such was the fatuity existing among the Slave-holders of the
Border States, that not one of those Slave States had wisdom enough
to take the liberal offer thus made by the General Government, of
compensation. They afterward found their Slaves freed without
compensation.]

So, also, one month later, (April 11, 1862), when the Senate Bill
proposing Emancipation in the District of Columbia, was before the
House, the same spokesman and leader of the loyal Border-State men
opposed it strenuously as not being suited to the times. For, he
persuasively protested: "I do not say that you have not the power; but
would not that power be, at such a time as this, most unwisely and
indiscreetly exercised. That is the point. Of all the times when an
attempt was ever made to carry this measure, is not this the most
inauspicious? Is it not a time when the measure is most likely to
produce danger and mischief to the Country at large? So it seems to
me."

It was not now, nor would it ever be, the time, to pass this, or any
other measure, touching the Institution of Slavery, likely to benefit
that Union to which these men professed such love and loyalty.

Their opposition, however, to the march of events, was of little avail
--even when backed, as was almost invariably the case, by the other
Democratic votes from the Free States. The opposition was obstructive,
but not effectual. For this reason it was perhaps the more irritating
to the Republicans, who were anxious to put Slavery where their great
leader, Mr. Lincoln, had long before said it should be placed--"in
course of ultimate extinction."

This very irritation, however, only served to press such Anti-Slavery
Measures more rapidly forward. By the 19th of June, 1862, a Bill "to
secure Freedom to all persons within the Territories of the United
States"--after a more strenuous fight against it than ever, on the part
of Loyal and Copperhead Democrats, both from the Border and Free
States,--had passed Congress, and been approved by President Lincoln.
It provided, in just so many words, "That, from and after the passage of
this Act, there shall be neither Slavery nor involuntary servitude in
any of the Territories of the United States now existing, or which may
at any time hereafter be formed or acquired by the United States,
otherwise than in punishment of crime, whereof the party shall have been
duly convicted."

Here, then, at last, was the great end an