Mr. BRECKINRIDGE then rose. He had last night understood Mr. Thompson to say, that this evening he would take up and expose the colonization scheme. It was possible that he had been wrong in this; but such was certainly the impression made upon his mind. Instead of adopting such a course, however, Mr. Thompson had treated them to a second edition of his last night's speech the only difference being that the one they had just heard was more elaborate. If they were to be called on to hear all Mr. Thompson's speeches twice, it would be a considerable time before they finished the discussion. He congratulated Mr. Thompson on his second edition, being in some respects an improvement, on his first. It was certainly better arranged. In the observations he was about to make, he would follow the course of the argument exhibited in Mr. Thompson's two speeches; but he, at the same time, wished it to be understood that he would not be cast out of the line of discussion every night in the same manner. As to what had been said about the 'handful,' he did not think it necessary to say much. He would simply remind Mr. T., that however great or however small the 'handful' might be, one pervading evil might pollute it all. A dead fly could cause the ointment of the apothecary to stink. But to come to the point. Mr. Thompson had said that the question was national as it respected America, because slaveholding states had been admitted into the confederacy. The simple fact of these states having been admitted members of the Union, was, in Mr. Thompson's estimation, proof sufficient, not only that slavery was chargeable on the whole nation, but that there had been a positive predilection among the American people in favor of slavery. In clearing up this point, a little chronological knowledge would help us. He would therefore call the attention of the audience to the real state of matters when the confederacy was established. At that period, Massachusetts was the only State in which slavery had been abolished; and even in Massachusetts its formal abolition was not effected till some time after. For in that State it came to an end in consequence of a clause inserted in the Constitution itself – tantamount to the one in our Declaration of Independence, that freedom is a natural and inalienable right. Successive judicial decisions, upon this clause, without any special legislation, had abolished slavery there; so that the exact period of its actual termination is not easily definable. This recalls another point on which Mr. Thompson would have been the better of possessing a little chronological information. He had repeatedly stated that the American Constitution was founded on the principle, that all men are created free and equal. Now, this was not so. The principle was no doubt, a just one; it was asserted most fully by the Continental Congress of 1776, and might be said to form the basis of our Declaration of Independence. But it was not contained in the American Constitution, which was formed twelve years afterwards. That Constitution was formed in accordance with the circumstances in which the different states were placed. Its chief object was to guard against external injury, and regulate external affairs; it interfered as little as possible with the internal regulations of each state. The American was a federative system of government; twenty-four distinct republics were united for certain purposes, and for these alone. So far was the national government from possessing unlimited powers, that the Constitution itself was but a very partial grant of those, which, in their omnipotence, resided, according to our theory, only in the people themselves in their primary assemblies. It had been specially agreed in the Constitution itself, that the powers not delegated should be as expressly reserved, as if excepted by name; and, amongst the chief subjects, exclusively interior, and not delegated, and so reserved, is slavery. Had this not been the case, the confederacy could not have been formed. It had been said that the American Constitution had not only tolerated slavery, but that it had actually guaranteed the slave-trade for twenty years. Nothing could be more uncandid than this statement. Never had facts been more perverted. One of the causes of the American Revolution had been the refusal of the British King to sanction certain arrangements on which some of the states wished to enter, for the abolition of the slave-trade. At the formation of the Federal Constitution, while slavery was excluded from the control of Congress, as a purely state affair, the slave trade was deemed a fit subject, by the majority, for the executors of national power, as being an exterior affair. And at a period prior to the very commencement of that great plan of individual effort, guided by Wilberforce and Clarkson, in Britain; and which required twenty years to rouse the conscience of this nation – our distant, and now traduced fathers, had already made up their minds, that this horrid traffic, which they found not only existing, but encouraged by the whole power of the King, should be abolished. It was granted, perhaps too readily to the claims of those who thought, (as nearly the whole world thought) that twenty years should be the limit of the trade; and at the end of that period it was instantly prohibited, as a matter course, and by unanimous consent. How unjust then was it to charge on America, as a crime, what was one of the brightest virtues in her escutcheon. Mr. Thompson had next asserted, that slavery of the most horrid description existed in the Capital of America, and in the surrounding District, subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of Congress. He (Mr. Breckinridge) did not hesitate to deny this. It was not true. Slavery did exist there; but it was not of the horrible character which had been represented. It was well known that the slavery existing in the United States was the mildest to be seen in any country under Heaven. Nothing but the most profound ignorance could lead any one to assert the contrary. Mr. Thompson had a colleague in his recent exhibitions in