Published: December 16, 1858 Copyright © The New York Times
Douglas at the South
Views of Mr. Douglas on Slavery, State Rights, Territorial Acquisition, Cuba, Central America, and Asia
His Speech at New-Orleans, Dec. 6
From the New-Orleans Delta, Dec. 8
The Hon. Pierre Soule introduced Judge Douglas to the audience in the following speech:
Fellow-Citizens: On no occasion could I have been called upon to perform a more grateful task than that which is assigned to me as presiding officer of this meeting. I shall discharge it briefly. Nor, knowing as I do, your anxiety to hear the distinguished guest you have so enthusiastically welcomed along you, I cannot wish to keep you in painful suspense by any remarks I might offer. Tendering you, therefore, my humble thanks for the distinction with which it has been your pleasure to honor me, I will at once invite him to these hustings.
Judge Douglas: This immense concourse of people which you see congregated here, have thus assembled to hear you on those great doctrines of National and State policy which you have so triumphantly vindicated in that ever-memorable contest in which you had to encounter, in full array, the influence and power of a reckless, disorganizing and fierce fanaticism, combined with the dark maneuvers and the perfidy of profligate politicians. But for your indomitable firmness and the enlightened patriotism of the Democracy of Illinois, which struck these with impotency, you and that Democracy had been surrendered over to the tender mercies of a foe, who, if victorious, would have strewed this glorious country of ours with such seeds of trouble and discord as would have imperiled the very existence of the Republic, and perhaps blasted the last hope on which hung with our own liberty the liberties of the world. Come, then, you, the intrepid and invincible tribune, the independent and uncompromising Senator; come, and speak forth with that boldness which you have so successfully displayed in the councils of the nation and before your own people at home, and say where were and where still are the designs of your enemies and ours. Be fearless. You are in the midst of men who love truth and who value above all other things moral courage and political honesty.
Senator Douglas then spoke as follows:
Mr. President and Citizens of New-Orleans: It was with much hesitation and no small degree of reluctance that I was induced to give my consent to address you on this occasion. I had just passed through a fierce conflict in my own State, which required me to perform more speaking than was either agreeable to my wishes, or consistent with my own strength. When I determined to visit New-Orleans, it was only on private business of an imperative character; and it was my desire to arrive and depart as quietly as possible, and without, in any way, connecting myself with politics. When I approached your city, as I supposed, unheralded and unknown, I was amazed at the magnificent reception which was extended to me on the levee of your magnificent city, by so vast a concourse of people, by the municipal authorities, by the citizens in their individual capacity, by my own political friends, and by men of all political parties. This was a compliment which filled my heart with gratitude, and did not leave me at liberty to decline the first request you might make of me in return. I have, therefore, yielded to the solicitations addressed to me, to make a few remarks on the political topics which now agitate the public mind throughout the length and breadth of our glorious Republic.
