Part 14

“Well, what next? Why, an election for members of the Legislature to organize the Territory must be held. What did I advise you to do then? Why, meet them on their own ground, and beat them at their own game again; and cold and inclement as the weather was, I went over with a company of men. My object in going was not to vote. I had no right to vote, unless I had disfranchised myself in Missouri. I was not within two miles of a voting-place. My object in going was not to vote, but to settle a difficulty between two of our candidates; and the Abolitionists of the North said, _and published it abroad, that Atchison was there with bowie-knife and revolver,--and, by God, ’twas true! I never did go into that Territory, I never intend to go into that Territory, without being prepared for all such kind of cattle._ Well, we beat them, and Governor Reeder gave certificates to a majority of all the members of both Houses, and then, after they were organized, as everybody will admit, they were the only competent persons to say who were and who were not members of the same.”

4. It is confirmed by contemporaneous admission of “The Squatter Sovereign,” a paper published at Atchison, and at once the organ of the President and of these Borderers, which, under date of 1st April, thus recounts the victory.

“INDEPENDENCE, [MISSOURI,] March 31, 1855.

“Several hundred emigrants from Kansas have just entered our city. They were preceded by the Westport and Independence brass bands. They came in at the west side of the public square, and proceeded entirely around it, the bands cheering us with fine music, and the emigrants with good news. Immediately following the bands were about two hundred horsemen in regular order; following these were one hundred and fifty wagons, carriages, &c. They gave repeated cheers for Kansas and Missouri. They report that not an Antislavery man will be in the Legislature of Kansas. _We have made a clean sweep._”

5. It is also confirmed by contemporaneous testimony of another paper, always faithful to Slavery, the “New York Herald,” in the letter of a correspondent from Brunswick, Missouri, under date of 20th April, 1855.

“From five to seven thousand men started from Missouri to attend the election, some to remove, but the most to return to their families, with an intention, if they liked the Territory, to make it their permanent abode at the earliest moment practicable. But they intended to vote. The Missourians were, many of them, Douglas men. There were one hundred and fifty voters from this county, one hundred and seventy-five from Howard, one hundred from Cooper. Indeed, every county furnished its quota; and when they set out, it looked like an army.… They were armed.… And, as there were no houses in the Territory, they carried tents. Their mission was a peaceable one,--to vote, and to drive down stakes for their future homes. After the election some fifteen hundred of the voters sent a committee to Mr. Reeder to ascertain if it was his purpose to ratify the election. He answered that it was, and said the majority at an election must carry the day. But it is not to be denied that the fifteen hundred, apprehending that the Governor might attempt to play the tyrant,--since his conduct had already been insidious and unjust,--wore on their hats bunches of hemp. They were resolved, if a tyrant attempted to trample upon the rights of the sovereign people, to hang him.”

6. It is again confirmed by testimony of a lady for five years resident in Western Missouri, who thus writes in a letter published in the “New Haven Register.”

“MIAMI, SALINE COUNTY, November 26, 1855.

“You ask me to tell you something about the Kansas and Missouri troubles. Of course you know in what they have originated. _There is no denying that the Missourians have determined to control the elections, if possible_; and I do not know that their measures would be justifiable, except upon the principle of self-preservation; and that, you know, is the first law of Nature.”

7. And it is confirmed still further by the Circular of the Emigration Society of Lafayette County, in Missouri, dated as late as 25th March, 1856, where the efforts of Missourians are openly confessed.

“The western counties of Missouri have for the last two years been heavily taxed, both in money and time, in fighting the battles of the South. _Lafayette County alone has expended more than one hundred thousand dollars in money, and as much or more in time. Up to this time the border counties of Missouri have upheld and maintained the rights and interests of the South in this struggle, unassisted, and not unsuccessfully._ But the Abolitionists, staking their all upon the Kansas issue, and hesitating at no means, fair or foul, are moving heaven and earth to render that beautiful Territory _a Free State_.”

8. Here, also, is amplest testimony to the Usurpation, by the “Intelligencer,” a leading paper of St. Louis, Missouri, made in the ensuing summer.

“Atchison and Stringfellow, with their Missouri followers, overwhelmed the settlers in Kansas, browbeat and bullied them, and took the Government from their hands. Missouri votes elected the present body of men, who insult public intelligence and popular rights by styling themselves ‘the Legislature of Kansas.’ This body of men are helping themselves to fat speculations by locating the ‘seat of Government’ and getting town lots for their votes. They are passing laws disfranchising all the citizens of Kansas who do not believe Negro Slavery to be a Christian institution and a national blessing. They are proposing to punish with imprisonment the utterance of views inconsistent with their own. And they are trying to perpetuate their preposterous and infernal tyranny by appointing _for a term of years_ creatures of their own, as commissioners in every county, to lay and collect taxes, and see that the laws they are passing are faithfully executed. Has this age anything to compare with these acts in audacity?”