London, who seemed to have taken interludes in all Mr. T's speeches. In one of these, that colleague had said, he knew of his own knowledge a case, in which a man had given $500 for a slave, in order to burn him alive! Mr. Thompson, no doubt knew, that even on the supposition that such a monster was to be found, he was liable in every part of the United States, to be hanged as any other murderer. Slavery was bad enough anywhere; but to say that it was more unmitigated in America than in the West Indies, where emigration had always been necessary to keep up the numbers, while in America, the slave population increased faster than any part of the human race, was a gross exaggeration, or a proof of the profoundest ignorance. To say that the slavery of the District of Columbia was the most horrid that ever existed, when it, along with the whole of the slavery on that continent, was so hedged about by human laws, that in every one of the states cruelty to the slave was punished as an offence against the state; the killing of a slave was punished every where with death; while in all ages, and nearly in all countries where slavery has existed besides, the master was not only the exclusive judge of the treatment of his slave, but the absolute disposer of his life, which he could take away at will; these statements can proceed only from unpardonable ignorance, or a purpose to mislead. As to the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, there might, at first sight, appear to be some grounds of accusation; but yet, when the subject was considered in all its bearings, so many pregnant, if not conclusive, reasons presented themselves against interference, that though much attention had been bestowed upon it for many years, the result had been that nothing was done. It was to be recollected that the whole District of Columbia was only ten miles square; and that it was surrounded by states in which slavery was still legalized. It was thus clear, that though slavery were abolished in Columbia, not an individual of the six thousand slaves now within its bounds, would necessarily be relieved of his fetters. Were an abolition bill to pass the House of Representatives to-day, the whole six thousand could be removed to a neighboring slave state before it could be taken up in the Senate to-morrow. It was, therefore, worse than idle to say so much on what could never be a practical question. Again; the District of Columbia had been ceded to the General Government by Maryland and Virginia, both slaveholding states, for national purposes; but this would never have been done had it been contemplated that Congress would abolish slavery within its bounds, and thus establish a nucleus of anti-slavery agitation in the heart of their territory. The exercise of such a power, therefore, on the part of Congress, could be viewed in no other light than as a gross fraud on those two states. It should never be forgotten that slavery can be abolished in any part of America only by the persuasive power of truth voluntarily submitted to the slaveholders themselves. And though much is said in that country, and still more here, about the criminality of the Northern States in not declaring that they would not aid in the suppression of a servile war – such declamation is worse than idle. But there is a frightful meaning in this unmeasured abuse heaped by Mr. Thompson on the people of the free states, for their expressions of devotion to the Union and the Constitution, and their determination to aid, if necessary, in suppressing by force – all force used by, or on behalf of the slaves. Is it then true, that Mr. Thompson and his American friends, did contemplate a servile war? If not, why denounce the North for saying it should be suppressed? Were the people of America right when they charged him and his co-workers with stirring up insurrection? If not, why lavish every epithet of contempt and abhorrence upon those who have declared their readiness to put a stop to the indiscriminate slaughter and pillage of a region as large as Western Europe? Such speeches as that I have this night heard go far to warrant all that has ever been said against this individual in America, and to excuse those who considered him a general disturber of their peace, and were disposed to proceed against him accordingly. It was, however, the opinion of many that Congress had no power to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia. Mr. B. said his opinion was different; yet it must be admitted that the obstacles to the exercise of this power were of the most serious kind, and such as, to a candid mind, would free those who hesitated, from the charge of being pro-slavery men. Perhaps the great reason against the exercise of that power, even if its existence in Congress were clear, was, that it would inevitably produce a dissolution of the Union. When he spoke of the free states bringing about the abolition of slavery in the South, he was to be understood as meaning that these states, in accordance with what had been so often hinted at, should march to the South with arms in their hands, and declare the slaves free. Now, even supposing that the people of the North had no regard for the peace of their country – that they were perfectly indifferent to the glory, the power, and the happiness resulting from the Federal Union – was it certain, that by adopting such a course, they would really advance the welfare of the slave? Every candid man would at once see that the condition of the slave population would be made more hopeless than ever by it. The fourth proof brought forward by Mr. Thompson, in support of his proposition that America was chargeable, in a national point of view, with the guilt of slavery, was the fact that the different states were bound to restore all run-away slaves. But this was a regulation which applied to the case of all servants who leave their masters in an improper manner. Apprentices, children, even wives, if it might be supposed that a wife would ever leave her husband, were to be restored as well as the slaves. Were this not provided, the different states would form to each other the most