t Constitutions of Indiana and Illinois, and has
been enforced in Constitutions or legislation of other Northern States,
and was sanctioned by the people of Indiana in 1851, when submitted to
them as a distinct proposition, by a vote of 100,976 for it, to 21,066
against it. By that vote, Indiana as late as 1851 affirmed that Missouri
was right and Congress wrong in the great conflict of 1821.

The high and sacred character of a national compact has been claimed for
the Missouri act of 6th March, 1820. No man who will calmly and
intelligently and without prejudice examine its history, can fail to see
that however expedient it might have been at the time, there is no
compact--no sacred character about it. Looking on the whole question as
one of constitutional power and policy, I am free to say I think the
South and not the North were in the right in the Missouri controversy.

What are the plain facts? In 1803 the territory embracing Missouri had
been acquired as slave territory. It had been organized by Congress in
1804 as slave territory. The inhabitants under the foreign and
territorial law had acquired and held slaves, as rightfully as they were
held in any State. No prohibition of slavery had been extended over the
territory. By the treaty with France and the settled policy of the
Federal government, the territory of Missouri, when it had attained a
sufficient population, was entitled to admission as a State on an equal
footing with the original States. In 1817 Missouri asked of Congress
authority to form a State Constitution, preparatory to her admission to
the Union. Her case was in all its cardinal and essential features
precisely parallel to that of Kentucky, Tennessee, Mississippi and
Louisiana, which had already been admitted as Slave States without
question, and how was she met? Northern men in Congress, in effect said
to her, if you choose to come into the Union as a Free State, we will
let you in; if not, we will keep you out, and under our arbitrary power
of government, until you get rid of your slaves. We don't believe in
slavery, and don't mean to have any more barbarian slaveholders in our
company. Northern men in Congress, in violation of the spirit and policy
of the Constitution, which recognized slavery as a purely local
institution, endeavored to compel a full grown sovereign State to
abolish slavery. That is the whole point of the case. It is not
surprising that this position and attempt of the North