And, moreover, I have one gratification in yielding to the request. I desire to know whether the principles, which are admitted to be sound and orthodox in the Free States, can pass current in the Slave States. So long as we live under a common Constitution, binding on the people of all the States, any political creed which cannot be proclaimed in Louisiana as boldly as in Illinois, must be unsound and unsafe. With the view of testing this question, I shall not attempt to enter upon any new views, or propound any original ideas, but simply discuss these existing questions, in the same way as I have always done before an Illinois audience. The tendency of events during the past fifteen years has been to force the organization of political parties on a geographical basis, to array the North against the South, embittering the South against the North, under the misapprehension that there is some irreconcilable antagonism between the interests of the one and the other, which prevents harmony between them. For the last twenty-five years I have been in public life; fifteen years of which have been spent in the Congress of the United States, and the whole of my life has been devoted to the discovery and elucidation of some common ground on which Northern and Southern men might stand on terms of equality and justice. If you will take pans to examine the history of this sectional strife, you will find that the whole contest has arisen from an attempt on the part of the Federal Government to assume, or usurp, if you will, the exercise of powers not conferred by the Federal Constitution. When this Government was formed, the confederacy consisted of thirteen States - twelve of which were Slaveholding States, while one was what is called a Free State. Of course, had the doctrine then prevailed which was proclaimed by my opponent, Mr. Lincoln, and by Mr. Seward in New-York, and by the leaders of the Abolition or Black Republican Party throughout the North; the doctrine that uniformity in the domestic institutions of the several States is necessary - that a house divided against itself cannot stand; that this Government, divided between Free States and Slave States, cannot endure; that it must be all the one thing or the other; what do you suppose, had such a doctrine prevailed when the Constitution was made, would have been the result? Suppose that Mr. Seward himself had been a member of the Convention which framed the Constitution, and when the members came to affix their signatures to the instrument, this doctrine of uniformity had been proclaimed - this doctrine that the domestic institutions of the several States must be the same - what would have been the effect? Would the one Free State have out-voted the twelve Slave States? On the contrary, would not the twelve Slave States have out-voted the one Free State, and thus Slavery have been established in all the States forever by an irrevocable provision of the Constitution? Why, then, was this not done? Simply because the sages who formed our Government had more at heart the great principles of civil liberty than the desire of sectional power or sectional advantage - because they wished to establish the principle that each State should possess the sovereign power of legislation over its own domestic institutions - to form them and modify them to suit themselves, retaining Slavery so long as they might desire to retain it, and abolishing it whenever they chose. This Government was formed on the principle of State Rights and State Sovereignty. It is a confederacy of sovereign and independent States, having a certain common purpose, each retaining the right to manage its own affairs, and maintaining its own liberties inside of its own jurisdiction.
It is a fatal heresy to proclaim the doctrine that there out to be or can be uniformity among the different States of the Union, as to their local and domestic institutions. Uniformity is neither possible nor desirable. Our fathers knew, when they made this Government for so many different communities, that there must necessarily be a corresponding variety, requiring different laws and domestic institutions adapted to the wants and characteristics of each separate locality. They knew that variety and dissimilarity of local and domestic institutions to be an essential element in a confederated form of Government. On this point you find a vast difference between the Abolition and Black Republican party, on the one hand, and the Democratic Party, on the other hand. It is true that there may be some individual exceptions to this classification, but not many. The effort had previously been made, principally in the North, to array the North against the South, and the South against the North, and thus embittering them against each other, until no Southern man would vote for a Northern candidate, and no Northern man would trust a Southern candidate. I can well understand how unscrupulous politicians in the North, who prefer their own aggrandizement to the peace of their country, and prohibit the perpetuity of this Union, may advocate this doctrine, as they belong to the stronger section. But how long was it before that doctrine prevailed? Did we of the North desire sectional power so long as we were the minority and you the majority? So long as the Free States were the minority section, the North adhered to the doctrine that each State should manage its own domestic affairs without interference from the other States or the Federal Government. But when, in the progress of events the Free States increased till they obtained the majority in the House of Representatives, and then a tie in the Senate, ambitious men found that by organizing sectional parties, and belonging to the strongest section, they could ride into power. Thus the Black Republican or Abolition party is sectional in its organization, in its principles, and in its whole line of policy. Every argument they use is addressed to Northern ambition, and is directed against the Southern people and Southern institutions. Of course the Abolition Party of the North had a baneful influence on some Southern people, by inducing them to try to form a Southern party in opposition to the Northern Abolition Party. Thus, you see, the attempt was made to introduce the test, not whether a representative is faithful to his own State, and to the Federal compact, but whether he is true to the North or faithful to the South. Let me remind you that the Constitution recognizes no such divisions. It recognizes no North and no South, but one Republic under one Constitution, and thirty-two independent States, bound together by one Federal compact. Hence I say to you that I owe no allegiance either to the North or to the South. My allegiance is to my own State, and through that State to the Federal Government, and no other power on earth. Let this principle be observed and acted upon in good faith, and there will always be peace between the North and the South, and between all the States of this glorious confederacy. When I addressed this argument to Northern men - and especially to large crowds of Abolitionists, as I have often done - I was answered that Slavery is so great and monstrous an evil, that their consciences will not permit them to be quiet in regard to it, even after they have performed their whole duty in their own State. They bring forward the Declaration of Independence, and read from it with wonderful satisfaction. I can give you their dogmas, as presented in every Abolition catechism. They take the Declaration of Independence, as I have said, and read this passage: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Then they stop and say, "Doesn't that Declaration tell us that all men are created equal? Is not a negro a man, and is he not, therefore the equal of the white man? Was he not made equal by his Creator, and is his equality not, therefore inalienable by Divine law? Then how can you reduce him to an inferior position by any human law?
