Washington, January 28, 1861.
Your esteemed favor of the 17th inst. has reached me.
There appears to be a very great misunderstanding in the
public mind, as to the present condition of affairs at the capital of the nation,
and especially in relation to the demands of the disunionists upon the Union
men of the North. I find that the impression prevails quite extensively that
the “Crittenden proposition,” as it is called, is simply a reestablishment of
the Missouri Compromise line. This is very far from the truth.
Mr. Crittenden proposes to extend the line of 36° 30'
through to the Pacific Ocean, and to agree, by constitutional provision, to
protect and defend slavery in all the territory of the United States south of that
line. Nor is this all. He now proposes that this protection to slavery shall
be extended to all territory that may hereafter be acquired south of that line.
The sum and substance of the whole matter is, that we are asked, for the
sake of peace, to surrender all our cherished ideas on the subject of slavery,
and agree, in effect, to provide a slave code for the Territories south of 36°
30' and for the Mexican provinces, as soon as they shall be brought within our
jurisdiction. It is demanded of us that we shall consent to change the
Constitution into a genuine pro-slavery instrument, and to convert the
Government into a great slave-breeding, slavery-extending empire.
Every man blessed with ordinary foresight must see what
would be the inevitable and almost immediate consequence of the adoption of
this provision as a part of the Constitution. It would disclose itself to be
the very reverse of a measure of peace. Raids would at once begin upon the
provinces of Mexico; war would ensue; the annexation of Sonora, Chihuahua,
Cohahuila, Nuevo Leon, Tamaulipas, and other provinces, would follow; they
would be converted, at the instant of their acquisition, from free into slave
Territories, and ultimately be admitted into the Union as slave States. Much as
I love peace and seek to pursue it, I am not prepared to pay this price for it.
Let no man in Iowa imagine for a moment that the Crittenden proposition is for
a mere restoration of the Compromise line of 1820. It is simply and truly the application
of the Breckinridge platform to all territory now acquired, or hereafter
to be acquired south of 36° 30', and would result, if adopted, in the
acquisition and admission of new slave States for the ostensible purpose of
restoring what is called the equilibrium of the sections. The restoration of
the Missouri Compromise line has been offered to the disunionists and contemptuously
rejected. Their maxim is “rule or ruin.”
I confess that I look with amazement upon the course of the
Northern sympathizers with the disunionists. Six years ago they assisted to
break down a compromise of thirty-four years' standing, and defended their
action by what they claimed to be the right of the people to determine for
themselves what should be the character of their own domestic institutions.
There was much plausibility in their argument. They made a party creed of it.
Now, after the lapse of six short years, they have become so pro-slavery in
their opinions that they are willing to ignore the past, and recognize and
protect slavery in the very country which they boasted that their own act had
made free.
There are other provisions in the Crittenden resolutions
which to my mind are wholly inadmissible, but let them pass. My objection is to
any compromise. I will never consent to compromises, or the imposition of terms
upon me or the people I represent, under threats of breaking up the Government.
I will not “give reasons under compulsion.” No surer or more effectual way
could be devised for converting this into a revolutionary Government than the
adoption of a compromise expedient at this time.
Eight months ago the four political parties of this country,
in their several conventions, announced certain abstract propositions in their
platforms which each believed to be true, and which, if acted upon, would in
their opinion most conduce to the prosperity of the whole country. The issue
upon these propositions was submitted to the people through the ballot-boxes.
One party was successful, as either might have been, but for the lack of votes;
and now one of the vanquished parties seeks to overthrow the Government,
because they were not themselves the victors, and will only consent to stay
their work of demolition upon the condition that we will agree to make their
platform, which is abhorrent to us, a part of the Constitution of the country.
After taking their chances for success, and being defeated in a fair and manly
contest, they now seek to overthrow the Government under which they live, and
to which they owe their allegiance. How rapidly are we following in the
footsteps of the governments of Mexico and South America!
I do not believe that the public mind is now in a condition
to calmly consider the great questions involved in the amendments proposed. But
suppose the people were willing and anxious that such amendments to the
Constitution should be submitted to them; suppose they were in a proper frame
of mind to weigh them and decide upon their adoption; suppose their adoption
was not attempted to be enforced by threats, can we have any assurance that
this is the last demand to be made upon us? Can we be certain that success in
this instance will not whet the appetite for new concessions and new demands,
and that similar threats of secession and revolution will not succeed every
future presidential election? Will the demand for new guarantees stop here?
