June 14, 1864 (2)

Mr. HIGBY. I call for the regular order of business, and I yield to the gentleman from New York, [Mr. Pbutn.]

Mr. PllUYN. For the first time m our history it is now pioposed to maKe a change m the Constitution wliich, if effected, wdl interfere with the reserved rights of the States. '1 his question is presented in the midst of a great struggle w Inch demands all the power and energies and thought of the country, and when a large number of fne States, and those most deeply to be affected by the contemplated change, are not represented in either House of Congress. It has been one of the great drawbacks under which the country has labored in its present troubles that the time and attention of the Administration and its 'friends have been so largely devoted to questions of social reform in the condition of the slave populatiohof the South, alienating thereby the "friends of the Union in those States and embarrassing their return to their allegiance, while they should have devoted theirenergies to thegreat work and duty' before them, leaving other questions until the rebellion should have been suppressed. Had this latter course been thoroughly and faithfully pursued and a sincere respect exhibited for the spirit of the Constitution and the rights of the States, the contest would, in my judgment, long since have ended. Those who are to write the history of the present time will look back with astonishment at the course of an Administration which, while ostensibly engaged in putting down the rebellion, did so much to keep it alive, and, while calling on the people of the South to return to their allegiance, did so much to drive them still further into resistance. These thoughts properly lead to a consideration of the expediency of the measure before us. That this is not the time to act upon it, and that it is inexpedient now to consider it, has been well shown in the very clear remarks ofmy colleague, [Mr. Herrick,] and others no doubt will add to what he has said. I will, however, entirely pass by this part of the subject, and with it all consideration of the slavery question, wishing only to present very briefly some remarks as to the power of Congress to take the action now proposed, and to show that we have no right to initiate the measure under consideration.

At the time of the adoption of the Constitution of the United States the several States were independent sovereignties, each claiming and exercising the full attributes of sovereignty under constitutions or forms of government which they had respectively established or recognized. The Constitution was a grant of power by these sovereignties, each acting for itself severally, as appears by the express terms of the instrument, and each retaining every attribute and power not thus granted, and that this might not rest on implication only, however clear and strong, it was so expressly declared by one of the amendments to the Constitution, insisted upon by some of the States at the time of its adoption, and forthwith assented to by the others. The reserved rights of the States, as they are often called—more properly their inherent original rights of sovereignty not; granted under the Constitution to the common Government thereby established will thus be seen are ill no manner impaired or affected by that instrument, but belong to and remain with the States respectively as fully and entirely as if it did not exist.

I admit that the Constitution should be liberally construed for the purposes for which it was established, but I deny that it can be constructively enlarged, or that under the pretense of amending it, we can go outside of the terms and of the spirit of the grant, and draw within its grasp subjects with which ltdoes not deal and which have been expressly declared to be beyond its reach. This is not the legitimate meaning of the power to amend; such a power would be one to originate— to create establish. The right remained with the States severally to regulate their internal affairs each in its own way, and according to its own views of right and duty. The relations of parent and child, of master anil servant; the law of marriage; the mode of alienating property; the law ot descent; m short, almost all that concerned the social relations, and the evcry day life and pursuits of the great body of the people, were left to be regulated by each State as it chose. The States were not asked to give up these rights, and they were not in any way yielded, and from the history of the times there can be no doubt that had it been proposed to give this large class of powers to the General Govermne nt the Constitution would never have been adopted.

Let us suppose that it had been distinctly declared by the Constitution, as adapted by the Convention which formed it, that the powers remaining in and not granted by the States respectively might at any time be delegated or transferred to the General Government, under the section au-. thorizmg amendments. Had this been done, no candid man who has studied our political history, or who is familiar with the debates in the State conventions which adopted the Constitution, will hesitate to say that it would never have received the sanction of the number of States required to putitintooperation. Or bad it been proposed to add to the amendment declaring the powers not granted to the United States to be reserved to the States, a proviso that this should not interfere with the right of "the General Government to absorb any of those powers by future amendments, can it be believed that it would have been adopted? The history of the times, and the debates already referred to, pronounce a most emphatic negative. It may be said that the objection I make would apply even if all the States shouldassent to a new clause to be added to the Constitution. My answer is that such an assent would be good not by way of amendment, but as a new or further grant of power.

Twelve amendments to the Constitution have been made, the first ten almost simultaneously with its adoption. They are declaratory and restrictive, containing the great principles of the BiH of Rights. Tin: eleventh and twelfth amendments were adopted a few years subsequently. The eleventh, as to the judicial powers, is also restrictive. The twelfth prescribes more definitely than before the mode of casting the electoral vote and of conducting the election for President and Vice President under the provisions of the Constitution. All these amendments, it will be observed, are in substance declaratory and restrictive, or regulate the exercise of powers already granted, and do not enlarge the powers of the General Government.' Since the last of them was adopted sixty years have passed, during which time the instrument has not been touched.