By this specious, but sophistical argument, they have succeeded in imposing on some weak-minded men, and some old women and children, until they have educated a generation who really believe that the negro is their brother. And I must be permitted to tell you that many, even of your Southern men, have quailed under that argument, and failed to meet it. My answer is this: When the framers of the Declaration declared that all men were equal, they had no reference whatever to the negro. They were speaking of white men - men of European birth and European descent. They had no reference to the negro or any other inferior and dependent race. And now for the proof of this point, as I have submitted it at home. You must bear in mind that when the Declaration was made, the Colonies were all slaveholding. Every man that signed the Declaration represented a slaveholding constituency. Bearing these facts in mind, tell me if you believe that those men were such hypocrites as to admit the negroes belonging to them to be their equals by divine right, and yet hold those negroes in Slavery the balance of their lives. Any man who asserts that the signers of the Declaration had reference to negroes in that document, declares every signer to have been a hypocrite, and worse than a hypocrite. I believe they spoke of white men, men of European birth and descent, without any reference to negroes or any other inferior race.
I repeat that this Government was made by white men, for the benefit of white men and their posterity forever, to be administered by white men, and none others. It is true that then, as well as now, we had among us other races - inferior races - incapable of self-government, and necessarily dependent on others for protection.
But it is a law of humanity, a law of civilization, that whenever a man, or race of men, show themselves incapable of managing their own affairs, they must consent to be governed by those who are capable of performing the duty. It is on this principle that you establish those institutions of charity, for the support of the blind, or the deaf and the dumb, or the insane, that those incapable of governing themselves must be governed by others. In accordance with this principle I assert that the negro race, under all circumstances, at all times and in all countries, has shown itself incapable of self-government. And it has been asserted, and I think with much force, that it has attained a higher degree of development of moral culture and of civilization in the Southern States of this Union, in the condition of Slavery, than in any other part of the world. From these considerations, I arrive at the conclusion that the negro race being inferior, does not form any component element in the governing power of the American system of government. Yet he is a human being, and as such is entitled to all of the privileges and immunities which can be extended to him consistently with the safety of the society in which he lives. I presume that all men, North and South, of whatever politics, religion, or prejudices, will assent to the principle that humanity compels us all to extend to the negro, and all other dependent races, all the privileges, immunities and facilities, consistent with the good of the society in which they reside. Then, you will ask me, as the Abolitionists have asked me, what are these privileges and immunities - what are their nature and extent? I will return the same answer I have so often given them. It is a question for each State to decide for itself, independent of any other State. Illinois has decided the question for herself. We have adopted a line of policy which has given satisfaction to us. If you do not like it, though we may regret your dislike, we must be permitted to say that it is none of your business. If you do not like our laws on the subject of negro Slavery, or any other domestic concern, stay at home and live under such laws as you choose to make. We have a law in our State that a negro shall not be a citizen, nor either shall he be a slave. But during our territorial existence, when the settlers were from Slaveholding States, bringing their slave-property with them, the Territorial Legislature, in defiance of the celebrated ordinance of 1787, established Slavery in Illinois, and maintained it for years. They then abolished it, because, from the circumstances of our climate, and soil, and productions, it was found not to be profitable or conducive to our welfare. If we had lived further South, in the districts which produce sugar, and cotton, and rice, we would have seen just as much virtue in slave-labor as you do in Louisiana. And, perhaps, if some of the more excitable of our Southern friends had happened to live among the granite hills of New-Hampshire, they would entertain very different views from those they now hold. This question of Slavery is not a question of legislation at all, but of climate, soil and self-interest. You can establish Slavery nowhere by any law of Congress, or a Territorial Legislature, or by any other power contrary to the will of the people where it is to exist; and, in my opinion, you should never be permitted to force it down the throats of an unwilling people.
