The Life of Jefferson Davis

“That it is the duty of the General Government by all proper legislation, to secure an entry into those Territories to all the citizens of the United States, together with their property, of every description; and that the same shall be protected by the United States, while the Territories are under its authority.”

So stands the record of that State which is now held responsible for retiring, and is alleged to have withdrawn because she received now what, in former times, she had demanded as the full measure of her rights. Did she receive it? The argument could only be made by concealing the fact that her resolutions of 1848 and 1856 asserted the right to protection, and claimed it from the General Government. What, then, is the necessary inference? That, in the Cincinnati platform, they believed they obtained that which they asserted, or that which necessarily involved it. So much for the point of faith; so much for the point of consistency in the assertion of right. But if it were otherwise; if they had neglected to assert a right; would that destroy it? If they had failed at some time to claim this protection, are they to be estopped, in all time to come, from claiming it? Constitutional right is eternal – not to be sacrificed by any body of men. A single man may revive it at any period of the existence of the Constitution. So the argument would be worthless, if the facts were as stated. That they are not so stated, is shown by the record.

Here allow me to say, in all sincerity, that I dislike thus to speak about conventions; it does not belong to the duties of the Senate; we did not assemble here to make a President, except in the single contingency of a failure by the people and by the House of Representatives to elect. When that contingency arrives, the question will be before us. I am sorry that it should have been prematurely introduced. But since the action of the recent convention at Charleston is presented as the basis of argument, it may be as well to refer to it, and see what it is. The majority report, presented by seventeen States of the Union, and those the States most reliable to give Democratic votes – the States counted so certain to give Democratic votes that they have been regarded as a fixed basis, a nucleus to which others were to be attracted – these seventeen States reported to the convention a series of resolutions, one of which asserted the right to protection. A minority of States reported another series, excluding the avowal of the right – not exactly denying it, but not avowing it – and a second minority report was submitted, being the Cincinnati platform, pure and simple. It is true that a majority of delegates adopted the minority report, but not a majority of States, nor does it appear, by an analysis of the votes, and the best evidence I have been able to obtain, that it was by a majority of delegates, if each had been left to his own choice; but that, by one of those ingenious arrangements – one of those incidents which, among jurists, is described as the favor the vigilant receives from the law – it so happened that, in certain States, the delegates were instructed to vote as a unit; in other States they were not; so that, wherever they were instructed to vote as a unit, the vote must so be cast, and wherever they were not, they might disintegrate. Thus minorities were bound in one instance, and released in another; and, by a comparison made by those who had an opportunity to know, it appears that the minority report could not have got a majority of the delegates, if each delegate had been permitted to cast his own vote in the Convention. Neither could it have obtained, as appears by the action of the committee, in a majority of the States, if they had been spoken as such. So that this vaunt as to the effect of the adoption of the platform by a majority, seems to have very little of substance in it. Again, I find that, after this adoption of a platform, a delegate from Tennessee offered a resolution:

“That all the citizens of the United States have an equal right to settle, with their property, in the Territories of the United States; and that, under the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States, which we recognize as a correct exposition of the Constitution of the United States, neither their rights of person or property can be destroyed or impaired by congressional or territorial legislation.”

It does not appear that a vote was taken on it. There is a current belief that it would have been adopted. If it had been, it would have been an acknowledgment by the Democracy, in convention assembled, that the question had been settled by the decisions of the Supreme Court. But in the progress of the convention, when they came to balloting, it appears, by an analysis of the vote for candidates, that the Senator from Illinois received from seventeen undoubted Democratic States of the Union, casting one hundred and twenty-seven electoral votes, but eleven votes. It is not such a great triumph, then, in the Democratic view, as is claimed. It does not suffice to add up the number of votes where they do not avail. It is not fair to bring the votes of Vermont, where I believe nobody expects we shall be successful, and count them for a particular candidate. The electoral votes – and these alone, tell upon the result; and it appears that in those States which have been counted certain to cast their electoral votes for the candidate who might have been nominated at that convention, the Senator received but eleven. This is but meagre claim to bind us to his car as the successful champion of the majority. This is but small basis for the boast that his hopes were gratified, that he would not receive the nomination unless sustained by a majority of the party, and that his opinions had received the indorsement of the Democracy.

