Mr Buchanan's Administration on the Eve of the Rebellion Chapter I
by James Buchanan
That the Constitution does not confer upon Congress power
to interfere with slavery in the States, has been admitted by all
parties and confirmed by all judicial decisions ever since the origin of the Federal Government. This doctrine was emphatically
recognized by the House of Representatives in the days of
Washington, during the first session of the first Congress,1 and
has never since been seriously called in question. Hence, it became necessary for the abolitionists, in order to furnish a pretext
for their assaults on Southern slavery, to appeal to a law higher
than the Constitution.
1. Annals of Congress, vol. i., p. 1474, Sept. 1, 1789-'90.
Slavery, according to them, was a grievous sin against God,
and therefore no human Constitution could rightfully shield it
from destruction. It was sinful to live in a political confederacy which tolerated slavery in any of the States composing it;
and if this could not be eradicated, it would become a sacred
duty for the free States to separate from their guilty associates.
This doctrine of the higher law was preached from the pulpits
and disseminated in numerous publications throughout New
England. At the first, it was regarded with contempt as the
work of misguided fanatics. Ere long, however, it enlisted numerous and enthusiastic partisans. These were animated with
indomitable zeal in a cause they deemed so holy. They constituted the movement party, and went ahead; because, whether
from timidity or secret sympathy, the conservative masses failed
in the beginning to resist its progress in an active and determined spirit.
The anti-slavery party in its career never stopped to reflect
that slavery was a domestic institution, exclusively under the
control of the sovereign States where it existed; and therefore,
if sinful in itself, it was certainly not the sin of the people of
New England. With equal justice might conscience have impelled citizens of Massachusetts to agitate for the suppression
of slavery in Brazil as in South Carolina. In both cases they
were destitute of all rightful power over the subject.
The Constitution having granted to Congress no power over
slavery in the States, the abolitionists were obliged to resort to
indirect means outside of the Constitution to accomplish their
object. The most powerful of these was anti-slavery agitation:
agitation for the double purpose of increasing the number of
their partisans at home, and of exciting a spirit of discontent and
resistance among the slaves of the South. This agitation was
conducted by numerous anti-slavery societies scattered over the
North. It was a new and important feature of their organization that women were admitted as members. Sensitive and enthusiastic in their nature against wrong, and believing slavery to
be a mortal sin, they soon became public speakers, in spite of the
injunctions of an inspired apostle; and their harangues were
quite as violent and extreme as those of their fathers, husbands,
and brothers. Their influence as mothers was thus secured and
directed to the education of the rising generation in anti-slavery
principles. Never was an organization planned and conducted
with greater skill and foresight for the eventual accomplishment
of its object.
The New England Anti-Slavery Society was organized in
Boston on January 30th, 1832; that of New York in October,
1833; and the National Society wasorganized in Philadelphia
in December, 1833. Affiliated societies soon became numerous.
After the formation of the New England society the agitation
against Southern slavery proceeded with redoubled vigor, and
this under the auspices of British emissaries. One of the first
and most pernicious effects of these proceedings was to arrest
the natural progress of emancipation under legitimate State
authority.
When this agitation commenced, the subject of such emancipation was freely discussed in the South, and especially in the
grain-growing border States, and had enlisted numerous and
powerful advocates. In these States the institution had become
unprofitable. According to the witty and eccentric Virginian, Mr.
Randolph, if the slave did not soon run away from the master,
the master would run away from the slave. Besides, at this
period nobody loved slavery for its own sake.