9. In harmony with all these is the authoritative declaration of Governor Reeder, in a speech to his neighbors at Easton, Pennsylvania, at the end of April, 1855, and immediately afterwards published in the Washington “Union.” Here it is.

“It was, indeed, too true that Kansas had been invaded, conquered, subjugated, by an armed force from beyond her borders, led on by a fanatical spirit, trampling under foot the principles of the Kansas Bill and the right of suffrage.”

10. In similar harmony is the complaint of the people of Kansas, in public meeting at Big Springs, on the 5th of September, 1855, embodied in these words.

“_Resolved_, That the body of men who for the last two months have been passing laws for the people of our Territory, moved, counselled, and dictated to by the demagogues of Missouri, are to us a foreign body, representing only the lawless invaders who elected them, and not the people of the Territory,--that we repudiate their action, as the monstrous consummation of an act of violence, usurpation, and fraud, unparalleled in the history of the Union, and worthy only of men unfitted for the duties and regardless of the responsibilities of Republicans.”

11. Finally, the invasion which ended in the Usurpation is clearly established from official Minutes laid on our table by the President. But the effect of this testimony has been so amply exposed by the Senator from Vermont [Mr. COLLAMER], in his able and indefatigable argument, that I content myself with simply referring to it.

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On this cumulative, irresistible evidence, in concurrence with antecedent history, I rest. And yet Senators here argue that this cannot be,--precisely as the conspiracy of Catiline was doubted in the Roman Senate. “_Nonnulli sunt in hoc ordine, qui aut ea quæ imminent non videant, aut ea quæ vident dissimulent; qui spem Catilinæ mollibus sententiis aluerunt, conjurationemque nascentem non credendo corroboraverunt._”[76] These words of the Roman Orator picture the case here. As I listened to the Senator from Illinois, while he painfully strove to show that there is no Usurpation, I was reminded of the effort by a distinguished logician to prove that Napoleon Bonaparte never existed. And permit me to say, that the fact of his existence is not more entirely above doubt than the fact of this Usurpation. This I assert on proofs already presented. But confirmation comes almost while I speak. The columns of the public press are daily filled with testimony solemnly taken before the Committee of Congress in Kansas, which attests, in awful light, the violence ending in the Usurpation. Of this I may speak on some other occasion.[77] Meanwhile I proceed with the development of the Crime.

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The usurping Legislature assembled at the appointed place in the interior, and then at once, in opposition to the veto of the Governor, by a majority of two thirds, removed to the Shawnee Mission, a place in most convenient proximity to the Missouri borderers, by whom it had been constituted, and whose tyrannical agent it was. The statutes of Missouri, in all their text, with their divisions and subdivisions, were adopted bodily, and with such little local adaptation that the word “State” in the original is not even changed to “Territory,” but is left to be corrected by an explanatory act. All this general legislation was entirely subordinate to the special chapter entitled “An Act to punish Offences against Slave Property,” where the One Idea that provoked this whole conspiracy is at last embodied in legislative form, and Human Slavery openly recognized on Free Soil, under the sanction of pretended law.[78] This chapter, of thirteen sections, is in itself a _Dance of Death_. But its complex completeness of wickedness without parallel may be partially conceived, when it is understood that in three sections only is the penalty of death denounced no less than forty-eight different times, by as many changes of language, against the heinous offence, described in forty-eight different ways, of interfering with what does not exist in that Territory, and under the Constitution cannot exist there,--I mean property in human flesh. Thus is Liberty sacrificed to Slavery, and Death summoned to sit at the gates as guardian of the Wrong.

The work of Usurpation was not perfected even yet. It had already cost too much to be left at any hazard.

“To be thus is nothing, But to be safely thus.”

Such was the object. And this could not be, except by the entire prostration of all the safeguards of Human Rights. Liberty of speech, which is the very breath of a Republic,--the press, which is the terror of wrong-doers,--the bar, through which the oppressed beards the arrogance of law,--the jury, by which right is vindicated,--all these must be struck down, while officers are provided in all places, ready to be the tools of this Tyranny; and then, to obtain final assurance that their crime is secure, the whole Usurpation, stretching over the Territory, must be fastened and riveted by legislative bolt, spike, and screw, _so as to defy all effort at change through ordinary forms of law_. To this work, in its various parts, were bent the subtlest energies; and never, from Tubal Cain to this hour, was any fabric forged with more desperate skill and completeness.

