Newspaper Page Text
SOUTHERN TRIBUNE,
PUBLISHED WEEKLY, BY
W.H. B . IURBISOX.
The Randolph Epistles, ."So. I,
(Concluded from First Page.)
The Enhanced valve of Slave Proper
ty', THROUGH A FREE ACCESS TO THE
Mines.
Heavy as are these deprivations and
losses,they are not all. Hail the South been
fairly dealt by, and shared in theseTerrito*
ries in proportion to her contributions in
men and money towards their acquisition,
consequences of immense importance po
litically, and of incalculable value finan
cially, must have resulted from it. The
South would have had free access to the
mines witn her slaves, and her citizens,
having ampler and readier means of work
ing them than all others, would have mi
grated thither earliest, and in numbers
Pufficieut have controlled the destinies of
the State. Thus would California inevita
bly, and Utah and New Mexico, through
the force of position and circumstances,
have beemo Slave States, and augmented
and improved the South’s political domin
ion and destinies beyond estimate or mea
sure ! Now look at the collateral results
upon the enhanced value of Slave proper
ty, coming from so vast a demand for Slave
labor, as such a field for its profitable em
ployment would have created. The present
market values for men would have been
trebled or quadrupled—but intending to
be moderate,the average increase upon all
conditions, at 50 per centum. The prosent
numbers of Slaves in the Snuihern States
are estimated to be 3,000,000, and allowing
them an average value of SIOO (which is
much below the present average market
value) and we have an aggregate valuation
ofSlave property amounting t051200,000,-
000, which a free access to the mines
would have given an increase of 50 per ct
and added $600,000,000, of value to the
slave property of the South! And now for
the tesults:—
Through the action cf Congress. — in not
exacting of California a Conventional Or
dinance, relinquishing all title or claim to
the public domain within her borders, be
fore receiving her as a sovereigu State in
to the Union, that domain has been suffer
ed to escheat to the State, —with treasures,
it may be sufficient to build up cities, and
support an Empire, which may, in the
c irrent half century, wield the scepture
*'*' ovor cLia great Continent,
and command the commerce of the world !
Through the action of Congress , —in le
ceiving California into the Union without
a reduction of limits, and organizing Utah
and New Mexico, into tho Territories
without abrogating the Mexican laws pro
hibiting slavety, the South is deprived of
every foot of the Mexican cession of Ter
ritory, which, without her lavish contiibu
tions in men and money;—and above all,
her ratifying votos in the Senate, woulJ ne
ver have been ours !
! Through the. action of Congress, —the
South is required to pay $75,000,000 of
the $100,000,000 of indebtedness which
the Terriitories have cost, and without re
ceiving one doit of consideration for such
a monstrous taxation; while the North,
with larger numbers and greater wealth,
through a tortuous and iniquitous taxation,
is only to contribute $25,000,000 of the
debt, though, through the despotism of
numbers, she has applied and appropria
ted, the entire consideration for that in
debtedness, absolutely and exclusively to
herself!
101 l me, men of the South ! of a civil
ised people under the sun, — except ovk
l iving brethren of free States, — who
would thus have served any other civilized
people under God’s protection, and in the
world’s peace ! Is there a nation of sav
ages, wlro after stripping you of all you
had, and taken all they wanted, would
keep the property, and yet make you pay
for it, five times the value at which it was
rated when you became the purchaser!—
True, the Corsairsof the Archipelago who
capture your merchantmen, impose a hea
vy ransom on their restitution—but then
when the ransom is paid, the property is
restored to you. Point me to a people
on the habitable globe, who would submit
to be robbed and despoiled of their share
in property, promising like this, the total
extinction of all Government taxes, with
large fortunes beside, to every unit of their
population; and who, after the spoliation
had passed into accomplishment, would
submk to the further, the monstrous, and
the debasing excalioti, of paying $75,000,-
000 of the money—cost of the acquisition
—without having any dominion or domain
over air acre or foot of it! It cannot be
done! There are no such people; and
may God forfend that there should be in
ihis noble land of freedom and equality !
There is not a form of Government on
the Globe, but this glorious Union of«. nrs,
which would have sanctioned,-—nor a peo
ple who inhabit it,—but these noble bre
thren of ours,—who would have attempt
ed, —nor they upon any other people but
their brethren, —the crushing down of
such a people under the weight of so
many wrongs, and under the stress of such
foul oppressions, rank injustice, and gall,
ing indignities!
