just
where it is. They admit that, constitutionally, it has now a right to
ravage two-thirds of the body politic--but they protest against its
extension. This in moral quackery. Even some, whose zeal in the
Anti-Slavery cause is fervent, are so infatuated as to propose no
other remedy for Slavery but its non-extension. Give it no more room,
they say, and it may be safely left to its fate. Yes, but who shall
"bell the cat?" Besides, with fifteen Slave States, and more than
three millions of Slaves, how can we make any moral issue with the
Slave Power against its further extension? Why should there not be
twenty, thirty, fifty Slave States, as well as fifteen? Why should not
the star-spangled banner wave over ten, as well as over three millions
of Slaves? Why should not Nebraska be cultivated by Slave labour, as
well as Florida or Texas? If men, under the American Constitution, may
hold slaves at discretion and without dishonour in one-half of the
country, why not in the whole of it? If it would be a damning sin for
us to admit another Slave State into the Union, why is it not a
damning sin to permit a Slave State to remain in the Union? Would it
not be the acme of effrontery for a man, in amicable alliance with
fifteen pickpockets, to profess scruples of conscience in regard to
admitting another pilfering rogue to the fraternity? "Thou that
sayest, A man should not steal, dost thou steal," or consent, in any
instance, to stealing? "If the Lord be God, serve Him; but if Baal,
then serve him." The South may well laugh to scorn the affected moral
sensibility of the North against the extension of her slave system. It
is nothing, in the present relations of the States, but sentimental
hypocrisy. It has no stamina--no back-bone. The argument for
non-extension is an argument for the dissolution of the Union. With a
glow of moral indignation, I protest against the promise and the
pledge, by whomsoever made, that if the Slave Power will seek no more
to lengthen its cords and strengthen its stakes, it may go unmolested
end unchallenged, and survive as long as it can within its present
limits. I would as soon turn pirate on the high seas as to give my
consent to any such arrangement. I do not understand the moral code of
those who, screaming in agony at the thought of Nebraska becoming a
Slave Territory, virtually say to the South: "Only desist from your
present designs, and we will leave you to flog, and lacerate, and
plunder, an