Congressman Horace Mann, September 2, 1850

SEPT. 2.

You may expect, notwithstanding what Miss ——— says, that Mr. E—— will vote with the Northern proslavery men, and help decide all the great questions now pending against us. He, like all the rest, will be artful; and, when he finds a chance to cast a vote against slavery which will do slavery no harm, he will be glad to improve it; but in the essentials he will go for them. . . . I have no doubt the time will come when Mr. Webster's course will be seen in the true light; but it will not be till after the mischief is done, and then only individuals will be vindicated, while the cause will be ruined.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 321

Congressman Horace Mann, September 4, 1850

SEPT. 4.

We had two or three proslavery speeches yesterday, and we have been taking some very interesting questions this morning. This whole question has become so complicated, that it is difficult to explain it. It cannot be done by letter. I hope I shall have a chance soon to do it orally. . . . I wish every night that could see our sunsets. I get no time to read or to write. To keep up with the business of the House, to prepare myself so as to know how to vote conscientiously, occupies my whole time. If I would vote with the party, or vote without knowing any thing upon what I vote, it would save me a great deal of time. We have just voted to commit the Texas Boundary Bill to the Committee of the Whole on the State of the Union. This gives us a chance to amend it, and put it in a better shape. The friends of freedom all voted for this; and many who do not care for freedom, but who must vote as they did, joined us, so that we prevailed by 101 to 99.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 321-2

Congressman Horace Mann, September 6, 1850

SEPT. 6.

I had no letter from you last night, nor eke this morning. I am so sure that you never fail, that I always convict the railroads or postmasters, and condemn them.

I had a sad day yesterday. The day before, Mr. Boyd's amendment, giving a Territorial Government to New Mexico, not only without a proviso against slavery, but with an express provision, that, when States are erected, they may be slave States if they wish, was voted down; but yesterday that vote was reconsidered. Then Massachusetts members went for it, although our Legislature, the last of last April, expressed the most decided opinions to the contrary, and although, before this new Administration, in which Mr. Webster takes so conspicuous a part, the whole North, with the exception of a part of the cities, was against it. Mr. E—— has voted steadily and uniformly for slavery. It is getting to be a fixed law, in my mind, to have no faith in men who make money their god. It is amazing into what forms the human mind may be shaped. Here are twenty, perhaps thirty, men from the North in this House, who, before Gen. Taylor's death, would have sworn, like St. Paul, not to eat nor drink until they had voted the proviso, who now, in the face of the world, turn about, defy the instructions of their States, take back their own declarations a thousand times uttered, and vote against it. It is amazing; it is heart-sickening. What shall be done? I know no other way but through the cause in which I have so long worked. May God save our children from being, in their day, the cause of such comments by others!

P.S. It is two o'clock, and the infernal bill has just passed. Dough, if not infinite in quantity, is infinitely soft. The North is again disgracefully beaten, most disgracefully.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 322

Congressman Horace Mann, September 8, 1850

SEPT. 8, 1850.

Texas has not a particle of rightful claim to all the north-western region this bill contends for; but she has passed a law claiming it, and threatens to make war upon the Union if her claim is not allowed. An extra session of her legislature is now in being. Her governor recommends that she should raise and equipmen to march to Santa Fé, and subdue the people there to her control (who are Mexicans, and who hate her); and the legislature is now preparing means to carry, or rather to seem to carry, their threats into execution. Our great Presidency-seekers, Webster, Cass, Clay, &c., wish to succumb to her claims. They cannot afford to offend any party at the South, because they want the votes of the South. The South wants Texas to have all this territory, because Texas is one of the most atrocious proslavery States in the Union; and, if any part of the territory is set off to New Mexico, they say it may eventually be free. Those who think their party will gain something by yielding to this false claim of Texas go for it with their leaders. Texas would not relinquish an inch of it but for money: therefore it is proposed to give her ten millions of dollars to buy her off. It is the most outrageous piece of swindling ever practised. In reality, we give her, by this boundary, a hundred thousand more square miles than she owns, and ten millions of dollars besides. President Taylor meant to maintain the rights of the country; and, if he had lived, we should have tried strength with the miserable braggarts of Texas: but, since his death, the whole policy of the Administration is changed, and with that, owing to their power and patronage, Congress is demoralized, and the bill has passed, and the Territories have governments without any prohibition of slavery. California is admitted as a free State; and that is all the compensation we have.