Yet so it is! And so is it recorded —
that among all the Senators, and all [the
Senators and all the Representativesoftbe
Free North and the Free West—not one
man was to be found with that love in his
heart, or that justice in his dealing, which
would have spared the South and saved
the Union from the blasting recoil of that
mortal blow which cleaved an opening for
California unshorn of her dimensions, and
without a quiet calim of her treasures! —
In form indeed, the Union survives, and
for a life-time have I wished, in the
Providence of God, that it might have
lasted forever;—but how long can it cling
together, after all the affections which for
med it lie crushed and dstroyed—under
the insupportable weight of these cumula
ed oppressions! 1 must repeat it! Not
a man of the North nor of the West, would
rally to the Sonth’a side, to protect her
rights from spoliation and her pcsture from
digrace, in the admission of California,
though it involved her exclusion from the
soil for which she so gallantly shed her 1
blood, and lavished out her treasure! Ay
verily, every Senator and Representative
North of Mason and Dixon’s line, and
North West of the Ohio—voted persist
ingly and to a man, for the admission of the
State, just as she came here, without a
precedent relinquishment or reduction of
limits! Bu>, woe upon our domestic broils
and collisions. Southerners! for my indig
nant amazement at this concentrated hosti
lity to the rights of the South, as I regarded
it, —was soon lost in the wonder and the
sorrow with which I read, —that no less
than thirty.one Southerners (four in the
Senate and twenty-seven in the House)
had joined with the Northerners in this
baleful and most perilous experiment upon
the forbearance and the nerves of the
South! F i om tho bottom of my heart should
I rejoice, could I see in this measure, no
deeper wrongs to the South, nor imminent
hazards to the Union, —than were seen,
(we presume) by these gentlemen—but my
judgment instructs me,that it is plenary to
the biim of the one, and perilous to the
brink of the other ! But that I may do
such justice to all, as they have done to
themselves, —here are the affirmative
votes of the Southerners for tho admission
of California; Let them speak for them
selves :
In the Senate: Messrs. Clayatul Under
wood, Whigs—and Messrs. Benton and
Houston, Democrats.
In the House :— Of Tennessee, Messrs.
Anderson, Gentry, Watkins and Williams,
Wbigs ; and Messrs. Ewing, Johnson and
Jones, Democrats. Whigs, 4—Demo
crats, 3.
Os Kentucky: Messrs. Breck, John
son, Marshall, McLean, Moorhead, and
Thompson, Whigs,—and Mr. Mason, De
mocrat, —Whigs, 6—Democrat, 1.
Os Maryland : —Messrs. Bowie, Evans
and Kerr, Whigs,—and Messrs, Hamilton
and McLanne, Democrats. Whigs 3
Democrats, 2.
Os Delncarc : —Mr. Houston, Whig,
—l.—No Democrat.
Os Missouri: —Messrs. Bay, Bowlin >
Hal! and Phelps, Democrats 4.—No
Whig.
Os Virginia: —Mr. Hamond, whig, 1—
No Democrat.
Os North Carolina: —Messrs. Caldwell
and Stanly, Whigs, 2.—No Democrat.
Totals.—ln the Senate—Wbigs, Ken.
tucky 2 —Democrats Missouri and Texas,
2—Totals in the House, Whigs, 17, —
Demoorats, 10.
Had these Southerners been united with
their Brethren, from the moment these
territories were acquired,—and remained
firm to our rights and united of purpose—
all the probabilities are, that the South
would have had free access to the mines,
and that the public domain would have
been cared for, and screened from escheat,
—and to say nothing of other most import
ant resits, both political and monetry, —the
consideration alone, of the vast enhance
ment in value, of tho slave-property in
those Stales respectively, which those
Southerners represented,— should have
been temptation enough, to have prompt
ed a trial of the effects of Union upon the
rights and fortunes of the South. Cast an
eye over the following table, showing the
States which these Southerners represent
ed—tbe estimated number of slaves in
each tinder the current census, in round
numbers—their present value, —and their
enhanced value upon the contingency of
the South having access to tho mines :
Here it is:
E«timatad Average Additional
No. of values at values
slaves in present tliro' access
each. rates. to mines.
