If we return home for instruction upon this point, we perceive that same
union exemplified in many a State, in which "Liberty has a temple in
every house, an altar in every heart," while involuntary servitude is
seen in every direction.
Is it denied that those States possess a republican form of government?
If it is, why does our power of correction sleep? Why is the
constitutional guaranty suffered to be inactive? Why am I permitted to
fatigue you, as the representative of a slaveholding State, with the
discussion of the "_nugae canorae_" (for so I think them) that have been
forced into this debate contrary to all the remonstrances of taste
and prudence? Do gentlemen perceive the consequences to which their
arguments must lead if they are of any value? Do they reflect that they
lead to emancipation in the old United States--or to an exclusion of
Delaware, Maryland, and all the South, and a great portion of the West
from the Union? My honorable friend from Virginia has no business here,
if this disorganizing creed be anything but the production of a heated
brain.
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