But, to return to the point I am considering: Can three fourths of the States, under this power to amend, overturn the institutions, subvert the authority, and change the condition of the other States? If so, the States might as well in the outset have surrendered all their sovereignty to the General Government, and the amendment declaratory of their reserved rights was meaningless. Is there any person who will venture to claim that any State which adopted the Constitution placed any such construction on this power to amend? 1 find that the amendment affirming the reserved rights of the States was adopted unanimously by the States which voted on it, and that in Massachusetts it was proposed by John Hancock, president of the State convention, warmly approved by Samuel Adams, and recommended for adoption to the other States. (See Eliot s Debates.)

I am well aware, Mr. Speaker, that it is considered by the supporters of the present Administration to be a great offense to speak of the reserved lights of the States, even in the light in which those rights were formerly understood by the people of the North of all political parties. I learn that three Republican Senators have recently ventured to say a word for them m the Senate Chamber. One of these is the venerable Senator from Vermont, once at the head of the Post Office JDepai tmcnt; another is one of the Senators from New Hampshire; and the third a Senator from Wisconsin. What will be done by the Senate with these, I had almost said contumacious members of their body, remains to be seen. In my opinion they deserve credit for thenboldness and fidelity to principle. But if gentlemen will read the debates which took place m (he State conventions held to consider the question of adopting the Federal Constitution, they will learn how highly State institutions, Stale interests, and State rights were then prized even in the northern States. My friends from Massachusetts especially would find that views were advanced m their State convention from which most of their statesmen of the present day have widely departed. Let us look at this point somewhat further.

Can Maryland and Delaware and New Jersey (for this illustrates the principle) force upon Pennsylvania an entire change of her domestic policy and institutions? Can Vermont, Massachusetts, and Connecticut compel New York to submit to their domination over her internal affairs, and to lay down rights at their bidding which she never agreed to surrender? If three fourths of the States can take away rights now clearly reserved to their associates, what is to prevent the absorption of their territory by other States? If one right can be taken away, several can be—all can be. If one principle can be swept away, all can be. Under such a doctrine States may be annihilated and a monarchy built up. These it may be said are extreme cases, but they are legitimate results from the power to amend now claimed. The right to amend is not a right to extend and enlarge the powers granted under the Constitution. It was only intended through its instrumentality to provide for the better and more convementexercise of the powers expressly granted, in case defects should be found to exist in the practical working of the system. The amendment as to the manner of electing the President and Vice President illustrates this view.

To construe the Constitution as authorizing three fourths of the States to impose upon the residue terms and conditionsof Union not agreed upon or assented to by them, would be a wide departure from its spirit, and a monstrous usurpation of power; and this it is which we are now called upon to do; to take a fuiHhei step to alienate the feelings of the South, and to embarrass and impede their return to the Union. No matter what the question may be, whether that of slavery ot of any other domestic institution or right reserved to the States; so long as it is reserved, Congress has no right to interfere with it in any way". Let us leave it as the fathers of the Republic left it, to each State to do what it believes to be just and expedient in reference to its own people and to its own institutions. Had this course been pursued; had not the aggressive, untiring spirit of abolitionism, which has brought so much misery and wretchedness upon the negro population of the South, been constantly at work; emancipation would have taken place in many of the slave States years since and the so called political power of slavery would have disappeared long before the opening of the rebellion. But a spirit of intermeddling and of false philanthropy has delayed this result and broughtevils upon our country which no man living can expect to see wholly removed.

Mr. FERNANDO WOOD. Mr. Speaker, this is a proposition to provide by an amendment to the Constitution for the abolition of slavery without compensation in all of the States in the Union. It will be, if adopted, a change in the fundamental law material alteration in the Constitution of the United States as formed by the founders of the Government. It is, therefore, a proposition which involves considerations and reflections such as belong to the gravest questions which can come before the American people for determination. It is whether we shall alter the whole structure and theory of government by changing the basis upon which it rests. My first difficulty in assenting to the resolution is that this is no time for any alteration in the organic law. We are now in the midst of a fearful civil war. The horrid din ot this conflict, the gionns of the wounded and dying, the sad evidences of death and destruction are all around us. Until recently, even at the very doors of this capital, the armed enemy has presented his threatening hostility. The whole people of America ni e involved directly or indirectly m this dt cudful conflict. Reason, judgment, and that cautious investigation and comparison of interests, opinions, and prejudices necessary to a proper adjustment of a nation s welfare have been banished by the giavoi realities of war. This is no tune to make or alter constitutions. Those who are enveloped in the elemental strifes of the tempest or the earthquake, and involved in the ruin thus created, cannot judge of the cause or measure the extent ot the calamity. So if is with the historical convulsions which have desolated vast regions and swept myriads to pie grave. The spectator who is himself in the midst of the horrors of war has seldom the coolness to discriminate and decide, with any reasonable degree of accuracy, as to the impelling cause of the struggle. The passions of men, the excitements of the contest, the temptations of ambition, avarice, and fear, all tend to blimHhe vision and warp the judgments of the actors m the terrible drama now being performed on this continent before the civilized world as spectators. Therefore, in my opinion, this is no time to act upon the proposition, no time to change the fundamental law. Nations do not alter their forms of government amid revolutions. We are now surrounded by dangers from without and from within. The people are in an unnatural excitement, u asm ted to that calm deliberation which an alteration of the Constitution requires. All our statesmanship, love of country, efforts at union, consolidation, and good fellowship should be devoted to a restoration of our fraternity and prosperity as a people.

