It is not my purpose, Mr. Chairman, to address the House at
all in reference to the bill now before it. I propose, in the opening of my
remarks, to take a brief retrospect of the rise, progress, and fall, of the
southern movement. It is very well known, sir, not only to the members of
Congress, but to the whole country, that the continued action of the northern
people, and of the Northern States, upon the subject of the domestic relations
existing in the South, between the master and the slave, had at one time
wrought up the southern mind to a very high degree of exasperation.
Apprehensions were freely expressed, and doubtless generally entertained, that
some great disaster was likely to befall the country, growing out of this
excitement. In this state of public feeling, during the Thirtieth Congress, a
gentleman, then a representative from one of the districts in the state of New
York [Mr. Gott], introduced a resolution, preceded by what the southern members
believed to be a most insulting preamble. This preamble, insulting though it
certainly was, did not propose any legislative action. The resolution directed
a very simple, but a very important inquiry to be made. It directed the
committee for the District of Columbia, to inquire into the expediency of
abolishing the slave trade in this District. The passage of this resolution
gave offence to the whole southern delegation, and they commenced, at once,
manifesting their hostility to this movement in a manner not to be
misunderstood.
A distinguished gentleman in the other branch of the
legislature, from my own state, and now its governor, came, as the older
members of Congress know very well, into this House and solicited members of
Congress to sign their names to a call for a meeting of southern senators and
representatives. In obedience to this call, a meeting assembled in the Senate
Chamber, over which a venerable senator from the state of Kentucky [Governor
Metcalfe] was called to preside. Here, sir, I date the rise of the southern
movement. From this point it commenced its progress. But for this movement, I
undertake to say, the southern Democracy was not responsible. That meeting was
a joint assemblage of the southern Whigs and of the southern Democrats. There
were Whigs who absented themselves; and there were Democrats who absented
themselves; but the southern delegation in Congress generally, and without
reference to party, was responsible for the meeting and for its proceedings.
That meeting put forth an address to the southern people, written, as it is
said, and I have no doubt correctly, by the late venerable and distinguished
senator from South Carolina [Mr. Calhoun]. It was such a paper as was intended
to produce, as it certainly did produce, a most profound sensation upon the
southern mind. Upon my return to Mississippi, I found a very high degree of
excitement an excitement not confined to the Democrats, but pervading all
parties, Whigs as well as Democrats. A proposition had already been made, and
was then being actively urged, for a convention of our state—a popular
convention to take into consideration the relations then subsisting between the
North and the South, growing out of the institution of domestic slavery. A
number of gentlemen, of both political parties, published a call to the people,
inviting them to assemble in convention. This call was the first advance step
of the southern movement, and for it, both Whigs and Democrats in my state were
alike responsible. In obedience to it, the people, without reference to party,
assembled in primary meetings and appointed delegates to a state convention,
and, in every instance, the delegates to that convention were appointed of
equal numbers, Whigs and Democrats. The convention assembled in the month of
October, 1849.
This, sir, was the second step in the progress of the
southern movement. Up to this period neither party could claim the exclusive
credit, and up to this time it was all credit—there was no debit. That
convention put forth another address to the people of Mississippi, and from that
address I propose just in this connection to read a very short extract. For
this address, bear you in mind, both the Whig and the Democratic parties of
Mississippi were responsible, so far as they could be made responsible by their
delegates in convention. It bore the honored signatures of leading Democrats
and leading Whigs. It was a document which bore the signature of a very
distinguished member of the UNION party, now high in the confidence of the
administration, and its representative as chief consul on the Island of Cuba—Judge
Sharkey. After disclosing to the people what had been done and what was
proposed for the future, Judge, now Consul, Sharkey and his associates said:—
“Besides and beyond a popular
convention of the Southern States with the view and the hope of arresting the
cause of aggression, and if not practicable, then to concentrate the South in
will, understanding, and action, the convention of Mississippi suggested, as
the possible ultimate resort, the call by the legislature of the assailed
states, or still some more solemn conventions—such as should be regularly
elected by the people of those states to deliberate, speak, and act with all
the sovereign power of the people. Should, in the result, such conventions be
called and meet, they may lead to a like regularly—constituted convention of
all the assailed states, to provide in the last resort for their
separate welfare by the formation of a compact and an union that
will afford protection to their liberties and their rights.”
