ustice, and
harmony will be restored. Act impartially, that justice may be done:
hear petitions on both sides, if they are offered, and give righteous
judgments, and your people will be satisfied. You cannot compromise
them out of their rights, nor lull them to sleep with fallacies in the
shape of reports. You cannot conquer them by rebuke, nor deceive them
by sophistry. Remember you cannot now turn public opinion, nor can you
overthrow it. You must, and you will, abandon the high ground you have
taken, and receive petitions. The reason of the case, the argument and
the judgment of the people, are all against you. One in this cause can
"chase a thousand," and the voice of justice will be heard whenever
you agitate the subject. In Indiana, the right to petition has been
most nobly advocated in a protest, by a member, against some puny
resolutions of the Legislature of that State to whitewash slavery.
Permit me to read a paragraph, worthy an American freeman:

"But who would have thought until lately, that any would have doubted
the right to petition in a respectful manner to Congress? Who would
have believed, that Congress had any authority to refuse to consider
the petitions of the people? Such a step would overthrow the autocrat
of Russia, or cost the Grand Seignior of Constantinople his head. Can
it be possible, therefore, that it has been reserved for a republican
Government, in a land boasting of its free institutions, to set the
first precedent of this kind? Our city councils, our courts of
justice, every department of Government are approached by petition,
however unanswerable, or absurd, so that its terms are respectful.
None go away unread, or unheard. The life of every individual is a
perfect illustration of the subject of petitioning. Petition is the
language of want, of pain, of sorrow, of man in all his sad variety of
woes, imploring relief, at the hand of some power superior to himself.
Petitioning is the foundation of all government, and of all
administrations of law. Yet it has been reserved for our Congress,
seconded indirectly by the vote of this Legislature, to question this
right, hitherto supposed to be so old, so heaven-deeded, so undoubted,
that our fathers did not think it necessary to place a guaranty of it
in the first draft of the Federal Constitution. Yet this sacred right
has been, at one blow, driven, destroyed, and trodden under the feet
of slavery. The old bulwarks of our Federal and State