My devotion to the party is life-long. If the assertion be allowable, it may be said that I inherited my political principles. I derive them from a revolutionary father – one of the earnest friends of Mr. Jefferson; who, after the revolution which achieved our independence, bore his full part in the civil revolution of 1800, which emancipated us from federal usurpation and consolidation. I therefore have all that devotion to party which belongs to habitual reverence and confidence. But, sir, that devotion to party rests on the assumption that it is to maintain sound principles; that it is to strive hereafter, as heretofore, to carry out the great cardinal creed in which the Democratic party was founded. When the resolutions of 1798 and 1799 are discarded; when we fly from the extreme of monarchy to land in the danger to republics, anarchy, and the Democratic party says its arm is paralyzed – can not be raised to maintain constitutional rights, my devotion to its organization is at an end. It fails thenceforward in the purposes for which it was established; and if there be a constitutional party in the land which, in the language of Mr. Jefferson, would find in the vigor of the Federal Government the best hope for our liberty and security, to that party I should attach myself whenever that sad contingency arose.

The resolutions of 1798 and 1799, though directed against usurpation, were equally directed against the dangers of anarchy. Their principles are alike applicable to both. Their cardinal creed was a Federal Government, according to the grants conferred upon it, and these righteously administered. It is not fair to the men who taught us the lessons of Democracy that they should be held responsible for a theory which leaves the Federal Government, as one who has abdicated all authority, to stand at the mercy of local usurpations. Least of all does their teaching maintain that this Government has no power over the Territories; that this Government has no obligation to protect the rights of person and property in the Territories; for, among the first acts under the Constitution, was one which both asserted and exercised the power.

After the adoption of the Constitution, in 1789, an act was passed, to which reference is frequently made as being a confirmation of the ordinance of 1787; and this has been repeated so often that it has received general belief. There was a constitutional provision which required all obligations and engagements under the confederation to hold good under the Constitution. If there was an obligation or an engagement growing out of the ordinance of 1787, out of the deed of cession by Virginia, it was transmitted to the Government established under the Constitution; but that Congress under the Constitution gave it no vitality – that they added no force to it, is apparent from the fact which is so often relied upon as authority. It was in view of this fact, in full remembrance of this and of other facts connected with it, that Mr. Madison said, in relation to passing regulations for the Territories, that “Congress did not regard the interdiction of slavery among the needful regulations contemplated by the Constitution, since, in none of the territorial governments created by them, was such an interdict found.” I am aware that Justice McLean has viewed this as an historical error of Mr. Madison. I shall not assume to decide between such high authorities. The act is as follows:

“An Act to provide for the government of the Territory north-west of the Ohio River

“Whereas, In order that the ordinance of the United States in Congress assembled, for the government of the territory north-west of the river Ohio, may continue to have full effect, it is requisite that certain provisions should be made so as to adapt the same to the present Constitution of the United States.

“Section 1. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That, in all cases in which, by the said ordinance, any information is to be given, or communication made, by the governor of the said Territory to the United States in Congress assembled, or to any of their officers, it shall be the duty of the said governor to give such information, and to make such communication, to the President of the United States; and the President shall nominate, and, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall appoint all officers which, by the said ordinance, were to have been appointed by the United States in Congress assembled; and all officers so appointed shall be commissioned by him; and in all cases where the United States in Congress assembled might, by the said ordinance, make any commission, or remove from any office, the President is hereby declared to have the same powers to revocation and removal.

“Sec. 2. And be it further enacted, That in the case of the death, removal, resignation, or necessary absence of the governor of the said Territory, the secretary thereof shall be, and he is hereby authorized and required to execute all the powers and perform all the duties of the governor during the vacancy occasioned by the removal, resignation, or necessary absence of the said governor.

“Approved August 7, 1789.”

All that is to be found in this act which favors the supposition and frequent assertion that, under the Constitution, the ordinance of 1787 was ratified and confirmed is to be found in the preamble, and that preamble so vaguely alludes to it that the idea is refuted by reference to an act which followed soon afterwards – the act of 1793 – from which I will read a single section:

“Sec. 3. And be it further enacted, That when a person held to labor in any of the United States, or in either of the Territories on the north-west or south of the river Ohio, under the laws thereof, shall escape into any other of the said States or Territories, the person to whom such service or labor may be due, his agent, or attorney, is hereby empowered to seize or arrest such fugitive from labor,” etc.

Is it not apparent that, when the Congress legislated in 1793, they recognized the existence of slavery and protected that kind of property in the territory north-west of the river Ohio, and is it not conclusive that they did not intend, by the act of 1789, to confirm, ratify, and give effect to the ordinance of 1787, which would have excluded it?

This doctrine of protection, then, is not new. It goes back to the foundation of the Government. It is traceable down through all the early controversies; and they arose at least as early as 1790. It is found in the messages of Mr. Jefferson and Mr. Madison, and in the legislation of Congress; and also in the messages of the elder Adams. There was not one of the first four Presidents of the United States who did not recognize this obligation of protection, who did not assert this power on the part of the Federal Government; and not one of them ever attempted to pervert it to a power to destroy. If division in the Democratic party is to arise now, because of this doctrine, it is not from the change by those who assert it, but of those who deny it. It is not from the introduction of a new feature in the theory of our Government, but from the denial of that which was recognized in its very beginning.

