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1 Anson Burlingame, Defence of Massachusetts: Speech of Hon. Anson Burlingame, of Massachusetts, in the House of Representatives, June 21, 1856 1 (1856)

handle is hein.slavery/defmaspab0001 and id is 1 raw text is: Defence of Massachusetts. SPEECH OF HON. ANSON BURLINGAME OF MASSACHUSETTS, IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENT IVF.1 JUNE 21, 1856 The House being in the Committee of the Whole on the state of the Union, Mr. BURLINGAME said: Mr. CHAIRMAN: The House will bear witness that I have not pressed myself upon its deliber- ations. I never before asked its indulgence. I have assailed no man; nor have I sought to bring reproach upon any man's State. But, while such has been my course, as well as the course of my colleagues from Massachusetts, upon this floor, certain members have seen fit to assail the State which we represent, not only with words, but with blows. In remembrance of these things, and seizing the first opportunity which has presented itself for a long time, I stand here to-day to say a word for pld Massachusetts-not that she needs it; no, sir; for in all that constitutes true great- ness-in all that gives abiding strength-in great qualities of head and heart-in moral power-in material prosperity-in intellectual resources and physical ability-by the general judgment of mankind, according to her popu- lation, she is the first State. There does not live the man anywhere, who knows anything, to whom praise of Massachusetts would not be needless. She is as far beyond that as she is beyond censure. Members here may sneer at her-they nday praise her past at the expense of her present; but I say, with a full convic- tion of its truth, that Massachusetts, in her present performances, is even greater than in her past recollections. And when I have said this, what more can I say? Sir, although I am here as her youngest and humblest member, yet, as her Representative, I feel that I am the peer of any man upon this floor. Occupying that high stand-point, with modesty, but with firmness, I cast down her glove to the whole band of her assailants. She has been assailed in the House and out of the House, at the other end of the Capitol, and at the other end of the avenue. There have been brought against her general charges and specific charges. I am sorry to find at the head of the list of her assailants the President of the United States, who not only assails Mas- sachusetts, but the whole North. He defends one section of the Union at the expense of the other. He declares that one section has ever been mindful of its constitutional obligations, and that the other has not. He declares that, if one section of our country were a foreign country, the other would have just cause of war against it. And to sustain these remarkable declarations, he goes into an elaborate perver- sion of history, such as that Virginia ceded her lands against the interests of the South, for the benefit of the North; when the truth is, she ceded her lands, as New York and other States did, for the benefit of the whole country. She gave her lands to Freedom, because she thought Freedom was better than Slavery-because it was the policy of the times, and events have vindicated that policy. It is a perversion of history, when he. says that the territory of the country has been ac- quired more for the benefit of the North than for the South; he says that substantially. Sir, out of the territory thus acquired, five slave States, with a pledge for four more, and two free States, have come into the Union; and one of these, as we all know, fought its way through a compromise degrading to the North. The North does not object to the acquisition of territory, when it is desired, but she desires, that it shall be free. If such a complexion had been given to it, how different would have been the fortunes of the Republic to-day! This may be ascertained by comparing the progress of Ohio with that of any slave State in the Missis. sippi valley. It will appear more clearly by comparing the free with the slave regions. I have not time to do more than to present a general picture. Freedom and Slavery started together in the great race on thil continent. In the very year the Pilgrim Fathers landed on Plymouth Rock,

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