Now, that is the language for which I say all parties in
Mississippi were responsible. It is the emanation of a convention composed
equally of Whigs and of Democrats, or as they are now called of State-Rights
men and Union men. The very head and front of the Union party in Mississippi,
was the president of the convention, which put forth that address—the very head
and front of the Union party in Mississippi attached his name to that sentiment
and published it to the people of Mississippi—“to provide in the last resort
for their separate welfare.” How could this be done else than by a separation from
the Northern States? How could it could be done else than by secession or
revolution—by breaking up the government? True, it was to be done in the last
resort; and pray, have we ever spoken of secession except as the last
resort—the final alternative? But now I find this language brought into the
House of Representatives by my honorable colleague [Mr. Wilcox], and held up
here with an attempt to hold the party to which I belong responsible for it.
History, sir, must be known to him, at least the history of our own state, and
if he has read that history, he knows that the Honorable William L. Sharkey,
the appointee of Millard Fillmore as consul to the city of Havana, was among
those who put forth this address—put his signature to this language, and
endorsed it to the people of Mississippi. To this point the southern movement
progressed. This Mississippi convention advised the convention of the Southern
States. Virginia responded to that call, so did Georgia and Alabama, and
Louisiana, and Arkansas, and Texas. Ay, even Tennessee came in, slowly and
reluctantly, it is true, but still she comes
Mr. POLK. To save the republic.
Mr. BROWN. Yes, sir, Tennessee went into the Nashville
Convention to save the republic, and so did Mississippi.
Mr. SCURRY. If the gentleman will permit me to interrupt
him.
Mr. BROWN. Very briefly.
Mr. SCURRY. The gentleman who attended from Texas did so
against the large majority of the district which he represented. A majority of
that district voted directly and flatly against the convention.
Mr. BROWN. Well, I am not going to inquire how delegates
came to be there. I speak of history as it is. Texas was represented in the
convention, whether by her authority I do not know, and what is more, at this
time I do not care. It is not material. The Nashville Convention, in obedience
to this call, and in pursuance of these proceedings, assembled. This was
another step in the progress of the southern movement. Up to this time, if
there was any strenuous objection to it anywhere, I, at least, was not aware of
it. Here and there an exception may have been found—here and there a newspaper
editor might be found to oppose it; but the great mass of the southern politicians—as
far as I could judge of the southern people—Whigs and Democrats were for
it. They were for it without distinction as to party. The convention assembled.
It elected Honorable William L. Sharkey, of my own state—the head and front of
Mississippi UNIONISM—to preside over its deliberations. He did preside. That
convention put forth an address to the people, followed by a series of
resolutions, asserting certain propositions upon which the southern people
ought to insist. Still, sir, there was no formidable objection either to the
convention, or to what it said or did. The progress of the movement still
seemed to be onward. Soon afterwards the compromise measures began to attract
attention in the country and in Congress. A feeling of trepidation seemed to
steal over senators and representatives. Here and there an old advocate of the
Nashville Convention—one who had looked to it as the source from which a
panacea was to come for all wounds and bruises and putrifying sores, gradually
fell off. I might call names, if I did not wish to avoid involving myself in a
discussion with too many gentlemen at the same time. With the falling off of
these early and sturdy advocates, commenced the decline of the southern
movement and with the passage of the compromise, I mark the first distinct
evidence of its decay.
In November, 1850, after the compromise measures had passed,
a Union convention, the first ever held to my knowledge in the United States—certainly
the first ever held in my own state—was assembled at the city of Jackson, the
seat of government of Mississippi. It was not a Southern-Rights convention; it
was not a State-Rights convention; it was not a Whig convention; it was not a
Democratic convention; it was a UNION convention, so it was called, and so it assembled.
