to the people of the Territory of Kansas full power at any time through its Territorial legislature to exclude slavery from said Territory, or to recognize or regulate it therein.

The official report of the proceedings on this amendment (see App. to "Cong. Globe," July 2d, 1856) shows that this amendment was discussed by Senators Benjamin, Trumbull, Fessenden, Cass, Douglas, Bigler, Toucey, Hale, Seward and Bayard, and that no one of them denied or intimated that the amendment did not declare the true intent and meaning of the original act, and that those who opposed it did so upon the ground that it was irrelevant to the bill under consideration.

MR. CASS said: Now, in respect to myself, I suppose the Senate knows clearly my views. I believe the original act gave the Territorial legislature of Kansas full power to exclude or allow slavery. This being my view, I shall vote against the amendment. MR. DOUGLAS said: The reading of the amendment inclines my mind to the belief, that in its legal effect it is precisely the same with the original act, and almost in the words of that act. Hence, I should have no hesitancy in voting for it, except that it is putting on this bill a matter which does not belong to it.

MR. BIGLER said: Now, sir, I am not prepared to say what the intention of the Congress of 1854 was, because I was not a member of that Congress. I will not vote on this amendment, because I should not know that my vote was expressing the truth. I agree too, with the senator from Michigan (Mr. Cass), and the senator from Illinois (Mr. Douglas), that this is substantially the law as it now exists.

MR. TOUCEY said: Now, I object to this amendment as superfluous, nugatory, worse than that, as giving grounds for misrepresentation. It leaves the subject precisely where it is left in the KansasNebraska Bill.

MR. BAYARD said: I have an objection to the amendment proposed by the honorable senator from Illinois (Mr. Trumbull), which to me would be perfectly sufficient, independent of any other and that is, it is nothing more or less than an attempt to give a judicial exposition by the Congress of the United States to the Constitution; and I hold that they have no right to usurp judicial power.

The question being taken by yeas and nays on the amend. ment, resulted, ayes 11, nays 34, as follows:

YEAS-Messrs. Allen, Bell, of N. H., Collamer, Durkee, Fessenden, Foote, Foster, Hale, Seward, Trumbull and Wade-11.

NAYS-Messrs. Adams, Bayard, Benjamin, Biggs, Bigler, Bright, Brodhead, Brown, Cass, Clay, Crittenden, Dodge, Douglas, Evans, Fitzpatrick, Geyer, Hunter, Iverson, Johnson, Jones, of Iowa, Mallory, Mason, Pratt, Pugh, Reid, Sebastian, Slidell, Stuart, Thompson, of Kentucky, Toombs, Toucey, Weller, Wright and Yulee-34.

So the amendment was rejected.

Upon this transcript from the records we have three comments to make, which cannot fail to impress the reader.

First, That during this whole debate no senator pretended that Mr. Trumbull's amendment did not declare the true intent and meaning of the Nebraska Act, according to its legal effect and plain reading.

Second, That every senator who spoke against the amendment, assigned as the sole reason for his vote, either that it was irrelevant or an attempt by Congress to usurp judicial power.

Third, That those senators who now arraign and condemn Mr. Douglas as too unsound to be chairman of the Territorial Committee for no other reason than that he now construes the Kansas-Nebraska Act precisely as he then did, listened to this debate without one word of dissent, and by silence have acquiesced in the construction which the author of the bill distinctly affirmed in their presence. Indeed, it may be said that this construction of the act was unanimously affirmed by the Senate, on this occasion-the Republicans assenting to it by their votes in favor of the amendment, and all the others by their acquiescence in the reasons assigned by Messrs. Cass, Douglas, Bayard, Bigler and Toucey for voting against it. If, however, these senators shall attempt to escape the conclusion under cover of the reasons assigned by Mr. Bayard, that the amendment was "nothing more or less than an attempt to give a judicial exposition, by the Congress of the United

States, to the Constitution," and "that they have no right to usurp judicial power," with what consistency can these gentlemen meet in secret caucus and propose resolutions, to be offered in open Senate, as a platform for the Charleston Convention; thus "giving a judicial exposition," by the caucus and the Senate, to the Constitution, on the identical point which Mr. Bayard denounced as "a usurpation of judicial power," and in the justice of which denunciation they all appeared at the time to acquiesce? Would it not be well, at the next meeting of the senatorial caucus, to give a satisfactory answer to this inquiry?

CHAPTER XVII.

PROTECTION OF STATES FROM INVASION-THE SENATORIAL CAUCUS.

Great Speech of Mr. Douglas on the Harper's Ferry Invasion-Anxiety to hear him-His Speeches in Reply to Senators Fessenden, Jeff. Davis, and Seward―The Caucus of Senators—Their Utopian Platform.

THE first session of the 36th Congress met on the first Monday in December, 1859. The great practical measure of the session was the proposition of Mr. Douglas, embraced in the resolution which he offered on the 16th of January, 1860, instructing the Judiciary Committee to report a bill to protect each State from invasion by people of other States.

A day or two before the introduction of this resolution, a sharp passage at arms took place in the Senate between Mr. Douglas and Messrs. Clay, Jeff. Davis, and Green, which is thus described by the correspondent of the "New York Herald:"

MR. PUGH, of Ohio, a sharp, keen, and plucky debater, and the right-hand man of Mr. Douglas, brought the controversy to a focus. There was a good deal of cross-firing and sharp-shooting against the doctrines and speeches of the Little Giant, from Green, Iverson, Clay, Davis, Gwin, and other southsiders, till at length the Little Giant himself was brought to the floor.

He complained of ill-health; but he never looked better in his life -never appeared fresher in the ring, and never acquitted himself more to the admiration of his friends. He was like a stag at bay, and right and left he dashed among his pursuers. It is useless here to repeat this branch of the debate. It was the feature of the day and of the session.

Mr. Douglas announced to-day that he will abide by the decision of the convention, for the sake of the Democratic party, though he will not accept its nomination except upon the doctrine of popular sovereignty, as enunciated in the Cincinnati platform.

EXTRACTS FROM THE DEBATE.

This was Mr. Douglas's first appearance in the Senate after his severe and protracted illness, and it was thought rather ungenerous in these senators to make a combined and concerted attack upon him under the circumstances. It is conceded, however, by all who listened to the debate, that he never bore himself more gallantly or came out of a contest more successfully. The objects of the assaults upon him were to justify his removal from the Committee on Territories, upon the ground that he held opinions incompatible with the Democratic creed. We give several extracts from this important debate.

In reply to Mr. Davis of Mississippi, Mr. Douglas said:

I have never complained of my removal from the chairmanship of the Committee on Territories, and I never intended to allude to that subject in this body; but I do assert that the record proves that the Senate knew for eleven years that I held the identical opinions which I expressed in my Freeport speech, and which are now alleged as the cause of my removal; and during that period, with a full knowledge of those opinions, which were repeated over and over again in this body, within the hearing of every member of the Senate, I was, by the unanimous vote of the body, made chairman of that committee, being reëlected each year for eleven years. The cause now assigned for my removal is that I held the identical opinions to-day that I held and repeatedly expressed during that whole period. If this be the true state of the facts, what does it prove? Simply, that those who removed me changed at the end of the eleven years, and I was not sound because I did not change as suddenly as they. My only offence consists in fidelity to the principles that I had avowed during that whole period. If at the end of that time my opinions were incompatible with those of a majority,