Hence, I say, that the people of Illinois, finding that Slavery did not suit them, abolished it. I will state, too, that our kind friends over in Kentucky, when their servants become old and valueless, and a tax on their masters, showed their humanity by emancipating them and sending them into Illinois. This was also the case in other Slave States, till Illinois was in danger of becoming a free negro colony, when she found it necessary to provide for her own protection by enacting that no more negroes should come to Illinois to reside, whether free or slaves. Since she had determined not to have Slavery, she would not establish a free negro colony for your benefit. In a word, she says to the Slave States, take care of your own negroes, make just such laws as you choose and be responsible to God and to your posterity. Let us alone and we will let you alone. That is the policy of Illinois in regard to Slavery and the negro question. If you say you do not like that it can not be helped. Illinois, however, has just as much right to adopt her policy as you in Louisiana have to adopt a different policy. We are prepared to make this bargain with you, or rather to maintain inviolate the bargain our fathers made in the Federal Constitution, to mind your business and let us mind ours. Under that principle this Union can exist forever - divided into Free and Slave States, each State having the right to preserve and retain Slavery so long as it chooses, and abolish it whenever it pleases. That is what I mean when I say that the Democratic Party is a party devoted to State Rights and State Sovereignty, in opposition to that other policy which concentrates the liberties and rights of the people in the Federal Government.
The discussion of this question in the North has so far modified public opinion as to induce a willingness to acquiesce in its application to the States, while the Black Republicans deny the propriety of applying it to the Territories.
On this point the Abolitionists assert the right of Congress, under the Constitution, to form and establish, for the people of the Territories, their domestic institutions, without their consent. The Democratic Party deny that Congress can rightfully exercise any such authority.
We say that for Congress to say to any people, you shall or shall not have such or such institutions, is a violation of the great principles of our Federal Government. In the discussion of these questions, I sometimes go back to the history of the Revolution, and show that it involved the same principles when the British Government attempted to pass laws for the American colonies, without giving them a representation in Parliament.
In opposition to this claim our fathers rose up and said: We will obey the laws of Parliament, which are imperial laws, and not local laws - but we will not submit to local laws affecting our domestic institutions, and passed without giving us a fair representation in Parliament. The Democratic Party says that Congress has no right to establish or to prohibit Slavery. We say that the Territories should be open to the citizens of the United States to go there with their property, and subject alike to the laws when they arrive there. But an objection is raised by some of our Southern friends, and I have been asked here and at home what I meant by the doctrine of popular sovereignty in the Territories, and whether we abide by the Dred Scott decision. In a discussion with my opponent, Mr. Lincoln, at Freeport, Illinois, the question was put to me whether, in the event that the people or Legislature of a Territory were hostile to Slavery, there was any lawful means by which Slavery could be excluded. I said yes, and proceeded to state the means. I will state them here to you. The Democracy of Illinois, in the first place, accepts the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Dred Scott, as an authoritative interpretation of the Constitution. In accordance with that decision, we hold that slaves are property, and hence on an equality with all other kinds of property, and the owner of a slave has the same right to move into a Territory and carry his slave property with him, as the owner of any other property has to go there and carry his property. All citizens of the United States, no matter whether they come from the North or the South, from a free State or a slave State, can enter a Territory with their property on equal footing.