It was in advance of any other political organization in the state of
Mississippi, or any other state, growing, so far as I know, out of the
compromise. It rose as if from the ashes of the southern movement in
Mississippi. It was made up of the consistent few who opposed, and of the
greater number who seceded from the southern movement. With the assemblage of
this convention in Mississippi, I date the downfall of the southern movement in
that state; a fall which was rapidly succeeded by its downfall elsewhere.
Virginia determined to acquiesce in the measures of the compromise; Georgia
acquiesced; Alabama and the other states in the South followed suit, or were
silent. To the Union convention of Mississippi belongs the credit, if credit it
be, of striking the first fatal blow at the southern movement. From this
moment it rapidly declined. The movement I regard as dead. It
died at the hands of its early friends—its fathers. It is now very dead; and if
I were called upon to write its epitaph, I would inscribe upon the stone that
marked its burial place, Requiescat in pace. I will not
make merry over the tomb of an old friend. I loved this movement. I believed it
was, in its day, full of patriotism, full of devotion to the best interests of
the country, and eminently calculated to preserve the Union, because it was
eminently calculated to preserve the rights of the states within the Union. But
it has passed away. A witty friend, in speaking of its buoyant rise, its rapid
progress, and its early decay, described it as being like Billy Pringle's pig:
"When it lived, it lived in
clover,
And when it died, it died all
over."
[Laughter.]
When those who had been chiefly instrumental in getting up
this movement abandoned it, could we be made longer responsible for it? They
brought it into being, and by their hands it fell; and now they turn upon us,
denounce it as a monster, and charge its sole paternity on us. We assume our
due share of the responsibility, and they shall take theirs.
The Southern movement was, I repeat, the joint work of both
parties acting together. This is history. If there was any rivalry, it was as
to which party was entitled to the most credit. There was in this movement a
fusion of parties. But upon all the old issues each party maintained its
separate organization. And when the Southern movement was abandoned, each was
free to resume its original position.
The Whigs did not return to their position. They halted by
the wayside, and, by the aid of a few Democrats, formed the Union party. It was
a party not demanded by the exigencies of the hour; but called into existence
to subserve the views of particular men. This brings me to consider the present
organization of parties in my state.
My colleague [Mr. Wilcox] the other day, in what I
considered rather bad taste—although I certainly shall not undertake to lecture
him upon matters of taste—spoke of a bare minority—of almost a majority of the
people of our state, as attempting to SNEAK BACK into the Democratic ranks.
That was the language employed. In speaking of the State-Rights men of 1832,
after their separation from General Jackson, he said:
“They stood aloof from the party, in
armed neutrality, in the only state where they had a majority; and in states
where they were in the minority, generally acted with the Whig party in
opposition to the Democrats. They did not, after their defeat, attempt to sneak
back into the Democratic party under the style of old-line Democrats, as the secessionists
of the present day are attempting to do.”
Now I shall undertake to demonstrate that the State-Rights
party of Mississippi were never out of the ranks of the Democratic party, and
that by no act of theirs have they ever put themselves beyond the pale of that
party; and therefore there was no occasion for them to march back, even with
banners flying, and much less for them to "sneak back," in the
language of my colleague. Who were they that put themselves first out of the
pale of the Democratic party? It was my colleague and his associates. In November,
1850, they assembled together in what they certainly did not call a Democratic
convention. They assembled in a Union convention, and passed what they were
pleased to term Union resolutions. They formed a Union organization,
independent of the Democratic party, and equally independent of the Whig party.
