in it in its integrity, to the full extent
of the obligations imposed and the power conferred on me by the
Constitution."

Recommending specially that territorial governments for New Mexico
and Utah should be formed, leaving them to settle the question of
slavery for themselves, President Taylor, in his Message, said
further:

"I repeat the solemn warning of the first and most illustrious of
my predecessors against furnishing any ground for characterizing
parties by geographical discriminations."

Alluding to these passages, Calhoun, in his last speech, said:

"It (the Union) cannot, then, be saved by eulogies on it, however
splendid or numerous. The cry of 'Union, Union, the glorious
Union,' can no more prevent _disunion_ than the cry of 'Health,
Health, glorious Health,' on the part of the physician can save
a patient from dying that is lying dangerously ill."

To the allusion of the President to Washington, Calhoun sneeringly
said:

"There was nothing in _his_ history to deter us from seceding from
the Union should it fail to fulfil the objects for which it was
instituted."

The prime objects for which the Union was formed, were, as he
contended, the preservation, perpetuation, and extension of the
institution of human slavery. In the antithesis of this speech he
asked and answered:

"How can the Union be saved?

"To provide for the insertion of a provision in the Constitution,
by an amendment which will restore to the South in substance the
power she possessed of protecting herself before the equilibrium
between the sections was destroyed by the action of this
government."

The speech did not state what, exactly, this amendment was to be,
but it transpired that it was to provide for the election of _two_
Presidents, one from the free and one from the slave States, each
to approve all acts of Congress before they became laws.

Of this device, Senator Benton said:

"No such double-headed government could work through even one
session of Congress, any more than two animals could work together
in the plough with their heads yoked in opposite directions."(69)

In the same month (March 31, 1850) the great political gladiator
and pro-slavery agitator and originator and disseminator of disunion
doctrines was dead;(70) but there were others to uphold and carry
forward his work to its fatal ending.

Calhoun was early accounted a sincere and honest man, a patriot of
moderate views, and at one time was mu