the rising of the Committee, the Yeas and Nays were demanded in the House on the question of agreeing to this amendment; when a division was called, and so much of it as precedes and includes the word "convicted" was adopted by 87 Yeas-all from the substantially Free States' except one of the two members from Delaware-to 76 Nays, whereof ten were from Free States-Massachusetts (then including Maine) supplying three of them, New York three, with one each from New Jersey, New Hampshire, Ohio, and Illinois. The residue of the amendment was likewise sustained, by the close vote of 82 Yeas to 78 Nays. The bill thus amended was ordered to a third reading by 98 Yeas to 56 Nays, and the next day was passed and sent to the Senate, where the restriction aforesaid was stricken out by a vote of 22 to 16, and the bill thus amended passed without a division, on the last day but one of the session. Being now returned to the House, General Tall

5 New York and New Jersey still held a few slaves, but the former had decreed their manumission.

THE MISSOURI STRUGGLE.

75

States, beside Mr. Scott, who was chairman, with but one from a Free State. In the Senate, the legislative memorial aforesaid was referred to the Judiciary Committee, consisting of three members from Slave States with but two from Free States.

madge moved its indefinite post- | Committee three members from Slave ponement, which was defeated Yeas 69, Nays 74. But the question next presented, of concurrence in the Senate's amendment aforesaid, was decided in the negative-Yeas 76, Nays 78; and the bill returned to the Senate accordingly. The Senate insisted on its amendment without a division; and, on the return of the bill to the House, Mr. John W. Taylor, of New York, moved that the House adhere to its disagreement; which prevailed-Yeas 78, Nays 66. And so the bill failed for that session.

A bill, organizing so much of the Territory of Missouri as was not included within the borders of the proposed State of that name, to be known as the Territory of Arkansas, was considered at this session, and Mr. Taylor, of New York, moved the application thereto of the restriction aforesaid. So much of it as required that all slaves born within the Territory after the passage of this act should be free at twenty-five years of age, was carried,' by 75 Yeas to 72 Nays, and the residue defeated by 70 Yeas to 71 Nays. Next day, however, the adopted clause was reconsidered and stricken out, and the bill ultimately passed without any reference to Slavery. Arkansas became in consequence a Slave Territory, and ultimately a Slave State.

A new Congress convened December 6, 1819; and Mr. Scott moved a reference to a Select Committee of the memorials from Missouri, including that of her Territorial Legislature, asking admission into the Union. This motion prevailed, and Mr. Speaker Clay appointed as such

* Some years afterward, Speaker of the House.

Upon the conflict which ensued, the Slave Power entered with very great incidental advantages. The President, Mr. Monroe, though he took no conspicuous part in the strife, was well known to favor that side, as did a majority of his Cabinet, so that the patronage of the Government and the hopes of aspirants to its favor were powerful makeweights against the policy of Restriction. The two ex-Presidents of the dominant party, Messrs. Jefferson and Madison, still survived, and gave their powerful influence openly in accordance with their Southern sympathies rather than their Anti-Slavery convictions. Mr. Clay, the popular and potent Speaker of the House, though likewise Anti-Slavery in principle, was a zealous and most efficient adversary of Restriction. The natural fears of a destruction, or at least a temporary prostration, of the Republican ascendency, through the reformation of parties on what were called geographical lines, also tended strongly to defeat the proposed inhibition of Slavery. The North, it had by this time come to be understood, if beaten in such a struggle, would quietly submit; while the South, it was very clearly intimated and generally believed, would shiver all party bands, and perhaps even the Union itself, rather than submit to a defeat on this issue.

potent voice can say to it, Thus far shalt thou go and no farther. Slavery engenders pride and indolence in him who commands, and inflicts intellectual and moral degradation on him who serves. Slavery, in fine, is unchristian and abominable. Sir, I shall not stop to deny that Slavery is all this and more; but I shall not think myself the less authorized to deny that it is for you to stay the course of this dark torrent, by opposing to it a mound raised up by the labors of this portentous discretion on the domain of oththrough the instrumentality of a trespass of ers; a mound which you cannot erect but no ordinary kind-not the comparatively in

Moreover, the shape and manner in which the question was presented were exceedingly favorable to the Southern side. Its advocates, in accordance with their general policy of defending and promoting Slavery in the abused name of Liberty, fought their battle under the flag of State Sovereignty, State Equality, etc. The Right of the People to form and modify their institutions in accordance with their own judgment, in-nocent trespass that beats down a few blades terest, feelings, or convictions, was the burden of their strain. Said Mr. William Pinkney,' of Maryland, their most pretentious and ornate, if not their ablest champion:

"Slavery, we are told in many a pamphlet, memorial, and speech, with which the press has lately groaned, is a foul blot on our otherwise immaculate reputation. Let this be conceded yet you are no nearer than be

fore to the conclusion that you possess power which may deal with other objects as effectually as with this. Slavery, we are further told, with some pomp of metaphor, is a canker at the root of all that is excellent in this republican empire, a pestilent disease, that is snatching the youthful bloom from its cheek, prostrating its honor and withering its strength. Be it so-yet, if you have power to medicine to it in the way proposed, and in virtue of the diploma which you claim, you also have the power, in the distribution of your political alexipharmics, to present the deadliest drugs to every Territory that would become a State, and bid it drink or remain a colony forever. Slavery, we are also told, is now rolling onward with a rapid tide toward the boundless regions of the West,' threatening to doom them to sterility and sorrow, unless some

1820.

Speech in the U. S. Senate, February 15,

10 In the debate of Monday, Feb. 15, 1819, Mr. P. P. Barbour, of Va., said:

"The effect of the proposed amendment is to prohibit the further introduction of slaves into the new State of Missouri, and to emancipate, at the age of twenty-five years, the children of all those slaves who are now within its limits. The first objection, said he, which meets us at the very threshold of the discussion, is this: that we have no constitutional right to enact the proposed provision. Our power, in relation to this subject, is derived from the first clause of the third section of the fourth article of the Consti

of grass, which the first kind sun or the next refreshing shower may cause to spring again

but that which levels with the ground the mortality for the destruction which it inlordliest trees of the forest, and claims imflicts."

Throughout the discussion, the argument that Missouri, by the adoption of this amendment, would be subject to unprecedented, invidious, and degrading exactions-that she would be brought into the Union not as the equal, but as the subject of her elder sisters-that the power thus exercised involved the assertion of unlimited and utterly irresponsi ble authority to shape and mold the institutions of

every new State-was pressed with eminent subtlety, pertinacity, and vigor. The right to prohibit Slavery in any or all of the Territories, denied by none, was expressly admitted by Mr. Philip P. Barbour, of Virginia. But this admission, however generally made,

10

tution, which is in these words: 'New States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union.' Now, Sir, although by the next succeeding clause of the same section, Congress has the power to make all needful rules and regulations respecting the Territory of the United States;' and although, therefore, whilst the proposed State continued a part of our Territory, upon the footing of a Territorial government, it would have been competent for us, under the power expressly given to make needful rules and regulations to have established the principle now proposed; yet the question assumes a totally different aspect when that principle is intended to apply to a STATE."-Benton's Abridgment. N. Y 1858., vol. vi., p. 341.

JOHN W. TAYLOR FOR RESTRICTION

11 February 15, 1819.