Part 9

The _Life of Macon_ was written in 1840 by Edward R. Cotten; but in his book of two hundred and seventy-two pages, Cotten says comparatively little of Macon, and devotes most of his space to his own views on many subjects, Macon's opinions and acts sometimes furnishing the text. If the book was not entitled _Life of Macon_ it would be more interesting. As indicating what a Warren county gentleman of much leisure and considerable reading, of good associates and ordinary capacity, was thinking about in 1840, the book ought to be preserved.

In order to give an idea of Macon's directness and simplicity, I offer an abbreviated report of one of his speeches made in the Senate, taken almost at random from the _Abridgment of the Debates of Congress_. The time was January 20, 1820. The question was the admission of Missouri, as well as Maine, into the Union. The protected States urged an amendment restricting slavery in Missouri before it should be admitted as a State, which amendment Mr. Macon opposed with his usual sound sense. The speech is imperfectly reported, but contains the germ of almost all that could have been said on the subject from his standpoint.

SPEECH ON THE MISSOURI COMPROMISE.

By NATHANIEL MACON.

Mr. Macon, of North Carolina, said that he agreed in opinion with the gentleman who had declared this to be the greatest question ever debated in the Senate, and that it ought to be discussed in the calmest manner, without attempting to excite passion or prejudice. It was, however, to be regretted that while some of those who supported the motion were quite calm and cool they used a good many hard words, which had no tendency to continue the good humor which they recommended. He would endeavor to follow their advice, but must be pardoned for not following their example in the use of hard words. If, however, one should escape him, it would be contrary to his intention, and an act of indiscretion, not of design or premeditation. He hoped to examine the subject with great meekness and humility.

The debate had brought forcibly to his recollection the anxiety of the best patriots of the nation, when the present Constitution was examined by the State conventions which adopted it. The public mind was then greatly excited, and men in whom the people properly placed the utmost confidence were divided. There was then no whisper about disunion, for every one considered the Union as absolutely necessary for the good of all. But to-day we have been told by the honorable gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Lowrie) that he would prefer disunion rather than that slaves should be carried west of the Mississippi. Age, Mr. Macon said, may have rendered him timid, or education may have prevailed on him to attach greater blessings to the Union and the Constitution than they deserve. If this be the case, and it be an error, it was one he had no desire to be free from even after what he had heard in this debate. Get clear of this Union and it will be found vastly more difficult to unite again and form another. There were no parties in the country at the time it was formed, not even upon this question. The men who carried the nation through the Revolution were alive, and members of the Convention. Washington was at their head. Have we a Washington now? No. Is there one in the nation to fill his place? No. His like, if ever, has been rarely seen; nor can we, rationally, expect another in our day. Let us not speak of disunion as an easy thing. If ever it shall come, it will bring evils enough for the best men to encounter, and all good men, in every nation, lovers of freedom, will lament it. This Constitution is now as much an experiment as it was in the year 1789. It went into operation about the time the French Revolution commenced. The wars which grew out of that, and the difficulties and perplexities which we had to encounter, in consequence of the improper acts of belligerents, kept the people constantly attached to the government. It has stood well the trial of trouble and of war, and answered, in those times, the purposes for which it was formed and adopted; but now it is to be tried, in time of universal peace, whether a government within a government can sustain itself and preserve the liberty of the citizen. When we hear the exclamation "Disunion, rather than slaves be carried over the Mississippi," it ought not to be forgotten that the union of the people and the Confederation carried us through the Revolutionary war (a war of which no man can wish to see the like again in this country); but, as soon as peace came, the Confederation was found to be entirely unfit for it; so unfit that it was given up for the present Constitution. Destroy this Union, and what may be the condition of the country, no man, not the most sagacious, can even imagine. It will surely be much worse than it was before the Constitution was adopted; and that must be well remembered.