Shall we not be as liable to have our trade paralyzed, our finances deranged,
our national flag insulted, the public property wrested from us and destroyed,
and the Government itself overthrown, four years hence, if we amend the
Constitution, as we should be if we now stand firmly by our principles and
uphold the authority of the Government?
The question before the country, it seems to me, has assumed
gigantic proportions. It has become something more than an issue on the slavery
question growing out of the construction of the Constitution. The issue now
before us is, whether we have a country, whether or not this is a nation. Is
this a Government which Florida, with eighty thousand people, can destroy, by
resolving herself out of the Union and seizing the forts and arsenals within
her borders? That is the question presented us for our decision. Can a great
and prosperous nation of thirty-three millions of people be destroyed by an act
of secession of some of its members? Florida and her sister revolutionary
States answer in the affirmative. We deny it. They undertake to act upon their
professed belief, and secede, or, as I term it, rebel against the Government.
While they are in this attitude of rebellion a compromise is presented to us
for adoption, by which it is proposed, not to punish the rebellious States, but
to entice them back into the Union. Who does not see that by adopting these
compromise propositions we tacitly recognize the right of these States to
secede? Their adoption at this time would completely demoralize the Government,
and leave it in the power of any State to destroy. If Florida and South
Carolina can secede because of the slavery question, what shall prevent
Pennsylvania from seceding because the Government declines to adequately
protect her iron and coal interests, or New England because her manufactures,
or New York because her commerce is not sufficiently protected? I could agree
to no compromise until the right to secede was fully renounced, because it
would be a recognition of the right of one or more States to break up the
Government at their will.
Iowa has a peculiar interest in this question. If this right
of State revolution be conceded, her geographical position is such as to place
her completely in the power of revolutionary States. Will she agree that one
State can secede and take from her the mouth of the Mississippi River, that
another can take from her the mouth of the Missouri, and that others shall be
permitted to deprive her of the right of passage to the Atlantic Ocean? If she
will not agree to this, it becomes her people to insist that the Constitution
of the country shall be upheld, that the laws of the land shall be enforced,
and that this pretended right of a State to destroy our national existence
shall be sternly and emphatically rebuked. I know the people of Iowa well
enough to believe that appeals to their magnanimity, if not successful, will be
kindly received and considered, while appeals to their fears will pass by them
as the idle wind, and that they will risk all things and endure all things in
maintaining the honor of the national flag and in preserving the national
Union.
One word more and I close this letter, already too long. At
the commencement of the session, before revolution had assumed its present
gigantic proportions, before any State had pretended to secede except South
Carolina, before the forts and arsenals of the United States had been captured,
the flag of the country fired upon, and the capital of the nation threatened, I
assented, as a member of the Senatorial Committee of Thirteen, to three
propositions, which were to the following effect, viz.:
1. That Congress should never be permitted to interfere with
the domestic institutions of any State, or to abolish slavery therein.
2. That the several States should be advised to review their
legislation in regard to persons of color, and repeal or modify all such laws
as might conflict with the Constitution of the United States or with any of the
laws of Congress made in pursuance thereof.
3. To admit Kansas into the Union under the Wyandotte
constitution, and then to admit the remaining territory belonging to the United
States as two States, one north and one south of the parallel of 36° 30' with
the provision that these States might be subdivided and new ones erected
therefrom whenever there should be sufficient population for one Representative
in Congress upon sixty thousand square miles.
Those propositions, if adopted, would have quieted the
apprehensions of the Southern people as to the intention of the people of the
free States to interfere with slavery in the States, and would have finally
disposed of all the territory belonging to the Government. They would have made
two very inconvenient States, but they would have settled a very inconvenient
question. They could have been adopted without any surrender of principle by
anybody or any section, and therefore without any party and personal
humiliation. But they were spurned by the disunionists. They preferred to
plunge the country into revolution, and they have done it. It only remains for
us now to obey and enforce the laws, and show to the world that this Government
is strong enough to protect itself from rebellion within as well as from
assault without.
The issue now made up for the decision of the people of this
country is between law, order, the Union, and the Constitution, on the one
hand, and revolution, anarchy, dissolution, and bloodshed, on the other. I do
not doubt as to the side you and the people of Iowa will occupy in this contest.
SOURCE: William Salter, The Life of James W. Grimes,
p. 133-8
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