'Under our practice, the preliminary act of framing a State Constitu'tion is uniformly performed through the instrumentality of a convention

obedience to the Constitution, the Kansas-Nebraska Act declared, in the precise language of the compromise measures of 1850, that, when admitted as a State, 'the said territory, or any portion of the same, shall be received into the Union, ' with or without slavery, as their Constitutions may prescribe at the time of their 'admission.' Again, after declaring the said section 8 of the Missouri Act [sometimes called the Missouri compromise, or Missouri restriction] inoperative and void, as being repugnant to these principles, the purpose of Congress in passing the Act is declared in these words: -

It being the true intent and meaning of this Act not to legislate slavery into 'State or Territory, nor to exclude it therefrom, but to leave the people thereof perfectly free to form and regulate their domestic institutions in their own way, 'subject only to the Constitution of the United States.'

The passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act was strenuously resisted by all persons who thought it a less evil to deprive the people of new States and Territories of the right of State equality and self-government under the Constitution, than to allow them to decide the slavery question for themselves, as every State in the Union had done, and must retain the undeniable right to do, so long as the Constitution of the United States shall be maintained as the supreme law of the land. Finding opposition to the principles of the Act unavailing in the halls of Congress and under the forms of the Constitution, combinations were immediately entered into in some portions of the Union to control the political destinies, and form and regulate the domestic institutions of those Territories and future States, through the machinery of emigrant aid societies. In order to give consistency and efficiency to the movement, and surround it with the colour of legal authority, an Act of incorporation was procured from the Legislature of the State of Massachusetts, in which it was provided in section 1, that twenty persons therein named, and their associates, successors, and assigns, are hereby made a cor'poration, by the name of the Massachusetts Emigrant Aid Company, for the purpose of assisting emigrants to settle in the West; and for this purpose they 'shall have all the powers and privileges, and be subject to all the duties, re'strictions, and liabilities set forth in the 38th and 44th chapters of the revised 'statutes' of Massachusetts.

The Committee here enter into a detail regarding the Massachusetts Emigrant Aid Society, and remark:

'When a powerful corporation, with a capital of five million of dollars invested in houses and lands, in merchandise and mills, in cannon and rifles, in powder and lead, in all the implements of art, agriculture and war, and employing a corresponding number of men, all under the management and control of non' resident directors and stockholders, who are authorised by their charter to ' vote by proxy to the extent of fifty shares each, enter a distant and sparsely 'settled Territory with the fixed purpose of wielding all its power to control the 'domestic institutions and political destinies of the Territory, it becomes a question ' of fearful import how far the operations of the company are compatible with the ' rights and liberties of the people. Whatever may be the extent or limit of Congressional authority over the Territories, it is clear that no individual State has 'the right to pass any law or authorise any Act concerning or affecting the Ter'ritories, which it might not enact in reference to any other State.'

'It is a well-settled principle of Constitutional law in this country, that while

of delegates, chosen by the people themselves. That convention is now about to be elected by you, under the call of the Territorial Legis'lature, created and so recognised by the authority of Congress, and 'clothed by it in the comprehensive language of the organic law, with 'full power to make such an enactment. The Territorial Legislature, 'then, in assembling in Convention, were fully sustained by the act of 'Congress, and the authority of the Convention is distinctly recognised ' in my instructions from the President of the United States. Those 'who oppose this course cannot aver the alleged irregularity of the 'Territorial Legislature, whose laws, in town and city elections, in corpo'rate franchises, and all other subjects but slavery, they acknowledge by their votes and acquiescence. If that Legislature was invalid, 'then are we without law or order in Kansas; without town, city, or county organisation; all legal and judicial transactions are void; all titles null, and anarchy reigns throughout our borders.

The people of Kansas, then, are invited by the highest authority 'known to the Constitution to participate freely and fairly in the elec'tion of delegates to frame a Constitution and State Government. The 'law has performed its entire appropriate function when it extends to the 'people the right of suffrage; but it cannot compel the performance 'of that duty. Throughout the whole Union, however, and wherever 'free government prevails, those who abstain from the exercise of the 'right of suffrage authorise those who do vote to act for them in that 'contingency; and the absentees are as much bound under the law and 'constitution, where there is no fraud or violence, by the majority of 'those who do vote, as although all had participated in the election. 'Otherwise, as voting must be voluntary, self-government would be 'impossible, and monarchy or despotism would remain as the only 'alternative.