The proposed amendment is calculated to produce geographical parties, or why admonish us to discuss it with moderation and good temper? No man who has witnessed the effect of parties nearly geographical can wish to see them revived. Their acts formerly produced uneasiness, to say the least of them, to good men of every party. General Washington has warned us against them; but he is now dead, and his advice may soon be forgotten; form geographical parties and it will be discarded. Instead of forming sectional parties it would be more patriotic to do them away. But party and patriotism are not always the same. Town meetings and resolutions to inflame one part of the nation against another can never benefit the people, though they may gratify an individual. Leave the people to form their own opinions, without the aid of inflammatory speeches at town meetings, and they will always form them correctly. No town meeting was necessary to inform or inflame the public mind against the law giving members of Congress a salary instead of a daily allowance. The people formed their own opinions, disapproved it, and it was repealed. So they will always act if left to themselves. Let not parties formed at home for State purposes be brought into Congress to disturb and distract the Union. The general government hitherto has been productive enough of parties to satisfy those who most delight in them; so that they are not likely to be long wanted in it. Enough, and more than enough, has been produced by the difficulty of deciding what is and what is not within the limits of the Constitution. And, at this moment, we have difficulties enough to scuffle with without adding the present question. The dispute between the Bank of the United States and the State banks, the want of money by the government, the increase of taxes in the midst of increasing debts, and the dispute with Spain might serve for this session.

All the States now have equal rights and all are content. Deprive one of the least right which it now enjoys in common with the others, and it will no longer be content. So, if the Government had an unlimited power to put whatever conditions it pleased on the admission of a new State into the Union, a State admitted with a condition unknown to the others would not be content, no matter what might be the character of the condition, even though it was not to steal or commit murder. The difference in the terms of admission would not be acceptable. All the new States have the same rights that the old have, and why make Missouri an exception? She has not done a single act to deserve it, and why depart, in her case, from the great American principle that the people of each State can govern themselves? No reason has been assigned for the attempt at the departure, nor can one be assigned which would not apply as strongly to Louisiana. In every free country that ever existed the first violations of the principles of government were indirect and not well understood, or supported with great zeal by only a part of the people.

All the country west of the Mississippi was acquired by the same treaty, and on the same terms, and the people in every part have the same rights; but, if the amendment be adopted, Missouri will not have the same rights which Louisiana now enjoys. She has been admitted into the Union as a full sister, but her twin-sister, Missouri, under the proposed amendment, is to be admitted as a sister of the half-blood, or rather as a stepdaughter, under an unjust stepmother--for what? Because she, as well as Louisiana, performed well her part during the late war, and because she has never given the general government any trouble. The operation of the amendment is unjust as it relates to the people who have moved there from other States. They carried with them the property which was common in the States they left, secured to them by the Constitution and laws of the United States as well as by the treaty. There they purchased public lands and settled with their slaves, without a single objection to their owning and carrying them; but now, unfortunately for them, after they have been to the trouble and expense of building houses and clearing plantations in the new country it has been discovered that they had no right to carry their slaves with them and that they must now move and make room for those who are considered a better people. The country was bought with the money of all, slaveholders as well as those who are not; and every one knew when he bought land and moved with his property he had a perfect right to do so. And no one till last session ever said to the contrary or moved the restriction about slaves. The object now avowed is to pen up the slaves and their owners, and not permit them to cross the Mississippi to better their condition, where there is room enough for all and good range for man and beast. (And man is as much improved by moving and range as the beast of the field.) But what is still more unaccountable, a part of the land granted to the soldiers for their services in the late war was laid off in Missouri expressly for the soldiers who had enlisted in the Southern States, and would prefer living where they might have slaves. These too are now to leave the country of their choice and the land obtained by fighting the battles of the nation. Is this just in a government of law, supported only by opinion? for it is not pretended that it is a government of force. In the most alarming state of our affairs at home--and some of them have an ugly appearance--public opinion alone has corrected and changed that which seemed to threaten disorder and ill-will into order and good-will, except once, when the military was called out in 1791. Let this be compared to the case of individuals and it will not be found to be more favorable to the amendment than the real case just stated. A and B buy a tract of land large enough for both and for their children, and settle it, build houses and open plantations. When they have got it in good way to live comfortably, after ten or fifteen years, A thinks there is not too much for him and his children, and that they can, a long time hence, settle and cultivate the whole land. He then for the first time tells B that he has some property he does not like, and that he must get clear of it or move. B states the bargain. A answers that it is true he understood it so until of late, but that move he must or get clear of his property; for that property should not be in his way. The kind or quality of property cannot affect the question.

