rsonal recollection of every Senator who was here
during the discussion of those compromise acts disproves? I will not
believe it until I see it. If you wish to break up the time-honored
compact embodied in the Missouri compromise, transferred into the joint
resolution for the annexation of Texas, preserved and affirmed by these
compromise acts themselves, do it openly--do it boldly. Repeal the
Missouri prohibition. Repeal it by a direct vote. Do not repeal it by
indirection. Do not "declare" it "inoperative," "because superseded by
the principles of the legislation of 1850."

Mr. President, three great eras have marked the history of this country
in respect to slavery. The first may be characterized as the Era of
ENFRANCHISEMENT. It commenced with the earliest struggles for national
independence. The spirit which inspired it animated the hearts and
prompted the efforts of Washington, of Jefferson, of Patrick Henry, of
Wythe, of Adams, of Jay, of Hamilton, of Morris--in short, of all the
great men of our early history. All these hoped for, all these labored
for, all these believed in, the final deliverance of the country
from the curse of slavery. That spirit burned in the Declaration of
Independence, and inspired the provisions of the Constitution, and the
Ordinance of 1787. Under its influence, when in full vigor, State after
State provided for the emancipation of the slaves within their limits,
prior to the adoption of the Constitution. Under its feebler influence
at a later period, and during the administration of Mr. Jefferson, the
importation of slaves was prohibited into Mississippi and Louisiana, in
the faint hope that those Territories might finally become free States.
Gradually that spirit ceased to influence our public councils, and lost
its control over the American heart and the American policy. Another
era succeeded, but by such imperceptible gradations that the lines which
separate the two cannot be traced with absolute precision. The facts of
the two eras meet and mingle as the currents of confluent streams mix
so imperceptibly that the observer cannot fix the spot where the meeting
waters blend.

This second era was the Era of CONSERVATISM. Its great maxim was to
preserve the existing condition. Men said: Let things remain as they
are; let slavery stand where it is; exclude it where it is not; refrain
from disturbing the public quiet by agitation; adjust all difficulties
that arise, not by the applicat