Virginia, whose example has always exercised great influence
on her sister States, was, in 1832, on the verge of emancipation.1
The current was then running strong in its favor throughout the
State. Many of the leading men, both the principal newspapers,
and probably a majority of the people sustained the policy
and justice of emancipation. Numerous petitions in its favor
were presented to the General Assembly. Mr. Jefferson Randolph, a worthy grandson of President Jefferson, and a delegate
from one of the largest slaveholding counties of the commonwealth (Albemarle), brought forward a bill in the House to accomplish the object. This was fully and freely discussed, and
was advocated by many prominent members. Not a voice
was raised throughout the debate in favor of slavery. Mr. Randolph, finding the Legislature not quite prepared for so decisive a measure, did not press it to a final vote; but yet the House
resolved, by a majority of 65 to 58, "that they were profoundly
sensible of the great evils arising from the condition of the colored population of the commonwealth, and were induced by policy
as well as humanity to attempt the immediate removal of the free
negroes; but that further action for the removal of the slaves
should await a more definite development of public opinion."
1. Letter of Geo. W. Randolph to Nahum Capen, of 18th April, 1851.
Mr. Randolph's course was approved by his constituents, and
at the next election he was returned by them as a member of the
House of Delegates, on this very question. Unfortunately, at
this moment the anti-slavery agitation in New England began
to assume an alarming aspect for the peace and security of the
Southern people. In consequence, they denounced it as a foreign
and dangerous interference with rights which the Constitution
had left exclusively under their own control. An immediate and
powerful reaction against emancipation by State authority was
the result, and this good cause, to which so many able and
patriotic Southern men had been devoted, was sacrificed.
Mr. Randolph himself, a short time thereafter, expressed a
confident belief to the author, that but for this interference, the
General Assembly would, at no distant day, have passed a law
for gradual emancipation. He added, so great had been the revulsion of public sentiment in Virginia, that no member of that
body would now dare to propose such a measure.
The abolitionists became bolder and bolder as they advanced.
They did not hesitate to pervert the Post Office Department of
the Government to the advancement of their cause. Through
its agency, at an early period, they scattered throughout
the slaveholding States pamphlets, newspapers, and pictorial
representations of an incendiary character, calculated to arouse
the savage passions of the slaves to servile insurrection. So
alarming had these efforts become to the domestic peace of the
South, that General Jackson recommended they should be prohibited by law, under severe penalties. He said, in his annual
message of 2d December, 1835: "I must also invite your attention
to the painful excitement produced in the South by attempts to
circulate, through the mails, inflammatory appeals addressed to
the passions of the slaves, in prints, and in various sorts of publications, calculated to stimulate them to insurrection and to produce all the horrors of a servile war." 1 And he also commended to
the special attention of Congress "the propriety of passing such a
law as will prohibit, under severe penalties, the circulation in the
Southern States, through the mails, of incendiary publications intended to instigate the slaves to insurrection." 2
A bill for this purpose was reported to the Senate, but after a
long and animated debate, it was negatived, on the 8th of June,
1836, by a vote of 19 to 25.1 It is worthy of remark, that even
at this early period not a single Senator from New England,
whether political friend or opponent of General Jackson, voted
in favor of the measure he had so emphatically recommended.
All the Senators from that portion of the Union, under the lead
of Messrs. Webster and Davis, of Massachusetts, denied to Congress the Constitutional power of passing any law to prevent the
abolitionists from using our own mails to circulate incendiary
documents throughout the slaveholding States, even though
these were manifestly intended to promote servile insurrection
and civil war within their limits. The power and duty of Congress to pass the bill were earnestly urged by Mr. Buchanan,
then a Senator from Pennsylvania, in opposition to the objections
of Mr. Webster.
1. Senate Journal, June 2, 1836, pp. 399, 400, and Con. Globe of June 8, 1836.
This anti-slavery agitation in New England was prosecuted by
other and different agencies. The pulpit, the press, State Legislatures, State and county conventions, anti-slavery societies,
and abolition lectures were all employed for this purpose.
Prominent among them were what were called, in the language of the day, abolition petitions.
Throughout the session of 1835-'6, and for several succeeding
sessions, these petitions incessantly poured in to Congress. They
prayed for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia,
and in the forts, magazines, arsenals, and dockyards of the United
States within the slaveholding States. They also protested
against the admission of any new slaveholding State into the
Union, and some of them went even so far as to petition for a
dissolution of the Union itself.
