Page:Speeches of Carl Schurz (IA speechesofcarlsc00schu).pdf/175

Rh tionality the very moment that the preservation and execution of that compromise would have advanced the interests of free labor? How did it happen that his convictions, in all their prompt and wonderful transformations, always coincided so admirably with the interests of slavery? This is indeed a most astonishing coincidence, and I leave it to your sagacity to draw your conclusions. [Laughter.]

But Mr. Douglas is still the “true champion of free labor;” for it is asserted that the Nebraska Bill—the same measure which breaks down all barriers to slavery—will by that very operation introduce free labor into the Territories. The thing is speedily brought to a practical test. No sooner is the Nebraska Bill enacted, and the Missouri restriction wiped out, than emigrant-aid-societies are organized in the Slave States, especially in Missouri, for the purpose of introducing slavery into Kansas. The history of the Blue Lodges is familiar to you. Lawless bands of armed invaders pour into Kansas, take possession of the ballot-boxes, bowie-knife and revolver in hand, and control the elections by fraud and violence. Did Mr. Douglas ever utter a word of reproach or condemnation against the border ruffians of Missouri? Did he not most tenderly excuse their atrocities on the plea of self-defence, while it was a notorious fact that their organization had preceded that of the Free-State men? And, mark well, that immigration was pro-slavery.

Other emigrant aid societies are organized in the Northern States. Large numbers of men go to Kansas, armed, indeed, for self-defence, as every pioneer will be, but with the bona fide intention of settling down upon the soil of that Territory as permanent inhabitants; and while burning houses and trails of blood mark the track of the border ruffians, flourishing farms and industrious towns spring up under the hands of the Free-State men.