to the payment of her bonds, that, in issuing them, her
Governor and Legislature had violated _their own Constitution_, proposes
to cure one fraud, by committing another far more stupendous. The bonds
were issued by the highest legislative and executive functionaries of
the State, the broad seal of the State attached, the bonds sold, and the
money received. In such a case, there is a legal, as well as a moral
estoppel, forbidding such a plea, for, by the English, as well as by the
American doctrine, an estoppel excludes the truth, whenever such proof
would enable the party, who obtained money on false pretences, to commit
a fraud on third persons, by disproving his own averment. This is not a
mere technical rule, but one which is based upon experience, and
sustained by the most exalted morality.

I have given the several objections made by Governor McNutt and Senator
Davis to the payment of these bonds, with one exception. This will be
found in the following extract from the executive message of Governor
McNutt, (p. 502): 'The bank, I have been informed, has hypothecated
these bonds, and borrowed money upon them of the Baron Rothschild; the
blood of Judas and Shylock flows in his veins, and he unites the
qualities of both his countrymen. He has mortgages on the silver mines
of Mexico and the quicksilver mines of Spain. He has advanced money to
the Sublime Porte, and taken as security a mortgage upon the holy city
of Jerusalem, and the sepulchre of our Saviour. It is for the people to
say, whether he shall have a mortgage upon our cotton fields and make
serfs of our children.' I trust the baron will have the good sense to
smile at such folly, and realize how universally, at least throughout
the North, the malice and dishonesty of these suggestions was condemned
and repudiated. We have no such prejudices, worthy only of the dark
ages, against 'God's chosen people,' 'the descendants of the patriarchs
and prophets,' and the 'countrywomen of the mother of our Lord.'

But this whole question has been twice unanimously decided by the
highest judicial tribunal of Mississippi against the State, and every
point made by Governor McNutt and Jefferson Davis overruled by the
court. One of these decisions was in January term, 1842, more than seven
years before the date of Jefferson Davis's letters, and the other was at
April term, 1853, nearly four years subsequently.

The first decision, at January term, 1842, is in the case of Cam