These petitions were signed by hundreds of thousands of men,
women, and children. In them slavery was denounced as a national sin and a national disgrace. Every epithet was employed
calculated to arouse the indignation of the Southern people. The
time of Congress was wasted in violent debates on the subject of
slavery. In these it would be difficult to determine which of the
opposing parties was guilty of the greatest excess. Whilst the
South threatened disunion unless the agitation should cease, the
North treated such threats with derision and defiance. It became manifest to every reflecting man that two geographical
parties, the one embracing the people north and the other those
south of Mason and Dixon's line, were in rapid process of formation--an event so much dreaded by the Father of his
Country.
It is easy to imagine the effect of this agitation upon the proud,
sensitive, and excitable people of the South. One extreme naturally begets another. Among the latter there sprung up a party
as fanatical in advocating slavery as were the abolitionists of the
North in denouncing it. At the first, and for a long time, this
party was small in numbers, and found it difficult to excite the
masses to support its extreme views. These Southern fanatics,
instead of admitting slavery to be an evil in itself, pronounced
it to be a great good. Instead of admitting that it had been reluctantly recognized by the Constitution as an overruling political necessity, they extolled it as the surest support of freedom
among the white race. If the fanatics of the North denounced
slavery as evil and only evil, and that continually, the fanatics
of the South upheld it as fraught with blessings to the slave as
well as to his master. Far different was the estimation in which
it was held by Southern patriots and statesmen both before and
for many years after the adoption of the Constitution. These
looked forward hopefully to the day when, with safety both to
the white and black race, it might be abolished by the people
of the slaveholding States themselves, who alone possessed the
power.
The late President, as a Senator of the United States, from
December, 1834, until March, 1845, lost no opportunity of warning his countrymen of the danger to the Union from a persistence in this anti-slavery agitation, and of beseeching them to
suffer the people of the South to manage their domestic affairs
in their own way. All they desired, to employ their oft-repeated language, was "to be let alone." With a prophetic vision, at
so early a period as the 9th March, 1836, he employed the following language in the Senate: "Sir," said Mr. B., "this question of domestic slavery is the weak point in our institutions.
Tariffs may be raised almost to prohibition, and then they may
be reduced so as to yield no adequate protection to the manufacturer; our Union is sufficiently strong to endure the shock.
Fierce political storms may arise--the moral elements of the
country may be convulsed by the struggles of ambitious men for
the highest honors of the Government--the sunshine does not
more certainly succeed the storm, than that all will again be
peace. Touch this question of slavery seriously--let it once be
made manifest to the people of the South that they cannot live
with us, except in a state of continual apprehension and alarm
for their wives and their children, for all that is near and dear to
them upon the earth--and the Union is from that moment dissolved. It does not then become a question of expediency, but
of self-preservation. It is a question brought home to the fireside, to the domestic circle of every white man in the Southern
States. This day, this dark and gloomy day for the Republic,
will, I most devoutly trust and believe, never arrive. Although,
in Pennsylvania, we are all opposed to slavery in the abstract,
yet we will never violate the Constitutional compact which we
have made with our sister States. Their rights will be held
sacred by us. Under the Constitution it is their own question,
and there let it remain." 1
1. Gales and Seaton's Register of Debates, vol. xii., part 1, 1835-'6, p. 781.
A new source of anti-slavery agitation was about this time
opened against the execution of the old Fugitive Slave Law, passed
in February, 1793.
This was greatly increased by the decision of the Supreme
Court of the United States, at the January term, 1842, in the case
of Prigg vs. the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.1 It is true,
the opinion of the Court, delivered by Mr. Justice Story,
explicitly affirmed the Constitutional right of the master
to recover his fugitive slave in any State to which he had fled.
It even went so far as to clothe the master himself "with full
authority, in every State of the Union, to seize and recapture
his slave, wherever he can do it without a breach of the peace
or any illegal violence." After these strong affirmations it becomes necessary to state the reason why this decision became the
occasion of increased anti-slavery agitation.
1. 16 Peters, 539.