They did more than that. They chose, as the especial organ of that party—the
particular mouth—piece of that political organization, the leading Whig organ
at the seat of government. I ask if it is not so? It is true they took down the
name of the paper. It was called the "Southron." That title no longer
suited their purpose, and they called it the "Flag of the Union." But
they left the old Whig editor to conduct it. True it is that they associated
with him a so—called Union Democrat. And it is equally true that the old-line
Whig and the newline Democrat yet conduct that journal. From this point, the
unhappy controversy which has continued in Mississippi, took its progress. The
Democratic party became divided. But there can be no difficulty in deciding who
kept up the old organization. The newspaper press of the state gives always a
pretty clear indication as to how parties stand. If there is one single,
solitary Whig paper in the state of Mississippi that has not kept the Union
flag flying at its masthead from the opening of the contest down to this hour,
I ask my colleague to say which one it is. If there was a Democratic paper in
the state of one year's standing that did not take the State-Rights side, with
but a single exception, the Columbus Democrat, and keep it, I do not know where
it is to be found. Who seems from these facts to have been getting out of the
Democratic party—my colleague, who is sustained by the Whig press, or I, who
have been and am yet sustained by the Democratic press?
More than this. The Union party called a convention in
April, 1851. It was to be, by the terms of the call, a Union convention—mark
you, it was not a Democratic convention, it was not a Whig convention, but it
was a Union convention. What did it do? Did it nominate Democrats for office?
It made four nominations, and two of them were Democrats by name, and two of
them were open and avowed Whigs. It did not assemble as a Democratic
convention. It did not sit as a Democratic convention. It did not make
Democratic nominations. It nominated two Whigs and two Democrats, and my
colleague voted the ticket thus nominated. Who was it, let me ask, that,
following after strange gods, thus put himself outside the Democratic party; and
who is he that, in coming back, will have occasion to sneak into the ranks?
The State-Rights party, or the Democratic State-Rights
party, as it is termed in our state, assembled in convention in June. What did
they do? They made their nominations, and they selected their nominees from the
old-line Democracy. General John A. Quitman was made our standard-bearer. I was
surprised the other day to hear my colleague going back to 1824 and 1828, to
find the evidence of Quitman's want of fidelity to true Democratic principles.
Something has been said about a statute of limitation. Whether the late
distinguished nominee of the Democracy of Mississippi requires a statute of
limitation, I certainly do not know. If he voted for John Quincy Adams in 1824
and 1828, and has since seen the error of his way, where is the Democrat who
will not forgive him? Where is the Mississippi Democrat who has not forgiven
him? But we have his own word for saying, that he did not vote for John Quincy
Adams in 1824. He did not vote for him in 1828. He was always a State-Rights
man of the strictest sect; and upon the issuing of General
Jackson's proclamation against South Carolina, he, like hundreds and
thousands of others who had been always faithful to the standard of the old
hero, abandoned him; and they returned to him in their own good time. But if it
be so grave an offence in the Democrats of Mississippi to have nominated a
gentleman who voted (allowing the charge of my friend to be true) for John
Quincy Adams in 1824, and again in 1828, what shall my friend say of Governor
Foote? He claims to be a better Democrat than anybody else; and yet he held the
only office that he ever did hold at the hands of the people in Mississippi,
until he was elected governor, from the Whigs of the county of Hinds, and that
so late as 1838-'9. Yes; my friend forgot that, in 1838, Governor Foote run as
a Whig, was elected as a Whig, and served as a Whig in our legislature. So upon
the score of consistency, I think, allowing my friend's statements to be true,
we stand quite as well as he does. And I submit to my colleague whether it is
not a little too late for him, or for his friend, the governor of the I was
going to say Union party, but he is governor of the state by the constitution—to
complain of Governor Quitman's want of Democracy. Did not both you and Governor
Foote vote for Quitman for governor in 1849? Did not Governor Foote put forth,
or aid in putting forth, a pamphlet, in this city, urging the claims of this
same John A. Quitman for the Vice-Presidency? Yes, sir, so late as 1848 he
recommended him as a man worthy of trust, to the whole Democracy of the Union.