Delaware, 2,000 $ 1,000,000 $ 500,000
Maryland, 85,000 42,500,000 21,250,000
Virginia, 400,000 215,000,000 107,500,000
N.Carolina 200,000 100,000,000 50,000,000
! Kentucky, 200,000 100,000,000 50,000,000
Tennessee,22o,ooo 110,000,000 55,000,000
Missouri, 100,000 50,000,000 25,000,000
Texas, 50,000 25,000,000 12,500,000
$322,750,000
This sum of 6322,750.000 has been cer.
tainly lost to these eight States through the
course that was taken in reference to Cal
ifornia, and in which, to the extent I have
stated, their Senators and Representatives
have shared. Had they united their
strength to that of other members from the
South, the results could not have been more
disastrous than they have proved and might
have entirely succeeded, and enriched
with these heavy profits—tho important
States whose Representatives they are !
The present number has been prolonged
much beyond the limits I had designed it
to reach, and yet does not embrace all the
matters I had intended to include in it.—
In the course of another number,l propose
to touch upon topicsof even higher interest
than any brought to notice in this : such as
the meelingofthe Naskille Convention—
Non-intercourse—Secession all embra
ced in that most vital of questions which
ever was submitted to the Southern peo
pie:—ln the present position of public af
fairs, WAAT SHALL BE DONE ?
RANDOLPH OF ROANOKE.
From the Southern Press.
THE RANDOLPH EPISTLES.
Fuels and Reflections foi- the Southern
People.
NO. 11.
The const lutionally of the Act of Admission
—ls California of right and in law a
member of the Union?—Her constitution
void—The incapacity of Congress to re
suscitate it—lllustrations and analogies
—CanCongress repeal the Act of Admis
sion?— Can the Supreme Court take
cognizance of the question?—The State
the ultimate expounder — Secession —
Massachusdtt and the admission of Texas
Partition of the Federal property Syr.
Fellow-Citizens of the South :
In my last I referred to ih<* insufferable
wrongs and injustice inflicted upon the
South, by the Act of Congress admitting
California into Union, — but unwilling to
tax your patience further, l of purpose
refrained from broaching in that paper,
another question of the very greatest im
portance, and indissolubly allied with that
measure: I mean its Constitutionality. 1
propose now tonotce this very impoitant
feature of the Act of admission, and to
make the issue for public consideration
and judgment,—whether California is, or
is not, —of right and in law, a member of
the Union?
If the United Stats had had no share in
the conquest or cession of California, —
and a number of adventurers, wholly un
connected with tnis Government, —had
invaded and vanquisced it, — proclaimed
their Independence and maintained it, and
established an Independent Republic,—
not a doubt could be mooted, —but that the
proceeding would have been valid, and
constituted it a Government both de jure
and de facto ; but why?—Because the con
quest would have made the domain, the
jurissiction and the sovereignty all theirs,
and absolutely and exclusively so. Bu’
the actual state of tilings was variant from
this iu every particular. Not an iota of
the eminent or useful domain, or of the
territorial jurisdiction,—or of the sover
eignty, was coferred upon or vested in
these California adventurers when they
migrated thither,—nor since has been,
unless it was done through the Act of Con
gress of the 11th instant admitting her into
the Union. All these rights and attributes
were vested conjointly and exclusively in
the co-States of the Union, and Congress
is constituted their attorney in fact by the
Constitution, to administer them. In Con
gress, then, as the Federative agent of the
States,--is exclusively vested all powers
to “dispose of” or to make “a!l needful
rules and regulations” concerning the ter
ritory of the Ucited States, and to hold and
exercise jurisdiction and sovereignty over it
Congress may, if it will, and aught to,
when it can, —and the population and
circumstances of the public domain admit
ofit, —to confer upon the people who in
habit it, the appropriate jurisdiction for
governing themselves, —by conferring on
them a Territorial form of Government,
and asigning them their boundaries, and 1
have no hesitation in saying, that Congress
failed in its duty, (and the Free Stales
were exclusively to blame for it,) in with,
holding such jurisdiction and powers of
legislating fur themselves, from the people
of California; I go further, and admit fully
that Congress might, if it would, have dis
pensed the people of California from pass
ing under the regime of a Territorial Gov.
ernment, and have invested them at once
with sovereign powers, thicugh an Act of
Congress empowering them to call a Con
vention, to form a Constitution, and to or
ganize a State Government. It is plain
then, and I repeat, that the whole powers,
both of jurisdiction and sovereignty over
domain out the limits of a State, are ex-
clusively vested in Congress by the Con
stitution: It is plain, and I repeat,—that
Congress had the power to delegate such
jurisdiction or sovereignty, either or both
to the people of California, but that with
powers to delegate either, it in fact dele
gated neither to them. Hence, as ma’ter
of fact it is sure, that the people of Cali
fornia did not derive either jurisdiction or
sovereignty, from that source, and as mat.
of law it is incontestible, that they could
net have deived it from any other: Fur
thermore: the Executive of the United
States was invested with no other jurisdic
tion thither; than such as was incident to
a mere military occupancy; and surely
such military jurisdiction was wholly in
adequate to the constituting of a civil Gov
ernment, and whould not have been alien
able and transferable to others, if it were:
Therefore, the Executive Department of
the Government having no civil sovereign
jurisdiction in California, had none to con
fer on the people thereof, and consequent
ly did not and could not have conferred
any!