Those who oppose slavery in Kansas, do not base their opposition upon any philanthropic principles, or any sympathy for the African For their so-called constitution, framed at Topeka, they deem

race.

all the States of the Union are united in one for certain purposes, yet each State, in respect to everything which affects its domestic policy and internal concerns, 'stands in the relation of a foreign power to every other State.'

Hence no State has a right to pass any law or do or authorise any Act, with a view to influence or change the domestic policy of any other State or Territory in the Union, more than it would with reference to France or England, or any other foreign State with which we are at peace. Indeed, every State of this Union is under higher obligations to observe a friendly forbearance and generous amity towards each other member of the Confederacy than the laws of nations can impose on Foreign States.

'that entire race so inferior and degraded as to exclude them all for ever from Kansas; yet such a clause, inserted in the Topeka constitu'tion, was submitted by the Convention for the vote of the people, and ' ratified by an overwhelming majority of the anti-slavery party. The 'party here, therefore, has in the most positive manner affirmed the 'constitutionality of that portion of the recent decision of the Supreme 'Court of the United States, declaring that Africans are not citizens of 'the United States.

This is the more important, inasmuch as this Topeka Constitution 'was ratified with this clause, inserted by the entire Republican party in Congress; thus distinctly affirming the recent decision of the 'Supreme Court of the Union, that Africans are not citizens of the 'United States, for, if citizens, they may be elected to all offices, State ' and national, including the Presidency itself; they must be placed ' upon a basis of perfect equality with the whites, serve with them in 'the militia, on the bench, the legislature, the jury-box, vote in all 'elections, meet us in social intercourse, and intermarry freely with the 'whites.'*

* The decision of the Supreme Court was in the celebrated Dred Scott case (1854). The Chief Justice Taney said: "The question is simply this :—can a negro, 'whose ancestors were imported into this country, and sold as slaves, become a 'member of the political community formed and brought into existence by the Con'stitution of the United States, and as such become entitled to all the rights, and 'privileges, and immunities, guaranteed by that instrument to the citizen-one of 'which rights is the privilege of suing in a Court of the United States in the cases 'specified in the Constitution? . . . . It becomes necessary, therefore, to determine 'who were citizens of the several States when the Constitution was adopted. And in order to do this, we must recur to the governments and institutions of the thir'teen colonies, when they separated from Great Britain and formed new sovereign'ties, and took their places in the family of independent nations. We must enquir 'who, at that time, were recognised as the people or citizens of a State, whose ' rights and liberties had been outraged by the English Government; and who de'clared their independence, and assumed the power of government to defend their 'rights by force of arms. In the opinion of the Court, the legislation and histories ' of the times, and the language used in the Declaration of Independence, show 'that neither the class of persons who had been imported as slaves, nor their 'descendants, whether they had become free or not, were then acknowledged as a 'part of the people, nor intended to be included in the general words in that 'memorable instrument.' After referring to a number of historical facts, Judge Taney continues:- The language of the Declaration of Independence is equally 'conclusive: it begins by declaring that, "when in the course of human events it "becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have "connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth the 6.66 separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and nature's God entitle them, a decent respect for the opinions of manhood requires that they should "declare the causes which impel them to the separation." It then proceeds to 'say:-"We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights: that

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Governor Walker, in his first despatch to the Federal Secretary of State, under date of June 2, 1857, alluded to the efforts of the Abolitionists to disregard the law; and on the 14th he called for troops to defend the Territory from their actions. The next day, July 15, he writes that this movement at Lawrence was the beginning of a plan, originating in that city, to organise insurrection through out the 'Territory; and especially in all towns, cities, or counties where the Republican party have a majority. Lawrence is the hot-bed of all 'the Abolition movements in the Territory. It is the town established by the Abolition Societies of the east, and whilst there are respectable 'people there, it is filled by a considerable number of mercenaries, who are paid by Abolition Societies to perpetuate and diffuse agitation ' throughout Kansas, and prevent a peaceful settlement of this question. Having failed in inducing their own so-called Topeka State Legisla'ture to organise this insurrection, Lawrence has committed it herself, and, if not arrested, the rebellion will extend throughout the Territory. ".... In order to send this communication immediately by mail, 'I must close by assuring you that the spirit of rebellion pervades the 'great mass of the Republican party of this Territory, instigated, as I ' entertain no doubt they are, by eastern Societies.'