Yet my friend lays charges against his political orthodoxy, dated as far back
as 1824 and 1828—twenty years beyond the time when he received the endorsement
of Governor Foote and nearly one-third of the whole Democracy of the Union;
twenty-one years beyond the time when he received the endorsement of
Mississippi for governor, and my friend's vote for the same office. If the
endorsement of the National Democracy in 1848—if the endorsement of the
Mississippi Democracy in 1849—if the endorsement of Governor Foote, and of my
colleague also, may be relied on, I think Quitman can pass muster. He is sound.
Our nominees were all Democrats. We run them as Democrats—as
State-Rights Democrats—against the Union ticket, composed of two Whigs and two
Democrats. We were beaten. And what has happened since the election? Who is it
that has gone out of the Democratic party? The legislature assembled the new
governor was inaugurated. What was almost his first act? It was to appoint an
adjutant-general. It was an important appointment—the most important in his
gift. Did he appoint a Union Democrat? No, not he. Did he appoint a Secession
Democrat, as my friend calls them? No, not at all; but he appointed a Whig.
That was his first important appointment as governor, and he dismissed a
Democrat to make it. What did his "faithful Union legislature" do? It
did not send him back to the Senate, that is clear. I will tell you what it
did. There was an old and venerable Democrat superintending the penitentiary.
It was a mere ministerial office, filled by a man who had confessedly
discharged his duties with ability and integrity, and to the entire
satisfaction of everybody. He was turned out by the Union legislature, and a
Whig put in his place. A gentleman who had discharged for a series of years the
duties of clerk of the same establishment, with fidelity, and to the entire
satisfaction of every one, was also dismissed, and a Whig put in his place. A
Whig sergeant-at-arms was elected. Places were given to other Whigs over the
heads of Democrats. The patronage of the state, so far as the governor and
legislature could control it, has been given to the Whigs; and so far as the
executive advertising has been concerned, it has, with scarcely an exception,
been given to the Whig press. I ask if this looks like Democracy? Two vacancies
existed in the United States Senate. How were they filled? With Democrats, did
you say—old, long-tried, and consistent Democrats? Were they sent here to
represent the Union men of Mississippi? No, sir. One Democrat and one Whig were
returned. If these things show that my colleague, and his associates in
Mississippi, have been faithful to the Democratic party, why, then, I must
confess I have grown strangely wild in my opinions of political fidelity. What
think our friends from other states ? "Can things like these o'ercome
them like a summer cloud, and not excite their wonder?" Is it consistent
with Democratic usage to organize under the style of the Union party? Is it
compatible with party fidelity to nominate and elect bitter enemies of the
party? Is it a part of the tactics of the Democratic party to dismiss Democrats
and put Whigs in their places? Ought the patronage of a Democratic government
to be given exclusively to the Whig press? And, finally, ought a Democratic
legislature to elect a Whig United States senator? These are questions raised
by my friend, and his party. I ask the National Democracy to answer them.
My colleague calls us constantly through his speech,
the secessionists and disunionists of
Mississippi. This is a kind of political slang used in a party canvass with
effect, but it is entirely out of place here. A member of Congress ought to use
terms that apply to a given state of facts—that have some relation to justice.
My friend says what he, perhaps, said so often in the heat of the canvass, that
he almost got to think it was true that we went into the contest with secession
and disunion inscribed upon our banners. Why, no such thing is true. My friend
must have seen that inscription through a distempered imagination—through some
extraordinary perversion of his mental vision. There was no such inscription on
our banner. The Democratic party of Mississippi asserted the abstract right of
a state to secede from this Union. They entertain that opinion now; and at all
proper times and upon all proper occasions, they will maintain it. We believe,
in the language of the Kentucky resolutions, "that where there is no
common arbiter, each party to a compact is to judge of the infractions of the
compact, and of the mode and measure of redress."
The state, we say, "is to be the judge of infractions
of the compact, and of the mode and measure of redress." If, in the
language of the Kentucky resolutions, the state believed that the compact has
been violated, she, and she alone, has the right to judge, so far as she
herself is concerned, of that infraction, and the mode and measure of its
redress. I desire to ask my colleague if he does not endorse the Kentucky
resolutions, and whether the whole Union party of Mississippi does not endorse
them? If he will say to us, by authority of his party, that they repudiate
these resolutions, I will guaranty that they sink so low, as a political party,
that, though you sounded for them with a hundred fathom lead line, a voice
would still come booming up from this mighty deep, proclaiming, "no bottom
here."