Mark, Sir, three different legislative enactments, constituting part of this work. _First_, according to one act, all who deny, by spoken or written word, “the right of persons to hold slaves in this Territory,” are denounced as felons, to be punished by imprisonment at hard labor for a term not less than two years,--it may be for life. To show the extravagance of this injustice, it is well put by the Senator from Vermont [Mr. COLLAMER], that, should the Senator from Michigan [Mr. CASS], who believes that Slavery cannot exist in a Territory, unless introduced by express legislative act, venture there with his moderate opinions, his doom must be that of a felon! To such extent are the great liberties of speech and of the press subverted! _Secondly_, by another act, entitled “An Act concerning Attorneys-at-Law,” no person can practise as attorney, unless he _shall obtain a license_ from the Territorial courts, which, of course, a tyrannical discretion will be free to deny; and after obtaining such license, he is constrained to take an oath not only “to support” the Constitution of the United States, but also “to support and sustain”--mark here the reduplication--the Territorial Act and the Fugitive Slave Bill: thus erecting a test for admission to the bar, calculated to exclude citizens who honestly regard the latter legislative enormity as unfit to be obeyed. And, _thirdly_, by another act, entitled “An Act concerning Jurors,” all persons “conscientiously opposed to the holding slaves,” or “who do not admit the right to hold slaves in this Territory,” are excluded from the jury on every question, civil or criminal, arising out of asserted slave property,--while, in all cases, the summoning of the jury is left, without one word of restraint, to “the marshal, sheriff, or other officer,” who is thus free to pack it according to his tyrannical discretion.

For the ready enforcement of all statutes against Human Freedom, the President furnished a powerful quota of officers, in the Governor, Chief Justice, Judges, Secretary, Attorney, and Marshal. The Legislature completed this part of the work, by constituting in each county a Board of Commissioners, composed of two persons, associated with the Probate Judge, whose duty it is to “appoint a county treasurer, coroner, justices of the peace, constables, and _all_ other officers provided for by law,” and then proceeding to the choice of this very Board: thus delegating and diffusing their usurped power, and tyrannically imposing upon the Territory a crowd of officers, in whose appointment the people had no voice, directly or indirectly.

And still the final, inexorable work remained to be done. A Legislature renovated in both branches could not assemble until 1858: so that, during this long intermediate period, this whole system must continue in the likeness of law, unless overturned by the National Government, or, in default of such interposition, by the generous uprising of an oppressed people. But it was necessary to guard against possibility of change, even tardily, at a future election; and this was done by two different acts, under the _first_ of which all who do not take the oath to support the Fugitive Slave Bill are excluded from the elective franchise, and under the _second_ of which all others are entitled to vote who tender a tax of one dollar to the sheriff on the day of election; thus, by provision of Territorial law, disfranchising all opposed to Slavery, and at the same time opening the door to the votes of the invaders; by an unconstitutional shibboleth excluding from the polls the body of actual settlers, and by making the franchise depend upon a petty tax only admitting to the polls the mass of borderers from Missouri. By tyrannical forethought, the Usurpation not only fortified all that it did, but assumed a _self-perpetuating_ energy.

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Thus was the Crime consummated. Slavery stands erect, clanking its chains on the Territory of Kansas, surrounded by a code of death, and trampling upon all cherished liberties, whether of speech, the press, the bar, the trial by jury, or the electoral franchise. And, Sir, all this is done, not merely to introduce a wrong which in itself is a denial of all rights, and in dread of which mothers have taken the lives of their offspring,--not merely, as is sometimes said, to protect Slavery in Missouri, since it is futile for this State to complain of Freedom on the side of Kansas, when Freedom exists without complaint on the side of Iowa, and also on the side of Illinois,--but it is done for the sake of political power, in order to bring two new slaveholding Senators upon this floor, and thus to fortify in the National Government the desperate chances of a waning Oligarchy. As the gallant ship, voyaging on pleasant summer seas, is assailed by a pirate crew, and plundered of its doubloons and dollars, so is this beautiful Territory now assailed in peace and prosperity, and robbed of its political power for the sake of Slavery. Even now the black flag of the land pirates from Missouri waves at the mast-head; in their laws you hear the pirate yell and see the flash of the pirate knife; while, incredible to relate, the President, gathering the Slave Power at his back, testifies a pirate sympathy.

Sir, all this was done in the name of Popular Sovereignty. And this is the close of the tragedy. Popular Sovereignty, which, when truly understood, is a fountain of just power, has ended in Popular Slavery,--not in the subjection of the unhappy African race merely, but of this proud Caucasian blood which you boast. The profession with which you began, of _All by the People_, is lost in the wretched reality of _Nothing for the People_. Popular Sovereignty, in whose deceitful name plighted faith was broken and an ancient Landmark of Freedom overturned, now lifts itself before us like Sin in the terrible picture of Milton, which

“seemed woman to the waist, and fair, But ended foul in many a scaly fold Voluminous and vast, a serpent armed With mortal sting: about her middle round A cry of hell-hounds never ceasing barked With wide Cerberean mouths full loud, and rung A hideous peal; yet, when they list, would creep, If aught disturbed their noise, into her womb, And kennel there, yet there still barked and howled Within, unseen.”

