two years." Lost-yeas 6, nays 6. Mr. Toombs' motion was then lost-yeas 3 (Bigler, Crittenden, Grimes), nays 9. Dec. 24th, 1860. Mr. SEWARD submitted these Resolutions: 1. No amendment shall be made to the Constitution which will authorize or give to Congress the power to abolish or interfere, within any State, with the domestic institutions thereof, including that of persons held to labor or service by the laws of said State. 2. The Fugitive Slave act of 1850 shall be so amended as to give to the alleged fugitive a jury trial. 3. The Legislatures of the several States shall be respectfully requested to review all of their legislation affecting the right of persons recently resident in other States, and to repeal or modify all such acts as may contravene the provisions of the Constitution of the United States, or any laws made in pursuance thereof. The first was agreed to-yeas 11, nays 2 (Rice and Toombs.) Mr. ToоMBS moved to add to the second the words, "in the State from which he fled." Agreed to-yeas 7, nays 5. The resolution as amended was disagreed to-yeas 6, nays 7. YEAS-Messrs. Collamer, Doolittle, Douglas, Grimes, Seward, Wade. NAYS-Messrs. Bigler, Crittenden, Davis, Hunter, Powell, Rice, Toombs. The third was lost, under the rule-yeas 7, nays 5. YEAS-Messrs. Bigler, Collamer, Crittenden. Doolittle. Grimes, Seward, Wade. NAYS-Messrs. Davis, Hunter, Powell Rice, Toombs. Dec. 26, 1860. Mr. SEWARD moved, That under the 4th section of the 4th article of the Constitution, Congress should pass an efficient law for the punishment of all persons engaged in the armed invasion of any State from another, by combinations of individuals, and punishing all persons in complicity therewith, on trial and conviction in the State or district where their acts of complicity were committed, in the Federal courts. Mr. TоOMBS moved to add: "And also all attempts to excite insurrection in any State by the people of any other State." Agreed to-yeas 8, nays 5 (Collamer, Doolittle, Grimes, Seward, Wade). Mr. DOUGLAS moved to add: "And for the suppression and punishment of conspiracies or combinations, in any State or Territory, with intent to invade, assail, or molest the government, inhabitants, property, or institutions of any other State or Territory of the Union." Agreed to. On the resolution as amended, the question was divided, and the proposition offered by Mr. Seward was agreed to-yeas 9, nays 3 (Rice, Toombs, Wade); that offered by Mr. Toombs was agreed to; that offered by Mr. Douglas was lost-yeas 6, nays 6 (Collamer, Davis, Doolittle, Grimes, Seward Wade). The resolution as amended by Mr. Toombs was then lost, under the rule-yeas 7, nays 5 (Collamer, Doolittle, Grimes, Seward, Wade). MR. DAVIS Submitted a proposition, that it shall be declared, by amendment of the Constitution, that property in slaves, recognized as such by the local laws of any of the States in the Union, shall stand on the same footing in all constitutional and federal Mr. TоOMBS'* propositions were then neg-relations as any other species of property atived. They were 1st. The people of the United States shall have an equal right to emigrate to, and settle in, the preseat or any future acquired territories, with whatever property they may possess (including slaves), and be securely protected in its peaceable enjoyment, until such Territory may be admitted as a State in the Union, with or without slavery, as she may determine, on an equality with all existing States. Lost under the rule-yeas 7, say 5 the Republican members). 2. That property in slaves shall be entitled to the same protection from the Government of the United States in all of its departments, everywhere, which the Constitution confers the power upon it to extend to any other property-this not to interfere with the right of every State to prohibit, abolish, or establish, and protect slavery within its limits. Lost under the rule by the same 3. Parsons committing crimes against slave property in one State and fleeing to another, shall be delivered up as other criminals. Lost by the same vote. 4. Congress to pass laws punishing persons engaged in invasion or insurrection, or other act tending to disturb the tranquillity of any other State. Lost, 6 to 4. 6. Fozitive slaves not to have benefit of writ of habeas corpus or trial by jury. Lost, 7 to 5, as before. 6. Congress to pass no law in relation to slavery in the States or Territories or elsewhere, without the cousent of a majority of the Senators and Representatives of the slaveholding States. Amended, on motion of Mr. HUNTER, 80 es to add and also a majority of the Senators and Representatives of the non-slaveholding States," and then lost-yeas 5, nays 6. 