I am sick at heart, and disgusted at the wickedness of men.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 322-3

Congressman Horace Mann, September 9, 1850

SEPT. 9.

Eureka! Eureka! or at least almost Eureka! The House has passed a resolution this morning to adjourn three weeks from to-day. It must be acted upon in the Senate; but I think they are tired enough to go home, and that it will not be postponed longer. This will bring it to the very last day of the month, and I shall almost count the hours till it comes.

Read Mr. Underwood's speech on the Texas Boundary Bill, and understand it, and you need read nothing else on the subject.

The politicians and the Texas bond-holders had a sort of public frolic on Saturday evening, after the bill for the admission of California, and for the establishment of a Territorial Government for Utah, was passed. Texas stock, which, on the 1st of January last, was not worth more than five or six cents on the dollar, will now be worth one dollar and five or six cents! This bill appropriates ten millions of dollars. Think, then, what immense and corrupt influences have been brought to bear upon the decision of this freedom-or-slavery question! . . . One of the most extreme antislavery men in all the North, who had given the strongest pledges, made the most emphatic declarations, and defied all consequences in the most unreserved manner, went over as soon as Mr. Webster was appointed Secretary of State, and has voted on the proslavery side ever since. He has been talking for some time about going to California, and, this morning, has notified the House of his resignation, and started for New York. See if, before six months have elapsed, he does not have an office. It wrings my heart to see such venality.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 323-4

Theodore Parker to Congressman Horace Mann, September 9, 1850

WEST ROXBURY, Sept. 9, 1850.

DEAR SIR, I suppose that any word of commendation which I could utter would seem to you as a very doubtful compliment; for, if it is a desirable thing laudari a viro laudato, it is undesirable to be praised by a viro odioso. Still, I cannot help saying to you how much I honor and esteem you for the services you have rendered to your country and mankind since you entered Congress. I thought, at the time you first went there, you would find more trouble there than with the Boston schoolmasters and such poor things as Matthew Hale Smith. It seems to me, not only that you have done a great service by your speeches on slavery, but by what you have done in opposition to Mr. Webster. Excuse me for saying so; but there are some things in your Notes which it grieved me to see there. They weakened your position; they gave your doubtful friends an opportunity to pass over to Webster's side; and to your real foes they gave an opportunity of making out a case before the public. Still, to candid men, it must be plain, from your Notes, that Mr. Webster is exceedingly base. In doing this, you have done a great service. Webster has often been attacked, but almost wholly by political rivals or mere partisans, neither of whom were sincere in the charges against him. You attack him on moral grounds. I think your attack must disturb him more than all ever written against him before now. But, in the mean time, you are continually or often attacked yourself, your language misinterpreted, your motives assailed. There is nobody to defend you. Some cannot; others dare not. Then some of the men you have relied upon were never worthy of your confidence, and will do nothing. You have crossed the path of some selfish men by your theories of benevolence, and mortified them by your own life; and they will pay you for both. Some men would gladly have written in your defence; but they would only bring you into trouble. You saw how “Codus Alexandricus,” in the “Advertiser,” tried to couple you with me; and you doubtless appreciated the benevolence of the attempt. I write to you chiefly to suggest to you, whether it would not be a good plan for you to write another letter to your constituents, on the state of the country, the conduct of public men (above all, of Webster), and your own relations to the wicked measures of the past Congress. It seems to me you might, in this way, orient yourself before the public, and give them a good deal of information which they need and want. I suppose, of course, you knew the attempt made in Boston (and by a few in New York) to defeat your election this autumn. Marshall P. Wilder is thought of by some men for your successor. Such a letter as you might write would settle that matter.

