634 PROCEEDINGS OF THE CONFERENCE. Maine; George S. Boutwell, of Massachusetts; David Dudley Field, Erastus Corning and William E. Dodge, of New York; Frederick T. Frelinghuysen, of New Jersey; David Wilmot, of Pennsylvania; Reverdy Johnson, of Maryland; John Tyler and George W. Summers, of Virginia; Thomas Ruffin, of North Carolina; James Guthrie, of Kentucky; Salmon P. Chase and Thomas Ewing, of Ohio; Caleb B. Smith, of Indiana; Stephen T. Logan and John M. Palmer, of Illinois; James Harlan, of Iowa, and other distinguished civilians. The resolutions, under which most of these held their appointments, are highly instructive as showing the attitude of the State legislatures toward the issues of the time.1 Tennessee proposed a constitutional amendment, almost identical with that submitted by Douglas to the committee of thirteen, but with no reference to free persons of color. The slaveholding States having agreed among themselves on a basis of adjustment, should invite the other States to meet in a Constitutional Convention, at Richmond, some time in February, 1861. The Ohio legislature, which had recently elected Chase to the Senate, was "fully satisfied with the Constitution as it is, if fairly interpreted and obeyed by all sections of the country." Kentucky proposed the Crittenden resolutions. Indiana instructed its commissioners to take no action until nineteen States were represented, and, like Ohio, affirmed that the Constitution "contains ample provisions within itself for the correction of the evils complained of." Delaware declared that preservation of the Union to be paramount to any political consideration. Its appointment of commissioners, Illinois wished to be understood not as an expression on the part of the State that any amendment of the Federal Constitu1 For the resolutions, see Id., pp. 454-464. PROCEEDINGS OF THE CONFERENCE. 635 tion was requisite "to secure to the people of the slaveholding States adequate guarantees for the security of their rights," nor as an approval of the basis proposed by Virginia. The resolutions of New Jersey were a departure in the history of that State, and the announcement of a doctrine of which much was to be said and heard during the next twenty-five years. "The Government of the United States is a National government, and the Union it was designed to perfect is not a mere compact or league." It recommended the Crittenden resolutions, and if these were not adopted, that Congress call a Constitutional Convention. The States should repeal all acts interfering with the fugitive slave laws. New York sent commissioners to the conference as a possible means "of an honorable settlement of our national difficulties," but wished not to be understood as approving of the propositions submitted by Virginia. The Pennsylvania legislature denied that there was reasonable cause for extraordinary excitement. It believed no constitutional amendment necessary, but the State would support one making the fugitive slave clause more effective. Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Missouri made no comments, but sent delegates in the hope of peace. The conference was in session nineteen days and ExPresident Tyler presided. It was the plan of Virginia that the Conference should work out a constitutional amendment and send it to Congress, which body should submit it to the States for ratification. The Conference voted by States. Guthrie, of Kentucky, was made chairman of the General Committee on Propositions, and on the fifteenth it reported an amendment, the basis of which was the Missouri Compromise line. New ter ritory could be acquired only with consent of four-fifths of all members of the Senate, which would amount practically to a prohibitory clause. Virginia had proposed the Crittenden resolutions1, which put no obstacles in the way of acquiring territory. It seemed that its wishes would be those of the Conference, for on the last day the Missouri Compromise line, as described in the Crittenden resolutions, was adopted by the votes of nine States to eight, Virginia voting in the negative. Virginia insisted on the admission of States south of the line, with slavery, and north of it, with or without slavery as the population might decide in its constitution. Free persons of color were to be excluded from all political rights throughout the Union. The vote on the line of 36° 30', on the twenty-seventh, was directly contrary to the vote on the same issue the day before, when the line was rejected by eleven States to eight.2 Just why the Conference changed its mind so suddenly has never been explained. Perhaps the best explanation is suggested by the debates themselves, and the numerous resolutions, giving voice to irreconcilable opinion. But the Conference passed a thirteenth amendment which Tyler sent to the Senate on the twenty-seventh of February. It was referred to a committee of five,3 of which Crittenden was chairman, and he espoused it with what energy and hope he could, after his own resolutions had been rejected by the Conference. But to so generous a mind as Crittenden, no price, with honor, was too great for Union, and he labored to have the Conference resolutions substituted for his own. At times till the second of March he spoke, but the Senate, on that day, by a vote of twenty 1 Peace Convention Debates, 418-420. 2 Debates, 438. 3 Senate Journal, 333; Globe, 1254. THE HOUSE RESOLUTION. 637 eight to seven, rejected the amendment.1 The vote clearly measured the estimate which the Senate put on the work of the Conference. There was yet another hope of compromise, for on the day when the Senate committee of five was appointed to report on the Conference resolutions, John W. Forney presented a message to the Senate from the House, that it desired the concurrence of the Senate in a joint resolution, which it had passed, to amend the Constitution.2 This amendment may be said to have engaged the attention of the House almost from the opening of the session. We have seen what efforts were put forth in some of the slave States to break up the Union; what ideas prevailed in some of the free States as to the means of saving it; what compromise was suggested by Virginia, leading to the interesting but useless peace conference, and what antagonisms made the efforts of the Committee of Thirteen futile. Amidst all this gloom there have rung out the clear voices of Wade and Trumbull, and Seward, and their colleagues and followers, but not yet were they clothed with power to act. While the strength of the Union has been sapped by secession and very distinguished public men have one after another risen in Congress to announce the termination of their allegiance to the old flag, and their devotion, henceforth, to a Confederacy of slaveholding States, the House of Representatives, under control of men of that party which had elected Lincoln, have been attempting the solution of the great problem, whether the Union should longer endure. Looking back to the period in which all these things were done, we miss the quality of mercy which a later generation has been prone to read into the ac1 Journal, 386. 2 Journal, 339. 638 A SLAVEHOLDING REPUBLIC FOREVER. tion of that day. Thus far no sign of pity for the slave, nor of justice to the free black has appeared. States, Congresses, conventions, Presidents and Courts of Law, the powers of the Republic, have dealt with the millions of the African race in bondage, and the half million in precarious freedom, as commodities in the market, as property increasing in value or declining, with the acts of legislatures and the decrees of courts. Thus far every plan for saving the Union has had for its chief purpose the more complete subjugation, the more hopeless bondage and inferiority of the unfortunate race. Even the aggressive friends of Union have demanded little more than the statu quo. Wade would not hint at making slavery in a State insecure, nor at this time at the price of peace would Seward refuse to have it established there, beyond the reach of Congress forever. It was the new States that should be free; it was the Territories from which the institution should be excluded. No one has hinted at the abolition of slavery as the price of Union. Thus far, every plan has proposed the permanency of slavery. The Republic should be made a slaveholding Republic forever. It is with great interest, therefore, that we turn to the Republican House, to learn what amendment it will propose as the saving compromise of 1861. As soon as the President's message was read, on the fourth of December, several motions were made to refer it to a special committee. McClernand of Illinois moved for a committee with duties like those which the Senate had given to the Committee of Thirteen, but by a vote of one hundred and forty-five to thirty-eight the House 1 See his resolution to this effect proposed to the Committee of Thirteen (Report Com., No. 288. Senate, 36th Congress, 2d Session, p. 11). |