7. None of these provisions, or others in the Constitution relating to slavery (except the African slave trade), to be altered without the consent of all the States in which slavery exists. Lost, 6 to 5 (the Republican members). so recognized, and like other property shall not be subject to be divested or impaired by the local law of any other State, either in escape thereto or of transit or sojourn of the owner therein; and in no case whatever shall such property be subject to be divested or impaired by any legislative act of the United States, or any of the territories thereof. This was lost-yeas 6, nays 6. YEAS.-Messrs. Bigler, Davis, Hunter, Powell, Rice, Toombs. NAYS. Messrs. Collamer, Crittenden, Doolittle, Grimes, Seward, Wade. December 28th, 1860. Mr. CRITTENDEN submitted a proposition relative to New Mexico, which was lost-yeas 2, (Crittenden and Douglas,) nays 11. Mr. BIGLER submitted a proposition, proposing seven amendments to the Constitution. 1st. Dividing the territory now owned by the United States by a line from east to west on the parallel of 36° 30'. 2d. Dividing the territory south into four territories, the territory north into eight. 3d. Congress to provide governments when the inhabitants become sufficiently numerous, and when the bona fide inhabitants in any one shall be equal to the ratio of representation in Congress, it shall be the duty of the President, by proclamation, to announce the admission of such State into the Union. 4th. In territory south, involuntary servitude, as it now exists in the States south of Mason and Dixon's line, shall be recognized and protected by all the departments of the Territorial Governments; and in all territories north, involuntary servitude except as a punishment of crime shall be prohibited. 5th. Congress shall be denied power to abolish slavery in places now under its jurisdiction within slave States and the District of Columbia, while slavery may exist in Virginia or Maryland. 6th. Non-slaveholding States shall provide efficient laws for the delivery of fugitives from labor to the persons to whom such service or labor may be due. 7th. Neither these amendments nor the third paragraph of the second section of the first article of the Constitution, nor the third paragraph of the second section of the fourth article of the Constitution, shall be liable to further amendment. This proposition was determined in the negative without a division. Mr. DOUGLAS's propositions were then considered. They were: 1st. Congress shall make no law in regard to slavery or servitude in the territories, but the status of such territory in this respect to remain as at present; and that every territory might form a Constitution when its population should be fifty thousand, and exercise all the rights of selfgovernment; and that such State should be admitted into the Union on an equal footing with the original States, with or without slavery, as its Constitution should provide, when such State should contain a population to entitle it to a representation, according to the federal ratio of representation. 2d. No more territory to be acquired except on a vote of two-thirds of both branches of Congress, and the status thereof as to servitude to remain as at the time of its acquisition, until altered by the people in framing a Constitution as aforesaid. 3d. Area of future States to contain not less than 60,000, nor more than 80,000 square miles. 4th. Extending provisions of the fugitive slave law to the new States and Territories. 5th. Extending the judicial power of the United States to the new States and Territories. 6th. Forbidding the exercise of the elective franchise to persons of the African race, in whole or in part. 7th. Giving power to Congress to acquire territory in Africa or South America for colonization of free blacks. 8th. Prohibiting Congress from abolishing slavery in any places in any slave State without the consent of such State. 