operly be done to remove this wrong--did you bow your heads in sorrow
because of that defeat? Do you, any of you, know one single Democrat that
showed sorrow over that result? Not one! On the contrary every man threw
up his hat, and hallooed at the top of his lungs, "Hooray for Democracy!"

Now, gentlemen, the Republicans desire to place this great question of
slavery on the very basis on which our fathers placed it, and no other. It
is easy to demonstrate that "our fathers, who framed this Government
under which we live," looked on slavery as wrong, and so framed it and
everything about it as to square with the idea that it was wrong, so far
as the necessities arising from its existence permitted. In forming the
Constitution they found the slave trade existing, capital invested in it,
fields depending upon it for labor, and the whole system resting upon
the importation of slave labor. They therefore did not prohibit the slave
trade at once, but they gave the power to prohibit it after twenty years.
Why was this? What other foreign trade did they treat in that way? Would
they have done this if they had not thought slavery wrong?

Another thing was done by some of the same men who framed the
Constitution, and afterwards adopted as their own the act by the first
Congress held under that Constitution, of which many of the framers were
members, that prohibited the spread of slavery into Territories. Thus
the same men, the framers of the Constitution, cut off the supply and
prohibited the spread of slavery, and both acts show conclusively that
they considered that the thing was wrong.

If additional proof is wanted it can be found in the phraseology of the
Constitution. When men are framing a supreme law and chart of government,
to secure blessings and prosperity to untold generations yet to come, they
use language as short and direct and plain as can be found, to express
their meaning In all matters but this of slavery the framers of the
Constitution used the very clearest, shortest, and most direct language.
But the Constitution alludes to slavery three times without mentioning it
once The language used becomes ambiguous, roundabout, and mystical. They
speak of the "immigration of persons," and mean the importation of slaves,
but do not say so. In establishing a basis of representation they say "all
other persons," when they mean to say slaves--why did they not use
the shortest phrase? In providing for the return of fugiti