I desire to submit this proposition to my colleague. He
says, that because we assert the right of secession, therefore we are secessionists.
Non constat. He asserts the right of revolution. Let me ask my friend, Do you
consider yourself as a revolutionist? If I am to be denounced as a secessionist
because I assert the right to secede, may I not turn upon my assailant and say
to him, You are not a revolutionist, because you assert the right of
revolution?
But, sir, this new Union organization—this party which
claims first to be the Whig party par excellence, and then to
be the Democratic party par excellence—to what sort of sentiments
does it hold? Ask my friend here [Mr. Wilcox], in the presence of our colleague
of the Senate [Mr. Brooke], who has lately arrived in this city,
"Gentlemen, what are your opinions on the subject of the currency?"
My friend would doubtless say something about hard-money, and gold and silver;
but our colleague in the Senate would tell us that he believes in paper money,
and banks. Suppose the two gentlemen should be asked what they thought on the
subject of protection? My friend here would commence lecturing you about
free-trade; but his colleague in the Senate would begin to tell us how much
protection we want. And it would be thus in regard to distribution, internal
improvements by the federal government, the Sub-treasury, and upon all other
party questions. If you ask them what they are for, they tell you they are for
the Union. But as to what political measures they propose to carry out, they do
not at all agree, even among themselves.
Why, sir, if I may be allowed, in this high council-place,
to indulge in an anecdote, I think I can tell one illustrative of the position
of this Union party, and especially the Union party of my own state. There was
an old gentleman who kept what was called the "Union Hotel." A
traveller rode up and inquired whether he could have breakfast. The landlord
said, "What will you have?" "Well," said he, "I'll
take broiled chicken and coffee. "I don't keep them." "Let me
have beefsteak and boiled eggs, then." "I don't keep them." "Well,"
said the traveller, "never mind; give me something to eat." "I
don't keep anything to eat." "Then," said the traveller, getting
a little out of patience, "feed my horse; give him some oats."
"I don't keep oats." "Then give him a little hay.' "I don't
keep hay." "Well, give him something to eat." "I don't keep
anything for horses to eat." [Laughter.] "Then what the devil do you
keep?" "I keep the Union Hotel." [Renewed laughter.] So with
this Union party. They are for the Union, and they are for nothing else. They
are for that to which nobody is opposed. They are constantly trying to save the
Union, and are making a great outcry about it, when, in fact, nobody has sought
or is seeking to destroy it. They keep the Union Hotel, but they don't keep
anything else.
Now, sir, to come a step further in the progress of
Mississippi politics. As soon as the election in our state resulted adversely
to my friends and to myself, we, as a matter of course, abandoned the issue
upon which it had been conducted. We gave up a contest in which we had been
beaten. But we did not change our opinions as to the soundness of the principle.
It was a contest for the maintenance of a particular state principle, or state
policy. We were overthrown by a majority of the people of our own state, and
consequently we gave up the issue. Immediately afterwards, by the usual
authority and in the usual way, there was a notice inserted in the leading
Democratic papers of the state, calling upon the Democratic party, without
reference to new state issues, and without reference to past disputes, to assemble
in convention for the purpose of appointing delegates to attend the Baltimore
National Democratic Convention. This was in November, 1851. Almost immediately
afterwards, the Union party called a Union convention, which assembled on the
first Monday in January last. It was represented by about thirty-six delegates,
from twelve or fourteen counties. On the 8th of the same month, the Democratic
Convention proper, assembled, represented by some two hundred or more
delegates, from fifty-five counties. Our convention was called as a Democratic
convention. It assembled as a Democratic convention. It deliberated as a
Democratic convention. It appointed delegates to the Baltimore Convention
as a Democratic convention. It appointed Democratic electors. It represented
emphatically the Democracy of Mississippi. Having been beaten on the issues of
state policy, I repeat, we gave them up. We so publicly announced; and when we
met in convention on the 8th of January, it was as Democrats on the old issues.
