so many years consecrated by the intrinsic principles
of equity, would overrule even the most explicit declarations and
terms, as has been done without the aid of that principle in the
slaves, who remain such in spite of the declarations that all men
are born equally free.[19]

TO MATTHEW CAREY

MONTPELIER, July 7, 1831.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

If the States cannot live together in harmony under the auspices
of such a Government as exists, and in the midst of blessings
such as have been the fruits of it, what is the prospect
threatened by the abolition of a common Government, with all the
rivalships, collisions and animosities inseparable from such an
event? The entanglements and conflicts of commercial regulations,
especially as affecting the inland and other non-importing
States, and a protection of fugitive slaves substituted for the
obligatory surrender of them, would, of themselves, quickly
kindle the passions which are the forerunners of war.[20]

To R. R. Gurley, a promoter of colonization, Madison wrote the
following December 28, 1831:

_Dear Sir_,--I received in due time your letter of the 21 ultimo,
and with due sensibility to the subject of it. Such, however, has
been the effect of a painful rheumatism on my general condition,
as well as in disqualifying my fingers for the use of the pen,
that I could not do justice "to the principles and measures of
the Colonization Society, in all the great and various relations
they sustain in our country and to Africa." If my views of them
could have the value which your partiality supposes, I may
observe, in brief, that the Society had always my good wishes,
though with hopes of its success less sanguine than were
entertained by others found to have been the better judges; and
that I feel the greatest pleasure at the progress already made by
the Society, and the encouragement to encounter the remaining
difficulties afforded by the earlier and greater ones already
overcome. Many circumstances at the present moment seem to concur
in brightening the prospects of the Society, and cherishing the
hope that the time will come when the _dreadful calamity which
has so long afflicted our country, and filled so