ircumstances, this should be no longer practicable, then their
policy would be to select a candidate who had no sympathy for the slave,
and whose subserviency to the supremacy of Southern interests was
unquestionable. The attempt to extinguish slavery in Missouri, although
it had resulted in what was called the Missouri compromise, had created
towards all who were not slaveholders a feverish jealousy in the South,
which descended on Mr. Adams with double violence because his free
spirit was known. This was not diminished by the fact that he had,
neither in act nor language, ever transcended the provisions of the
constitution, but had, in every instance, fully recognized its
obligations.

In February, 1826, two resolutions, which had been adopted in executive
session, were brought to Mr. Adams. The first declared "that the
expediency of the Panama mission ought to be debated in Senate with open
doors, unless the publication of the documents, to which it would be
necessary to refer in debate, would prejudice existing negotiations. The
second was a respectful request to the President of the United States to
inform the Senate whether such objection exists to the publication of
all or any part of those documents; and, if so, to specify to what part
it applies."

"These resolutions," said Mr. Adams, "are the fruit of the ingenuity of
Martin Van Buren, and bear the impress of his character. The resolution
to debate an executive nomination with open doors is without example;
and the thirty-sixth rule of the Senate is explicit and unqualified,
that all documents communicated in confidence by the President to the
Senate shall be kept secret by the members. The request to me to specify
the particular documents the publication of which would affect
negotiations was delicate and ensnaring. The limitation was not of
papers the publication of which might be injurious, but merely of such
as would affect existing negotiations; and, this being necessarily a
matter of opinion, if I should specify passages in the document as of
such a character, any senator might make it a question for discussion in
the Senate, and they might finally publish the whole, under color of
entertaining an opinion different from mine upon the probable effect of
the publication. Besides, should the precedent once be established of
opening the doors of the Senate in the midst of a debate upon executive
business, there would be no prospect of ever keeping them shut