A wise legislature will always consider the character, condition and feelings of those to be legislated for. In a government and people like ours this is indispensable. The question now under debate demands this consideration. To a part of the United States, and that part which supports the amendment, it cannot be important except as it is made so by the circumstances of the time. In all questions like the present, in the United States, the strong may yield without disgrace even in their own opinion; the weak cannot. Hence the propriety of not attempting to impose this new condition on the people of Missouri. Their numbers are few compared to those of the whole United States. Let the United States then abandon this new scheme, let their magnanimity and not their power be felt by the people of Missouri. The attempt to govern too much has produced every civil war that ever has been, and probably every one that ever may be. All governments, no matter what their form, want more power and more authority, and all the governed want less government. Great Britain lost the United States by attempting to govern too much and to introduce new principles of governing. The United States would not submit to the attempt, and earnestly endeavored to persuade Great Britain to abandon it, but in vain. The United States would not yield, and the result is known to the world. The battle is not always to the strong nor the race to the swift. What reason have we to expect that we can persuade Missouri to yield to our opinion that did not apply as strongly to Great Britain? They are as near akin to us as we were to Great Britain. They are "flesh of our flesh and bone of our bone." But as to kin, when they fall out they do not make up sooner than other people. Great Britain attempted to govern us on a new principle, and we are attempting to establish a new principle for the people of Missouri on becoming a State. Great Britain attempted to collect a threepenny tax on the tea consumed in the then colonies, which were not represented in Parliament; and we to regulate what shall be property when Missouri becomes a State, when she has no vote in Congress. The great English principle of no tax without representation was violated in one case, and the great American principle, that people are able to govern themselves, will be violated if the amendment be adopted. Every free nation has had some principle in its government to which more importance was attached than to any other. The English principle was not to be taxed without the consent of the people given in Parliament; the American principle is the right of the people to form their State governments in their own way, provided they be not inconsistent with the Constitution of the United States. If the power in Congress to pass the restriction was expressly delegated, and so clear that no one could doubt it, in the present circumstances of the country, it would still not be wise or prudent to do so; especially against the consent of those who live in the territory. Their consent would be more important to the nation than a restriction which would not make one slave less, unless indeed they might be starved in the old States.

Let me not be understood as wishing or intending to create any alarm as to the intentions of the people of Missouri. I know nothing of them. But in examining the question, we ought not to forget our own history nor the character of those who settle on our frontiers. Your easy chimney-corner people, the timid and fearful, never move to them. They stay where there is no danger from an Indian or any wild beast. They have no desire to engage the panther or the bear. It is the bravest of the brave and the boldest of the bold who venture there. They go not to return.

The settling of Kentucky and Tennessee during the war of the Revolution proves in the most satisfactory manner what they can do and will undergo, and that they will not return. The few people who first settled there had to contend, without aid from the States, against all the Indians bordering on the United States except the Chickasaw and Choctaw nations, and maintained their stations. The northern tribes, unaided by the southern, attacked the United States since the adoption of the Constitution and defeated two armies, and it required a third to conquer them. The frontier people in the Revolutionary war, as well as in the late, astonished everybody by their great exploits. Vermont, though claimed in the Revolutionary war by New Hampshire and New York, was not inferior to any of the States in her exertions to support independence.

The gentleman from Pennsylvania will pardon me for stating that that State had had some experience of its government managing a few people who would not yield obedience to its authority, though settled within its limits. They were obliged to compromise. I mean the Wyoming settlers. Again, since this government was in operation, a few people settled on the Indian lands: they were ordered to move from them, but did not obey: the military was sent to burn their cabins. The commanding officer told them his business, and very humanely advised them to move what property they had out of them. This they did, and their cabins were burnt. They waited till the troops marched, and very soon after built new cabins on the same places and to the same chimneys.

These facts are stated to show that a contest with a people who believe themselves right and one with a government are very different things. It would have been very gratifying to me to have been informed by some one of the gentlemen who support the amendment what is intended to be done if it be adopted, and the people of Missouri will not yield, but go on and form a State government (having the requisite number of inhabitants agreeably to the ordinance), as Tennessee did, and then apply for admission into the Union. Will she be admitted, as Tennessee was, on an equal footing with the original States, or will the application be rejected as the British government did the petitions of the old Congress?