horrible neighborhood that could be imagined. No state is expected to say, that any man is of right or should be 'held to service' of any kind, in another state; for such are the words of the Constitution, But the purely internal arrangements of each state, must necessarily be respected by all the others; or eternal border wars must be the result. In the re-delivery of a run-away slave, or apprentice, therefore, the court of the one state is only required to say what are the law, and the fact of the other state from which the claimant comes, and to decide accordingly. And when Mr. T. says that this proceeding is not only contrary to the spirit of the gospel, but to the express command of God under the Jewish dispensation, I need only to defend the practice, by questioning his biblical capacities, and referring for explanation to his second printed speech before the Glasgow Emancipation Society. In that, he states a fictitious case as regards Ireland – resembling remarkably the case recorded in holy writ, of Egypt under the government of Joseph; and while all men have thought that Joseph came from God, and was peculiarly approved of him – Mr. T. has represented, that he who should do in Ireland, very much what Joseph did in Egypt, could be considered as coming only 'from America, or from the bottomless pit!!!' As long as the Holy Ghost gives men reason to consider certain principles right, they may be well content to abide under the wrath of Mr. Thompson. Mr. Thompson said, in the fifth place, that slavery was a national crime, because the states were all bound to assist each other, in suppressing internal insurrection. To this he would answer, that as it regarded the duty of the nation to the several states, there were two, and but two great guarantees – namely, the preservation of internal peace, and the upholding of republican institutions, tranquillity, and republicanism. Carolina was as much bound to assist Rhode Island as Rhode Island was to assist Carolina. All were mutually bound to each; and if things went on as of late, the South were as likely to be called on to suppress mobs at the North, as the North to suppress insurrection at the South. It was next advanced by Mr. T. that the people of the North were taxed for the support of slavery. Now, the fact was, that America presented the extraordinary spectacle of a nation free of taxes altogether; free of debt, with an overflowing Treasury, with so much money, indeed, that they did not well know what to do with it. It was almost needless to explain that the American revenue was at present and had been for many years past, derived solely from the sale of public lands, and from the customs or duties levied on imported articles of various kinds. The payment of these duties was entirely a voluntary tax, as in order to avoid it, it was only necessary to refrain from the use of articles on which they were imposed. As for Mr. T's argument about the standing army, employed in keeping down the slaves, its value might be judged from the fact, that, though even according to Mr. T's own showing, the slave population amounted to two and a half millions, the army was composed of only six thousand men, scattered along three frontiers, extending two thousand miles each. Throughout the whole slaveholding states there were not probably fifteen hundred soldiers. The charge was, in fact, complete humbug, founded upon just nothing at all. Mr. Thompson's seventh charge was, that Congress refused to suppress the internal slave-trade. This was easily answered. There was in America not one individual among five hundred who believed that Congress had the power to do so. And, although he (Mr. B.) believed that Congress had power to prevent the migration of slaves from state to state, as fully as they had to prevent the importation of them into the states from foreign countries; and that the exercise of this power, would prevent, in a great degree, the trade in slaves from state to state, yet very few concurred with him even in this modified view of the case. And it must be admitted that the exercise of such a power, if it really exists, would be attended with such results of unmixed evil at this time, that no one whatever would deem it proper to attempt, or possible to enforce its exercise. It was next said, that as Missouri, a slaveholding state, had been admitted into the Union after the full consideration of the subject by Congress, therefore the nation had become identified with slavery, and responsible for its existence, at least in Missouri. But on the supposition that, before receiving Missouri as a member of the confederacy, it had been demanded of her that she should abolish slavery; and supposing Missouri had acceded to the terms proposed, that she had really given her slaves freedom, and been added to the Federal Union in consequence: suppose Missouri had done all this; what was there to prevent her from re-establishing slavery so soon as the end she sought was gained. No power was possessed by the other states in the matter, and all that could have been said was, that Missouri had acted with bad faith – that she had broken a condition precedent – that she had given just cause of war. According to the most latitudinarian notions, this was the extent of the remedy in the hands of Congress. But Mr. Thompson, being a holder of peace principles – if we may judge by his published speeches – must admit it to be as really a sin to kill, as to enslave men; so that, in his own showing, this argument amounts to nothing. But when it is considered that every state in the American Union has the recognized right to alter its Constitution, when, and how it may think fit, saving only that it be republican; it is most manifest that Congress and the other states have, and could have in no case, any more power or right to prevent Missouri's continuing, or creating slavery, than they had to prevent Massachusetts from abolishing it. But, if we were to stand upon the mere rights of war, he (Mr. B.) did not know but that America had just cause of war against Britain, according to the received notions on that subject, in the speeches