imits. From the necessities
of the case we should be compelled to form just such a government as our
blessed fathers gave us; and, surely, if they have so made it, that adds
another reason why we should let slavery alone where it exists.

If I saw a venomous snake crawling in the road, any man would say I might
seize the nearest stick and kill it; but if I found that snake in bed with
my children, that would be another question. I might hurt the children
more than the snake, and it might bite them. Much more if I found it
in bed with my neighbor's children, and I had bound myself by a solemn
compact not to meddle with his children under any circumstances, it would
become me to let that particular mode of getting rid of the gentleman
alone. But if there was a bed newly made up, to which the children were to
be taken, and it was proposed to take a batch of young snakes and put them
there with them, I take it no man would say there was any question how I
ought to decide!

That is just the case. The new Territories are the newly made bed to which
our children are to go, and it lies with the nation to say whether they
shall have snakes mixed up with them or not. It does not seem as if there
could be much hesitation what our policy should be!

Now I have spoken of a policy based on the idea that slavery is wrong, and
a policy based on the idea that it is right. But an effort has been made
for a policy that shall treat it as neither right nor wrong. It is based
upon utter indifference. Its leading advocate [Douglas] has said, "I don't
care whether it be voted up or down." "It is merely a matter of dollars
and cents." "The Almighty has drawn a line across this continent, on one
side of which all soil must forever be cultivated by slave labor, and on
the other by free." "When the struggle is between the white man and
the negro, I am for the white man; when it is between the negro and the
crocodile, I am for the negro." Its central idea is indifference. It holds
that it makes no more difference to us whether the Territories become
free or slave States than whether my neighbor stocks his farm with horned
cattle or puts in tobacco. All recognize this policy, the plausible
sugar-coated name of which is "popular sovereignty."

This policy chiefly stands in the way of a permanent settlement of the
question. I believe there is no danger of its becoming the permanent
policy of the country, for it is based on a public indifference. The