But I apprehend when you arrive there with your property you are subject to the local law of the Territory. How can your slave property be protected without local law? The Constitution gives you a right to go into a Territory and carry your slave property with you; but it does not punish any man for stealing your slave, when you get there. It does not punish a man for stealing any other property, when you get there. Congress never yet passed a law to punish crime or protect property in any organized Territory.
Congress never yet passed a criminal code for any organized territory. It has simply organized the Territory and established a Legislature, that Legislature being vested with legislative power over all rightful subjects of legislation, subject only to the Constitution of the United States. Hence, whatever jurisdiction the Legislature possesses over other property, it has over slave property - no more, no less. Let me ask you, as Southern men, can you hold slaves anywhere unless protected by the local law; would not the inaction of the local Legislature, its refusal to provide a slave code, or to punish offenses against that species of property, exclude Slavery just as effectually as a Constitutional prohibition? Would it not have that effect in Louisiana and in every other State? No one will deny it. Then, let me ask you, if the people of a Territory refuse to pass a slave code, how are [you] going to make them do it? When you give them power to legislate on all rightful subjects of legislation, it becomes a question for them to decide, and not for me.
If the local Legislature imposes a tax on horses, or any other kind of property, you may think it a hardship, but how are you going to help it? Just so it is with regard to traffic in liquors. If you are dealing in liquors, you have the same right to take your liquor into the Territory that anybody else has to take any other species of property. You may pass through and take your liquors in transitu, and you will be protected in your right of property under the Constitution of the United States; but if you open the packages they become subject to the local law; and should the Maine law happen to prevail in the Territory, you had better travel with your liquors. Hence, if the local Legislature has the same right over slave property as over every other species of property, what right have you to complain of that equality? And let me say to you that if you oppose this just doctrine, if you attempt to exempt slaves from the same rules that apply to every other kind of property, you will abandon your strongest grounds of defense against the assaults of the Black Republicans and Abolitionists. If the people of a territory are in favor of Slavery they will make laws to protect it; if opposed to Slavery they will not make those laws, and you cannot compel them to do it. It comes simply to this - they don't want it, they won't have it, and you can't force it upon them. But I will tell you when they will have it, and when Slavery will find protection in a territory, it is when the territory lies in those latitudes and climates which adapt it to the profitable production of rice and sugar and cotton, and where Slave labor will be remunerative. In those territories the people will want Slavery, and will have it in spite of Abolitionism and all its power. Permit me to say that there is no line running along 36° 30', or any other parallel of latitude, and separating Free territory from Slave territory, irrespective of climate, soil and productions; but there is a line, or belt of country, meandering through the valleys and over the mountain tops, which is a natural barrier between Free territory and Slave territory, on the south of which are to be found the productions suitable to Slave labor, while in the north exists a country adapted to Free labor alone. Thus, Slavery will exist wherever soil, climate, and productions demand it, and it will exist nowhere else. Now if climate and soil, and self-interest will regulate this question, why should we quarrel about it? When you arrive at a certain distance to the north of the line there cannot be any doubt of the result; and so, when you got a certain distance south the result will be equally certain the other way. But in the great central regions, where there may be some doubt as to the effect of natural causes, who ought to decide the question except the people residing there, who have gone there to live with their wives and children? Any party which attempts, by a system of coercion, to force any institutions into regions not adapted to them, violates the great principles on which our Government is founded. Thus you have my views on the subject of Slavery in the territories. Practically, it amounts simply to this: If the people want Slavery they will have it, if they don't want it they won't have it, and you can't force it upon them. If these principles be recognized and adhered to we can live in peace and harmony together; but just as surely as you attempt to force the people to have Slavery, against their will, in regions to which