I beg you not to answer this letter, which will only occupy your time; but believe me truly your friend and servant,

THEO. PARKER.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 324-5

Congressman Horace Mann, September 10, 1850

SEPT. 10.

This is Tuesday, my black-chalk day; for, on this day, I get no letter from home. The House is now discussing the question, whether the representatives from California shall be admitted as members of the House. They are objected to because they were chosen by the people long before California became a State. The bill to admit California was signed by the President yesterday, and these claimants were chosen nearly a year ago: so that they were chosen to represent a State before there was any such State.

What a mighty country ours is! It has all the means of greatness but intelligence and integrity. In these how deficient it is! I hope God will let us live through our youthful follies and vices, as he does some individuals; and that, later in life, something may be done to atone for the follies of these early days.

The time for our adjournment is fixed. Then-oh then! I will not think too much of what may lie between me and my hopes.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 325-6

Congressman Horace Mann, September 12, 1850

SEPT. 12.

What I wished to tell you yesterday was what Miss Dix had just told me about her hospital in New Jersey. One gentleman has given money enough — several hundred dollars to place a fountain in the yard; another to buy a magic lantern for the amusement of the patients; and she had just asked a Mr. King, a member of the House, to give her money for a library, and he had given it. So she was all smiles and delight when I saw her. Think of her going round, first to establish hospitals; then to fill them, and to take care of them; and then to enrich them with libraries and apparatus, and beautify them with embellishments!

I have been writing so far while the clerk was calling the yeas and nays on the Fugitive-slave Bill, an outrageous bill; not so bad as the one I denounced in my second letter, but one which will make abolitionists by battalions and regiments.

It has just passed by a vote of 105 to 73, an enormous majority. I think this bill will inflame the country more than the Territorial bills; but I do not know but the nerve of the country has been so often excited, that it has lost its susceptibility. I cannot speak with any composure of this series of diabolical measures. What makes it all so terrible is, that these bills passed by treachery, the grossest treachery of those who were chosen to do directly the opposite thing. I wish I had my former force with which to curse the measures, if not the men!

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 326

Congressman Horace Mann to Samuel Downer, September 10, 1850

WASHINGTON, Sept. 10, 1850.

MY DEAR DOWNER, You see all is gone. The influence of the Administration became all-powerful. E—— voted in committee against the Wilmot Proviso, direct. D—— was swept away. He voted on the first day against the Texas Boundary Bill, when it was alone; and the next day in favor of it, with New Mexico attached. There will be the most vigorous efforts to wheel the Whigs into line. Will they wheel? All motives on the surface will prompt them to do so. Thousands will say, "What can we do better? It is past it cannot be remedied. Abandon the past, and go for the future." This will be the superficial argument; but I mistake if the Whig party has not received a wound from which it will never recover. Good-by!

Ever yours,

HORACE MANN.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 326-7

Congressman Horace Mann to Samuel Downer, September 13, 1850

WASHINGTON, Sept. 13, 1850.

S. DOWNER, Esq.

MY DEAR SIR,—Is it true that you say, or that you have been informed, that I have written any apologetic or any explanatory or deprecatory letter to the editor of the "Boston Bee," which he is privately showing?

It certainly shows native genius when men can build so large a superstructure of falsehood on so small a foundation of truth. I will tell you the whole story, so that you may see how big a bird can be hatched out of a small egg.

Some time during the present session, I think, last winter, one of the editors of the "Bee," Mr. R—— called on me here. I saw him several times, and he appeared friendly, and our interviews were agreeable; that is, to me. He asked some favor of me, which I gladly rendered. He then expressed his thanks, quite as warmly as I could have desired; told me that his paper had done me injustice formerly (during my controversy with the Boston schoolmasters); said he resisted it at the time, but was overcome by his partners; and then expressed to me, in strong terms, his regret for the injury that had been done me. I gave him to understand, that, at the time, I had felt the injustice, but that the occasion had passed away, and with it almost all recollection of it; and that I should be none the less ready to do him a favor when occasion should offer.

