tates are free, and when the progress of civilization has
arrayed the world against slavery? If the love of peace and ease,
and office, should tempt politicians and merchants to do it, the
people will rebel. I assure you, whatever may be the consequence,
they will not yield their moral convictions by strengthening the
influence of slavery in this country. Recent events have only
deepened this feeling.

"The struggle to establish slavery in Kansas; the frequent murders
and mobbings, in the south, of northern citizens; the present
turbulence and violence of southern society; the manifest fear of
the freedom of speech and of the press; the danger of insurrection;
and now the attempt to subvert the government rather than submit
to a constitutional election--these events, disguise it as you may,
have aroused a counter irritation in the north that will not allow
its representatives to yield merely for peace, more than is prescribed
by the letter and spirit of the constitution. Every guarantee of
this instrument ought to be faithfully and religiously observed.
But when it is proposed to change it, to secure new guarantees to
slavery, to extend and protect it, you invoke and arouse the anti-
slavery feeling of the north to war against slavery everywhere.

"I am, therefore, opposed to any change in the constitution, and
to any compromise that will surrender any of the principles sanctioned
by the people in the recent contest. If the personal-liberty bills
of any state infringe upon the constitution, they should at once
be repealed. Most of them have slumbered upon the statute book
for years. They are now seized upon, by those who are plotting
disunion, as a pretext. We should give them no pretext. It is
always right and proper for each state to apply to state laws the
test of the constitution.

"It is a remarkable fact that neither of the border free states--
New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, nor Iowa--have
any such upon their statute books. The laws of these states,
against kidnapping, are similar to those of Virginia and Kentucky.
The laws of other states, so-called, have never operated to release
a single fugitive slave, and may be regarded simply as a protest
of those states against the harsh features of the fugitive slave
law. So far as they infringe upon the constitution, or impair, in
the least, a constitutional right, they are void and ought to be
repealed.

"I venture the assertion that