as a single example where
the true principles of all law have been so irrationally defied.

To make a law final, so as not to be reached by Congress, is, by mere
legislation, to fasten a new provision on the Constitution. Nay, more;
it gives to the law a character which the very Constitution does not
possess. The wise Fathers did not treat the country as a Chinese foot,
never to grow after infancy; but, anticipating progress, they
declared expressly that their great Act is not final. According to the
Constitution itself, there is not one of its existing provisions--not
even that with regard to fugitives from labor--which may not at all
times be reached by amendment, and thus be drawn into debate. This
is rational and just. Sir, nothing from man's hands, nor law, nor
constitution, can be final. Truth alone is final.

Inconsistent and absurd, this effort is tyrannical also. The
responsibility for the recent Slave Act, and for slavery everywhere
within the jurisdiction of Congress, necessarily involves the right to
discuss them. To separate these is impossible. Like the twenty-fifth
rule of the House of Representatives against petitions on Slavery,--now
repealed and dishonored,--the Compromise, as explained and urged, is a
curtailment of the actual powers of legislation, and a perpetual
denial of the indisputable principle, that the right to deliberate is
coextensive with the responsibility for an act. To sustain Slavery it
is now proposed to trample on free speech. In any country this would be
grievous; but here, where the Constitution expressly provides against
abridging freedom of speech, it is a special outrage. In vain do we
condemn the despotisms of Europe, while we borrow the rigors with which
they repress Liberty, and guard their own uncertain power. For myself,
in no factious spirit, but solemnly and in loyalty to the Constitution,
as a Senator of the United States, representing a free Commonwealth, I
protest against this wrong.

On Slavery, as on every other subject, I claim the right to be heard.
That right I cannot, I will not abandon. "Give me the liberty to
know, to utter, and to argue freely according to conscience, above
all liberties"; these are glowing words, flashed from the soul of John
Milton in his struggles with English tyranny. With equal fervor they
could be echoed now by every American not already a slave.

But, Sir, this effort is impotent as tyrannical. Convictions of the
heart cannot be rep