Page:Speeches of Carl Schurz (IA speechesofcarlsc00schu).pdf/181

Rh the rights of all men. Its natural end is the protection of all individuals in the exercise of their rights and in the enjoyment of their liberties. Hence it precludes the idea of slavery in all its forms. Apply this true popular sovereignty to the Territories, and we are willing to accept it—nay, it is the very thing which we are contending for. But is this what Douglas, in the Nebraska Bill, contemplated? By no means. His popular sovereignty is based upon the assumption that one class of men has the power—has the right—to strip another class of their natural rights, and to hold them as slaves.

For argument's sake, let us follow him in his course of reasoning, and suppose the white population of the Territories had the right to hold a portion of the inhabitants as property. So, we have to lower the standard of popular sovereignty one degree. Listen to the language of the Kansas and Nebraska Bill:

“It is the true intent and meaning of this act not to legislate slavery into any State or Territory, nor to exclude it therefrom, but to leave the people thereof perfectly free to form and regulate their institutions in their own way, subject only to the Constitution of the United States.”

At first, one would suppose this bill gave the people of the Territories the sovereign right to introduce slavery, provided always that slavery could not go there unless introduced by a positive act of Territorial legislation. Is that what Douglas's principle of popular sovereignty contemplated? By no means. For, according to him, a slaveholder may introduce his slave property, and thereby introduce and establish slavery in a Territory, without that positive act of Territorial legislation.

We have, therefore, to lower the standard of popular sovereignty another degree! One would suppose that slavery so being admitted at first, the people of the Ter-