In July or August last, when the "Bee" published that gross falsehood, that I (with others) had visited Mr. Fillmore, and had interfered to persuade him not to appoint Mr. Webster as a member of his Cabinet, the interviews which I had had with Mr. R———, his apology for the wrong done me by the " Bee," &c., came to my mind. At that period, the "Bee" had, for some time, been assailing me through what was called a "Washington correspondent." Under these circumstances, I thought I would write a letter to Mr. R———, remind him of our former intercourse, and put him upon his bearings as a man of honor and truth. I did not know his partners, and did not wish to write to them, or put myself in their hands in any way. I thought, if I had not entirely mistaken the character of Mr. R———, I would prevent further abuse and falsification by appealing to him. I therefore wrote him the letter marked private, or confidential, in which I referred to our former interview, reminded him of his apology, and remonstrated with him for the course taken in charging me with what I had not done. There was not a word in the letter which a gentleman might not write or receive; nothing clandestine, nothing partisan; no threats for anger, no intercessions for favor. Not knowing Mr. R's partners, and at the same time knowing how such things get distorted and misrepresented and falsified when they pass through a partisan medium, I wrote to him alone; and I can hardly conceive that he should show the letter, even to his partners. Certainly, if I did not entirely mistake his character as a man of honor, he cannot have been showing that letter to the public or to individuals, or suggesting that there is one idea in it unworthy of me, as a man of truth and sincerity, to feel or to express.

I desire, therefore, that you would go to Mr. R, and, if the letter is in being, ask him to show it to you (for which this is my permission), and learn for yourself whether it contains any thing which I might not write, or any thing which would authorize him to break the seal of silence by showing it.

Yours very truly,

HORACE MANN.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 327-8

Congressman Horace Mann to Samuel Downer, September 13, 1850

WASHINGTON, Sept. 13, 1850.

MY DEAR DOWNER,—I wrote you nothing about affairs; and how could I? The atmosphere is full of treachery. If what was done about New Mexico and Texas shocks every honest mind, what will be said of the Fugitive-slave Bill?

By the way, in the "Boston Courier" of Tuesday they pretend to give the Texas Boundary Bill; but they wholly omit the clause at the end, by which an additional slave State is given to Texas. So I see, in the "Union" of this morning, they profess to give the Fugitive-slave Bill, but leave out from the fifth section one of the most obnoxious and outrageous provisions which the bill contains. I have seen these bills quoted falsely in other Northern papers. Is this ignorance, or falsehood?

You do not tell me how this series of measures strikes the Northern mind. Are they all dead in Massachusetts? Will there be no re-action? or will the Whigs face about, and go for slavery in 1850, as the Democrats did for Texas in 1846? . . .

We had no chance to amend the Fugitive-slave Bill. It was hardly anticipated that not a moment's debate or chance for amendment would be allowed. . . .

If the friends of freedom do not rally on this, they are dead for half a century.

Does the "Atlas" lie down, and take it without one kick? Do all the Boston papers take command, as expressed by Byron?—

"Kiss the rod;

For, if you don't, I'll lay it on, by God!"

Yours ever and truly,

HORACE MANN.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 329

Congressman Horace Mann, September 13, 1850

SEPT. 13, 1850.

I wrote you word yesterday what an infernal day's work we did. The Fugitive-slave Bill was driven through under the gag. The floor was assigned to Mr. Thompson, a Pennsylvania Democrat, who made a speech of nearly an hour long, and then called for the previous question, which was sustained; and so all possibility of debate or of amendment was precluded.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 329

Congressman Horace Mann, September 14, 1850

Sept. 14. . . . I do not think Mr. Webster has any chance for the Presidency. The South, having used him, will fling him away. But that he neither does nor will see. My own opinion is, that, notwithstanding all this billing and cooing of the heads of the hostile parties, there will be a deadly fight between them ere long. They have united to settle this question satisfactorily to the South, so that they might challenge Southern votes. It has been a competition for political power, stimulated, in regard to some of them, by the venality growing out of the Texas ten millions.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 330