But if a change can be made, is this such a one as should be made? It is sought through this amendment to abolish at once and summarily the system of domestic servitude existing in one third of the States which came into the Union with the Government and which have remained with it until now. The effects of such a revulsion in such an interest will be of the most wide spread and radical character. It will of course, add to the existing sectional hostilities, and if possible make the pending conflict yet more intense and deadly. Mr. Speaker, I see many objections to this amendment, while I fail to find one reason in its favor. I am opposed to it because it aims at the introduction of a new element over which Government shall operate. It proposes to make the social interests subjects for governmental action. This is the introduction of a principle antagonist to that which underlies all republican systems. Our Union was made for the political government of the parties to it, for certain specified objects of a very general character, all of them political y and none of them relating to or affecting in any manner individual or personal interests m those things which touch the domestic concerns. There is no feature or principle of it giving to the Federal power authority over them. These were reserved and leftexelusively to the jurisdiction of the States and u the people thereof.** Of this characterare the marital relations, therehgious beliefs, the right of eminent domain within the territorial limits of the States, other private property, and all matters purely social. Slavery where it exists is a system of domestic labor; it is not the creature of law. It existed without law before this Government was established. It is incorporated into the organization of society as part of the existing domestic regulations. It cannot be brought within constitutional jurisdiction any more than can any or either of the other private and personal interests referred to.

Again, sir, the proposed amendmentto abolish slavery in the States of the Union is unjust in itself, a breach of good faith, and utterly irieconcilablewith expediency. Itisunjust because it involves a tyrannical destruction of individual property under the plea of a legitimate exercise of the functions of Government. It is in theory the idea which has been derived from despotism and the notions of feudal powers that Governments are omnipotent, and draw within their sphere all that belongs to the individual, even the liberty of thought, speech, and conscience. This is an impious dogma of the past which should be repudiated, as opposed to the fundamental aims and ends of the Constitution of our Government. The essence of a constitution is protection of individual rights, and in popular Governments to resti win the power of majorities and secure the rights of minorities. Hence it has been truthfully said that the best Government is that which governs least. 1 characterize all pure, unmixed, and unconditional Governments, whether dependent on the will of one, few, or many, as alike repugnant to sound reason, to justice, and to the interests and happiness of mankind. Modern Turkey, mediaeval Venice, and ancient Athens, are examples alike of euoi in theory and injustice in practice, and wanting in the necessary conditions to sec ire permanent success and prosperity. I should be sorry to see our system degenerate into either the despotism of monarchy or the despotism of majorities, and 1 therefore oppose the very first step toward removing the wholesome checks imposed by the constitutional compact. I am well aware in stating this that constitutions are limitations self imposed by the popular will, and that the sovereign power is competent to change them so as to make them better subserve the great ends of civil order and the welfare of the general mass. Like all other institutions, Governments are mads for man, and contrived for his benefit; they con.- form to the errors and frailties of his nature, and are affected by the ignorances and vices of the times to which they belong. In this enlightened era, and in a land like ours, separated from the influence of ages of barbarism and wars, I shudder at the prospect of going back to any of the exploded forms of arbitrary power, I desire to stand by the traditions of our fathers, and above all to the legacy of that sound and beneficent form of Government which they have given us in the Constitution.

I hold thata good Governments bound to protect the individual in the enjoyment of life and liberty, and in .the exercise of his faculties for labor, physical and mental, in the acquisition and preservation of property. It may be destructive, but it should be conservative in these respects. This proposition strikes at property, and it is justified on the doctrine of the wild and erratic though subtle and powerful thinker who proclaimed that all property is founded on robbery. Property, Mr. Speaker, is the stimulus to industry and the foundation of improvement and civilization. All that is valuable or valued belongs to the grand total of public or private wealth, the material products of nature, the field, the mine, and the water, with all their teeming variety of what is useful or necessary; the powers of mind, the stores of knowledge, the genius of the inventor, the harmony of the poet, and last and greatest, virtue itself, the priceless treasure of the soul, all that can be wished and hoped for, are embraced in the idea of property. The social and domestic relations are equally matters of individual ownership with flocks and herds, houses and lands. The affections of a man s wife and children are among the dearest of his possessions, and as such are under the protection of the law. The domestic institution of slavery is one of these relations, and was recognized m the States of this Confederation as a species of proprietary interest. The Constitution describes slaves and I suppose children and appientices might come under the same class as persons bound to service.

