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MR. BERRIEN'S SPEECH.

able that this invasion will be made with this principle-this 'genius of universal emancipation,' which gentlemen talk of, but which will rather be a sweeping anathema against the white population in front. And then what is the situation of the Southern States? These are hints; and this is one of the cases in which the suggestions of instinct are worth all the logic in the world—the instinct of self-preservation. It is one of the cases in which our passions instruct our reason.”

Mr. Berrien was troubled lest emancipation should be extended to Cuba and Porto Rico. He preferred a conquest of those islands by England or France to the erection of "another Haytien republic in juxtaposition with the Slave States in this Union." He was in favor of notifying the Spanish American States of our determination to repulse their movements in the West Indies. He characterized the movement as a "splendid diplomatic campaign," which endangered the peculiar institutions of the South, and in which the United States were exhibited to the Cabinets of Europe in the character of a "political busy-body." And he insisted upon striking off the existing mesh-work of "diplomatic fetters."

"When we reflect," said Mr. Berrien, "that they (Cuba and Porto Rico) are in juxtaposition to a portion of this Union, where slavery exists, that the proposed change is to be effected by a people whose fundamental maxim it is that he who would tolerate slavery is unworthy to be free; that the principle of universal emancipation must march in the van of the invading force, and that all the horrors of a servile war will too surely follow in its train, commercial considerations are swallowed up in the magnitude of the danger with which we are menaced. Under such circumstances, the question to be determined is this: With a due regard to the safety of the Southern States, can you suffer these islands to pass into the hands of buccaniers, drunk with new-born liberty?

"What, then, is our obvious policy? Cuba and Porto Rico

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must remain as they are. To Europe, the President has distinctly said we cannot allow them to be transferred to any European power. We must hold language equally decisive to the Spanish American States. We cannot allow their principle of universal emancipation to be called into activity where its contagion in our neighborhood would be dangerous to our quiet and safety. The safety of the Southern portion of this Union must not be sacrificed to a passion for diplomacy. If it shall comport with our interest that Cuba should pass into the hands of England o of France, rather than to see another Haytien Republic erected there, we are free to insist upon it. If our interests and our safety require us to say that both Cuba and Porto Rico must remain as they are, we are free to say it. And let me say to gentlemen, these high considerations require the Government to respect our wishes."

Mr. Hayne was opposed to the appointment of commissioners for the same reasons. His perceptions, keener than the rest, induced him to aver that this measure was in effect a direct interference with slavery in the south. He said: "When called upon to given my sanction to the discussion with our ministers, in connection with a foreign Congress, of questions so intimately connected with the welfare of those whom I represent, I cannot consent to be silent. On the slave question my opinion is this: I consider our rights in that species of property as not even open to discussion, either here or elsewhere; and in respect to our duties imposed by our situation, we are not to be taught them by fanatics, religious or political. To call into question our rights, is grossly to violate them. To attempt to instruct us on this subject, is to insult us. To dare to assail our institutions, is wantonly to invade our peace. Let me solemnly declare, once for all, that the Southern States never will permit, and never can permit, any interference whatever, directly or indirectly, in their domestic concerns, and that the very day on which the

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MR. ROBBINS' REPLY.

unhallowed attempt small be made by the authorities of the Federal Government, we will consider ourselves as driven from the Union."

To this, it was replied, in substance, by Mr. Robbins and others who favored the project, that no one contemplated any interference with slavery in the Southern States, yet if that unfortunate condition of society to which southern gentlemen adhered were incidentally exposed to the influence of the spirit of emancipation which pervaded the country on either side of them, it was an evil for which there was not, and ought not to be, a remedy; that it was an inseparable incident of that local despotism, which our southern brethren retained in their midst, to be continually operated upon by the adverse public opinion of the world; that the outcry of slave owners against this reasonable measure of public policy, evinced a criminal hostility to the fundamental principles of our Government; that distinctions among men, founded on color or upon any physical or moral trait other than their intelligence and behavior, had no warrant in any principle which could be recognized by it; that it was fortunately beyond the power of the Slave States in this. confederacy, and even of the United States, to turn back the progress of free sentiments in the western hemisphere; that the inhabitants of Mexico, Gautemala, Columbia, Peru, and even of San Domingo, of whatever lineage or complexion, were rightfully free; that they lighted their torches of liberty from sparks which had radiated from our own political system; that they had transcribed their liturgies of freedom from the Declaration of our Independence; that if the administration were to undertake to repulse, according to the suggestions of Mr. Berrien, the advances of Spanish American emancipation, it would only subject it to the contumely of other nations. around; that it was exceedingly presumptuous to suppose that the people whose patriotism had been libeled and whose

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complexions had been ridiculed by Mr. Randolph, could ever be re-subjugated by the Spanish government; and that as all these facts were unalterable by any conduct of the United States respecting the proposed Congress of Deputies at Panama, it would be well for Senators to consent that such defensive and commercial arrangements should be made between their Governments and ours, as would protect them all against the power of the holy alliance, and ours against possible combinations among them.

The nominations were at length confirmed, and an appropriation to defray the expenses of the embassy voted. But our ministers were unable, from the lateness of the passage of the appropriation bill in the House of Representatives, to reach the place appointed for the Congress in season to attend its meeting. This was, indeed, obvious before Mr. Sargeant and the Secretary reached Washington. Mr. Anderson, who was then minister at Columbia, had received early conditional instructions and commenced his journey, but on reaching Carthagena he was seized with a malignant fever, which terminated his existence. Hence, it so turned out, that this remarkable ebullition of the slave power in the United States, defeated a purpose which was as harmless as it was just in its inception, and which was a prominent administration measure.

"No question in its day," remarks Mr. Benton in his "Thirty Years View," "excited more heat and intemperate discussion, or more feeling between a President and Senate, than this proposed mission to the Congress of American nations at Panama; and no heated question ever cooled off and died out so suddenly and completely. And now the chief benefit to be derived from its retrospect, and that indeed is a real one, is a view of the firmness with which was then maintained by a minority, the old policy of the United States, to avoid entangling alliances and interference with the affairs of

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NEW AND DANGEROUS DOCTRINES.

other nations; and the exposition of the Monroe doctrine from one so competent to give it as Mr. Adams."

The demonstration in Congress against any intervention in behalf of those republics, developed and established the anomalous fact, that while representatives of States which practiced negro slavery are habitually opposed to intervention by the constituted authorities, in behalf of other republics in this hemisphere, they claimed for the oligarchy the attributes of an independent sovereignty inside the general scope and circumference of our system, and the right to intervene in all struggles for civil liberty in favor even of a foreign government against our own, whenever it fancies itself to be in danger. This was the import of the declaration of Mr. Berrien, that if the safety of the Southern portion of the Union should require Cuba to pass into the hands of England or France, they would permit the transition rather than suffer the example of another Haytien republic. And a careful observation of the origin, course, and subsequent influence of that heresy upon both the Legislative and Executive Departments, will hardly fail to convince any reader that from the prevalence of the Berrien doctrine against the policy of Presidents Monroe and Adams, and the views of a majority of both Houses of Congress in 1826, proceeded that political demoralization which, in its natural course from the fountain, has so nearly overborne the Federal Government.

It was previously known that slavery was, per se, a despotism-that it existed, by the necessity. of its nature, in hostility to the principles of liberty-that it possessed the nature of a poisonous canker-worm lying near the vitals of the republic, which would ultimately destroy them, if it did not, as it was hoped it would, perish in the attempt. All this was understood. But until this demonstration, it was not understood in the free States that it claimed to exist as an independent power, with attributes of sovereignty inside of