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The administration of Mr. Buchanan, more completely dominated by the Slave Power than any of its predecessors, made special efforts to secure that long-coveted prize. In his annual message in December, 1858, the President complained of the unsatisfactory condition of the relations of the country with Spain. Referring to the participation of Cuba in the African slave-trade, he affirmed his belief that the last relic. of that traffic would disappear if Cuba were annexed. reminded Congress that Cuba commanded the mouth of the Mississippi; that its "value was comparatively unimportant" to Spain, but that its possession was of vast importance to the United States.

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In the Senate, on the 10th of January, Mr. Slidell introduced a bill placing thirty million dollars in the hands of the President to facilitate the acquisition. He also presented a report from the Committee on Foreign Affairs in favor of its passage. Mr. Seward presented a minority report, calling upon the President for information, to be transmitted at the next session, to enable Congress to judge whether extraordinary measures were necessary to maintain the country's rights and interests in regard to Spain. An able discussion ensued, but no action was taken. On the 25th of February Mr. Slidell announced the purpose of the majority to force the bill to a vote; but he was met with so resolute a resistance that the sitting was protracted until one o'clock at night. Despairing of his ability to force the bill through in the brief remnant of the session, he abandoned his purpose. Early the next session he introduced another bill for the same purpose. A favorable report was secured from the Committee on Foreign Affairs. But the matter was not forced to an issue, and Congress adjourned without action.

But the Democratic party did not relinquish its cherished ob ject. "Cuba must and shall be ours," said Senator Brown in a speech in New York, soon after the adjournment of Congress. "The decree has gone forth, and nowhere on earth is there power to remove it. If Spain is disposed to sell the island, I, for one, stand prepared to pay for it. If Spain be indisposed to sell, I would seize Cuba as indemnity for the past, and then

negotiate for future security. It may be asked, What do we want of Cuba? We want it for territorial expansion. We want it to extend our commerce. Then I have a little private reason of my own. I want Cuba for the extension of slavery. I have freely spoken the sentiments of my own heart, and of a vast majority of the Democracy throughout the Union. The Democratic party are going into the next Presidential canvass upon this and other questions, and we intend to meet Seward face to face upon it."

There is, too, evidence strongly circumstantial, if not absolutely conclusive, that the administration was more deeply in earnest for this object than was avowed. William Walker wrote to the Southern press that, when in the autumn of 1858 he was preparing one of his expeditions for Nicaragua, he was assured by General Henningsen, on the authority of the Secretary of War, that, though the President would probably prevent his going to Central America, he would look favorably upon an attempt on Mexico; and that if Spain and Mexico could be involved in war, and Cuba could be seized, they might look with confidence to this government for pecuniary aid. On his trial, Walker summoned General Henningsen as a witness and sought to elicit these facts in the evidence in his case. But the district attorney objected and the presiding judge would not allow the questions to be put. This sheltering action of the court was deemed by many equivalent to an acknowledg ment that the charge was true.

There were, too, other possessions to be desired than Cuba, and the propagandists had turned their eyes to Mexico and Central America, as presenting new fields for conquest. But, as the nation was at peace with these governments, and there was no room for diplomacy, resort must be had to filibustering. Accordingly, Walker, who had already signalized himself by unsuccessful marauding expeditions in southern California, sailed for Nicaragua with a company of freebooters on the 4th of May, 1855. Arriving in that land of chronic revolutions and anarchy, he raised the standard of revolt and rapine. Numbers responded, and after a brief career of varied and unequal successes he found himself in the possession of the city

of Granada, with the assumed title of president. Though there was little in the office, with its imposing title, save the name, and his authority was of the most unsubstantial and ephemeral character, he revealed his own purposes, and those of the men he led and represented, by a decree re-establishing slavery, confiscating estates, offering them for sale, and thus inviting emigration from the Southern States. But his checkered career was short, and, though he headed no less than three distinct expeditions from this country, he was finally arrested, convicted, and shot; but not until some three thousand persons had perished in these various and marauding exploits. Though despicable in character, criminal in purpose, and unsuccessful in results, he lived long enough to reveal, in unmistakable ways, the spirit, sympathies, and designs of Southern leaders and of the Democratic party. The latter, even as late as the convention that nominated Buchanan, while Walker was thus engaged, and with unquestionable reference to him. and his work, expressed its sympathy with "the people of Central America," in their effort to "regenerate that portion of the continent." Soulé, too, one of the signers of the Ostend manifesto, visited him just at the time of issuing his decree for the re-establishment of slavery. Direct affirmation could hardly make more conclusive the evidence that slavery afforded the main, if not the sole motive, and furnished largely the means that sustained these lawless and aggressive movements.

