nto enemies, onerous taxes, death on the field and in the hospital,
and conscription to maintain opposing forces. "It will then appear
that the question of dissolving the Union is a complex question; that
it embraces the fearful issue whether the Union shall stand and
slavery be removed by gradual, voluntary effort, and with
compensation, or whether the Union shall be dissolved and civil war
ensue, bringing on violent but complete and immediate emancipation. We
are now arrived at that stage of our national progress when that
crisis can be foreseen--when we must foresee it."[398]

[Footnote 397: F.W. Seward, _Life of W.H. Seward_, Vol. 2, p. 126.]

[Footnote 398: _Ibid._, p. 127.]

A less fearless and determined nature must have been overwhelmed by
the criticism, the censure, and the insulting sneers which this speech
provoked. Southern feeling dominated the Senate chamber. Many northern
men, sincerely desirous of limiting slavery, preferred giving up the
Wilmot Proviso for the sake of peace. Thousands of Whigs regarded
dissent from Clay and Webster, their time-honoured leaders, as bold
and presumptuous. In reviewing Seward's speech, these people
pronounced it pernicious, unpatriotic, and wicked, especially since
"the higher law" theory, taken in connection with his criticism of the
fugitive slave law, implied that a humane and Christian people could
not or would not obey it. But the Auburn statesman resented nothing
and retracted nothing. "With the single exception of the argument in
poor Freeman's case," he wrote, "it is the only speech I ever made
that contains nothing I could afford to strike out or qualify."[399]

[Footnote 399: F.W. Seward, _Life of W.H. Seward_, Vol. 2, p. 129.]

But Seward's speech did not influence votes. Clay's compromises passed
amidst the wildest outbursts of popular enthusiasm. They appealed to a
majority of both the great parties as a final settlement of the
slavery question. In New York and other cities throughout the State,
flags were hoisted, salutes fired, joy bells rung, illuminations
flamed at night, and speakers at mass-meetings congratulated their
fellow citizens upon the wisdom of a President and a Congress that had
happily averted the great peril of disunion.

These exhibitions of gratitude were engrossing the attention of the
people when the Whig state convention met at Utica on the 26th of
September, 1850. Immediately, the approval of Seward's course assumed
supreme import