even in the far south,
and at the hazard, too, of exercising doubtful power.

Nothing can be clearer than that the original States had a right to
form a Federal Government on such terms as to themselves as they
could mutually agree upon, and to fix the terms upon which they would
permit new members to be admitted. The Northern States were under no
obligation to protect slavery at all, not even by permitting fugitives
to be reclaimed within their limits. If, then, they were willing to
concede that right to the original States, only upon condition that
slavery should not be allowed to extend, who will say they had not a
right to make that condition, or that, if agreed to, it would not be
valid and binding? With their views of slavery, believing it to be a
moral and political evil, it was certainly their first and highest
duty to make effectual provision against its extension, before
undertaking, for any reason, to give the least protection to it. Such
provision they supposed they had made, and it was this that justified
them, if any thing could, in conceding the right of reclamation.

The free, or northern States, in the exercise of their admitted right
in deciding upon the terms of Union, insisted on making it a
fundamental and ever-binding condition that no obligation to protect
slavery in Illinois should ever exist; and this was done for reasons
which render it morally certain that they would have insisted on the
same condition in reference to Missouri, if Missouri had been part of
the original territory. It would be preposterous to suppose that while
they would not consent to guarantee slavery in any manner in Illinois,
because they believed it to be a moral and political evil, they meant
at the same time to make a Government that could obligate them to
guarantee it in the adjoining Territory or State of Missouri, either
by the return of fugitive slaves, or in any other manner. They meant
no such thing, nor can an honest interpretation of the terms of union
bind them to such guarantee now. The right to recapture fugitive
slaves could not exist without the consent of the free States; and as
that consent was given upon conditions and with limitations, by
necessary implication and every sound principle of construction, they
reserved the right to say whether it should exist upon other
conditions and with other limitations, or without either condition or
limitation.

Mr. WICKLIFFE:--No one from Kentucky or Virginia wis