Page:The landmark of freedom.djvu/20

Rh Missouri as a Slave State, slavery was forever prohibited in all the remaining part of this territory which lies north of 36° 30'. This arrangement, between different sections of the Union—the Slave States of the first part, and the Free States of the second part—though usually known as the Missouri Compromise, was at the time styled a. In its stipulations for slavery, it was justly repugnant to the conscience of the North, and ought never to have been made; but it has on that side been performed. And now the unperformed outstanding obligations to freedom, originally proposed and assumed by the South, are resisted.

Years have passed since these obligations were embodied in the legislation of Congress, and accepted by the country. Meanwhile, the statesmen by whom they were framed and vindicated, have, one by one, dropped from this earthly sphere. Their living voices cannot now be heard, to plead for the preservation of that Public Faith to which they were pledged. But this extraordinary lapse of time, with the complete fruition by one party of all the benefits belonging to it, under the compact, gives to the transaction an added and most sacred strength. Prescription steps in with new bonds to confirm the original work; to the end that while men are mortal, controversies shall not be immortal. Death, with inexorable scythe, has mowed down the authors of this compact; but, with conservative hour-glass, it