delivered by Mr. Thompson under the connivance of the authorities here. But the causes of war were very different in the opinions of men, and in the eye of God. If Mr. Thompson was right in condemning America for the guilt of Missouri, then they should go to war at once and settle the question. But, if they were not ready for this conclusion, they could do nothing. In the edition of Mr. Thompson's speech which had been delivered on the preceding evening, an argument had been adduced which was omitted in the present. The argument to which he referred, was concerning the right of the slaves to be represented. A slight consideration of the subject might have shown that the whole power over the subject of citizenship in each state, was exclusive in the state itself, and was differently regulated in different states. In some, the elective franchise was given to all who had attained the age of twenty-one. In some, it was made to depend on the possession of personal property; and in others, of real property. That in the Southern states, the power of voting should be given to the masters, and not to the slaves, was not calculated to excite surprise in Britain, where such a large proportion of the population, and that in a number of instances composed of men of high intelligence, were not entitled to the elective franchise. The origin of this arrangement, like many others involved in our social system, was a compromise of apparently conflicting interests in the states which were engaged in forming the Federal Constitution. The identity of taxation and representation, was the grand idea on which the nation went into the war of independence. When it was agreed that all white citizens, and three-fifths of all other persons, as the Constitution expresses it, should be represented, it followed of course, that they should be subject to taxation. Or, if it were first agreed that they should be taxed, it followed as certainly they should be represented. Who should actually cast the votes, was, of necessity, left to be determined by the states themselves, and as has been said, was variously determined; many permitting free negroes, Indians, and mulattos, who are all embraced, as well as slaves, to vote. That three-fifths, instead of any other part, or the whole should be agreed on, was, no doubt, the result of reasons which appeared conclusive to the wise and benevolent men who made the Constitution; but I am not able to tell what they were. It must, however, be very clear, that to accuse my country, in one breath, for treating the negroes, bond and free, as if they were not human beings at all – and to accuse her in the next, of fostering and encouraging slavery, for allowing so large a proportion of the blacks to be a part of the basis of national representation in all the states, and then, in the third, because the whole are not so treated, to be more abusive than ever – is merely to show plainly, how earnestly an occasion is sought to traduce America, and how hard it is to find one. He came now to the last charge. He himself, it seems, had admitted, on former occasions, that slavery was a national evil. He certainly did believe that the people of America, whether anti-slavery or pro-slavery, would be happier and better, in conscience and feelings, were slavery abolished. He believed that every interest would be benefited by such an event, whether political, moral, or social. The existence of slavery was one of the greatest evils of the world, but it was not the crime of all the world. Though, therefore, he considered slavery a national evil, it was not to be inferred that he viewed it as a national crime. The cogency of such an argument was equal to the candor of the citation on which it was founded. He would now come to matters rather more personal. In enumerating the great numbers of anti-slavery societies in America, Mr. Thompson had paraded one as formed in Kentucky, for the whole state. Now, he would venture to say that there were not ten persons in that whole State, holding anti-slavery principles, in the Garrison sense of the word. If this was to be judged a fair specimen of the hundreds of societies boasted of by Mr. Thompson, there would turn out but a beggarly account of them. He found also the name of Groton, Massachusetts, as the location of one of the societies in the boasted list. He had once preached, and spoken on the subject of slavery, in that sweet little village, and been struck with the scene of peace and happiness which it presented. He afterwards met the clergyman of that village in the city of Baltimore, and asked him what had caused him to leave the field of his labors. The clergyman answered, that the anti-slavery people had invaded his peaceful village, and transformed it into such a scene of strife that he preferred to leave it. And so it was. The pestilence, which, like a storm of fire and brimstone from hell, always followed the track of abolitionism, had overtaken many a peaceful village, and driven its pastor to seek elsewhere a field not yet blasted by it. He would conclude by remarking, that Mr. Thompson and he (Mr. B.) were now speaking, as it were, in the face of two worlds, for Western Europe was the world to America. And it was for England to know – that the opinion of America – that America which already contained a larger reading population than the whole of Britain – was as important to her, as hers could be to us. What he had said of Mr. Garrison and of Mr. Wright, he had said; and he was ready to answer for it in the face of God and man. But he had something else to do, he thanked God, than to go about the country carrying placards, ready to be produced on all occasions. Nor where he was known, was such a course needful, to establish what he said. When those gentlemen should make their appearance, in defence or explanation of what he had said, he would be the better able to judge – whether it would be proper for him to take any notice – and if any, what – of the defence for which Mr. Thompson had so frankly pledged himself. In the mean time, he would say to that gentleman himself, that his attempts at brow-beating were lost upon him.