Now the foregoing premises, in right
andin fact, and in all their particulars, are
absolutely incontestible; and tbe people
of California, having no jurisdiction or
sovereignty whatever to constitute them
selves a State, —it must follow, that every
act they have done, involved in the issue
under debate, — tbe calling of a Conven
tion, — the forming of a Constitution, —
the conferring of Execntive Legislation
and Judicial jurisdiction and powers on
themselves, — and more palpably still,-
the appointment of Senators and Repre
sentatives to the Congress of the United
Sta'es, —were, and aie, radically and in
curably unconstitutional, and null an void!
There cannot be a doubt of it, nor will it
ever be disputed by any one wl o bears in
mind, what every one cognizant of the ac
tion and powers of Congresss, knows and
admits, —that California did n t derive
any constitutional authority from Congress
to perform or legalize those acts, nor could
have derived it from any other source.
Taking this to be so, and it must follow,
that the Constitution of Callifornia and
the whole State Organization under it, are
and were ab initio absolute nullities. This
brings us to the main point in the case ;
Can Congress revive and give effect to an
act long since defunct and void in its in
ception,—and to the doing of which Con
gress itself was originally and is always
incompetent, that is to say, to making of a
State Constitution ?—The very statement
of the question carrins the answer along
with it; for no one will pretend, tha t
Congresss could originally have formed
the constitution of Callifornia, and how
could it revive, what it was powerless to
create?—Under our institutions none can
form a constitution for a State, bnt the
people themselves whom it is to bind and
protect; —and even they, if inhabiting
A TERRITORY DESTITUTE OF ALL TERRITO
RIAL organization ; are incompetent to
such a service, uniill an act of Congress
invests them with the authority; for Con
gress can delegate powers to others, which
it cannot exercise i'self; just as it passes
laws which it ca nnot execute. Congress may
accept or reject a Constitution when prof,
sered with a view to the admission of a
State, — but it cannot change it, and still
less can it substitute another to suit itself.
L nder the Constitution, Congress may ad
mit “new States” into the Union; but
then they must be real States, bringing
with them valid constitutions formed un
der a due authorization, from competent
authority, Now if my reasonings be
sound, the Constitution of California was
as imbecile for service, as a bit of unsolid
parchment, up to the very moment of ad
mitting her into the Union : and if it be.
came valid then, Congress must have made
it 60, —and lias thus, under an authority to
do no more than admit a Stste,—through
a single organic fiat of sovereign omnipo
tence, CREATED A SIATE: MADE A CON
STITUTION FOR HER : APPOINTED HER SEN
ATORS AND representatives: and re
CLIVED HER INTO THE UNION ! It is tIIUS,
iiat all, —that California became a State
and is now in the Union! It is nothing
but this pestilent dnti slavery fanaticism,
which shuts out truth, experience and con
ducts them to the results, which when
scrutiny exposes, their judgements, must
revolt at. Bring the very men who have
supported this monstrous measure to the j
tests of analogies, and they will admit in •
every instance you put to them, that Con-1
gress is utterly incompetent to give valid
ity and force to an act which was once,
and iu its inception, absolutely void for
the want of Constitutional authoriiy to
pass it. If on the decease of a United
States Marshal, a Judge of United States
District Court, should undertake to ap
point and commission another, —there is
not one of these members of Uongress
who would not admit that such an appoint
ment and all acts done under it, would be
absolute and incurable nullities, and that
Congress, though originally competent to
have invested such a power in tbe Judges
would be utterly powerless to retract up
on the Marshal’s acts, so as to give the
least validity or force to any of them. If
during the illness of a United S'etes Dis
trict Judge, the President of the United
Slates were to appoint and commission a
Judge iu his place to perform his judicial
duties, (even though the sick Judge should
die within an hour after such appoint
ment was made, and before any ju
dicial act had been performed,) every body
knows, that every such Judicial act per
formed by the new Judge therafter, —
would be entirely null and void from the
radical vice of unconstitutional ity inherent
in the original appointment:— The com
missioning the Judge anew, could have
had no retro-active effect whatever,and all
the powers of the Executive and Con
gress would have been inadequate to vali
date them. In the cases I have put, no
one will question the legitimacy of the
consequences I have deduced from the hy
p itlieses to wit: that acts originally void
and defunct for want of constitutional
sanction, —by no galvanic process of Con