I insist that no vmdictory laws can be passed either depriving individuals of anything which can be denominated as property or infringing existing social relations as tlie punishment of the offenses either of men or communities. Neither Congress nor the assent of the States requisite to incorporate a new article or amendment into the Constitution can do so justly, under any pretense, when the object is to appropriate private property without due compensation, or confiscate it without the formality of trial and condemnation. Within the scope and reason of the Constitution any amendment to it would be legitimate when ratified by the required three fourths of the States; but for those three fourths to attempt a revolution in social or religious rights by seizing on what was never intended to be delegated by any of the parties to the compact, would be a prodigy of injustice carried out under the forms of law, a wrong more fatally so because made by the very highest authority. If an amendment were now proposed to the Constitution declaring an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise of it by the citizen, it would be parallel with the present and no more obnoxious than this is to merited condemnation. The States, sovereign as claim that they are and continue to be could not have delegated what they did not themselves possess, that is, to destroy orappropi late individual rights without compensation, in all the acts of emancipation heretofore passed the tacit consent of the citizens affected accompanied the passage of the statute. A species of property which has ceased to be profitable is usually surrendered without protest or opposition. Men are not disposed to cavil at the exercise of a power abstractly arbitrary, which rids them of a relation which is onerous or inconvenient. Such was slavery m the States where it has been abolished. But where it is one of the mam sources of the prosperity of the community it will be regarded very differently.

This proposed alteration of the Constitution is therefore beyond the power of the Government, but the nect ssary consequences of it are revoltms y so. It involves the extermination of the white men of the southern States, and the forfeiture of all the land and other property belonging to them. Negroes and military colonists will take the place of the race thus blotted out of existence. Is this intended as the last scene of the bloody drama of cat nage and civil war now being prosecuted? The world looks on with horror, and it will leave to future ages a fearful warning to avoid similar acts of perfidious atrocity.

But, sir, the, most important aspect of this question is whether it is not a violation of the plighted faith of the States who shall aid in foisting this amendment in to the Constitution. That the States in establishing the Constitution performed it as a federal act has been shown in the Federalist by an argument as indisputable as any mathematical demonstration. Mr. Madison says on this subject: "Each State in ratifying the Constitution is considered as a sovereign body independent of all others, and only to be bound by it§ own voluntary act. In this relation, then, the new Constitution will, if established, be a federal and not a national Constitution."

It is true that the common Government which resulted presents national characteristics, especially in this respect, that its operation is exerted immediately upon citizens within the scope of the powers delegated to it in their individual capacities. The State sovereignties were by no means quenched by the act of federation, but by it certain functions were delegated by the sovereign power in each State to a common depository, to be used in certain cases, and to be exercised over the citizens respectively of each and every State by virtue of the sovereignty of their several States. The obligation, however, of the citizen of the State of New York to obey the Federal laws or authorities results from the powers imparted to the Federal Legislature or Executive by the act of New York, and derives no additional strength from otherStates entering into the Union. The citizen is bound to obey the Constitution and laws of the United States, because his State is a party to the Federal compact, and for no other reason. The State has delegated a portion of her authority (not of her sovereignty, which is, in its very nature, indivisible as that of individual personality) to a common agency, who may thus within the scope of such procuration require obedience to its requirements. The Government of the Union lias this extent and no more, and allegiance, loyalty, and nationality are the new-fangled catch words of the exploded dogmas of the old Federal party. Allegiance is due to the law, and derives its sanction from the sovereignty ot each individual State. The Democratic party has always maintained the doctrine that the Constitution was a compact from the times of Jefferson, and has for more than sixty years declared this as the foundation of its political faith. It is laid down most distinctly in the Kentucky and Virginia resolutions, the corner-stone of Democracy—

"That the several .States composing the United States of America are not united on the pi uiciples of unlimited submission to the General Government, but ui tr by ouuiimcC, amlei the ic and title ol a Constitution for the United States ami of amendments thereto, they constituted aGeneial Government for special purposes, delegated to that Government eeuaitl definitive powers, reserving each State to itself the residuary mass ol n jht to theirown selfgovernment, and that whensoever the Genet al Government attunes undelegated powers its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force that to this compact each State acceded as a State, find is an integral party that tlu* Government, created by this compact, w w not made the exclusive or final judge of the extent of the powers delegated to it elf since that would have made its discretion, and not the Constitution, the measure of us powers; but that, as in all other cases of compact among parties having no common judge, each party ha> an t equal i ght to judge for it oH a s well of infractions as ot the mode and measures of ledietiS.-"'

