Page:The History of Slavery and the Slave Trade.djvu/595

 servitude, which prevails in many of the states, should or should not be prohibited in that territory The periods of excitement from this cause, which have heretofore occurred, have been safely passed; but, during the interval, of whatever length, which may elapse before the admission of the territories ceded by Mexico, as states, it appears probable that similar excitement will prevail to an undue extent.

"Under these circumstances, I thought, and still think, that it was my duty to endeavor to put in the power of congress, by the admission of California and New Mexico as states, to remove all occasion for the unnecessary agitation of the public mind.

"It is understood that the people of the western part of California have formed the plan of a state constitution, and will soon submit the same to the judgment of congress, and apply for admission as a state. This course on their part, though in accordance with, was not adopted exclusively in consequence of, any expression of my wishes, inasmuch as measures tending to this end had been promoted by officers sent there by my predecessor, and were already in active progress of execution, before any communication from me reached California. If the proposed constitution shall, when submitted to congress, be found to be in compliance with the requisitions of the constitution of the United States, I earnestly recommend that it may receive the sanction of congress.

"Should congress, when California shall present herself for incorporation into the Union, annex a condition to her admission as a state affecting her domestic institutions contrary to the wishes of the people, and even compel her temporarily to comply with it, yet the state could change her constitution at any time after admission, when to her it should seem expedient. Any attempt to deny to the people of the state the right of self-government, in a matter which peculiarly affects themselves, will infallibly be regarded by them as an invasion of their rights; and, upon the principles laid down in our own Declaration of Independence, they will certainly be sustained by the great mass of the American people. To assert that they are a conquered people, and must, as a state, submit to the will of their conquerors, in this regard, will meet with no cordial response among American freemen. Great numbers of them are native citizens of the United States, and not inferior to the rest of our countrymen in intelligence and patriotism; and no language of menace to restrain them in the exercise of an undoubted right, substantially guarantied to them by the treaty of cession itself, shall ever be uttered by me, or encouraged and sustained by persons acting under my authority. It is to be expected that, in the residue of the territory ceded to us by Mexico, the people residing there will, at the time of their incorporation into the Union as a state, settle all questions of domestic policy to suit themselves."

On the 29th of January, Mr. Clay submitted to the senate of the United States the following propositions for an amicable arrangement of the whole slavery controversy: