istency"
presented by men who had "the Declaration of Independence on their
lips and the merciless scourge of slavery in their hands." "Never," he
says, "since human sentiments and human conduct were influenced by
human speech was there a theme for eloquence like the free side of
this question.... Oh, if but one man could arise with a genius capable
of comprehending, and an utterance capable of communicating those
eternal truths that belong to this question, to lay bare in all its
nakedness that outrage upon the goodness of God, human slavery; (p. 121)
now is the time and this is the occasion, upon which such a man would
perform the duties of an angel upon earth." Before the Abolitionists
had begun to preach their great crusade this was strong and ardent
language for a statesman's pen. Nor were these exceptional passages;
there is much more of the same sort at least equally forcible. Mr.
Adams notes an interesting remark made to him by Calhoun at this time.
The great Southern chief, less prescient than Mr. Adams, declared that
he did not think that the slavery question "would produce a
dissolution of the Union; but if it should, the South would be from
necessity compelled to form an alliance offensive and defensive with
Great Britain."

Concerning a suggestion that civil war might be preferable to the
extension of slavery beyond the Mississippi, Adams said: "This is a
question between the rights of human nature and the Constitution of
the United States"--a form of stating the case which leaves no doubt
concerning his ideas of the intrinsic right and wrong in the matter.
His own notion was that slavery could not be got rid of within the
Union, but that the only method would be dissolution, after which he
trusted that the course of events would in time surely lead to
reorganization upon the basis of universal freedom for all. He (p. 122)
was not a disunionist in any sense, yet it is evident that his strong
tendency and inclination were to regard emancipation as a weight in
the scales heavier than union, if it should ever come to the point of
an option between the two.

Strangely enough the notion of a forcible retention of the slave
States within the Union does not seem to have been at this time a
substantial element of consideration. Mr. Adams acknowledged that
there was no way at once of preserving the Union and escaping from the
present emergency save through the door of compromise. He maintained
strenuously