The act of 17931 authorized and required State judges and
magistrates, in common with judges of the United States, to
carry its provisions into effect. At the date of its passage no
doubt was entertained of the power of Congress to direct this
duty to be performed by appropriate State authorities. From
the small number of Federal judges in each State, and their distance from each other, the masters, in almost every instance, resorted to the magistrate of the " county, city, or town corporate,"
where the slave had been arrested. Before him the necessary proof
was made, and, upon being satisfied, he granted a certificate to the
master, which was a sufficient warrant under the law "for removing the said fugitive from labor to the State or Territory
from which he or she fled." These State magistrates, were familiar to the people of the respective localities, and their duties
were performed in a satisfactory manner, and with but little
complaint or commotion. This continued to be the practice
until the opinion of the Court in the case of Prigg was pronounced. In this it was decided that State magistrates were
not bound to perform these duties; and the question whether
they would do so or not, was left entirely to their own discretion.
It was thus rendered competent for State Legislatures to prohibit their own functionaries from aiding in the execution of the
Fugitive Slave Act.
1. * 1 U. S. L. 302.
Then commenced a furious agitation against the execution
of this so-called "sinful and inhuman" law. State magistrates
were prevailed upon by the abolitionists to refuse their agency in
carrying it into effect. The Legislatures of several States, in
conformity with this decision, passed laws prohibiting these
magistrates and other State officials from assisting in its execution. The use of the State jails was denied for the safe-keeping of the fugitives. Personal Liberty Bills were passed, interposing insurmountable obstacles to the recovery of slaves. Every
means which ingenuity could devise was put in operation to
render the law a dead letter. Indeed, the excitement against it
rose so high that the life and liberty of the master who pursued
his fugitive slave into a free State were placed in imminent peril.
For this he was often imprisoned, and, in some instances,
murdered.
The Fugitive Slave Law, although passed under the administration of Washington for the purpose of carrying into effect a
plain, clear, and mandatory provision of the Constitution, was
set at naught. And this was done in the face of a well-known
historical fact, that without such a provision the Constitution itself never could have existed. Without this law the slaveholder
would have had no remedy to enforce his Constitutional right.
There would have been no security for his property. If the
slave, by simply escaping across a State line, could make himself free, the guarantees of the Constitution in favor of the master would be effectually abolished. These very guarantees were
rendered practically of little or no avail, by the decision of the
Court in the case of Prigg vs. Pennsylvania, declaring that the
Congress of 1793 had violated the Constitution by requiring
State magistrates to aid in executing the law.
We have no disposition to dispute the binding force of this
decision, although made by a bare majority against the opinion
of Chief-Justice Taney and three other judges. It was nevertheless pronounced by the Constitutional tribunal in the last resort, and therefore challenges the obedience, if not the approval,
of every law-abiding citizen.
Mr. Justice Story himself seems to have clearly and complacently foreseen the injurious consequences to the rights of the
slaveholder which would result from his decision. In his
biography, written by his son (vol. ii., p. 392), it is stated: "But
in establishing, contrary to the opinion of four of the judges, that
the extradition of fugitive slaves is exclusively within the jurisdiction of the Federal Government, and that the State Legislatures are prohibited from interfering, even to assist in giving
effect to the clause in the Constitution on this subject; he (Judge
Story) considered that a great point had been gained for liberty;
so great a point, indeed, that, on his return from Washington, he
repeatedly and earnestly spoke of it to his family and his intimate friends as being 'a triumph of freedom.'"
Again (page 394): "Nor were these views contradicted by
subsequent experience. From the day of the decision of Prigg
vs. the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the act of 1793 was," says
his biographer, "a dead letter in the free States."
The slaveholders, thus deprived of their rights, began to
threaten secession from the Union. They contended that, the
people of the Northern States having violated the Constitution
in a fundamental provision necessary to their peace and safety,
they of the South, according to the settled rules governing the
construction of all contracts, whether between States or individuals, had a right to rescind it altogether.
