n favor of the
gradual abolition of slavery in all the states. This could not
have been effected under our constitution but for the Rebellion,
so that, in truth, South Carolina, unwittingly, led to the only
way by which slavery could be abolished in the present century.

The existence of slavery in a republic founded upon the declaration
that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their
creator with certain inalienable rights, and that among them are
life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, is an anomaly so pregnant
with evil that it is not strange that while it existed it was the
chief cause of all the serious contentions that threatened the life
of the republic. The framers of the constitution, finding slavery
in existence in nearly all the states, carefully avoided mention
of it in that instrument, but they provided against the importation
of slaves after a brief period, and evidently anticipated the
eventual prohibition of slavery by the voluntary action of the
several states. This process of prohibition occurred until one-
half of the states became free, when causes unforeseen made slavery
so profitable that it dominated in the states where it existed,
and dictated the policy of the United States. The first controversy
about slavery was happily settled by the Missouri Compromise of
1820. But a greater danger arose from the acquisition of territory
from Mexico. This, too, was postponed by the compromise of 1850,
but unhappily, within four years, the repeal of the Missouri
Compromise re-opened the controversy that led to the struggle in
Kansas. Douglas prescribed the doctrine of popular sovereignty.
Davis contended that slaves were property and must be protected by
law like other property. Lincoln declared that "a house divided
against itself cannot stand," that slavery must be lawful or unlawful
in all the states, alike north as well as south. Seward said that
an irrepressible conflict existed between opposing and enduring
forces, that the United States must and would become either entirely
a slaveholding nation or entirely a free labor nation. Kansas
became a free state in spite of Buchanan and then the conflict
commenced. The southern states prepared for secession. Lincoln
became President. The war came by the act of the south and ended
with the destruction of slavery. This succession of events,
following in due order, was the natural sequence of the existence
of slavery in the Unit