9th. Prohibiting Congress from abolish 12th. Provides that these amendments and the third paragraph of the second section of the first article, and the third paragraph of the second section of the fourth article of the Constitution, shall never be amended, and prohibits any amendment authorizing Congress ever to abolish slavery in the States. Mr. DOUGLAS's propositions were negatived. The vote on the first was, yeas 2 (Crittenden and Douglas,) nays 11. On the second, yeas 1, nays 10. On the third, yeas 2, nays 11. On the fourth, lost under the rule, yeas 8, nays 5 (the Republican members). The fifth was lost, nem con. The sixth, lost under the rule, yeas 8, nays 5 (the Republican members). The seventh was adopted, yeas 10, nays 3 (Davis, Hunter, Toombs). The eighth and ninth were lost, nem con. The tenth was amended, and negatived under the rule, yeas 8, nays 5 (the Republican members). The eleventh and twelfth were negatived, nem con Mr. RICE offered a proposition to settle the territorial question by admitting at once into the Union as a State all the territory lying north of 36° 30' to be called the State of Washington, and all the territory lying south of 36° 30' to be called the State of Jefferson; and in each case, whenever any portion of said States shall contain, within an area of not less than 60,000 square miles, 130,000 inhabitants, a new State may be formed-all acts organizing territorial governments to be repealed, and Congress to appropriate money to pay the expenses of the convention to form constitutions. Mr. SEWARD moved to amend by adding: "except so much of the Territory of Kansas as is contained in the proposed_boundary of the Wyandot Constitution." Lost-yeas 6, nays 6, Douglas voting aye with the Republican members. Mr. RICE's resolution was lost-yeas 3 (Bigler, Davis, Rice), nays 10 (Collamer, Crittenden, Doolittle, Douglas, Grimes, Hunter, Powell, Seward, Toombs, Wade). On motion of Mr. Tooмвs, the committee then agreed to report to the Senate, with their journal, the fact that they had not been able to agree upon any general plan of adjustment. Other Propositions of Adjustment. Other propositions were made, which do not appear to have been voted on in either House, or a committee of either: Mr. JOSEPH LANE, Senator from Oregon, offered a preamble and resolutions reciting the irreconcilable differences which had arisen between the North and South on the question of slavery in the Territories, and the measures that had been from time to time adopted to settle the difficulties; that the Southern States had resolved to dissolve the Union rather than submit to the principles embodied in the Chicago platform, and that the mode of amendment to the Constitution prescribed by that instrument itself was inadequate to the emergency. And he proposed to the several States to send delegates to a general convention to devise a new form of government and requesting the delegates of the Southern States to first meet in convention, being the aggrieved party, to confer and submit their conclusions to the delegates from the Northern States, and declaring it contrary and abhorrent to the religion and civilization of the age to prevent by force any State from taking such course as her safety and prosperity might require. sent of Maryland, and making compensation to the owners; and also from interfering with the three-fifths representation of slaves or the inter-State trade; and declaring that these amendments should never be amended. THE BORDER STATES PROPOSITION. At a meeting of Senators and Representatives from the fourteen border free and slave States, at which about seventy-five gentlemen were present, Mr. CRITTENDEN acting as President, and Messrs. COLFAX and BARRETT as Secretaries, the following propositions were submitted: By Mr. BARRETT of Missouri. Eleven amendments to the Constitution on the slavery question. By Mr. PRYOR of Virginia. That an attempt to preserve the Union between the States of this Confederacy by force would be equally unconstitutional, impolitic, and destructive of Republican liberty. By Mr. VALLANDIGHAM. The Crittenden Mr. ANDREW JOHNSON, Senator from Tennessee, submitted a joint resolution propos-resolutions. ing amendments to the Constitution in substance as follows: 1st. To apportion each State into as many districts as should be equal in number to the whole number of Senators and Representatives in Congress to which such State should be entitled, and that in every such district the persons receiving the highest number of votes for President and Vice President should be holden to have received one vote; that the persons receiving the vote of a majority of the districts, provided it should be a majority of the whole number of votes given, should be President and Vice President, but that if no person had received a majority of the whole number of votes as aforesaid, then a second election should be held between the two persons having the highest number of votes at the first election, and providing further for the election of a President from the free States and Vice President from a slave State, and vice versa, every four years. 