Such is the language of Mr. Jefferson in the Kentucky resolutions. In the Virginia resolutions, the author of which was Mr. Madison, 4 is declared— u That m ca e of a deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exeici e of o liot powers not granted by the said compact, the State* who are parties thereto have me light, and are in dim bound, to itit«ipo e for ai« p tmg the progress of the evil, and lor m uuumiiig within their respective limits the authoutiee, and liberties appeitaimng to them.' Daniel Webster emphatically recognized this character of a compact in the Constitution when he stated that if the northern btales refuse willfully anil deliberately to carry into effect that pan. of the Constitution which respects the restoration offugitive slaves, and Congress provide no remedy, the South would no longer be bound to observe the compact." Nay, the dominant party in this House, acti no on the tame theory ot a bargain broken on the part of the South by secession, and considering themselves thereby absolved from the constitutional obligation to return fugitive slaves, have just passed a bill to repeal the fugitive slave' law. It must be taken asconceded that the Constitution is a compact and covenant. Now, the very nature of a compact requires that there shall be contracting parties, and mutual obligations and considerations. The States and the people of those States in their sovereign capacity are the parties, and must be held answerable for any breach of good faith in not observing the terms of the contract, or in attempting to change them in any particular which destroys or alters essential and material portions. There was an implied and solemn understanding that the local and domestic institutions of the States should not be attempted to be interfered with in any manner so as to be drawn within the sphere of Federal authority. Does any one suppose that if it had been imagined fora momentthat the rights of property and the social relations of the citizens of the several States could have been made the subject of Federal legislation m any contingency that the Constitution would have been ratified by any of the States? The local jurisdiction over slavery was one of the subjects peculiarly guarded and guarantied to the States, and an amendment ratified by any number of States less than the whole, though within the letter of the article which provides for amendments, would be contrary to the spirit of the instrument, and so in reality an act of gross bad faith.

The control over slavery, and the domestic and social relations of the people of the respective States, was not and never was intended to be delegated to the United States, and cannot now be• delegated except by the consent of all the States. Articles nine and ten of the Amendments to the Constitution are conclusive on this point. These articles are the general rules for th i construction and interpretation of the entire instrument. Powers already granted may be modified, enlarged, or taken away by an amendment, but those which are retained by the people, or reserved to them or to the States, cannot be delegated to the United States, except by the unanimous consent of all the States. This is the only reasonable construction of those articles, in accordance with the plain sense and meaning of the words. The entire subject of slavery in the States has been reserved by thorn, and the right been retained by the people. No power has been delegated to the Uniteu States over this relation thus reserved to the legislative power of the State, and which is thus retained by the people, subject to such State power alone. It stands precisely on the same footing as that of eminent domain in the respective States, a prerogative of their inherent sovereignty, which cannot be taken away by an act of other States. How would an agreement between private parties be construed and interpreted which should declare that the articles of association might be modified and altered by three fourths of the number, and then should declare that certain rights were reserved to them individually? Would not, manifestly, the matters not delegated but reserved be considered as excepted from the subjects which were within the scope of the authority to alter or modify? Take the right of the States respectively of eminent domain within their territorial limits, could this be taken away from the States and delegated to the United States by the consent of the legislatures of three fourths of the States after a proposal made by two thirds of both Houses of Congress? I maintain that article ten of the Amendments is point blank against such a supposition, and is equally repugnant to an invasion of the right of the State alone to legislate on the subject of slavery. I insist further, that, as the Stales themselves could not justly take away property or destroy social relations without giving just compensation, this is not only not delegated by the States, but is among the rights retained by the people of the States where it exists, and that if all the States should delegate this power, K must, according to the rules of natural equity, be connected with the condition of allowing the masters a proper equivalent for the property taken or destioycd.

This identical proposition was laid down in the fourth resolution of the Chicago platform, once deemed so sacred in the eyes of the President and the gentlemen on the other side of the House, which asserts—

That the maintenance inviolate of the lights of tlie States, and especially the right of each State to order and control its own domestic institutions according to its own judgment exclusively, is essential to that balance of power on which the perfection and endurance of our political faith depend."

Where now will be the right of each State to order and control its domestic institutions if the institutions of one fourth of the States are to be subjected to the will of the people of three fourths by amending the Constitution so as to make them belong to and under the control of a majority in Congress, or to wipe them out altogether?

About the time of the peace conferences an amendment which was substantially the converse of the present was proposed, declaring explicitly that no amendment affecting slavery should be valid that did not obtain the consent of all the States in which that institution existed. I believe if it had been adopted the present war would have been averted; and I consider that the suggestion made by the present Secretary of State, in one of his speeches during the last presidential canvass, that slavery could be constitutionally abolished when the number of free States had increased so as to allow the passage of this very amendment now under consideration, was one of the impelling causes that precipitated the struggle now convulsing the States and converted the" irrepressible conflict" of that political leader into the fearful strife of contending armies and warring States. This, the crowning act of the agitation of years against slavery, from the Missouri restriction to the invasion of Virginia by John Brown, whose chorus has become the music for the loyal hosts, comes at length to give a show of legality to the destruction of the institution of slavery. The very proposal of this amendment demonstrates the utter bad faith of the long series of acts which, illegally and in defiance of the Constitution, "thfi pledge of mutual friendship and the instrument of mutual happiness," sought to break down this domestic institution of the States of the South.