it is not adapted, fanaticism will take control of the Federal Government and attempt to force it out of other countries adapted to it. It was on these principles that, last Winter, I resisted the admission of Kansas under the Lecompton Constitution. I have said, what I repeat here, that my opposition was not based upon any provision in that Constitution relating to the subject of Slavery. I then said that if Kansas wanted to be a slaveholding State, she had a right to be so, and if she wanted to be a free State, she had the same right. If the Lecompton Constitution was an embodiment of the people's will, it ought to have been accepted. If it was not an embodiment of their will, it ought not to have been forced upon them. And now let me reason with you, as Southern men, on this question. If we are going to live in peace together, we must act in harmony in the application of all just and fair principles. Suppose that, last Winter, we had had an Abolition President, an Abolition majority in both Houses of Congress, and that Kansas had had an Abolition Governor and authorities. Suppose that by some means - just such means as those by which the Lecompton Convention was called - a Convention had assembled composed of Abolitionists. Suppose the understanding to have been that the Constitution was to be submitted to the people; that the Convention had assembled, and it was discovered that the Pro-Slavery men were in a majority of five to one in the Territory. Suppose, under these circumstances, the Convention had refused to submit the Constitution to the people, and had attempted to force an Abolition Convention down the throats of a Pro-Slavery people against their will. Would you, the people of the South, have submitted to such tyranny? Would you have suffered an Abolition Constitution to be forced down the throats of the people of any territory in opposition to their wishes, more especially had such a Constitution contained a provision that it should not be changed for seven years, and not then except by a two-thirds vote; so that the minority having once fastened it on the people, that same minority could perpetuate it forever in opposition to the wishes of the majority.
Now, if I do not mistake the Southern character and Southern patriotism, you would never have submitted patiently and calmly to such an attempt to violate the great principles of self-government. I am not going to enter upon a discussion as to whether this Constitution was the act of the people of Kansas. If it was not their act, then I was right in opposing it; if it was their act, then you can draw your own inferences. I will only say now, that it was sent back to the people of Kansas under the provisions of the English bill, which submitted the question in an indirect manner, and rejected by a vote of eight to one. Under these circumstances who can say that it ever was the act of the people of Kansas. But I am not going to reopen that question. It is now settled. Let the asperities growing out of the controversy die with the controversy. All I ask is, that in future we recognize the right of the people of a Territory to form a Free State, or a Slave State, as they may choose, and come into the Union on an equality with the other States.
A few words more and I have done. I find that I am getting so hoarse from previous efforts and recent exposure, that I cannot speak much longer. I will only say to you, in conclusion, that if we recognize and observe this principle of State rights and self-government for the people of the Territories, there will be peace forever between the North and South, and American will fulfill the glorious destiny which the Almighty has marked out for her. She will remain an example for all nations, expanding as her people increase and her interests demand more territory. I am not in favor of the acquisition of territory by fraud, violence, or improper means of any kind; on the contrary, I would never permit the Federal Government to be an instrument in the hands of foreign powers to carry out their purposes upon the American Continent. Let us adopt a policy consistent with our destiny, and then bide our time. Let us apply these principles and we shall continue ever one nation, but separate and sovereign States under the Constitution, as our fathers and its founders desired and designed.
Mr. Douglas was apparently about to bring his remarks to a close at this point, when, in response to calls of "Cuba," "Cuba," from the audience, he proceeded thus:
It is our duty to have Cuba, and you cannot prevent it if you try. It is folly to debate the acquisition of Cuba. It naturally belongs to the American continent. It guards the mouth of the Mississippi River, which is the heart of the American continent and the body of the American nation. Its acquisition is a matter of time only. Our Government should adopt the policy of receiving Cuba as soon as a fair, just and peaceful opportunity shall be presented. Whether that moment be next year or the year after, whenever that occasion arises and the opportunity presents itself, it should be embraced.
