WRITINGS OF 5AM HOUSTON, 1856
384
despotism. Did I ask any one, in days that are past, to tell me what were my rights, who was encroaching upon them, and what measure was obnoxious to Southern rights? No, sir, I asked no one. If I am content with the humiliation of my condition, it is no man's business to thrust dignity upon me which may not befit me well. I have alluded to the men who had indorsed the Missouri Compromise. I was unwilling to see it disturbed. I knew that the mighty dead, if they could rise, would put their hands to the great work of its preservation, and if necessary, to prop th·at glorious pillar of peace with their lives. I felt that it was my duty to maintain the work of their hands. And I had other reasons which I will not detain the Senate by giving. There was one, however, that I will mention, which the South will realize and readily comprehend. Before that repeal free soil did not approach within four hundred and fifty miles of Texas; and if good faith had been maintained with the Indians, it might not have touched us for half a century, or even longer. Now, it comes on our borders for one hundred and sixty miles. You have laid open that vast frontier to the escape of fugitives, whilst we have another frontier equally exposed on the south, with Mexico. It was not worsting the condition of slavery, nor improving the condition of free soil to allow them to remain as they had been; but this measure has extinguished space, done away with dis- tance, and produced conflict. I had another reason, I desired above all things, to maintain faith and concord between the two sections of the country. These were the great reasons that pre- sented themselves to my mind; and to me they were satisfactory. Was that measure necessary for ~ny practical purpose, either for freedom or slavery? I believed then, as I believe now, that Kansas will be a free State, and, therefore, instead of that measure benefitting the South, she was inviting people to an uninhabited region to form a new State to be added to a section already numerically superior to her. I thought that there were other outlets, where there was no restraint on emigration, to which northern settlers could go, as congenial in climate and as aus- picious in soil. I have one solution for that measure which I feel it ·incumbent on me to state, because, though it be not pouring oil on the troubled waters, it will, at least, be giving an example .which history will record, and which hereafter may have a salu- tary influence on those who choose to experiment at the expense of the harmony, peace, and concord of their country. It will be recollected that an unfortunate incident occurred in New York shortly after the incoming of the present Administra- tion, in the removal of Mr. Bronson from the collectorship of that
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