Page:Speeches of Carl Schurz (IA speechesofcarlsc00schu).pdf/26

16 bolt of lightning when it strikes him down. [Repeated applause.] Aye, sir, slavery and democracy did live side by side these eighty years. But how did they live? Like two combatants that held each other by the throat, each watching his chance to strangle the other. [Cheers.]

Has Mr. Douglas seen or heard nothing of the din or clamor of that battle which has raged, with but short and apparent intermissions, since that time when the ruling parties of this Republic deviated from the original policy of the Revolutionary Fathers, to confine slavery within the narrowest limits, and to promote its gradual abolition by local legislation? Does he know nothing of the ridiculous failures of all the compromises that were called final settlements? May-be, he is not so blind; but what he sees, perhaps, does not suit him. [Cheers.] The conflict between slavery and democracy might have long ago been settled in the spirit of the Revolutionary times. But it was not; and it springs up in its true aspect, when Missouri claims admission as a Slave State. It is represented to be finally settled by the Missouri Compromise. And there it is again, lurking under the tariff question. It assumes threatening dimensions in the question of the annexation of Texas and the territories acquired from Mexico. It is again said to be finally settled by the compromise of 1850. But there it rises again, more terrible than ever, in the Nebraska Bill. Mr. Douglas then claims to have finally settled it by introducing his principle of squatter sovereignty. But streams of blood and smouldering ruins in Kansas give him the lie. [Cheers.] Then Mr. Buchanan's election was to settle it. But the poor old man has hardly set his foot in the White House, when the slavery question steps forth in unheard of turpitude from the hand of Judge Taney. There it is! It is like Banquo's ghost, which rises from the ground again and