As I understood the main argument of the Senator, it was based upon the general postulate that the Democratic Convention of 1848 recognized a new doctrine, a doctrine which inhibited the General Government from interfering in any way, either for the protection of property or otherwise, with the local affairs of a Territory; he held the party responsible for all the opinions entertained by the candidate in 1848, because the party had nominated him, and he quoted the record to show what States, by voting for him, had committed themselves to the doctrine of the “Nicholson letter.” He even quoted South Carolina, represented by that man who became famous for a single act, and, as South Carolinians said, without authority at home to sustain it. But this was cited as pledging the faith of South Carolina to the doctrine of the “Nicholson letter;” and, worse than all, the Senator did this, though he knew that the doctrine of the “Nicholson letter” was the subject of controversy for years subsequently; that, what was the true construction of that letter, entered into the canvass in the Southern States; that the construction which Mr. Cass himself placed upon it at a subsequent period was there denied; and the Senator might have remembered, if he had chosen to recollect so unimportant a thing, that I once had to explain to him, ten years ago, the fact that I repudiated the doctrine of that letter at the time it was published, and that the Democracy of Mississippi had well-nigh crucified me for the construction which I placed upon it; there were men mean enough to suspect that the construction I gave to the Nicholson letter was prompted by the confidence and affection I felt for General Taylor. At a subsequent period, however, Mr. Cass thoroughly reviewed it. He uttered, for him, very harsh language against all who had doubted the true construction of his letter, and he construed it just as I had done during the canvass of 1848. It remains only to add that I supported Mr. Cass, not because of the doctrine of the Nicholson letter, but in despite of it; because I believed a Democratic President, with a Democratic cabinet and Democratic counselors in the two houses of Congress, and he as honest a man as I believed Mr. Cass to be, would be a safer reliance than his opponent, who personally possessed my confidence as much as any man living, but who was of and must draw his advisers from a party, the tenets of which I believed to be opposed to the interests of the country as they were to all my political convictions.

I little thought at that time that my advocacy of Mr. Cass, upon such grounds as these, or his support by the State of which I am a citizen, would at any future day be quoted as an indorsement of the opinions contained in the Nicholson letter, as those opinions were afterwards defined. But it is not only upon this letter, but equally upon the resolutions of the convention as constructive of that letter, that he rested his argument. I will here say to the Senator that if, at any time, I do him the least injustice, speaking as I do from such notes as I could take while he progressed, I will thank him to correct me.

But this letter entered into the canvass; there was a doubt about its construction; there were men who asserted that they had positive authority for saying that it meant that the people of a Territory could only exclude slavery when the Territory should form a constitution and be admitted as a State. This doubt continued to hang over the construction, and it was that doubt alone which secured Mr. Cass the vote of Mississippi. If the true construction had been certainly known he would have had no chance to get it. Our majority went down from thousands to hundreds, as it was. In Alabama the decrease was greater. It was not that the doctrine was countenanced, but the doubt as to the true meaning of the letter, and the constantly reiterated assertion that it only meant the Territories when they should be admitted as States, enabled him to carry those States.

But if I mistook the Senator there, I think probably I did not on another point: that he claimed the support of certain Southern men for Mr. Richardson as Speaker of the House to be by them an acknowledgment of the doctrine of squatter sovereignty.

I suppose those Southern men who voted for Mr. Richardson voted for him as I did for Mr. Cass, in despite of his opinions on that question, because they preferred Mr. Richardson to Mr. Banks, even with squatter sovereignty. They considered that the latter was carrying an amount of heresies which greatly exceeded the value of squatter sovereignty. It was a choice of evils – not an indorsement of his opinions. Neither did they this year indorse the opinions on that point of Mr. McClernand when they voted for him. According to the Senator’s argument I could show him that Illinois was committed to the doctrine of federal protection to property in the Territories and the remedy of secession as a State right; committed irrevocably, unmistakably, with no right to plead any ignorance of the political creed of the individual, or the meaning of his words.