The proposal of this amendment arraigns the President as having violated the Constitution in his emancipation proclamation, and stamps it as a nullity and void. It is an implied confession that the Administration, carrying on an aggressive war on States and State institutions, had this design in view from the commencement the war was not for the purpose of sustaining the Government, preserving the Union and maintaining the supremacy of the Constitution, but was directed against the sovereignties of the States, and to destroy such of their domestic institutions as were obnoxious to the views of the party controlling the Government, for the time. The aggressor is always in the wrong in case of hostilities among States united under a federal system like ours, no matter on which side the General Government may array itself. This is the spirit embodied in the Crittenden resolutions, but it is not in accordance with the policy now avowed by the Administration in prosecuting the war, nor by the party which supports the President for reelection, and least of all by the proposed amendment to the Constitution. The Administration party have proclaimed "that the utter and complete extirpation of slavery from the soil of the Republic" is its present object, and support the adoption of an amendment to the Constitution to this effect, impartial history, in dealing with these events, will pronounce a verdict that this attitude, and, above all, the attempt to change the Constitution to make that ilU ai which was not so before, shows that (he moving c iu se of the war was from the commencement the pi ohibitjon of slavery. That design, suspected with such ample ground, is now rendered transparently clear. No candid mind can avoid the inevitable conclusion which will brand northern sectionalism as the primary cause of the war, and that the apprehensions of the southern people were fully justified by the events now taking place and by the previous acts and proclamations of the Government. The pretext that those acts woie done in its defense will be regarded aw a falsehood, only intended to deceive the people and conceal the real character of the war.

The charge that slavery was the cause of the war is notoriously false. The agitation ng iin st slavery and the menaces utteied against that institution had risen to such an alarming height that the States where it existed believed that the only recourse left was to attempt peaceably to withdraw from the Confederation on the ground that the compact was broken. That this would be the inevitable result of the success of a party which denounced slavery as a moral, social, and political evil and declared its intention to use every means to extirpate it, was foretold for years. The speeches and writings of that pack of political jackals known as war Democrats, most of whom are now to be found yelling and yelping at the heels of power, were full of warnings of what the South would do in defense of their domestic institutions and their constitutional rights. If I did not consider these political renegades and mountebanks beneath contempt, I could fill volumes and exhaust your' patience in quotations from men who were once the most ultra in their opposition to coercion and in defense of the Jeffersonian doctrine of State sovereignty. Fortunately their names are now erased from the memorials of the Democratic party, and are expunged and blotted out from the respect of those who still hold fast to its time honored principles —principles which I trust will survive the storm and wreck of battle and the fiery ordeal of this unjust ami unholy war, and upon which only the Union can or should exist.

The sentiment of opposition to slavery is so powerful that I could hardly expect to offer any reason which would awaken sympathy in behalf of its continuance, even if I showed that it was the best possible condition to insure the happiness of the negro race, or that its abolition was an invasion of the rights of the masters and the wellbeing of the communities where it existed. I have abstained from doing any more than to assert that the relation was one having a legal existence in the southern States and fully recognized by the Constitution. This is uncontrovertible, a fact not to be denied, and virtually admitted by the amendment now proposed. The theory that the States never parted with their sovereignty is likewise not acceptable to the oppositeside of the House, and the notion that the General Government is paramount and can setaside all State authority is nowpopular. We are told," Preserve the nation, though you tear the Constitution to a thousand pieces; hold the Union fast and let the Constitution slide as long as the nation remains; this, generation, wiser and more patriotic than any that lias gone before, is competent to devise a constitution better and nobler than that of Washington." I fear that I have no eloquence so persuasive, can make no appeals so winning as to convince the friends of the Administration that the Constitution cannot be improved by their wisdom, but I do insist -that no cunning of man can frame a system of morality more perfect than that which demands thatcontiacts between States and individuals should be observed inviolate, that mutual promises should be kept, and that faith should be preserved sacred and unbroken. If this is a nation, let not its national character be based on perfidy and falsehood. This would be worse than boldly proclaiming that it is founded on force, and that" might makes light."

