rogramme which related to Free-Trade, is thus
brought again to mind, the other part of that programme, which related
to Slavery, must not be neglected or overlooked. On this question they
had determined, as we have seen, to agitate without ceasing--having in
view, primarily, as already hinted, the extension of Slave territory and
the resulting increase of Slave power in the Land; and, ulteriorly, the
solidifying of that power, and Disunion of the Republic, with a view to
its conversion into an Oligarchy, if not a Monarchy.

The bitterness of the struggle over the admission of Missouri as a Slave
State in 1820, under the Missouri Compromise, was to be revived by the
Conspirators, at the earliest possible moment.

Accordingly in 1836--only three years after the failure of Nullification
in South Carolina, the Territory, of Arkansas was forced in as a Slave
State, and simultaneously the Slave-owning henchmen of the Conspirators,
previously settled there for the purpose, proclaimed the secession from
Mexico, and independence, of Texas. This was quickly followed, in 1844,
by Calhoun's hastily negotiated treaty of annexation with Texas; its
miscarriage in the Senate; and the Act of March 2, 1845--with its sham
compromise--consenting to the admission of Texas to the Union of States.

Then came the War with Mexico; the attempt by means of the Wilmot
proviso to check the growing territorial-greed and rapacity of the
Slave-power; and the acquisition by the United States, of California and
New Mexico, under the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848, which brought
Peace.

Then occurred the agitation over the organization of Territorial
governments for Oregon, California, and New Mexico, and the strong
effort to extend to the Pacific Ocean the Missouri-Compromise line of
36 30', and to extend to all future Territorial organizations the
principles of that compromise.

Then came the struggle in 1850, over the admission of California as a
State, and New Mexico and Utah to Territorial organization--ending in
the passage of Clay's Compromise measures of 1850.

Yet still the Southern Conspirators--whose forces, both in Congress and
out, were now well-disciplined, compacted, solidified, experienced, and
bigotedly enthusiastic and overbearing--were not satisfied. It was not
their intention to be satisfied with anything less than the destruction
of the Union and of our Republican form of Government. The trouble was
only beginning, a