In 1852 – I refer to it with pride – Illinois did me the honor to vote consistently for me for the Vice-Presidency, up to the time of adjournment; though in 1850, and in 1851, I had done all these acts which have been spoken of, and the Senator has admitted my consistency, in opinions which were avowed with at least such perspicuity as left nobody in doubt as to my opinion. Did Illinois then adopt my theory of protection in the Territories, or of the right of State secession? No, sir. I hold them to no such consequences. Some of the old inhabitants of Illinois may have remembered me when their northern frontier was a wilderness, when they and I had kind relations in the face of hostile Indians. Some of them may have remembered me, and, I believe, kindly, as associated with them, at a later period, on the fields of Mexico. The Senator himself, I know, remembered kindly his association with me in the halls of Congress. It was these bonds which gave me the confidence of the State of Illinois. I never misconstrued it. I never pretended to put them in the attitude of adopting all my opinions. Never required it, never desired it, save as in so far as wishing all men would agree with me, confidently believing my position to be true. At a later period, and when these questions were more important in the public mind, when public attention has been more directed to them, when public opinion has been more matured, at the very time when the Senator claims that his doctrine culminated, the State of Illinois voted for a gentleman for Vice-President at Cincinnati who held the same opinions with myself, or, if there was a difference, held them to a greater extreme – I mean General Quitman.

Mr. Douglas. We made no test on any one.

Mr. Davis. Then, how did the South become responsible for the doctrine of General Cass, by consenting to his nomination in 1848, and supporting his election? But at a later period, down to the present session, what is the position in which the Senator places his friends – those sterling Democrats, uncompromising Anti-Know-Nothings; men who give no quarter to the American party, and yet who voted this year for Mr. Smith, of North Carolina, to be Speaker of the House of Representatives. Is the Senator answered? Does he not see that there is no justice in assuming a vote for an individual to be the entire adoption of his opinions?

He cited, in this connection, a resolution of 1848, as having been framed to cover the doctrines of the Nicholson letter; and he claimed thus to have shown that the convention not only understood it, but adopted it, and made it the party creed, and that we were bound to it from that period forward. He even had that resolution of 1848 read, in order that there should be, at no future time, any question as to the principle which the party then avowed; that it should be fixed as a starting point in all the future progress of Democracy. I was surprised at the importance the Senator attached to that resolution of 1848, because it was not new; it was not framed to meet the opinions of the Nicholson letter, but came down from a period as remote as 1840; was copied into the platform of 1844, and again into that of 1848, being the expression which the condition of the country in 1840 had induced – a declaration of opinion growing out of the agitation in the two houses of Congress at that day, and the fearful strides which antislavery was making, and which Mr. Calhoun had labored to check by the declaration of constitutional truths, as set forth in his Senate resolutions of 1837-’8.

That there may be no mistake on this point, and particularly as the Senator attached special importance to it, I will turn to the platform of 1840, and read from it, so that it shall be found to be —

Mr. Douglas. It is conceded.

Mr. Davis. The Senator concedes the fact, that the resolution of 1848 was a copy of that of 1840, and with the concession falls his argument. The platforms of 1840 and 1844 were re-affirmed in 1848; and, consequently, the resolution of ’48 being identical with that of ’40, was not a construction of the letter written in 1847.

True to its instincts and to its practices, the Democratic party, from time to time, continued to add to their “platform” whatever was needful for action by the Government in the condition of the country. Thus, in 1844, they re-asserted the platform of 1840; and they added thereto, because of a question then pending, that —

“The re-annexation of Texas, at the earliest practicable period, is a great American measure, which the convention recommend to the cordial support of the Democracy of the Union.”

In 1848 they re-adopted the resolutions of 1844; and were not a little laughed at for keeping up the question of Texas after it had been annexed. In 1852 a new question had arisen; the measures of 1850 had presented, with great force to the public mind, the necessity for some expression of opinion upon the disturbing questions which the measures of 1850 had been designed to quiet. Therefore, in 1852, the party, true to its obligation to announce its principles, and to meet issues as they arise, said:

“Resolved, That the foregoing proposition (referring to the resolution of 1848) covers, and was intended to embrace, the whole subject of slavery agitation in Congress; and, therefore, the Democratic party in the Union, standing on this national platform, will abide by and adhere to a faithful execution of the act known as the compromise measure, settled by the last Congress, the act for reclaiming fugitives from labor included; which act, being designed to carry out an express provision of the Constitution, can not, with fidelity thereto, be repealed, or so changed as to destroy or impair its efficacy.

“Resolved, That the Democratic party will restrain all attempts at renewing, in Congress or out of it, the agitation of the slave question, under whatever shape or color the attempt may be made.”

This was the addition made in 1852, and it was made because of the agitation which then prevailed through the country against the fugitive slave act, and it was because the fugitive slave act, and that alone, was assailed, that the Democratic convention met the issue on that measure specifically, and for the same reason it received the approbation of the Southern States. Had this been considered as the indorsement of the slave trade bill for the District of Columbia, it would not have received their approval. The agitation was in relation to recovering fugitive slaves, and the Democratic party boldly and truly met the living issue, and declared its position upon it.