The same is true of Central America. It will not do to say we have territory enough. When the Constitution was formed, there was enough, yet, in a few years afterwards, we needed more. We acquired Louisiana and Florida, Texas and California, just as the increase of our population and our interests demanded. When, in 1850, the Clayton-Bulwer treaty was sent to the Senate for ratification, I fought it to the death. They then asked what I wanted of Central America. I told them I did not want it then, but the time would come when we must have it. They then asked what my objection to the treaty was. I told them I objected to that clause of it which said that neither Great Britain nor the United States should ever buy, annex, colonize, or acquire any portion of Central America. I said I would never consent to a treaty with any foreign Power, pledging ourselves not to do in the future whatever interest or necessity might compel us to do. I was then told by veteran Senators, as my distinguished friend well knows, that Central America was so far off that we should never want it. I told them then, "Yes; a good way off - half way to California, and on the direct road to it." I then said it was our right and duty to open all the highways between the Atlantic and the Gulf States and our possessions on the Pacific. I said I would enter into no treaty with Great Britain or any other Government concerning the affairs of the American Continent. And here, without a breach of confidence, I may be permitted to state a conversation which took place at that time between myself and the British Minister, Sir Henry Lytton Bulwer, on that point. He took occasion to reason with me that my position with regard to the Treaty was unjust and untenable; that the Treaty was fair because it was reciprocal, and it was reciprocal because it pledged that neither Great Britain nor the United States would ever purchase, colonize, or acquire any territory in Central America. I told him that it would be fair if they would add one word to the Treaty - so that it should read that neither Great Britain nor the United States should ever occupy or hold dominion over Central America or Asia. But he said: "You have no interests in Asia." "No," said I, "and you have none in Central America." "But," said he, "you can never establish any rights in Asia." "No," said I, "and we don't mean that you shall ever establish any in America." I told him it would be no more respectful for us to ask that pledge in reference to Asia, than for Great Britain to ask it from us in reference to Central America.
If experience shall continue to prove, what the past may be considered to have demonstrated, that those little Central American powers cannot maintain self-government, the interests of Christendom require that some power should preserve order for them. Hence, I maintain that we should adopt and observe a line of policy in unison with our own interests and our destiny. I do not wish to force things. We live in a rapid age. Events crowd upon each other with marvelous speed. I do not want territory any faster than we can occupy, Americanize and civilize it. I am no fillibuster. I am opposed to unlawful expeditions; but on the other hand, I am opposed to this country acting as a miserable constabulary for France and England.
I am in favor of expansion as fast as consistent with our interest and the increase and development of our population and resources. But I am not in favor of that policy unless the great principle of non-intervention and the right of the people to decide the question of Slavery, and all other domestic institutions, for themselves shall be maintained. If that principle prevail, we have a future before us more glorious than that of any other people that ever existed. Our Republic will endure for thousands of years. Progress will be the law of its destiny; it will gain new strength with every State brought into the Confederacy. Then there will be peace and harmony between the Free States and the Slave States. The more degrees of latitude and longitude embraced beneath our Constitution, the better. The greater the variety of productions, the better; for then we shall have the principles of free trade between the important staples of the world, making us the greatest planting as well as the greatest manufacturing, the greatest commercial as well as the greatest agricultural power on the globe.
These are my views in regard to our foreign relations. They are questions I had not intended to discuss; and I should not have done so if some gentleman in the crowd had not called my attention to them. My votes in Congress have always been in harmony with that line of policy. It matters not how far you acquire more territory, or how much or how little you wish to acquire. Expansion is the law of our existence; when we cease to grow, we commence to decline. Hence our course is onward, on the principle established by our fathers, under divine inspiration, as I believe, in the formation of the Government.
And now permit me to return my grateful acknowledgements for the kindness with which you have listened to me. It has been my desire to speak to you has I have before spoken to mixed audiences in my own State. This I have done, with the exception that I have treated the Abolitionists with more mildness than I have been in the habit of doing when I meet them face to face. Since I never could appreciate their conduct in standing on the shores of Lake Michigan and shaking their fists at the people on the Gulf of Mexico, I could not bring myself to stand here in New-Orleans, upon the shores of the Gulf of Mexico, and shake my fist at the people on Lake Michigan.