เ

Yet notwithstanding these declarations, Mr. Walker finally sympathised' with the very desperadoes that he complains of, and was in consequence removed from his position by President Buchanan, when he united himself with the fortunes of Stephen A. Douglas, one of the greatest political demagogues America ever produced. Mr. Walker ceased from that moment to have any influence, but taking advantage of the crusade against the South, he delivered two violent Northern 'spread-eagle' speeches at Brooklyn and New York, after the fall of Fort Sumter in 1861, on April 23 and May 30; and he has since been more or less connected with the Lincoln administration. It is said in the newspapers that he has been the chief adviser of Mr. Chase, the

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666 among them is life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights, governments are instituted, deriving their just powers from the consent "of the governed."

'The general words above quoted,' Judge Taney remarks, 'would seem to em'brace the whole human family, and if they were used in a similar instrument at this day, would be so understood. But it is too clear for dispute that the en'slaved African race were not intended to be included, and formed no part of the 'people who framed and adopted this declaration; for if the language, as under'stood in that day, would embrace them, the conduct of the distinguished men who 'framed this Declaration of Independence would have been utterly and flagrantly 'inconsistent with the principles they asserted; and instead of the sympathy of *mankind, to which they so confidently appealed, they would have deserved and 'received universal rebuke and reprobation.'

Federal Secretary of the Treasury; and it is alleged that he is now in Europe as the representative of that department.

Mr. Walker has recently published two pamphlets, in which he opposes the recognition by England of the Confederate States, and affects to be an Abolitionist on philanthropic grounds, thus abandoning the principles he advocated so zealously when the question of the recognition of Texas was under discussion.

In the same pamphlets which he calls 'letters,' although they have neither superscription nor address, he makes a most virulent attack upon Mr. Jefferson Davis, and endeavours to fasten upon him the responsibility of Mississippi repudiation, an affair in which he was in no manner concerned, and which took place some years before his entrance into public life. It was only at the request of the editor of the Washington Union that Mr. Davis furnished the particulars connected with the Mississippi bonds for publication in that journal, May 25, 1849. On being subsequently attacked by a Whig newspaper in his own State, he explained the transaction with still greater detail in an article addressed to the editors of the Mississippian.*

Although Mississippi did not receive one dollar for the bonds, Mr. Davis personally has been in favour of arranging the affair in question by a private subscription of the property owners in that state. He has never been Governor of Mississippi, as is supposed, nor did he ever hold office within its limits, excepting the unimportant one of Presidential Elector in 1844; and whatever influence that position conferred upon him with the incoming administration, was employed in urging Mr. Polk to invite Mr. Walker to a seat in his cabinet. During the 'repudiation' excitement, Mr. Walker was the leading politician in Mississippi, and Mr. Davis at that time was not a politician at all. Mr. Walker was a resident of Washington when Mr. Davis's letter appeared. Why did he not then reply to it? why does he wait for fourteen or fifteen years, in which interval he has been on terms of friendly association with, and has been the recipient of repeated favours from, the man he now seeks to defame?

He, however, does not deny the accuracy of Mr. Davis's statements, but endeavours by some ingenious use of terms to make him appear as the head and front of all offending.

It may not be out of place to add that, upon the formation of the Provisional Government of the Confederate States, and just after the intelligence reached this country that Mr. Davis had been selected as their President, some parties in London addressed a somewhat threat

* A history of the repudiation of these Mississippi bonds will be found in Chapters II. & III. of the preceding work on the Cotton Trade.