2d. Providing for an election of United States Senators by the people instead of by the State Legislatures. 3d. Limiting the tenure of office of the Judges of the Supreme Court of the United States to twelve years, and providing for an election of one-third of said Judges every fourth year. By Mr. COLFAX. That the laws of the Union should be enforced and the Union of the States maintained; and that it is the duty of the Executive to protect the property of the United States with all the power placed in his hands by the Constitution. By Mr. MORRIS of. Illinois. That in the maturing any plan for adjusting the existing difficulties of the country we will keep steadily in view the preservation of the Union under the Constitution as a paramount consideration. All of the above propositions after some discussion were referred to a committee consisting of Messrs. CRITTENDEN of Kentucky, HARRIS of Maryland, SHERMAN of Ohio, NIXON of New Jersey, SAULSBURY of Delaware, GILMER of North Carolina, HATTON of Tennessee, PETTIT of Indiana, HARRIS of Virginia, MCCLERNAND of Illinois, Barrett of Missouri, SEBASTIAN of Arkansas, VANDEVER of Iowa, and HALE of Pennsylvania. The committee after consultation adopted the following propositions: Recommending a repeal of all personal liberty bills. An efficient amending of the fugitive slave law, preventing kidnapping, equalizing commissioners' fees, etc. Amending the Constitution so as to proMr. JOHNSON also offered a resolution in-hibit interference by Congress with slavery structing the Committee of Thirteen to in- in the States, or abolishing it in any places quire into the expediency of amending the within its jurisdiction without the consent Constitution, so as to establish a division of the State in which such places are located. line in the Territories; to repeal the legisla- Or with the inter-State slave trade. tion of Congress relative to the return of Perpetual prohibition of the African slave fugitive slaves, and require each State to re-trade. turn them or pay their cash value to the owner; allowing the question of slavery in dock-yards, arsenals, etc., to be regulated by the States in which such places were located; restricting Congress from abolishing slavery in the District of Columbia without the con Division of territory into free and slave on the line of 36° 30', prohibiting Congress or the Territorial Legislature from abolishing or interfering with slavery south of that line, and providing for admission of new States with population sufficient for one member of Congress and 60,000 square miles of area. OTHER PROPOSITIONS. Proposition to the Hon. JAMES HUMPHREY, member of the Committee of Thirty-three from the State of New York, signed by JOHN COCHRANE, WILLIAM B. MACLAY, DANIEL E. SICKLES, GEORGE BRIGGS, THOMAS J. BARR, and HORACE F. CLARK, members of Congress from said State: 1st. Recommending the territorial line of 36° 30'. 2d. Non-interference of Congress with slavery in any places within the jurisdiction of Congress without the consent of the States in which such places are located. 3d. Change in the mode of electing President, by the adoption of the single electoral district system for the election of Presidential electors, with two electors at large for each State; with provision for a second election between the two highest candidates in case no one had received a majority on the first vote. 4th. Limiting the eligibility to the Presidency to one term, and recommending a change in the fugitive slave law so as to provide for the delivery of the fugitive, not to his master, but to the marshal of the district in which the claimant resided, there to be tried as to the right of ownership; and in case of unlawful rescue, etc., his value to be paid by the State or county in which such rescue occurred. To prohibit Congress from interfering with slavery in the States, in places under Federal jurisdiction within the limits of a slave State, or in the District of Columbia, or with the inter-State slave trade, or to reopen the slave trade; from acquiring any additional territory except by a concurrent vote of two-thirds of both Houses of Congress, or by treaty ratified by two-thirds of the Senate, and to adopt the single electoral district system, with two electors at large for each State. Also, to so amend the fugitive slave law as to give the same compensation to the Commissioner whether the slave was given up or not, and making the State liable for all extraordinary expenses attending the capture of fugitive slaves, and for compensation to the owner in case of violent rescue, etc. To admit all the