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Mr. Cambreleng replied, contending that there had been no quorum after the return of the committee; and, in confirmation of his statement, he read from the journal. He had voted several times against adjournment, anxious to get a quorum, but no quorum voted. The business preparatory to adjournment was all that was done after the passage of the Cumberland road bill, for which he had voted before he left the house as a member of the conference committee. Nothing was thereafter done but to hear certain reports, and to send and receive messages to and from the senate and the president. He denied that the refusal to vote was a party measure, or that the want of a quorum had reference to the fortification bill, or the three million appropriation. Mr. C. defended the proposition to place this sum at the disposal of the president, and cited, as precedents, a large number of similar instances under the administrations of Washington, John Adams, Jefferson, and Madison.

It appears from the journals of 1835, that Mr. Lewis, one of the committee, took from Mr. Cambreleng the report with the intention of offering it; but on counting the members, the tellers reported only 113. Several successive votes for adjournment showed the want of a quorum. On a motion to amend a motion to inform the senate that the house was ready to adjourn, so as to make it read," that the house having no quorum, was ready to adjourn," Mr. Cambreleng said there had not been a quorum for an hour or two. Mr. Reed said the committee of conference had agreed to a report, and as a quorum was undoubtedly present, it ought to be acted upon. The amendment declared what was not the fact : there was a quorum present. Mr. Lewis moved a call of the house. Mr. Cambreleng said : I protest against the right to call the house. What member will answer to his name? ["I will, I will,” exclaimed many members.] I am as much in favor (said Mr. C.) of the fortification bill as is the gentleman from New Jersey; but I say the responsibility of its failure rests upon the senate, and not upon us. The bill was defeated by the senate. [“No!” “No!” “not so!" was exclaimed by inany voices.] Mr. Barringer said the bill was defeated by an intrigue here in this house. If gentlemen desired names, he would give them. But if this was declined, he would say that there were members who now sat in their seats, and would not answer to their names, who did so in consummation of the intrigue. Mr. B. called for tellers on the motion. Ayes, 56; noes 26—no quorum. The house then adjourned.

On the 8th of February, 1836, the president informed congress that the government of Great Britain had offered its mediation for the adjustment of the dispute between the United States and France; and that he had accepted it; carefully guarding, however, that point in the controversy which, as it involved our honor and independence, did not admit

a

of compromise. He therefore recommended a suspension of all retaliatory proceedings against France; but again urged preparations for the defense of the seaboard and the protection of our commerce. On the 22d, followed another message, communicating the correspondence between the secretary of state, (Mr. Forsyth,) and the British chargé d'affaires, relative to the mediation, and repeating his recommendation to provide for defense, in case of the commencement of hostilities during the recess of congress.

On the 10th of May, the president announced to congress the payment, by France, of the instalments due under the treaty of indemnity.

CHAPTER LII.

THE ANTI-SLAVERY QUESTION.-DISCUSSION

PUBLICATIONS.-ATHERTON'S RESOLUTIONS.

IN CONGRESS.-INCENDIARY

AMONG the various excitements that have at different times prevailed in the United States, few have been more pervading and intense than that which was consequent upon the early anti-slavery organizations, subsequent to the year 1833, in which the national anti-slavery society was formed. At no time did this excitement reach a higher temperature than in the years 1835 and 1836. Societies were formed in all the northern states; in some of them in almost every county; and in some portions of these states, in nearly every town. Alarm at this movement was soon taken at the south; meetings were held, at which the most denunciatory resolutions against the abolitionists were adopted; and fears were expressed of a speedy dissolution of the union.

This expression of southern sentiment was responded to in the north. Opposition meetings were held in nearly all the large cities and towns attended by citizens of high standing, for the purpose of counteracting the efforts of the abolitionists. In numerous instances this opposition was carried so far as to break up anti-slavery meetings by violence. Indeed, mobs were common occurrences, and were not unfrequently encouraged or participated in by eminent and respectable citizens.

The great agency employed by the abolitionists which excited general alarm at the south, was that of the press. An immense quantity of anti-slavery publications was scattered over the northern states; and the abolitionists were charged with sending them to the south to insti

gate the slaves to violence and bloodshed. Hence attempts were made to suppress anti-slavery societies and their publications. The “ Emancipator," published in the city of New York, was indicted by a grand jury in Alabama, and a requisition by Governor Gayle was made upon Governor Marcy of the state of New York, for the surrender of the publisher, R. J. Williams, to be tried as an offender against the laws of Alabama concerning slavery. Governor Marcy, however, not being able so easily as Governor Gayle, to construe Mr. Williams into a “ fugitive from justice," the demand was not complied with.

Another expedient resorted to was the offering of rewards for offenders. A New Orleans paper contained an advertisement from a committee of vigilance of a parish in Louisiana, offering a reward of $50,000 for the delivery of Arthur Tappan, a conspicuous abolitionist in the city of New York. Rewards also for Lewis Tappan, and other persons, were offered. Nor were offers confined to individuals and voluntary associations. By an enactment of the legislature of the state of Mississippi, a reward of $5,000 was offered for the arrest and prosecution of any person who should be convicted of having circulated the “ Liberator," or any other seditious paper, pamphlet, or letter, within that state. In the legislatures of one or two other states, it is believed, similar propositions were made, and carried through one or both branches.

