“Resolved, that all Petitions, Memorials, Resolutions and Propositions relating in any way, or to any extent whatever, to the subject of Slavery, shall without being either printed or referred, be laid on the table, and that no further action whatever shall be had thereon.”  Yeas, 117.  Nays, 68.

Bear with us, fellow countrymen, while we call your attention to the outrage on your rights, the contempt of personal obligations and the hardened cruelty involved in this detestable resolution.  Condemn us not for the harshness of our language, before you hear our justification.  We shall speak only the truth, but we shall speak it as freemen.

The right of petition is founded in the very institution of civil government, and has from time immemorial been acknowledged as among the unquestionable privileges of our English ancestors.  This right springs from the great truth that government is established for the benefit of the governed; and it forms the medium by which the people acquaint their rulers with their wants and their grievances.  So accustomed were the Americans to the exercise of this right, even during their subjection to the British crown, that, on the formation of the Federal Constitution, the Convention not conceiving that it could be endangered, made no provision for its security.  But in the very first Congress that assembled under the new Government, the omission was repaired.  It was thought some case might possibly occur, in which this right might prove troublesome to a dominant faction, who would endeavor to stifle it.  An amendment was therefore proposed and adopted, by which Congress is restrained from making any law abridging “the right of the People, peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”  Had it not been for this prudent jealousy of our Fathers, instead of the resolution I have transcribed, we should have had a law, visiting with pains and penalties, all who dared to petition the Federal Government, in behalf of the victims of oppression, held in bondage by its authority.  The present resolution cannot indeed consign such petitioners to the prison or the scaffold, but it makes the right to petition a congressional boon, to be granted or withheld at pleasure, and in the present case effectually withholds it, by tendering it nugatory.

Petitions are to inform the Government of the wishes of the people, and by calling forth the action of the Legislature, to inform the constituents how far their wishes are respected by their representatives.  The information thus mutually given and received is essential to a faithful and enlightened exercise of the right of legislation on the one hand, and of suffrage on the other.  But the resolution we are considering, provides that no petition in relation to slavery, shall be printed for the information of the members, nor referred to a committee to ascertain the truth of its statements; nor shall any vote be taken, in regard to it, by which the People may learn the sentiments of their representatives.