territory north of 360 30' at once into the Union as a State to be called "Washington," and all south of that line as a State to be called "Jefferson," with provision for the sub-division of said States into two or more States. Governor LETCHER, of Virginia, in his message to the Legislature, proposed in substance the following plan: To appoint Commissioners to visit each Northern State that had passed personal liberty bills and urge their repeal, guarantee slavery in the District of Columbia, equal rights in the Territories, free transit for slave property, and the inter-State slave trade, punishment of persons aiding in any way in inciting slave A "distinguished gentleman of Kentucky" insurrections, and deprive the General Govproposed to so amend the Constitution as to ernment of the power to appoint to office in restrain Congress from passing any law to slave States persons hostile to the instituinterfere with slavery in territory south tion of slavery. He also declared strongly of 360 30', or to interfere with the inter- against the right of coercion, and that the State slave trade, or to abolish slavery in passage of Federal troops across Virginia places belonging to the General Government for such purpose would be repelled, and exwithin the limits of a slave State, or to per-pressed his willingness that New England mit the reopening of the slave trade, or to and Western New York should be sloughed interfere with slavery in the States by un-off and permitted to ally themselves with equal taxation or otherwise, but authorizing Canada. Congress to regulate the transit of slaves through free States, and to authorize the recapture of slaves escaping in such transit, and to give compensation to the owner of the slave in case of violent rescue, etc., making it compulsory to admit new States with slave constitutions, and to prevent and punish unlawful invasions of any State with a design to excite slave insurrections. Mr. A. H. H. STUART offered a series of resolutions in the Senate of Virginia to the effect that the slaveholding States should be created trustees of the territory south of 36° 30', and the free States trustees of the territory north of that line, with the right to regulate the question of slavery in either case respectively. The National Intelligencer of January 12th, 1861, proposed a plan of compromise by amendments to the Constitution and Congressional legislation substantially as fol lows: The Albany Evening Journal proposed the following as a basis of settlement: 1. The passage of an efficient but not revolting fugitive slave law. 2. The repeal of personal liberty laws. 3. Non-intervention by Congress with slavery in the Territories. 4. The admission of Territories as States with or without slavery, as they may decide, whenever they have a population entitling them to a Representative in Congress. 5. Or if the two last propositions are inadmissible, then the restoration of the Missouri compromise line. Hon. JOSEPH W. TAYLOR of Alabama proposed the following: 1st. That every Southern State should meet in Convention and adopt a platform expressive of their views and wishes in the present crisis, and then that they should all meet in a Southern Convention and adopt a platform setting forth all that they had to demand, with a request that the people of the Northern States should meet in a similar Convention to consider said demands. The New York Sun published as its plan of settlement: 1st. The prompt excision by amendment of the Constitution, of any State which shall within the next ten years, elect by vote of two-thirds of her inhabitants to secede from the Union. 2d. The adoption of State and Federal laws for the indemnification of owners of slaves who should be rescued by force or otherwise unlawfully. In an article in the Baltimore Exchange of January 7th, 1861, it was proposed as a settlement of the territorial question, to admit New Mexico and Arizona as a State, and then amend the Constitution so as to absolutely prohibit the acquisition in the future of any additional territory whatever, the author strongly alleging that Republican Governments had more to fear from the expansion of territory than from any other cause whatever. BY A DISTINGUISHED CITIZEN OF NORTH CARO- Resolved. That we deprecate the spirit of disobedience to the Constitution, wherever manifested, and we earnestly recommend the repeal of all statutes, including personal liberty bills, so called, enacted by State Legislatures, which are in conflict with and in violation of that sacred instrument, and of the laws of Congress made in pursuance