Page:The History of Slavery and the Slave Trade.djvu/586

 "Nor are we exempt from its disorganizing effects. "We now begin to experience the danger of admitting so great an error to have a place in the declaration of our independence. For a long time it lay dormant; but in process of time it began to germinate, and produce its poisonous fruits. It had strong hold on the mind of Jefferson, the author of that document, which caused him to take an utterly false view of the subordinate relation of the black to the white race in the south; and to hold, in consequence, that the latter, though utterly unqualified to possess liberty, were as fully entitled to both liberty and equality as the former; and that to deprive them of it was unjust and immoral. To this error, his proposition to exclude slavery from the territory northwest of the Ohio may be traced, and to that the ordinance of 1781, and through it the deep and dangerous agitation which now threatens to engulf, and will certainly engulf, if not speedily settled, our political institutions, and involve the country in countless woes."

The house bill providing a government for Oregon was passed by that body on the second of August, 129 to 71. It contained a provision for extending the ordinance of 1787 over the territory. The bill passed the senate on the 13th August — the session closing the next day.

The following letter from Gen. Cass to A. 0. P. Nicholson, appeared during the winter of 1847-8. It is regarded as the first well considered enunciation of squatter sovereignty:

, December 24, 1847.

I have received your letter, and shall answer it as frankly as it is written.

You ask me whether I am in favor of the acquisition of Mexican territory, and what are my sentiments with regard to the Wilmot proviso.

I have so often and so explicitly stated my views of the first question, in the senate, that it seems almost unnecessary to repeat them here. As you request it, however, I shall briefly give them.

I think, then, that no peace should be granted to Mexico, till a reasonable indemnity is obtained for the injuries which she has done us. The territorial extent of this indemnity is, in the first instance, a subject of executive consideration. There the constitution has placed it, and there I am willing to leave it: not only because I have full confidence in its judicious exercise, but because, in the ever-varying circumstances of a war, it would be indiscreet, by a public declaration, to commit the country to any line of indemnity, which might otherwise be enlarged, as the obstinate injustice of the enemy prolongs the contest, with its loss of blood and treasure.

It appears to me, that the kind of metaphysical magnanimity which would reject all indemnity at the close of a bloody and expensive war, brought on by a direct attack upon our troops by the enemy, and preceded by a succession of unjust acts for a series of years, is as unworthy of the age in which we live, as it is revolting to the common sense and practice of mankind. It would conduce but little to our future security, or, indeed, to our present reputation, to declare that we repudiate all expectation of compensation from the Mexican