14 disunion. It was no obiter dictum, but explicitly set down, and somewhat fully reasoned out. In answer to the inquiry, what course of action the usurpations of slavery demanded from the free States, that writer said, “they should not meditate a severance of the union of the States. Disunion would be as evil a thing as it is painted by any of those who, by dwelling exclusively on its evils, put their consciences to sleep in respect to that slavery, which, as long as it exists, will threaten, more than all other causes together, to bring it about.” He then proceeded to some considerations in confirmation of this sentiment, and concluded his remark upon the topic by saying, “constitutional proceedings, then, alone are to be thought of for the abatement of this monstrous nuisance. A disunion of the States, on all other accounts a calamity, does not change its character, when viewed in relation to this end.”* * Papers on the Slave Power, pp. 77-79. Another portion of those interested in the movement against slavery is embraced in the Liberty party, so called. It has a regular party organization, contemplating action under the Constitution, holding its conventions, and supporting its own candidates for office, as much as either of the two parties that mainly divide the country. In some States its numbers are large. In my own State its vote has nearly reached ten thousand. In New York, in 1844, it came up, I believe, to fifteen thousand^ * Among the opponents of slavery are next to be reckoned great numbers in the two principal parties in the free States. A very large number—I suppose the dominant portion—of the Democracy of New York has lately taken strong ground upon the subject; and the same, though to a less extent, has been the current of Democratic opinion in New Hampshire; while the Whigs of New Hampshire have made themselves very distinctly heard, and a combination, on the ground of hostility to slavery, has plucked.the government of that State out of the hands of a dynasty which had seemed1 destined to be perpetual. In Massachusetts we have fourteen counties. Two of them are small, their population not equalling that of several of our single towns. The Whigs of a majority, I believe, of the rest, at the county conventions last autumn, declared the opposition of Massachusetts to any candidate for the Presidency or Vice Presidency who was not known to be opposed to the further extension of slavery; while no county, as far as I know, assumed the opposite ground. But the people of that sober Commonwealth have widely taken the alarm, and they do not limit their views to the mere confinement of slavery within its present limits. Let me read, Mr. Chairman, a Resolve of the Legislature of the pattern Whig State of Massachusetts, passed, as appears by the certified copy which I hold in my hand, on the 27th day of February last, five days before the dissolution of the last Congress. It reads thus: “ Resolved, unanimously, That the legislature of Massachusetts views the existence of human slavery within the limits of the United States as a great calamity, an.immense moral and political evil, which ought to be abolished as soon as that end can be properly and constitutionally attained, and that, its extension should be uniformly and earnestly opposed by all good and patriotic men throughout the Union.” v c Sir, that is plain language. That is off-hand, downright, point-blank utterance, if I know what such utterance is. Without being any friend to the doctrine of instructions, I take that for the sentiment and counsel of my venerated mother, and may God prosper me as I will act accordingly! I stand on just that platform. I consult that solemn record of the,sense of my native State, and I find that my sentiments come exactly up to it. With that record of the will of whig Massachusetts in my hand, I shall not go to Mr. A, B, or C, in ■State street, or Wall street, to learn whether I am a Whig, when measured by some second-rate standard in their minds. As little shall I wait to have my
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