How was it with the Union Convention? Was that a Democratic
convention? Was there any such pretence? No, sir; it assembled as a Union
convention—a Union meeting to appoint delegates to attend a Democratic National
Convention. Why, what an idea! What right had such a meeting to appoint
delegates to a Democratic National Convention? If the Union party, calling
themselves Democrats, may appoint delegates to the National Democratic
Convention, why may not the Free Democracy of Ohio, typified in the person of
the gentleman across the way [Mr. Giddings], do the same thing? They claim to
be Democrats and have organized the Free Democracy; and why may not they send
their representation to the Democratic convention? Suppose the Free-Soil
Democrats get up an organization, why may not they send delegates too? and why
may not every other faction and political organization have its representatives
there? No, sir; if there is to be a Union party, let there be a Union
Convention. If certain gentlemen have become so etherealized that the
Democratic organization does not suit them, let them stay out of the Democratic
Convention. When they put on the proper badge—when they take down the Union
flag, and run up the old Democratic banner, I am for hailing them as brothers
for forgetting the past, and looking only to the future. They need not sneak
back. We will open the door, and let them in. "To err, is human; to
forgive, divine."
Mr. CHASTAIN (interrupting). I wish to ask the gentleman
from Mississippi if the platform of the Nashville Convention did not repudiate
the idea of having anything to do with either of the national conventions—the
Whig or the Democratic?
Mr. BROWN. For that convention, the Whig party and the
Democratic party, as I said before, were alike responsible. The Union party,
composed, as it is, of Whigs and Democrats, must take their part of the
responsibility for it. Was not Judge Sharkey, a Whig and your President's
appointee to Havana, responsible? Was he not president of the convention, and
is he not a Union leader? Did not Governor Foote have a hand in it? Did not Mr.
Clemens take his share of responsibility? Did not almost all the prominent,
leading Union Democrats of the South have a part in that convention? I want to
know if these gentlemen may slip out and leave us to hold the sack? The
State-Rights Democrats of Mississippi, as such, never endorsed the
recommendation to which the gentleman alludes; and, therefore, we no more than
others are responsible for it. If the Union Whigs and Union Democrats will
stand by the recommendation, they may fairly expect us to do so too; but it is
a very pretty business for us to make a joint promise, and then allow them to
break it, and require us to hold on to it. No, sir. "A contract broken on
one side, is a contract broken on all sides."
Mr. MOORE of Louisiana (interrupting). The gentleman from
Mississippi mentioned the state of Louisiana in connection with the Nashville
Convention. I wish merely to state this fact, that a law was introduced into
the legislature of Louisiana authorizing the people to send delegates to that
convention, but it failed. I do not believe a single man went from the state of
Louisiana to that convention who was authorized by the people to go there.
Mr. BROWN. I cannot stop for these interruptions, as I find
that my time is fast running out. Now, what did the Democratic party of
Mississippi mean when they assembled in convention and appointed delegates to
the Baltimore National Convention? They meant, sir, to go into that convention
in good faith, and to act in good faith. We do not believe the Democratic party
is going to come up to our standard of State-Rights, but we know they will come
nearer up to it than the Whig party; and we therefore intend to go into the
Democratic Convention, with an honest purpose to support its nominees. We trust
you to make us fair and just nominations; and if you do, we intend to support
them. If I am asked who the State-Rights Democrats of Mississippi would sustain
for the presidency, I will answer, they will sustain any good, honest,
long-tried, and faithful member of the Democratic party, who has never
practised a fraud upon them.
I can tell you this, that in going into that convention, the
Democracy of Mississippi will not ask from it an endorsement of their peculiar
notions—if, indeed, they be peculiar—on the subject of State-Rights.
