* * *
Mr. President, I did not wish to refer to these things. I did not
understand them fully in all their bearings at the time I made my first
speech on this subject; and, so far as I was familiar with them, I made
as little reference to them as was consistent with my duty; because it
was a mortifying reflection to me, as a Northern man, that we had not
been able, in consequence of the abolition excitement at the time, to
avoid the appearance of bad faith in the observance of legislation,
which has been denominated a compromise. There were a few men then, as
there are now, who had the moral courage to perform their duty to the
country and the Constitution, regardless of consequences personal to
themselves. There were ten Northern men who dared to perform their duty
by voting to admit Missouri into the Union on an equal footing with the
original States, and with no other restriction than that imposed by the
Constitution. I am aware that they were abused and denounced as we are
now--that they were branded as dough-faces--traitors to freedom, and to
the section of country whence they came. * * *
I think I have shown that if the act of 1820, called the Missouri
compromise, was a compact, it was violated and repudiated by a solemn
vote of the House of Representatives in 1821, within eleven months after
it was adopted.
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