ially
the boundary claims of Texas, and declared that the character of every
part of the country, so far as slavery or freedom was concerned, was now
settled, either by law or nature, and that he should resist the insertion
of the Wilmot Proviso in regard to New Mexico, because it would be merely a
wanton taunt and reproach to the South. He then spoke of the change of
feeling and opinion both at the North and the South in regard to slavery,
and passed next to the question of mutual grievances. He depicted at length
the grievances of the South, including the tone of the Northern press, the
anti-slavery resolutions of the Legislature, the utterances of the
abolitionists, and the resistance to the Fugitive Slave Law. The last,
which he thought the only substantial and legally remediable complaint, he
dwelt on at great length, and severely condemned the refusal of certain
States to comply with this provision of the Constitution. Then came the
grievances of the North against the South, which were dealt with very
briefly. In fact, the Northern grievances, according to Mr. Webster,
consisted of the tone of the Southern press and of Southern speeches which,
it must be confessed, were at times a little violent and somewhat
offensive. The short paragraph reciting the unconstitutional and
high-handed action of the South in regard to free negroes employed as
seamen on Northern vessels, and the outrageous treatment of Mr. Hoar at
Charleston in connection with this matter, was not delivered, Mr. Giddings
says, but was inserted afterwards and before publication, at the suggestion
of a friend. After this came the fine burst about secession, and a
declaration of faith that the Southern convention called at Nashville would
prove patriotic and conciliatory. The speech concluded with a strong appeal
in behalf of nationality and union.

Mr. Curtis correctly says that a great majority of Mr. Webster's
constituents, if not of the whole North, disapproved this speech. He might
have added that that majority has steadily increased. The popular verdict
has been given against the 7th of March speech, and that verdict has passed
into history. Nothing can now be said or written which will alter the fact
that the people of this country who maintained and saved the Union have
passed judgment upon Mr. Webster and condemned what he said on the 7th of
March, 1850, as wrong in principle and mistaken in policy. This opinion is
not universal,--no opinion is,