5.4: The Federal Government and Sectional Tenstions

Document A:

The division in Congress and the nation is nearly equal on both sides. The argument on the free side is, the moral and political duty of preventing the extension of slavery in the immense country from the Mississippi River to the South Sea. The argument on the slave side is, that Congress have no power by the Constitution to prohibit slavery in any State, and the zealots say, not in any Territory. The proposed compromise is to admit Missouri, and hereafter Arkansas, as states, without any restriction upon them regarding slavery, but to prohibit the future introduction of slaves in all Territories of the United States north of 36º 30’ latitude. I told these gentlemen that my opinion was, the question could be settled no otherwise than by a compromise.

Document B:

We, therefore, the people of the State of South Carolina in Convention assembled, do declare and ordain…That the several acts and parts of acts of the Congress of the United States, purporting to be laws for the imposing of duties and imposts on the importation of foreign commodities…and, more especially…[the tariff acts of 1828 and 1832]…are unauthorized by the Constitution of the United States, and violated the true meaning and intent thereof, and are null, void, and no law, nor binding upon this State, its officers or citizens; and all promises, contracts, and obligations made or entered into, or to be made or enter into, with purpose to secure the duties imposed by the said acts, and all judicial proceedings which shall be hereafter had an affirmance thereof, are and shall be held utterly null and void.

Document C:

It was caused by the legislation of this Government, which was appointed, as the common agent of all, and charged with the protection of the interests and security of all. The legislation by which it has been effected, may be classed under three heads. The first is, that series of acts by which the South has been excluded from the common territory belonging to all the States as members of the Federal Union- which have had the effect of extending vastly the portion allotted to the Northern section, and restricting within narrow limits the portion left to the South. The next consists of adopting a system of revenue and disbursements, by which an undue proportion of the burden of taxation has been imposed upon the South, and an undue proportion of its proceeds appropriated to the North; and the last is the system of political measure, by which the original character of the Government has been radically changed…

Document D:

But, sir, if I could overcome my repugnance to compromises in general, I should object to this one, on the ground of the inequality and incongruity of the interests to be compromised. Why, sir, according to the views I have submitted, California ought to come in, and must come in, whether slavery stands or falls in the District of Columbia, whether slavery stands or falls in New Mexico and Eastern California and even whether slavery stands or falls in the slave States.