Page:Life and Select Literary Remains of Sam Houston of Texas (1884).djvu/217

Rh been established and how it had been defended. It could not be the interest of the North to destroy the South. He thought that the South—and he was a Southern man—should make some sacrifice to reconcile the North. He made a humorous allusion to Mr. Van Buren's course, saying, that when he announced himself " a Northern man with Southern principles," that alone should have put the South on their guard. Referring to Van Buren's intimacy with Gen. Jackson, he exclaimed: " If the vision of the stern old warrior could break upon him, as that old man, if living, would have looked on his traitorous course, the glance of the warrior's eye would exterminate him where he stands, and would leave not a spot to mark the place! " He went on to show the mutual dependence of the North and the South; the one for raw material, the other for manufactured fabrics. He protested against cries of disunion, and against every attempt to traduce the Union. He was of the South, and was ready to defend the South; but he was for the Union. The Union was his guiding star, and he would fix his eyes on that star to direct his course. He would advise his friends of the North and South to pursue measures of conciliation.

Here Mr. Calhoun and Mr. Butler, both of South Carolina, interposed. Mr. Calhoun said there had been no threats, while Mr. Butler asked if a convention of the South were treason. Houston replied with warmth: "Certainly not! The South would have a right to hold a convention, and raise a puny war against the women and children who get up abolition papers, or against the Abolition Convention at Buffalo "; and he "had seen a much more respectable convention of buffaloes!" He would never go into a Southern convention. He would never aid in any scheme to bring about a dissolution of the Union.

At the evening session, the same day, several Senators spoke; among them Messrs. Yulee of Florida, Benton of Missouri, and Webster of Massachusetts. Houston was again called out, and addressed the Senate at length. As the record of the reporter states: "He paid a beautiful tribute to Mr. Clay, declaring that he deserved to have a statue erected to his memory in the rotunda of the Capitol, for his stand for thirty years, ever since the admission of Missouri, on behalf of compromise." At this point, says the record, " there was an involuntary burst of applause from the galleries and lobby, both of which were densely crowded, that could not be suppressed." This expression many Senators, both from the North and South, declared their disapproval of; but Mr, Dickinson, of New York, apologized for it as involuntary. Two days later, on the 14th August, when final action was to be taken, Houston again addressed the Senate. He said: