the same distance from me in Ohio, would probably
sell from one to five hundred dollars per acre. I was told by a
friend, a few days before I left home, who had formerly resided in the
county of Bourbon, Kentucky--a most excellent county of lands
adjoining, I believe, the county in which the Senator resides--that
the white population of that county was more than four hundred less
than it was five years since. Will the Senator contend, after a
knowledge of these facts, that slavery in this country has been the
cause of our prosperity and happiness? No, he cannot. It is because
slavery has been excluded and driven from a large proportion of our
country, that we are a prosperous and happy people. But its late
attempts to force its influence and power into the free States, and
deprive our citizens of their unquestionable rights, has been the
moving cause of all the riots, burnings, and murders that have taken
place on account of abolitionism; and it has, in some degree, even in
the free States, caused mourning, lamentation, and woe. Remove
slavery, and the country, the whole country, will recover its natural
vigor, and our peace and future prosperity will be placed on a more
extensive, safe, and sure foundation. It is a waste of time to answer
the allegations that the emancipation of the negro race would induce
them to make war on the white race. Every fact in the history of
emancipation proves the reverse; and he that will not believe those
facts, has darkened his own understanding, that the light of reason
can make no impression: he appeals to interest, not to truth, for
information on this subject. We do not fear his errors, while we are
left free to combat them. The Senator implores us to cease all
commotion on this subject. Are we to surrender all our rights and
privileges, all the official stations of the country, into the hands
of the slaveholding power, without a single struggle? Are we to cease
all exertions for our own safety, and submit in quiet to the rule of
this power? Is the calm of despotism to reign over this land, and the
voice of freemen to be no more heard! This sacrifice is required of
us, in order to sustain slavery. _Freemen_, will you make it? Will you
shut your ears and your sympathies, and withhold from the poor,
famished slave, a morsel of bread? Can you thus act, and expect the
blessings of heaven upon your country? I beseech you to consider for
yourselves.

Mr. President, I have been compelled