In the proceedings of the meetings held in Boston, Lowell, New York, Albany, Philadelphia, and other places, are found expressions of sympathy for the south, and censures of abolitionists, which would receive few votes in any public meeting at the present day. These anti-abolition meetings were gratifying to the people of the south. The proceedings of the Albany meeting were thus noticed by the Richmond Enquirer : “Amid these proceedings, we hail with delight the meeting and resolutions of Albany. They are up to the hub. They are in perfect unison with the rights and sentiments of the south. They are divested of all the metaphysics and abstractions of the resolutions of New York. They are free from all qualifications and equivocation—no idle denunciations of the evils of slaveryếno pompous assertions of the right of discussion. But they announce in the most unqualified terms, that it is a southern question, which belongs, under the federal compact, exclusively to the south. They denounce all discussions upon it in the other states, which, from their very nature, are calculated to “iniame the public mind,' and put in jeopardy the lives and property of their fellow-citizens, as at war with every rule of moral duty, and every suggestion of humanity; and they reprobate the incendiaries who will

r persist in carrying them on, as disloyal to the union.' They pronounce these vile incendiaries to be disturbers of the public

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peace. They assure the south,

that the great body of the northern people entertain opinions similar to those expressed in these resolutions ;' finally, that we plight to them our faith to maintain, in practice, so far as lies in our power, what we have thus solemnly declared.'

“We hail this plighted faith to arrest, by all constitutional and legal means,' the movements of these incendiaries. We hail these pledges with pleasure; and should it become necessary, we shall call upon them to redeem them in good faith, and to act, and to put down these disturbers of the peace.” The manner in which it was hoped these pledges would be redeemed, and these disturbers of the peace would be “put down" was by legislative enactments. This is expressly declared in the Whig, of the same city :

“The Albany resolutions are far more acceptable than those of New York. They are unexceptionable in their general expressions towards the south, and in their views of the spirit and consequences of abolition;

and they omit any specific recognition of the right of agitation. Nothing is wanting, indeed, but that which, being wanting, all the rest, we fear, is little more than 'a sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal.' We mean the recognition of the power of the legislature to suppress the fanatics, and the recommendation to do so. This is the substance asked of the north by their brethren of the south; and the recent manifesto of Tappan & Co. makes it plain, that without it, nothing effective can be done; that without it, urgent remonstrances to these madmen to desist, and warm professions towards the south, avail not a whit. Up to the mark the north must come, if it would restore tranquillity and preserve the union."

In the proceedings of the Albany meeting, the Whig could see an object which its neighbor, of opposite politics, appears not to have discovered. It says: " The failure of the Albany meeting to enforce the expediency of legislative enactments, is ominous. There is reason to believe that strong appeals were made to the leaders from various points, perhaps from Richmond itself, to go as far as possible, and to adopt a resolution, according to the south its demand for legislative enactment. Political importance was attached to it from the circumstance that the immediate friends of Mr. Van Buren and his party leaders, were to preside at the meeting, and thus that an intelligent sign might be given the south, that he sustained her claim. We infer nothing against Mr. Van Buren himself from the failure; but we do infer this, either that his Albany partisans reject the claim, or fear to encounter public opinion by adopting it. Either way it may be regarded as decisive of the fate of the demand itself, and as conclusive that nothing will be done by the state of New York to suppress the fanatics by law. New York is the lotbed of the sect; and nothing being done there, what may be done elsewhere will avail nothing."

The Philadelphia Inquirer said: “The south has called upon the north for action in relation to Garrison and his co-workers: Philadel. phia, at least, has responded to this call in a spirit of the utmost liberality. The resolutions adopted at the town meeting of Monday last, not only denounce the recent movements of the abolitionists, ... but they expressly disclaim any right to interfere, directly or indirectly, with the subject of slavery in the southern states, and aver that any action

' upon it by the people of the north, would be not only a violation of the constitution, but a presumptuous infraction of the rights of the south; and further, one of them recommends to the legislature of this commonwealth, to enact, at the next session, certain provisions to protect our fellow-citizens of the south from any incendiary movements, within our borders, should

any

such hereafter be made. Are not these declarations to the point? Do they not cover the whole ground? Do they not go even farther than many of the resolutions passed at public meetings in the south ?”

The northern anti-abolitionists received some pretty severe lectures for not putting their professions into practice. Said the Southern Patriot: "Why did not the Albany meeting recommend putting down, by the strong arm of the law, discussions which (it declared,) 'are at war with every moral duty, and every suggestion of humanity ? Surely, that which is declared to be so pernicious as to be at war with every moral duty, and every humane suggestion, can and ought to be made legally punishable. It is works and not words we want."

Despairing of seeing the progress of anti-slavery sentiment arrested by legislation, the south suggested the remedy of non-intercourse and disunion. In the resolutions of a public meeting in South Carolina, it was declared, “ that when the southern states are reduced to the alternative of choosing either union without liberty, or disunion with liberty and property, be assured they will not hesitate which to take, and will make the choice promptly, unitedly, and fearlessly.” And it was unanimously

, resolved, " That should the non-slaveholding states omit or refuse, at the ensuing meeting of their respective legislatures, to put a final stop to the proceedings of their abolition societies, against the domestic peace of the south, and effectually prevent any farther interference by them with our slave population, by efficient penal laws, it will then become the solemn duty of the whole south, in order to protect themselves and secure their rights and property, against the unconstitutional combination of the non-slaveholding states, and the murderous designs of their abolitionists to withdraw from the union.?'

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