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WRITINGS OF 5AM HOUSTON, 1851
Means has broken his chains, and unless I have him fastened again he will turn Purgatory upside down." [Great laughter.] When I review the conduct of the honorable Senator from Mississippi for several days, and indeed for several years past, I have had deeply impressed upon my mind the anecdote of Parson Means. The course the Senator has pursued has sug- gested itself so strikingly to me, that I could not resist relating the anecdote to the Senate for their application of it. [Foote and others talk.] I have a better illustrative anecdote than the one I told, but I shall not occupy the time of the Senate by repeating it at this late hour. Mr. President, I assure you, I assure the Senate, and I assure the country, that every insinuation against me of indi- rect plotting by myself or by my friends, within my knowledge, with one party or another--every insinuation that imputes to me any other design than that of preserving the Government in its purity, and the Democratic party in its own faith without an extension of platform, is altogether unfounded. I voted for the compromise, for every measure of it. But I did not insinuate that I had started it. The records of the Senate, however, will show that I gave out the inception of a suggestion of a committee of six Senators. In my absence, owing to the sickness of mem- bers of my family, the honorable Senator from Mississippi intro- duced his resolution for the appointment of a committee of thir- teen. Whoever insinuates that I have had any intrigue, or any understanding, or any correspondence upon the subject of free- soil, abolition, disunion, or secession insinuates what is utterly unfounded, and without the slightest countenance of truth. I make that declaration here without any feelings of unkindness towards the gentleman from Mississippi, for I can assure him that I wish him a smooth and untroubled path of life, and that for his own good and for the gratification of his friends, I hope it may be less troublous hereafter than it has been heretofore. [Mr. Foote and Mr. Butler speak.] I said nothing about condemnation. It is seldom that I ask the indulgence of the Senate; it is with regret that I ask that indulgence now. I started upon the compromise resolution, but I believe we have travelled off and around it until we have got to "Coke and Justinian." I am really very sorry that the hon- orable Senator from South Carolina has gone so much into detail in relation to the position I bear to his State. It would appear from his remarks that I had wantonly, at various times, made
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