Mr. THOMPSON said he should commence with the end of his opponent's speech, and notice what that gentleman had said in regard to the charges brought by him against William Lloyd Garrison and Elizur Wright. It appeared as if Mr. Breckinridge expected that, because in his own country his character for veracity stood high, that therefore, he was entitled, if he chose, to enter an assembly of twelve hundred persons in Great Britain, and utter the gravest charges against certain individuals 3,000 miles away, and when called upon as he had been for proof, that he had nothing to do but turn round and say, 'Why, I am not bound to furnish proof; let the parties accused demonstrate their innocence.' This was American justice with a vengeance. This might be Kentucky law, or Lynch law, but could hardly be called justice by any assembly of honest and impartial persons. Such justice might suit the neighborhood of Vicksburg, but it would not recommend itself to a Scotish audience. He (Mr. T.) would not undertake at this time the task of justifying the men who had been calumniated. He knew these gentlemen, and had no doubt when they heard the charges preferred against them in this country, they would be able and ready to clear themselves before the world. He would not say that Mr. Breckinridge did not himself believe the allegations to be true, but he would say that had that gentleman possessed a knowledge of the true character of those he had spoken against – had he known them as he (Mr. T.) knew them, he would have held them incapable of the dark deeds alleged against them. With regard to Mr. B's remarks upon the number of the slave population, the amount of the troops in the United States, and the existence of slavery in the district of Columbia, he must say that they were nothing but special pleadings; that the whole was a complete specimen of what the lawyers termed pettifogging. He (Mr. T.) was not prepared to hear a minister say that because only 1500 troops out of 6000 were found in the southern states, that, therefore, the nation was not implicated – that because, if the slavery of the district was abolished, there would be no fewer slaves in the country – that, therefore, the seat of government should not be cleansed from its abomination. He would remind his opponent that they were discussing a question of principle, and that the scriptures had declared that he who was unjust in the least, was unjust also in the greatest. Mr. Breckinridge had still cautiously avoided naming the parties in the United States who were responsible for the sin of Slavery. They were told that neither New Hampshire nor Massachusetts, nor any other of the Northern states were to blame; that the government was not to blame, nor, had it even yet been said, that the Southern states were to blame. Still the aggregate of the guilt belonged somewhere; and if the parties to whom reference had been made were to be exculpated, at whose door, he would ask, were the sin and shame of the system to be laid. The gentleman with whom he was debating had repeatedly told him (Mr. T.) that he did not understand 'the system.' He frankly confessed that he did not. It was a mystery of iniquity which he could not pretend to fathom; but he thought he might add that the Americans themselves, at least the Colonizationists, did not seem to understand it very well neither, for they had been operating for a very long time, without effecting any favorable change in the system. A word with regard to the representation of slaves in Congress. Mr. B. had spoken as if he had intended to have it understood, that the slaves were themselves benefited by that representation – that it was a partial representation of the slave population by persons in their interest. How stood the fact? The slaves were not at all represented as men, but as things. They swelled, it was true, the number of members upon the floor of Congress, but that extra number only helped to rivet their bonds tightly upon them, being as they were, in the interest of the tyrant, and themselves slaveholders, and not in the interest of the slaves. What said John Quincy Adams in his celebrated report on the Tariff: —
'The representation of the slave population in this House has, from the establishment of the Constitution of the United States, amounted to rather more than one-tenth of the whole number. In the present Congress (1833,) it is equivalent to twenty-two votes; in the next Congress it will amount to twenty-five. This is a combined and concentrated power, always operating to the support and exclusive favor of the slave-holding interest.'
Here was a mighty engine in the cause of oppression. It was a wicked misrepresentation to say that the slaves were benefited by such an arrangement. Instead of being a lever in their hands to aid them in the overthrow of the system which was crushing them, it was a vast addition of strength to the ranks of their tyrants, who went to Congress to cry down discussion, to cry up Lynch law, and shout Hail Columbia. Mr. Thompson then proceeded to give some account of the Maryland Colonization scheme.
The first movement on the subject was in March, 1831, when Mr. Brawner submitted the following resolutions to the Maryland Legislature, which were by that assembly adopted. He begged particular attention both to the letter and spirit of this document, exhibiting as it did, the feelings of 'the good people of the state' towards the colored population: —