In 1846, in the midst of the agitation against the Fugitive
Slave Law, came that on the Wilmot Proviso. This asserted it
to be the right and duty of Congress to prohibit the people of the
Southern States from emigrating with their slave property to the
common territory of the United States, which might be acquired
by the war with Mexico. Thus was raised anew the question in
regard to slavery in the territories, which has since proved so
fatal.
In May, 1846, the existence of war with Mexico, by the act
of that Republic, was recognized by Congress, and measures were
adopted for its prosecution.1
* Act of 13th May, 1846; 9 U. S. S. at Large, p. 9.
On the 4th of August, 1846, near the close of the session,1
President Polk, desirous of restoring peace as speedily as possible, and of adjusting the boundaries between the two Republics
in a satisfactory manner, asked Congress for a small contingent
appropriation, to be applied to this purpose, which it might or
might not become necessary to employ before their next meeting. Accordingly, on the 8th of August a bill was presented to
the House granting the President $2,000,000.
To this bill Mr. Wilmot offered his proviso as an amendment.2 The proviso declared "That, as an express and fundamental condition to the acquisition of any territory from the
Republic of Mexico by the United States, by virtue of any treaty
which may be negotiated between them, and to the use by the
Executive of the moneys herein appropriated, neither slavery nor
involuntary servitude shall ever exist in any part of said territory, except for crime, whereof the party shall first be duly convicted."
Had this proviso been never so proper in itself, it was both
out of time and out of place. Out of time, because, whether any
treaty could be made acquiring territory from Mexico, was future and contingent; and in fact that of Guadalupe Hidalgo,
under which we acquired Upper California and New Mexico,
was not concluded until almost eighteen months thereafter.1
But Mr. Wilmot was so eager to introduce this new subject
for anti-slavery agitation, that he could not await the regular
course of events.
1. Treaty, Feb. 2, 1848; 9 U. S. Statutes at Large, 922.
The proviso was also out of place in an appropriation bill
confined to a single important object, because it was calculated
to defeat, as it actually did defeat, the appropriation. It was a
firebrand recklessly and prematurely cast among the free and
slave States, at a moment when a foreign war was raging, in
which all were gallantly fighting, side by side, to conquer an
honorable peace. This was the moment selected, long in advance, to announce to the people of the slaveholding States
that if we should acquire any new territory by our common
blood and treasure, they should forever be prohibited from entering any portion of it with by far the most valuable part of
their property.
The introduction of this proviso instantly caused the flames
of fanaticism to burn with more intense ardor, both North and
South, than they had ever done before. How wise is the Divine
maxim, that "sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof"!
The new territory afterwards acquired from Mexico, being
outside of the ancient province of Louisiana, was not embraced
by the Missouri Compromise. The late President, then Secretary of State, strongly urged the extension of the line of 36 30'
through this territory to the Pacific Ocean, as the best mode of
adjustment. He believed that its division by this ancient line,
to which we had been long accustomed, would be more just in
itself, and more acceptable to the people, both North and South,
than any new plan which could be devised.1
1.Letter to Berks County, Aug. 25, 1847.
This proposal was defeated by the Wilmot Proviso. That
ill-starred measure continued to be forced upon the consideration of Congress, as well as of State Legislatures, session after session, in various forms. Whilst Northern Legislatures were passing resolutions instructing their Senators and requesting their
Representatives to vote for the Wilmot Proviso, Southern Legislatures and conventions were passing resolutions pledging
themselves to measures of resistance.
The interposition of the proviso, in season and out of season,
and the violent and protracted debates to which it gave rise, defeated the establishment of territorial governments in California
and New Mexico throughout the whole of the thirtieth Congress (1847-'8 and 1848-'9). Meanwhile it placed the two sections
of the Union in hostile array against each other. The people of
the one, instead of regarding those of the other as brethren, were
converted into deadly enemies. At the meeting of the thirty-
first Congress (December, 1849) serious apprehensions were everywhere entertained, among the most enlightened and purest patriots, for the safety of the Union. The necessity was admitted
by all that measures should be adopted to ward off the impending danger.