The image is complete at all points; and with this exposure I take my leave of the Crime against Kansas.

II.

Emerging from all the blackness of this Crime, where we seem to have been lost, as in a savage wood, and turning our backs upon it, as upon desolation and death, from which, while others have suffered, we have escaped, I come now to THE APOLOGIES which the Crime has found. Sir, well may you start at the suggestion, that such a series of wrongs, so clearly proved by various testimony, so openly confessed by the wrong-doers, and so widely recognized throughout the country, should find apologists. But partisan spirit, now, as in other days, hesitates at nothing. Great crimes of history have never been without apologies. The massacre of St. Bartholomew, which you now instinctively condemn, was at the time applauded in high quarters, and even commemorated by a Papal medal, which may still be procured at Rome,--as the Crime against Kansas, which is hardly less conspicuous in dreadful eminence, has been shielded on this floor by extenuating words, and even by a Presidential message, which, like the Papal medal, can never be forgotten in considering the perversity of men.

Sir, the Crime cannot be denied. The President himself has admitted “illegal and reprehensible” conduct. To such conclusion he was compelled by irresistible evidence. But what he mildly describes I openly denounce. Senators may affect to put it aside by sneer, or to reason it away by figures, or to explain it by theory, such as desperate invention has produced on this floor, that the Assassins and Thugs of Missouri are in reality citizens of Kansas; but all these efforts, so far as made, are only tokens of weakness, while to the original Crime they add another offence of false testimony against innocent and suffering men. But the Apologies for the Crime are worse than the efforts at denial. In essential heartlessness they identify their authors with the great iniquity.

They are four in number, and fourfold in character. The first is the _Apology tyrannical_; the second, the _Apology imbecile_; the third, the _Apology absurd_; and the fourth, the _Apology infamous_. This is all. Tyranny, imbecility, absurdity, and infamy all unite to dance, like the weird sisters, about this Crime.

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The _Apology tyrannical_ is founded on the mistaken act of Governor Reeder, in authenticating the Usurping Legislature, by which it is asserted, that, whatever may have been the actual force or fraud in its election, the people of Kansas are effectually concluded, and the whole proceeding is placed under formal sanction of law. According to this assumption, complaint is now in vain, and it only remains that Congress should sit and hearken to it, without correcting the wrong, as the ancient tyrant listened and granted no redress to the human moans that issued from the heated brazen bull which subtile cruelty had devised. This I call the Apology of technicality inspired by tyranny.

The facts on this head are few and plain. Governor Reeder, after allowing only five days for objections to the returns,--a space of time unreasonably brief in that extensive Territory,--declared a majority of the members of the Council and of the House of Representatives “duly elected,” withheld certificates from certain others, because of satisfactory proof that they were not duly elected, and appointed a day for new elections to supply these vacancies. Afterwards, by formal message, he recognized the Legislature as a legal body, and when he vetoed their act of adjournment to the neighborhood of Missouri, he did it simply on the ground of illegality in such adjournment under the organic law. Now to every assumption founded on these facts there are two satisfactory replies: _first_, that no certificate of the Governor can do more than authenticate a subsisting legal act, without of itself infusing legality where the essence of legality is not already; and, _secondly_, that violence or fraud, wherever disclosed, vitiates completely every proceeding. In denying these principles, you place the certificate above the thing certified, and give a perpetual lease to violence and fraud, merely because at an ephemeral moment they are unquestioned. This will not do.

Sir, I am no apologist for Governor Reeder. There is sad reason to believe that he went to Kansas originally as tool of the President; but his simple nature, nurtured in the atmosphere of Pennsylvania, revolted at the service required, and he turned from his patron to duty. Grievously did he err in yielding to the Legislature any act of authentication; but in some measure he has answered for this error by determined effort since to expose the utter illegality of that body, which he now repudiates entirely. It was said of certain Roman Emperors, who did infinite mischief in their beginnings and infinite good towards their end, that they should never have been born or never died; and I would apply the same to the official life of this Kansas Governor. At all events, I dismiss the Apology founded on his acts, as the utterance of Tyranny by the voice of Law, transcending the declaration of the pedantic judge, in the British Parliament, on the eve of our Revolution, that our fathers, notwithstanding their complaints, were in reality represented in Parliament, inasmuch as their lands, under the original charters, were held “in common socage, as of the manor of East Greenwich in Kent,” which, being duly represented, carried with it all the Colonies.[79] Thus in another age has Tyranny assumed the voice of Law.

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