When, however, I declare my hope and sincere desire to see the restoration and perpetuity of the Union, the gathering back into the galaxy of every star that has shot madly from its sphere, and the enfolding of every wanderer into the dear olil flag with all its precious memories of associated glory and mutual happiness and mutual good will, I expect that what 1 utter will not be regarded with hostile feelings and alienated minds. You profess yourselves lovers of the Union, and so do I*, we may differ as it regards the means of restoration and the remedy to be applied, "and purge it to a sound and pristine health," but we agree in devotion to the Union. It has been proposed by an eminent state physician that a violation of the Constitution is an excellent medicine to save the" life of the nation." 1 cannot, indeed, coincide with that same" learned Theban;" but I would humbly suggesta milder treatment than this with its concomitants of fire and sword and desolation. The" life of the nation"* cannot be preserved by perjury, the Almighty will not auilU- it, and the sense of truth and justice which He has implanted in His creatures forbids the success of the experiment. iu. No Government can be lasting that is not founded on the consent of the governed. Do we dream of a Union of force, and vainly imagine that we can hold forever unwilling States, linked to us without their consent, by circling bayonetsand threatening cannon r Is this the lesson taught by the history of that glorious Revolution which made the colonies of Great Britain free and independent States? If the policy of Chatham and Burke had been rejected instead of that of Bute and North, would not the rebellion of the colonies been crushed, and the authority of the mother country restored over her injured and offended children? Have centuries of wrong and injustice cemented the union between England and Ireland? Mark the difference: Scotland, treated with fairness and equity, became completely and firmly allied to her southern and more powerful neighbor, maintaining her laws, her church, and local institutions intact; the political alliance between the two nations has been undisturbed and inviolate. Turn to the other side of the Channel, and what a contrast between the union of force and the union of kindness, the union of oppression and the union of equality, the union of hate and the union of love! Unhappy Poland still writhes unsubdued in the chains of that union which binds her to the Muscovite throne. The last instance of determined resistance to arbitrary power is the voluntary expatriation of the Circassian mountaineers, abandoning their country rather than be made subjects of Russia. Do you think that the people of the southern States are more degenerate and of tamer natures than the children of Europe, or the sons of the old birthplace of the race among the rugged mountains of Caucasus? Assuredly the experience of this war should teach otherwise. 1 see in it no warrant to cherish the anticipation that they will succumb and acquiesce in the yoke, as they deem it, even of the most beneficent Government the world ever saw, when offered to them on the points of your bayonets. The paternal sway of a Butler and the conciliatory policy of a Hunter produced the same effect in Louisiana and South Carolina that the benignant lash of Haynau did in Brescia and the nier- •ciful Russian knout did at Wai saw. Human nature is constituted the same in every quarter ofthe world. Opposition and hate are the results of aggression and force, and gratitude and sympathy the peaceful fruit of kindness and love. On these last, joined with mutual forbearance and consideration, this Union was originally founded; by them alone can it be recreated and made perpetual. How is it that gentlemen can prate of the acts of confiscation and vengeance, and the proclamations of emancipation dealing a %i deathblow at the strength of this gigantic rebellion?" Is not the fact far otherwise and have not the most vigorous efforts to prosecute the war been fol- 16wed by equally determined resolution to resist to the last extremity? The bloody and brutal policy of the Administration party has well nigh destroyed all hope of reconstruction, but I have an enduring faith in the efficacy of justice and fraternity. Call these divine principles back to your counsels and you will have taken the only step which can permanently restore the Union.

We have destroyed the former happy state of mutual friendship by innovations on the pi mciples of the Government, first by the specious pretext of destroying slavery by excluding it from the common territory, and since the war broke out by executive usurpations substantially amounting to a military dictatorship under the same pretext, and the plausible though false assumption that this was necessary to preserve the existence of the Government. The present attempt to change the principles of the Union, though proposed in the form and letter of the Constitution, is adverse to its spirit and irreconcilable with its ends. But if it were allowable, it would be madness to press the alteration at this time, when a civil war is raging of such gigantic proportions. Pass this amendment, and the only limit of this war will be the subjugation of the South or the exhaustion of the North. And what is involved in the subjugation of the South? Nothing less than extermination. The contest is of a nature to admit of no termination until the last man dies on the battle field or the scaffold. From this alternative my soul' turns away in loathing and disgust. If the objects of the war were all that its instigators and supporters claim for them, i would shrink from the enforcement of the awful penalty which demands the annihilation of a kindred people. Infinite justice did not thus deal with the sons of Adam, but remitted the dire sentence of death at the intercession of mercy. If human societies would strive to imitate this august and divine exemplar, on earth would be seen—

"Golden days, fruitful of golden deeds,

With joy and love tuumphing, and f ih truth."

While this struggle is going on, an empire is planted in Mexico. If the war continues, the consequence will be not only perpetual disunion and the South a desolation, but on empire will be so firmly rooted on American Mexican soil that the battle wasted population and exhausted resources of the American" nation" cannot uproot it. Canada will have grown and expanded, and monarchical institutions will be then so matured that republicanism will stand alone on this as on the old continent. While war is continued, and it must long be so if this amendment is carried, it is idle to parade the threat that the people cannot regard with indifference the establishment of a monarchy in their proximity. Whether hostile, indifferent, or favorable to the erection of an empire in Mexico, this people must bide their time to offer resistance. It will be time enough to remonstrate when there is power to make remonstrances felt. Bring back the old Union, and the new empire will perish like a premature birth. Make it the victim of an interminable war, or witherand paralyze its limbs by subjugation, and the Mexican throne will be founded too securely to be overthrown by our exhausted energies.

I consider this the crisis of the fate of the Union. As yet there is hope, though three years of war may have piled the dead on either side so high that the boundary might be marked wifh the whitening bones of the slain. We may still be friends. Neither people have yet been dishonored, and both protest that they were observant of the compact. The people of the South you assert are rebels and traitors. Admit it. You cannot doubt that they are sincere in the opinion that they were justified in the course they adopted, and that 11 was consistent with the constitutional compact and their reserved rights. All crimes di pond on the motive and design of the perpetrator and his guilty knowledge. Youcannot deny the sincerity and patriotism of the South. They have submitted to sacrifices and sufferings greater than that of any other race that ever fought for independence. Are they to branded as traitors because they, in common with Jefferson and Madison, believed that this was not a nation but a confederacy? If you do indeed account this the gist of their offense, then tear theashesof those archtraitors from the sepuichers where they repose and cast them to be scattered by the winds and waves, so that the spot of their burial may be unhonored among men.