gress, can be heaved back into life, and
thus acqure a validity they had never pos
sessed ; and every sound-minded man,
who will put aside his pre-judgments and
give fair scope to his conscience, will gen
eralize these conclusions, and apply them
to alll acts whatsoever, void and defunct
ab initio for the want of constitutional au
thority. In the cases I put of the void acts
of the Marshal and the Judge, it is to be
noted, that though insusceptible, of revi
val, the ends they aimed would s:ill have
been attainable by investing those officers
or others with powers to perform them all
over again; and so of California. By re
minding her back to anew Convention
called under the sanction of Congress, she
might, if she would, (and if Congress had
not prescribed a reduction of limits) have
readopted entire her present Constitution,
but then all ils force and validity would
have been exclusively derived from the
second Convention, which could have had
no retro-active or reviving force whatever
upon the first Convention, or any of its
proceedings. If higher and weightier au
thority, or more cogent reasoning is need
ed to establish that the people of Callifor
nia could not constitutionally wrest from
Congress, its jurisdiction and sovereignty
over the Federal domain, and constitute
a Sovereign State and Goveanment over it,
without the primary sanction of those to'
whom the whole right of domain and do
minion belonged, and that Congaess could
not create a Stale, nor receive into the U
nion, any community of men which was
not a State, in the sense of the Constitu
tion, let me refer you to the unanswered
and unanswerable demonstrations recently
made by Senators Berrien and Butler in
the Senate of the United States.
I think I may now assume it as proven
that as the people of California did not de
rive the authority to constitute a Govern
ment over the property and territory of the
co-States, from Congress, in whom the whole
jurisdiction and sovereignty adequate to
such a function of sovereignty was exclusive
vested by the Constitution; and as they dul
not acquire it through an expulsion of the
Federal Authoritiesfrom both the dominion
and the domain, through revolution and con
quest, they were wholly without authority
in the premises, and of course void of all
consti’ulional capacity to have organized
a State Government over the properly of
others and without their consent • and hence,
California Constitution and all proceedings
under it,arc and were ah initio, absolutely
null AND void!—/ think I may also as
same it as proven,—that it was past all the
powers rs Congress to resuscitate an emhryo
thus abortedf/om the. womb of legislation
and dead-burn, by breathing into it anew
the breath of life / This being so, all the
skill of statesmanship and all the per ver -
sion of sophistry arealike defied,to elude the
corrollary, that, California is neither a
Constitutional State nor Constitu
tionally in the Union.
To all this it may be answered by,
President Fillmore— Admitting all you
say to be constitutional doctrine still Cal
ifornia has been already received into the
Union: The thing has been done: How
can it be undone ?
Randolph of That which is
not Constitutionally done, is not done at
all—Congress itself can undo what it had
no right to attempt, nor power to accom
pish.
Presidrnt F.— But the admission of a
State imports a contract with tlieco States
and rights are already vested under it,
and Congi ess is without jurisdiction to an
nul a contract itself has made, against the
consent of thh co contracting party.
11. of R — ls Congress may not undo,that
which being void in itself, may need no
undoing beyond a declaration of its nulity;
—then, the matter sounding in contract
and the United Slates being a party to the
controversy, the case is brought within the
jurisdiction and congizance of the Federal
Courts and may be adjudicated thither.
Prcs't F. —True, —were it not that the
question of the Constitutional admission of
a State is exclusively a political 'one, and
the Supreme Court of the United States is
w ithout jurisdiction in all questions of that
nature.
R. R. —That objection would be valid
if the question was exclusive\y political, but
that is not the case here, —as may readily
be illustrated. Supose California should
cla'm the public domain by virture of the
escheat, and that the United States should
contest her right to it:—That would be a
controversy, which no authority but the
Federal Judicial power would be cornpet.
ent to decide; —and as the escheat of the
domain, would be the only issue in the
cause,—the vital point to be de ermined
would necessarily be,— whetherCatifornia
was constitutionally in die Union or not,
for if she was not. there could have no es.
cheat, nor resulting divestiture! I will
not assert that the Court will take jurisdic
tion of the question,—but if it should, I
have a strong opinion and a trust, that it
will pronounce that act ofadmission an in-
curable nullity and absolutely void!
