g murdered, Lawrence was being destroyed for
the crime of freedom. It was the most prominent stronghold of liberty in
Kansas, and must give way to the all-dominating power of slavery. Only
two days ago, Judge Trumbull found it necessary to propose a bill in the
Senate to prevent a general civil war and to restore peace in Kansas.

We live in the midst of alarms; anxiety beclouds the future; we expect
some new disaster with each newspaper we read. Are we in a healthful
political state? Are not the tendencies plain? Do not the signs of the
times point plainly the way in which we are going? [Sensation.]

In the early days of the Constitution slavery was recognized, by South and
North alike, as an evil, and the division of sentiment about it was not
controlled by geographical lines or considerations of climate, but by
moral and philanthropic views. Petitions for the abolition of slavery were
presented to the very first Congress by Virginia and Massachusetts alike.
To show the harmony which prevailed, I will state that a fugitive slave
law was passed in 1793, with no dissenting voice in the Senate, and
but seven dissenting votes in the House. It was, however, a wise law,
moderate, and, under the Constitution, a just one. Twenty-five years
later, a more stringent law was proposed and defeated; and thirty-five
years after that, the present law, drafted by Mason of Virginia, was
passed by Northern votes. I am not, just now, complaining of this law, but
I am trying to show how the current sets; for the proposed law of 1817 was
far less offensive than the present one. In 1774 the Continental Congress
pledged itself, without a dissenting vote, to wholly discontinue the slave
trade, and to neither purchase nor import any slave; and less than three
months before the passage of the Declaration of Independence, the same
Congress which adopted that declaration unanimously resolved "that no
slave be imported into any of the thirteen United Colonies." [Great
applause.]

On the second day of July, 1776, the draft of a Declaration of
Independence was reported to Congress by the committee, and in it the
slave trade was characterized as "an execrable commerce," as "a piratical
warfare," as the "opprobrium of infidel powers," and as "a cruel war
against human nature." [Applause.] All agreed on this except South
Carolina and Georgia, and in order to preserve harmony, and from the
necessity of the case, these expressions were omitted. Indeed,