CHAPTER XLVIII.

THE SLAVE-TRADE.

Increased demand for slave labor. -Slave-traffic stimulated. -Revolting features.
Commercial conventions.
Demands for opening the foreign slave-trade.
De Bow's Review. - Utterances of Southern men. - Speech of Stephens.
President's
British cruisers. -American complaints. — Call for information.
Extent of participation in the traffic.

response. Action of the Republicans.

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New York the great mart. - Statistics. — Mr. Wilson's bill and speech. Testimonies. - Slaves at Key West. Benjamin's bill. - Heartless utterances of Mason, Davis, and Toombs. - Wilson's amendment opposed by Mason and Green. - His reply. No action taken. — Policy of the Republican party.

WHILE the Slave Power had been putting forth its gigantic and too successful efforts for expansion, unlimited control, and perpetuity, the prices of slaves had largely appreciated, and the domestic slave-traffic had increased. Indeed, it was estimated that near the close of Mr. Buchanan's administration it had grown to the purchase and sale of thirty thousand slaves a year, at a market value of some thirty million dollars. This trade, with its sad aggregate of suffering and sorrow on the one part, of demoralization and guilt on the other, was carried on unblushingly. The barracoon and auction-block were objects familiar to the public gaze, and domiciled as among the recognized, if not cherished, fixtures of Southern society. Though there was a pretended disfavor shown the slave-trader, yet his business was a necessity of the system in which all were implicated, his rooms and jails were marts of an established trade in which all participated, and he was a factor of a commerce which they all defended. Nor was it easy to see how even the regular slave-trader could become more cruel, more demoralized, and more degraded than they who bought of and sold to him, breaking up thereby families, parting husbands and wives, parents and children, and selling often those, and accepting

higher prices therefor, whose increased attractions and market value arose from the fact that their own or kindred blood was coursing through their veins. This growing demand for slave labor in the more Southern States increased the domestic traffic, diminished the number of emancipations, intensified the desire for cheaper labor, and turned the minds of many to the reopening of the African slave-trade.

In 1857 Governor Adams of South Carolina advocated it. declaring the laws which made that traffic piracy "a fraud upon us." In the Southern commercial convention, held in Montgomery in 1858, there were two reports made, one by Spratt of South Carolina, proposing a revival of the slavetrade, and another by Yancey of Alabama, proposing a repeal of the laws making it piracy. Both reports were referred to an adjourned meeting, to be held at Vicksburg the next year. At that meeting votes were adopted for the reopening of the trade, and demanding the unconditional repeal of the law that made it piracy. De Bow's Review, a work of large influence, contained labored articles advocating the same policy, especially for the Gulf and Southwestern States. During that year, too, published letters from the South revealed this growing purpose to supply in this manner the increasing demand for slave labor. It was reported that cargoes of slaves had been landed on the Florida coast; that several vessels were engaged in the traffic; and "that, if the slave-trade is not reopened, the indications are that it soon will be." An ex-member of Congress, after a tour through the Gulf States, stated to Mr. Giddings that the people were determined, and that they would defy the federal government in any attempt to enforce the law against the traffic. Mr. Dowdell of Alabama spoke of the question as one belonging to the States whose industrial policy was to be affected by it; of the trade as "not necessarily immoral," which those laws defined to be piracy, and for which they made the penalty death, which laws he deemed "highly offensive." Miles and Keitt of South Carolina, Seward and Crawford of Georgia, and Barksdale of Mississippi, concurred substantially in these views. During that summer De Bow and Yancey gave special attention to the subject, explaining

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