Sould the objections, 1 have thus taken
the liheity to attribute io the President, be
adjudged valid, by Congress on the one
side, and by the Court on the other, each
should peremptorily decline all jurisdiction
over the question, (and let U3 suppose it
would be so) —it would be monstrous and
absurd to say, that the complaining States
would have no right to be relie'ed against
an act, palpably unconstitutional ex ennees
sis, and wrongfully and most injuriously
affecting their rights and their interests.—
All must admit the right to be undoubted,
though the remedy be undelegated. The
l ight and remedy remain with the States
who are the parties to the compact, and of
necessity, its ultimate expounders, when
tho judicial power is incompetent.—
Both of them belong to the reserved and not to
delegated powers,—and of course the Constitu
tion lias not provided a mode for their enforce
ment. The reserx ed powers not being Fedetal
but State powers,—cannot be exercised Feder
ally (if I may coin a word) or conjointly, —but
each State must decide and act for itself; — and
because the power is a reserved pow er, and be.
cause it has not been delegated through the
Constitution, I maintain, (for I do not hold with
Aunification) that it cannot be exercised under
it. A State which would right itself in such a
conjuncture, must retire from the Union,— for
when oppressions are suffered within it, which
the Judicial Department is powerless to redress
or to remove, in the language of Judge Barbour,
“THE ONLY RIGHTFUL REMEDY IS SECESSION ! ’
But we must not roll the Free States of their
right, for it is New England which lias the
first claims to authorship in the doctrine, that
the unconstitutional admission of anew State
would authorize the secession of nny of the old
ones. As far hack as 1803, did New England
denounce the acquisition of Louisiana as uncon
stitutional, —ami maintaining that the admission
of new States under the Constitution, was lim
ited to such,as should be formed out of territory
within the limits of the Union at the date of the
Constitution, — she menaced secession for the,
unconstitutional admission of Louisiana in 1802,
as she alleged that act to be. But much moro
recently, (March 3, 1843) —and upon the first
dawn of the prospect of rc-annexirig Texas to
the Union, — the famous John Quincy Adams
drew up, a number of New England members of
Congress, signed and addressed a very memora
ble manifesto ‘<o the people of the Free States,' in
which they declared among other things that:
“VVe hesitate not to say, that .dnneration ef
fected by any act or p o eeding of the Federal
(lovernment, or any of its Deparinents would be
identical with dissolution. It would he a viola-
lion of our National Compact its objects, designs,
nnd the greet elementary principles which en
tered into its compositon.”
At the very next session of her Legislature
(1843-4) Massachusetts, trailing in the wake of
her boldest and greatest statesman, promptly re
solved that,
“The project ofthe annexation of Texas, unties
arrested on the threshold, may tend to drive the
State to a Dissolution of the Union.”
Again at the succeeding session of her Legis
lature, (1844,) she solemnly declared, that.
The Constitution contains no power whatever, to
admit new States or Territories without and. be
yond the bounds of the Union, as established xchen
it was formed and adopted”
To the proposition to unite Texas as n slave
State, “she made answer calmly,and deliberate
ly and firmly, Massachusetts will never consent to
enter into any such relations
And she finally declared that the Act of Ad
mission “would have no binding farce whatever
upon the people Massachusetts'. '
You were incontestibly right in vour doctrine,
Massashusetts, ifyou believed that the admission
ofTexas would bean unconstitutional act-((ot no
one but yourself could decide that matter for yfi
—but then, august Madam, there was no way in
which you could have avoided entering into ‘such
relations” with Texas, or of prevoting the ad
admitting her from having any “ binding fore®
whatever upon the people” of your State, but by
throwing \ourself upon your reserved rights*
picking up your bonnet and walking out ol th»
Union! And pray, most gracious Madam, «'b J ‘
would Massashusetts and New England ba fC
to say, should the South, embracing your doctrin®
nnd maintaining your principles, and having 8 *
much right to complain as you had—that Con
gross had admitted California into the tlai 9ll '
out of Territory foreign to the Union in l* r • "
but the far graver and weightier objection jnat
it had admitted her without any previous Con
stitutional organization—but through a sing' 9
tyrannous fiat had done irreparable violet) 9 t°
tiie Constitution, in creating a State —providing
her a Constitution—appointing her Senalo rs "|’
Representatives, and admitting Iter into tW
Union—l repeat, what would they have to ")*
if the South seceded from the Union!
Hut mind you though, nion of the Soutn •
