You have seen them on their winding way, meandering
the narrow and crooked path in Indian file, each treading close upon the
heels of the other, and neither venturing to take a step to the right or
left, or to occupy one inch of ground which did not bear the footprint
of the Abolition champion. To answer one, therefore, is to answer the
whole. The statement to which they seem to attach the most importance,
and which they have repeated oftener, perhaps, than any other, is, that,
pending the compromise measures of 1850, no man in or out of Congress
ever dreamed of abrogating the Missouri compromise; that from that
period down to the present session nobody supposed that its validity had
been impaired, or any thing done which endered it obligatory upon us to
make it inoperative hereafter; that at the time of submitting the report
and bill to the Senate, on the fourth of January last, neither I nor any
member of the committee ever thought of such a thing; and that we could
never be brought to the point of abrogating the eighth section of
the Missouri act until after the Senator from Kentucky introduced his
amendment to my bill.
Mr. President, before I proceed to expose the many misrepresentations
contained in this complicated charge, I must call the attention of
the Senate to the false issue which these gentlemen are endeavoring to
impose upon the country, for the purpose of diverting public attention
from the real issue contained in the bill.
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