Page:The History of Slavery and the Slave Trade.djvu/524

 any express authority. The president submitted another question: Was the term "forever" in the prohibition clause of the Missouri bill to be understood as referring only to the territorial condition of the district, or was it intended to extend the prohibition of slavery to such states as might be erected therefrom? Adams thought that the term "forever" must be understood to mean forever, and that the prohibition would extend to any states that might at any time be erected from the territory. The others, including Thompson, of New York, were all of opinion that the term "forever" was only a territorial forever, not interfering with the right of any state that might at any time be organized within the district referred to, to establish or prohibit slavery. The second question was modified into the inquiry, Was the proviso, as it stood in the bill, constitutional? To this they all replied, yes, and Monroe signed the bills. This account is from the unpublished diary of John Quincy Adams, quoted by Hildreth.

"The impression produced on my mind," so Adams wrote at the time in his diary, "by the progress of this discussion is, that the bargain between freedom and slavery contained in the constitution of the United States is morally and politically vicious, inconsistent with the principles upon which alone our revolution can be justified; cruel and oppressive, by riveting the chains of slavery, in pledging the faith of freedom to maintain and perpetuate the tyranny of the master; and grossly unequal and impolitic, by admitting that slaves are at once enemies to be kept in subjection, property to be secured and restored to their owners, and persons not to be represented themselves, but for whom their masters are privileged with nearly a double share of representation. The consequence has been, that this slave representation has governed the Union. Benjamin, portioned above his brethren, has ravined as a wolf, in the morning he has devoured the prey, and at night he has divided the spoil. It would be no difficult matter to prove, by reviewing the history of the Union under this constitution, that almost every thing which has contributed to the honor and welfare of the nation has been accomplished in despite of them; and that every thing unpropitious and dishonorable, including the blunders and follies of their adversaries, maybe traced to them."

Governor Wolcott, in his address shortly after to the Connecticut legislature, in reference to a very elaborate disquisition on state rights in their bearing on the Missouri question, which the Virginia legislature had sent, in the form of a circular, to all the states, thus expressed himself: "It can not hare escaped your attention, that a diversity of habits and principles of government exist in this country; and I think it is evident that slavery is gradually forming those distinctions, which, according to invariable laws of human action, constitute the characteristic difference between aristocratical and democratical republics.

"Where agricultural labor is wholly or chiefly performed by slaves, it must constitute the principal revenue of the community. The owners if slaves must necessarily be the chief owners of the soil, and those laborers who are too poor to own slaves, though nominally free, must be dependent on an aristocratical order, and remain without power or political influence. It has been