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1 Thomas Hart Benton, Speech Delivered by Hon. Thomas Hart Benton, at Jefferson, the Capitol of Missouri, on the 26th May, 1849 1 (1849)

handle is hein.slavery/sdhthb0001 and id is 1 raw text is: EXTRA EVENING POST. SPEECH DELIVERED BY 110N. THOMAS HART BENTON, AT JEFFERSON, THE CAPITOL OF MISSOURI, On the 26th MA./Y, 1849. The following speech was delivered by Senator Benton, at Jefferson, the Capitol of Missouri, on the 26th May last. The occasion for its delivery, and the purpose of its distinguished author, we need'not de- tail, for they are fully set forth in the speech itself. In laying this effort of Senator Benton before our .veaders, in a shape convenient for perusal and preser- vation, we feel called upon to direct public attention to some of its prominent features. It is made clear in this speech, if there had been any doubt before on the subject, that not only was the right of the federal government under the consti- tution to prohibit slavery in its territories, even in those where it already existed, regarded by the early statesmen of the south as undeniable, but that even the prominent champions c f the present extreme south- ern doctrine, have once held that opinion. That all Mr. Monroe's cabinet, including the members from the slave states-including even Mr. Calhoun-held that Congress had authority, under the federal corn act, to abolish slavery in Louisiana, no man can doubt who has read the analysis which Mr. Benton gives of the evidenceon this subject, and of the series of misre- collections, midbtake,, and transpositions of events, by which Mr. Calhoun has attempted to avoid the charge. Of course, that gentleman is made to figure among the early abolitionists by his relentless adversary, who shows him no quarter, and holds him up as a man to whom, whatever may be his present views, the ankti-slavery party, if they regarded only his an- cient services, might be almost moved to erect a sta- tue. The truth is manifest, that the doctrines which the South Carolina senator now labors to establish, and which Jhave been adopted by the Virginia legisla- ture, are almost as new as the last new novel. They are the product of a mind which has wandered from subtlety to sub:lety until it has entirely Iost sight of the plain practical sense which gtided the first inter- preiersof the constitution., Oneof the ablest passages in the speech is Mr. Benton's examination of this doctrine that the slave holder has a right to take his property with him ,a emigrating to the territories. It is an admirable ex- ample of the superiority of good sense to mere inge- nuity, and of the ease with which a strong mind tears in pieces a showy plausibility. If any thing could add value and weight to an ar- gument so irresistible, it is that it is the argument of a southern man, of the representative of a slave state, of one who is himself a slaveholder, and who, doubt- less, expresses opinions shared with him by numbers of the more unprejudiced and liberal-minded of that class. If this does notwgive the argument additional weight, it adds greatly to its importance. It shows the exiVence in that quarter of a spirit of candid dealing, of sincere respect for the constitution, and of regard for the welfare of the new communities to be founded on the Pacific, to which we may safely look for the wise and pacific settlement of this fierce con- troversy. In reading this speech, however, we have been tempted to regret that Mr. Benton has not gone yet further, so far at least as to admit the expediency of prohibiting slavery in the territories. He holds that Congress has a right to enforce such a prohibition; he is against slavery, he tells us; he would resist its introduction into- California and New Mexico ; the ordinance of 1787 was a noble and a wise ordinanco in his view, and the same policy which we then adopted in regard to the Northwestern Territory ought, he thinks, to be pursued in the g9vernment of the country acquired from MexioI. He believes, how- ever, the express prohibition of slavery in these provinces to be necessary, in since slavery does not now exist there, and oar--o5 be introduced but by act of Congress, and b would not vote for a regulation which he though' .o be simply superfluous. But is a 1. uninecessary, we should ask Mr. Ben- ton, the Q0ot *fdwhich is to end an angry contro- versy % He'bomplaint of the agitation of this ques- tio: .idisuetinig the Union. The prohibition of. snvcry by Congress would effoctualy compose the' agitation. When opinions are divided in regard to aipoint of existing law, declaratory statutes are often 1 ' Reproduced with permission from the University of Illinois at Chicago

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