Mr. CHASTAIN (interrupting). Let me ask the gentleman if he
would vote for Mr. Cass?
Mr. BROWN. If I were to answer that question, I might be
asked by other gentlemen whether I would vote for this man or that man. I do
not choose to engage in any controversy about men.
Sir, I was saying that we shall not ask at the hands of the
Baltimore Convention an endorsement of our peculiar views on the subject of
State-Rights—if, indeed, these views be peculiar. We shall ask in the name of
the State-Rights party no place upon the national ticket—neither at its head
nor at its tail. And when we have aided you on to victory, as we expect to do,
we shall ask no part of the spoils, for we are not of the spoil-loving school.
What we ask is this: that when we have planted a great
principle, which we intend to nourish, and, as far as we have the power,
protect, you shall not put the heel of the National Democracy upon it to crush
it. We ask that you shall not insult us in your convention, either by offering
us as the nominee a man who has denounced us as traitors to our country, or by
passing any resolutions which shall thus denounce us in words or by
implication. Leave us free from taunt and insult; give us a fair Democratic
nomination, and we will march up to it like men, and we will be, where we have
always been in our Democratic struggles, not in the rear, but in the advance
column. We will bear you on to victory; and when victory has been achieved, you
may take the spoils and divide them among yourselves. We want no office. Will
the Union party give this pledge? Of course they will not, for they are
committed against your nominees in advance, unless certain demands of theirs
shall be complied with—and among them is the ostracism of the State-Rights men.
They propose to read out the great body of the Southern Democrats, and then I
suppose make up the deficiency with Whigs. When the National Democracy relies
on Whig votes to elect its President, it had better "hang its harp upon
the willow."
The State-Rights Democrats will never be found sneaking into
any party. We ask nothing of our national brethren. If we support the nominees,
as we expect to do, it will be done, not for pay, but as a labor of love—love
for old party associations; love of principles, which we hope are not yet quite
extinct, and which, we are slow to believe, will be extinguished at Baltimore.
If we fail to support the nominees, it will be because they are such as ought
not to have been made.
We make no professions of love for the Union. Let our acts
speak. We have stood by the Constitution and by the rights of the states, as
defined by our fathers. If this be enmity to the Union, then have we been its
enemies. We have not made constant proclamation of our devotion to the Union,
because we have seen no attempt to destroy it, and have therefore seen no
necessity for defending it. The danger is not that the states will secede from
the Union, but rather that the Union will absorb the reserved rights of the
states, and consolidate them as one state. Against this danger we have raised
our warning voice. It has not been heeded; and if disaster befall us from this
quarter, we at least are not to blame.
Laudation of the Union is a cheap commodity. It is found on
the tongue of every demagogue in the country. I by no means say that all who
laud the Union are demagogues; but I do say that there is not a demagogue in
the Union who does not laud it. It is the bone and sinew, the soul and body of
all their speeches. With them, empty shouts for the Union, the glorious Union,
are a passport to favor; and beyond the point of carrying a popular election,
they have no ideas of patriotism, and care not a fig for the ultimate triumph
of our federative system.
Mr. Chairman, there are many other things to which I should
have been very glad to make allusion, but I am admonished that my time is so
nearly out, that I can have no opportunity to take up another point. I shall be
happy, however, in the few moments that remain of my time, to answer any
questions that gentlemen may desire to submit. I supposed, from the disposition
manifested by gentlemen a few moments ago to interrogate me, that I should
necessarily be compelled to answer some questions, or seem to shrink from the
responsibility of doing so. I therefore hurried on to the conclusion of what I
deemed it absolutely necessary to say, for the purpose of answering those
questions. I am now ready.
After a moment's pause, Mr. B. continued: Gentlemen seem not
disposed to press their inquiries, and my time being almost out, I resume my
seat.
SOURCE: M. W. Cluskey, Editor, Speeches,
Messages, and Other Writings of the Hon. Albert G. Brown, A Senator in Congress
from the State of Mississippi, pp. 261-72