Congressman Horace Mann, September 15, 1850

Sept. 15. There has been a very sharp debate in the Senate, in which the Southern men have rode and overrode Mr. Winthrop, and hunted up all the ugly things they could say about Massachusetts, and pitched them at him. I do not think Mr. Winthrop has sustained himself very well. He ought to have carried the war into Africa, or at least to have repelled the intruders from his own territory. When we speak of the South as they are, the first thing they do is to ransack our old history; and whatever they can find either against the law of toleration as we now consider it, or the duties of humanity as a higher civilization exemplifies and expounds them, they bring forward. They have never yet been properly answered. If some such man as Sumner was in the seat, he would turn the tables upon them.

The South are more rampant than ever. They feel their triumph. Two or three times within the last week, the "Union," the Southern Democratic organ here, has declared, that, if such or such a thing is done, the Union will totter to its centre. Her interminable cry will now be, if she cannot have her own way, that the Union is tumbling to pieces. We are to have this idea of dissolution as the supplement for all argument, and the arsenal of all weapons. There is a momentary lull; but the presidency-seekers will soon open a deadly fire upon each other.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 330

Congressman Horace Mann, August 18, 1850

AUG. 18, 1850.

. . We are now debating the Civil and Diplomatic Appropriation Bill in the House. It is quite uncertain when any one of the exciting questions will be taken up. On those questions, the old parties are greatly divided; and many members act upon their own judgment, or with reference to the wishes of their constituents at home. There is a party, however, which is determined to support the Administration, without further inquiry. The truth is, the slave-power of the South and the money-power of the North have struck hands. The one threatens the Union: the other yields, professing to be in fear of disunion, but really for the purpose of obtaining the profits of trade and of getting a new tariff. The whole mercantile press of Boston is under the influence of this power. They either come out decidedly, and denounce every thing and everybody that stands in the way of getting more money, at what ever sacrifice of human liberty, like the "Courier," "Advertiser," and "Post," or like the other papers, the "Traveller," the "Mercantile Journal," &c., they maintain silence on the subject while the enemy is at work. The "Courier" is the most spiteful and virulent against me. They cannot reason me down; so they try to ridicule me down. They copy from the "Springfield Republican."

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 315-6

Congressman Horace Mann, August 19, 1850

. . . We have no indications yet of what is likely to be done with the Texas Boundary Bill. The subject presents some points of real difficulty. Different views will be taken of the same facts, according to the party medium through which they are seen. We are in trying times; but I never felt my mind clearer and stronger to do the right, and defy consequences.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 316

Congressman Horace Mann, August 20, 1850

Since the children of Mammon have opened their batteries upon me, Downer writes me frequently, and says the wisest things about political and personal affairs. He is so much ahead of the age, that He seems not few will appreciate him. He seems not to have any power to lead or create a party; but he has more wisdom than four-fifths of those who constitute parties. He proves all the good things I have ever thought of him.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 316

Congressman Horace Mann to Samuel Downer, August 21, 1850

WASHINGTON, Aug. 21, 1850.

S. DOWNER, Esq.

MY DEAR SIR,—The only question on which the sincere friends of freedom here have any doubt is the Texas Boundary Bill. Most of us, I think, will go against this as it now is; but suppose it could be amended so as to conform its northern line to that of the Compromise Bill, and suppose also we could strike out the provision which secures the right to Texas to bring forth four slave States, what would then be your opinion about suffering it to pass, or helping to pass it? This boundary properly settled, I think we could count upon all the rest as free territory.

I see the "New-Bedford Standard," a Democratic Free-soil paper, comes out for the boundary as it is. So does the "Nantucket Inquirer." So, I am told, does the "Ploughman," a neutral paper. Doubtless the Whig papers will generally come out for it.

There is to be a competition between the old Hunkers of both parties for Southern support. On this Texan boundary question, I prophesy they will carry the country with them. On the Territorial questions, country or no country, I will never go with them. Either no Territorial governments, or governments with the Wilmot Proviso in them.

