dains to
employ a menace; she knows that she never can secure the cooperation
of brave men by employing menaces. No! She wishes to use all her
efforts to perpetuate the reign of peace.

Another says we are seeking to secure an amendment of the Constitution
by the employment of unconstitutional means, and that this meeting is
a revolutionary mob--that these eminent men of the country assembled
here, constitute a mob. No, sir! No!

Mr. BALDWIN:--If the gentleman from Virginia refers to me, he quite
misunderstood me. I said only that the action proposed here was not
contemplated by the Constitution, and was revolutionary in its
tendency.

Mr. BROCKENBROUGH:--I cannot for my life so consider it. This is
merely an advisory body. We are here to devise an adjustment, and to
lay it before Congress. We are exercising the right of petition, and
that is a sacred right. Is this revolutionary? No, sir! You would
insist that Congress should _receive_ a petition, although that body
had no right to act upon it. If so, how much more should our petition
be received, when we seek to preserve the Union, and when the
Constitution expressly authorizes Congress to act in such a case.

The gentleman from Vermont said last evening, that a pledge from the
South to abide by the result would be a condition precedent to the
submission of the proposition at all, and yet he says he cannot pledge
Vermont. Why, then, does he ask us to pledge Virginia?

Mr. CHITTENDEN:--I am not willing to be misunderstood. I thought my
language was plain. What I said was, that no one could pledge the
free States for or against these propositions; but I did say we could
pledge them _to abide by the Union, whatever_ the result might be.
_That_ is the pledge we ask from the South.

Mr. BROCKENBROUGH:--Well, that is a pledge we have no authority to
give. We cannot accept these propositions as a boon from any section.
We must have them as a right, or not at all.

But let me address myself at once to the momentous question. It seems
that we can agree upon every thing but this question of slavery in the
Territories. So far as that subject is concerned, Virginia has
declared that she will accept the Crittenden resolutions. She and her
southern sisters will stand upon and abide by them. If gentlemen will
come up to this basis of adjustment with manly firmness, the electric
wires will flash a thrill of joy to the hearts of the people this very
hour. Why not come up to i