If you do not admit her, and she will not return to the territorial government, will you declare the people rebels, as Great Britain did us, and then order them to be conquered for contending for the same rights that every State in the Union now enjoys? Will you for this, order the father to march against son and brother against brother? God forbid! It would be a terrible sight to behold these near relations plunging the bayonet into each other for no other reason than because the people of Missouri wish to be on equal footing with the people of Louisiana. When Territories they were equal. Those who remember the Revolution will not desire to see another civil war in our land. They know too well the wretched scenes it will produce. If you should declare them rebels and conquer them, will that attach them to the Union? No one can expect this. Then do not attempt to do that for them which was never done for others, and that which no State would consent for Congress to do for it. If the United States are to make conquests, do not let the first be at home. Nothing is to be got by American conquering American. Nor ought we to forget that we are not legislating for ourselves, and that the American character is not yielding when rights are concerned. But why depart from the old way, which has kept us in quiet, peace and harmony, every one living under his own vine and fig-tree and none to make him afraid? Why leave the road of experience, which has satisfied all and made all happy, to take this new way, of which we have no experience? This way leads to universal emancipation, of which we have no experience. The Eastern and Middle States furnish none. For years before these States emancipated their slaves they had but few, and of them a part were sold to the South. We have no more experience or book-learning on this subject than the French Convention had which turned the slaves of Santo Domingo loose. Nor can we foresee the consequences which may result from this new motion clearer than the Convention did in their decree.

A clause in the Declaration of Independence has been read declaring that "all men are created equal." Follow that sentiment, and does it not lead to universal emancipation? If it will justify putting an end to slavery in Missouri, will it not justify it in the old States? Suppose the plan followed and all the slaves turned loose, and the Union to continue, is it certain that the present Constitution would last long? The rich would in such circumstances want titles and hereditary distinctions, the negro food and raiment, and they would be as much or more degraded than in their present condition. The rich might hire these wretched people, and with them attempt to change the government by trampling on the rights of those who have only property enough to live comfortably. Opinions have greatly changed in some of the States in a few years. The time has been when those now called slaveholding States were thought to be the firm and steadfast friends of the people and of liberty. Then they were opposing an administration and a majority in Congress supported by a sedition law; then there was not a word heard, at least from one side, about those who actually did most toward changing the administration and the majority in Congress, and they were from slaveholding States. And now it would be curious to know how many members of Congress actually hold seats in consequence of their exertions at the time alluded to. Past services are always forgotten when new principles are to be introduced.

It is a fact that the people who move from the non-slaveholding to slaveholding States, when they became slaveholders, by purchase or marriage, expect more labor from them than those do who are brought up among them.

To the gentleman from Rhode Island (Mr. Burrill) I tender my hearty thanks for his liberal and true statement of the treatment of slaves in the Southern States. His observations leave but little for me to add, which is this, that the slaves gained as much by independence as the free. The old ones are better taken care of than any poor in the world, and treated with decent respect by their white acquaintances. I sincerely wish that he and the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Roberts) would go home with me, or some other Southern member, and witness the meeting between slaves and owner and see the glad faces and hearty shaking of hands. This is well described in General Moultrie's _Memoirs of the American Revolution_, in which he gives the account of his reception by his slaves the first time he went home after he was exchanged. He was made prisoner at the surrender of Charleston. Could he (Mr. Macon) have procured the book in the city he intended to have read it to show the attachment of the slave to his owner. A fact shall be stated. An excellent friend of mine--he too, like the other characters which have been mentioned in the debate, was a Virginian--had business in England which made it necessary that he should go to that country himself or send a trusty agent. He could not go conveniently, so he sent one of his slaves, who remained there near a year. Upon his return he was asked by his owner how he liked the country, and if he would have liked to stay there? He replied that to oblige him he would have stayed; the country was the finest he ever saw; the land was worked as nice as a square in a garden; they had the finest horses and carriages, and houses, and everything; but that the white servants abused his country. What did they say? They said we owed them (the English) a heap of money, and would not pay; to which he added, their chief food was mutton; he saw very little bacon there. The owner can make more free in conversation with his slave and be more easy in his company than the rich man, where there is no slave, with the white hireling who drives his carriage. He has no expectation that the slave will, for the free and easy conversation, expect to call him fellow-citizen or act improperly.