Please give me, as soon as you can, your opinion on the boundary matter, and I shall prepare myself for doing what, under all the circumstances, seems to be best for the cause.

Your last letter was very gratifying. You seem to me to take the most just, practical, as well as theoretical view of things.

In great haste, very truly yours,

HORACE MANN.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 317

Congressman Horace Mann, August 23, 1850

I stay at home this morning to write to you. I long to be at home; but the time of our departure cannot be seen by any political astronomer. There is a probability that we shall come to some of the exciting questions this week. We are as ready now to meet them as we ever shall be. The great influence of Mr. Webster is brought with full force to bear against all security for freedom in the Territories. His name, his reputation for talent, and, above all, his power of patronage and influence in the Government, tell with prodigious force upon all measures. His going into the cabinet may be the salvation of Mr. Fillmore's administration; but it is even more likely that it will be fatal to the cause of freedom. See what comes of intellect without morality!

We had another furious storm last night. It reminded me of the last, the one in which Sumner's brother and Margaret Fuller were lost; and, when I hear the winds howl and sweep so at night, my mind always goes out to watch along the seashore, and then I cannot but see what the next papers relate of disaster and death. I always had a special horror for a shipwreck. It seems to me the most terrible form of death that is not ignominious. If, however, — and I often have a vivid intellectual perception of this, regarded death as we should, it would cease to be the dreadful spectre that it now is. How much of this, in all after-life, must depend upon education!

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 316-7

Congressman Horace Mann to Samuel Downer, August 25, 1850

WASHINGTON, Aug. 25, 1850.

I must say, my dear Downer, for the friendliness of your letters turns the esteem and regard which I have always had for you into affection.

Your view of the difficulty of my case corresponds exactly with mine. The sentiment of the old catch, "I cares for nobody, and nobody cares for me," is perfectly true when applied to parties. No party has felt that I was in full communion with it. The "communication," as the magnetizers say, has not been established. They may have believed, what always was and always will be true, that, while ready to do any thing for their principles, I would not sell myself to their partisan schemes. Hence, in a crisis like this, they feel that I am not the man for them.

From all that I learn, I am led to suppose, that, while every thing is done against me that can be done in the lower part of the county, there is a state of entire quiescence in the upper. From those parts of the district which are in Plymouth and Middlesex Counties, I hear almost nothing. I have letters from different parts of the State which are as complimentary as my most partial friends could desire. They speak of the universal disaffection there is towards Webster, and of the sympathy there is for me. But these are away from commercial and manufacturing localities. In such resorts, and among men engaged in business, who are susceptible on the Mammon side of their nature, I suppose Webster is all powerful. Never was a greater influence exerted than his friends are exerting now, here as well as at home; and I think that the Territories have as good a chance to come in without the proviso as California has to be admitted as a free State.

It is impossible for the friends of freedom at home to take any but the most general positions now.

Within the coming month, there will be developments which will have decisive influences upon parties and individuals. No conventions should be held till after the adjournment of Congress. We shall then see what foe we have to meet, and what weapons we have to fight with.

On the Texas Boundary Bill I may have an opportunity to say something, though not much at length. Texas has been allowed to slide or steal into possession of a great extent of territory to which she has no right,—all, or almost all, between the Nueces and the Rio Grande, from the Gulf up to New Mexico. The New-Mexicans, by fixing the boundary in their constitution at 32° on the east side of the Rio Grande, have cut their friends off from all attempt to give them any thing below. My impression is, that if the Texan Boundary Bill were amended so as to adopt the compromise line, -that is, starting from twenty miles above El Paso, and going north-east to the south-west corner of the Indian Territory,—and if the provision were stricken out which gives Texas a right to an additional slave State, it would be best to vote for it. Please to tell me what you think of this, as soon as convenient.

I do not know exactly on whom to rely in these times. . . . I will send you one or two letters, that you may see what people say to me. . . . Please return these letters to me. I receive any amount of this kind, —paper abuse, much more than the amount of the news

Yours ever,

HORACE MANN.

SOURCE: Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, Life of Horace Mann, p. 317-9