t,
except upon conditions specified, which would make the project of
immediate annexation impossible. On the slavery question, he had
not yet seriously offended the anti-slavery element in his own
party, and was even trusted by some of the voting anti-slavery men.
In a speech at Raleigh, in April of this year, he declared it to
be "the duty of each State to sustain its own domestic institutions."
He had publicly said that the General Government had nothing to do
with slavery, save in the matters of taxation, representation, and
the return of fugitive slaves. He had condemned the censure of
Mr. Giddings in 1842 as an outrage, and indorsed the principles
laid down in his tract, signed "Pacificus," on the relations of
the Federal Government to slavery, and the rights and duties of
the people of the free States. In his earlier years, he had been
an outspoken emancipationist, and had always frankly expressed his
opinion that slavery was a great evil. These considerations, and
especially his unequivocal utterances against the annexation scheme,
were regarded as hopeful auguries of a thoroughly united party,
and its triumph at the polls; while Mr. Webster, always on the
presidential anxious-seat, and carefully watching the signs of the
political zodiac, now cordially lent his efforts to the Whig cause.

With the Democracy, Mr. Van Buren was still a general favorite.
His friends felt that the wrong done him in 1840 should now be
righted, and a large majority of his party undoubtedly favored his
renomination. But his famous letter to Mr. Hammet, of Mississippi,
dated March 27th, on the annexation of Texas, placed a lion in his
path. In this lengthy and elaborate document he committed himself
against the project of immediate annexation, and the effect was at
once seen in the decidedly unfriendly tone of Democratic opinion
in the South. He had been faithful to the Slave oligarchy in many
things, but his failure in one was counted a breach of the whole
law. By many acts of patient and dutiful service he had earned
the gratitude of his Southern task-masters; but now, when driven
to the wall, he mustered the courage to say, "Thus far, no farther";
and for this there was no forgiveness. General Jackson came to
his rescue, but it was in vain. The Southern heart was set upon
immediate annexation as the golden opportunity for rebuilding the
endangered edifice of slavery, and Mr. Van Buren's talk about
national obligations and