say, Mr. President, that it was established with the entire and unanimous concurrence of the whole South.  Why, there it stands!  The vote of every State in the Union was unanimous in favor of the Ordinance, with the exception of a single individual vote, and that individual vote was given by a Northern man.  This Ordinance prohibiting slavery for ever northwest of the Ohio has the hand and seal of every Southern member in Congress.  It was therefore no aggression of the North on the South.  The other and third clear historical truth is, that the Convention meant to leave slavery in the States as they found it, entirely under the authority and control of the States themselves.

This was the state of things, Sir, and this the state of opinion, under which those very important matters were arranged, and those three important things done; that is, the establishment of the Constitution of the United States with a recognition of slavery as it existed in the States; the establishment of the ordinance for the government of the Northwestern Territory, prohibiting, to the full extent of all territory owned by the United States, the introduction of slavery into that territory, while leaving to the States all power over slavery in their own limits; and creating a power, in the new government, to put an end to the importation of slaves, after a limited period.  There was entire coincidence and concurrence of sentiment between the North and the South, upon all these questions, at the period of the adoption of the Constitution.  But opinions, Sir, have changed, greatly changed; changed North and changed South.  Slavery is not regarded in the South now as it was then.  I see an honorable member of this body paying me the honor of listening to my remarks;[3] he brings to my mind, Sir, freshly and vividly, what I have learned of his great ancestor, so much distinguished in his day and generation, so worthy to be succeeded by so worthy a grandson, and of the sentiments he expressed in the Convention in Philadelphia.[4]

Here we may pause.  There was, if not an entire unanimity, a general concurrence of sentiment running through the whole community, and especially entertained by the eminent men of all parts of the country.  But soon a change began, at the North and the South, and a difference of opinion showed itself; the North growing much more warm and strong against slavery, and the South growing much more warm and strong in its support.  Sir, there is no generation of mankind whose opinions are not subject to be influenced by what appear to them to be their present emergent and exigent interests.  I impute to the South no particularly selfish view in the change which has come over her.  I impute to her certainly no dishonest view.  All that has happened has been natural.  It has followed those causes which always influence the human mind and operate upon it.  What, then, have been the causes which have created so new a feeling in favor of slavery in the South, which have changed the