Recall, I entreat you, before it is too late, the ancient spirit of concession and mutual forbearance. There is a higher duty of every American citizen than fighting enemies or quelling by force of arms rebellions. Its voice may be stifled in the deadly struggle and forgotten in the tempest of political animosities, or the earthquake of revolution, but it sldi lives, and will foi ever survive. See it in the homely lesson, "to love his neighbor." This obeyed, though but imperfectly, will be more efficacious than all that has been done by force of arms in crushing the rebellion. In carrying out this policy of peace and reconciliation, do not in one breath proclaim the paramount authority of the Constitution, and then proceed to change it in that very particular in which those who are now in rebellion charged that you intended to disobey and violate it. Assure them that the Constitution shall remain as it is; publish an amnesty so broad, general, and all umbtacing that it will include all degrees and ranks, civil and military, make at once a treaty of peace, pledging the faith of the States and the people to Us strict observance, and invite the rebel States and people to send Representatives to Congress and join in the election ofa Chief Magistrate and unite again m the establishment anew of the Union as it was. Let no feeling of •vengeance and no mock philanthropy mar this auspicious reinauguration of the Constitution, but let an act of mutual oblivion conceal forever the horrible demoniac possession which has held possession of the States and the people for the hist three years. This can be accomplished inho peoflo ighest only duty were and wise their enough highest interest. to lecognizo Admon- tneir ishod by the past, let them be willing to purchase peace by the cheap cost of doing justice.

Mr. HIGBY. Before speaking to the resolution embracing the proposition to amend, I refer to the fifth article of the Constitution of theUnited States, which makes ample provision and explains the way by which an amendment may be made. The article reads as follows:

"Article V —The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitution, or, on the application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a convention for proposing amendments, which, m either case, shall he valid to all intents and purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths ot the several States, or by conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other mode of ratification may lie proposed by the Congress; provided, that no amendment which may be made prior to the year one thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any manner affect the first and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article; and that no State, without its consent, shall be deprived ot its equal suffrage in the Senate."

The resolution follows in accordance and in consonance with the method proposed by that article of the Constitution, and it proposes an article which, should it become a portion of the Constitution, will forever prohibit the institution of slavery within the limits of our country. The resolution and amendment proposed read as follows:

Be it resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of jJmenca in Cong7 e s assembled, (two limtl s of both Houses concurring,) ThatthefoJlowinsr article be proposed iii tu the Legislatures of the several States as an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which, when ratified by three fourths of said Legislatures, sliali be valid, to all intents and purposes, as a part of the said Constitution, namely:

Article XIII.

Sec. 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except a? a punishment for crime, whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Pkc. '2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Sir, the whole debate on the other side of the House upon this proposition has been upon the presumption that whatever action is taken by us as a legislative body is conclusive; that if this resolution passes this House—it having aheaily passed the Senate becomes a finality, and whatever is embraced in it becomes a portion of the Constitution of the United States. Let no such fallacy sink deep into the heart of any man. The Constitution hasmostamply and cautiously provided that the national legislative branch of the Government can make no such amendment. Why, sir, the resolution simply gives the amendment in so many words, and proposes its ratification, and then the amendment goes to the State Legislatures, and must be ratified by them.

There is nowhere contemplated in the Constitution of the United States any action by Congress that more completely acknowledges and recognizes State sovereignty than this very provision of the Constitution explaining how itmay be amended. Our people are looking with anxiety to the action of Congress with reference to this subject. And now let me put a question to gentlemen oil the other side of the House. They have belabored this side often and long with denunciations that State lights are not regarded, that State sovereignty by our action is unheeded, and that we are aiding the national Government to absorb all powers which legitimately belong to the States under and by virtue of the Constitution. I appeal to them when a proposition does come from this side of the House that acknowledges and recognizes State sovereignty in full, whether they dare submit that proposition to the several States; whether they have faith in State sovereignty so great that when the Constitution makes a provision so ample as it has in this case, and so safe too, requiring the Legislatures of three fourths of the States to ratify, that they dare allow their different States to act upon this subject.

The only question that could possibly arise—- and that one I find dwelt upon but very little whether the times call for an amendment of this character, but the great burden of the argument on the other side is that there is no power in the Constitution to do this act. The member from New York whohas just taken his seat [All. 5 er.- xando Wood] has' had the hardihood to piomul e to this nation that the ninth and tenth aiticles of the Amendments to the. Constitution do away and make a nullity of the article to which 1 have directed attention and quoted. Can he hnu anywhere in the Constitution a provision by which itmay be amended in so indirect a way, and the portions amended be left as dead matter to cumber the living body? He would search in vain for such a provision. Why, sir, he would trample the Constitution underhis feet. And if we follow out his argument and act upon it we will become violators of that instrument.

I regard the fifth article as a part of the Constitution just as full of vitality as it was the day our fathers established it as a part of the Constitution of this country, and, sir, the gentleman from New York, if he has a particle of honesty, himself will ignore every word which he has said upon that one subject.