thereof." Which was agreed to-yeas 154, nays 14, as follows: Halo, Hall, Hardeman, Harris of Md., Harris of Va., Landrum, Larrabee, Leach of N. Carolina, Leake, Lee, Lo YEAS-Messrs. Adams of Ky., Adrain, Aldrich, Allen, Anderson of Missouri, Anderson of Ky., Ashley, Avery, Babbitt, Barr, Barrett, Beale, Bingham, Blair, Blake, Bocock, Boteler, Bouligny, Branch, Brayton, Briggs, Brown, Campbell, Carter, Case, Horace F. Clark, Clark of Missouri, Buflinton, Burlingame, Burnett, Burnham, Butterfield, Cobb, John Cochrane, Colfax, Conkling, Covode, Cox, Craig Indiana, Dawes, De Jarnette, Delano, Duell, Dunn, Edmundof Missouri, Craige of North Carolina, Crawford, Davis of son, Ely, English, Etheridge, Farnsworth, Fenton, Florence, Fouke, Frank, Garnett, Gilmer, Gooch, Graham, Grow, Hatton, Helmick, Hill, Hindman, Holman, Houston, How ard of Ohio, Hughes, Humphrey, Irvine, Jenkins, Jones, Junkin, Kellogg of Michigan, Kenyon, Kilgore, Killinger, gan, Longnecker, Loomis, Lovejoy, Maclay, Mallory, Martin of Ohio, Martin of Va., Maynard, McClernand, McKean, Me Kenty, McKnight, McPherson, Millward, Montgomery, Moore of Ky., Moorhead, Morris of Penn'a, Morris of Ill Niblack, Nixon, Noell, Olin, Palmer, Pendleton, Pettit, Peyton, Porter, Pottle, Pryor, Quarles, Reagan, J. H. Reynolds, Rice, Riggs, Robinson, Royce, Ruffin, Scott, Scranton, Sherman, Sickles, Simms, Smith of N. C., Spaulding, Stanton, Stevenson, Stewart of Pa., Stokes, Thayer, Thomas, Walton, Washburne of Ill., Webster, Wilson, Wood, Wood Tompkins, Train, Trimble, Vance, Verree, Wade, Waldron, son, Wright-154. An amendment of the Constitution in regard to the election of a President and Vice President, providing for a vote of the people throughout each State directly for President and Vice President; then ascertain the number to which the popular vote ought to be increased by reason of the slave population, and let that be divided pro rata between the several sets of electors according to their respective strength, then let the majority of each set of electors cast the popular vote for President and Vice Presi-ing: dent of their choice. A writer in the National Intelligencer proposed the following: That Congress, by joint resolution, should declare that the personal liberty bills are unconstitutional, and the States should repeal them; that Congress should not interfere with slavery in the States; that no more territory should be acquired except by consent of three-fourths of the States, and that the Dred Scott decision should govern all our present territory. In a letter published in the New York Herald, purporting to have been written at Lexington, Kentucky, it was asserted that JOHN C. BRECKINRIDGE was in favor of the Crittenden Compromise, and that the Crittenden amendment had actually been drawn up by Mr. Breckinridge and a Mr. M. C. Johnson of Lexington. prior to Mr. Breckinridge's departure for Washington. Miscellaneous Resolutions. ON UNCONSTITUTIONAL STATE LAWS. December 17, 1860. Mr. ADRAIN, of New Jersey, offered the following: "Whereas the Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the land, and Potter, E. R. Reynolds, Sedgwick, Spinner, Tappan, Vande NAYS-Messrs. Alley, Carey, Edwards, Eliot, Hutchins, ver, Washburn of Wisconsin, Washburn of Maine, Wells-14. The preamble was agreed to-yeas 156, nays none. ON THE UNION. Mr. MORRIS, of Illinois, offered the follow "Resolved, &c., That we properly estimate the immense value of our National Union to our collective and individual happiness; that we cherish a cordial, habitual, and immovable attachment to it; that we will speak of it as of the palladium of our political safety and prosperity; that we will watch its preservation with jealous anxiety; that we will discountenance whatever may suggest even a suspicion that it can in any event be abandoned, and indignantly frown down the first dawning of every attempt to alienate any portion of our country from the rest, or enfeeble the sacred ties which now link together the various parts; that we regard it as a main pillar of the edifice of our real independence, the support of our tranquillity at home, our peace abroad, our safety, our prosperity, and that very liberty which we so highly prize; that we have seen nothing in the past, nor do we see any thing in the present, either in the election of Mr. Lincoln to the Presidency of the United States, or from any other existing cause, to justify its dissolution; that we regard its perpetuity as of more value than the temporary triumph of any party or any man; that whatever evils or abuses exist under it ought to be |