“Their policy is dalliance with the South; and they care no more for the right of petition than is absolutely necessary to satisfy the feeling of their constituents.  They are jealous of Cushing, who, they think, is playing a double game.  They are envious of my position as the supporter of the right of petition; and they truckle to the South to court their favor for Webster.  He is now himself tampering with the South on the slavery and the Texas question.”

This harsh judgment may or may not be correct, but it shows very plainly that Mr. Webster’s caution in dealing with these topics was noticed and criticised at this period.  The annexation of Texas, moreover, which he had so warmly opposed, seemed to him, at this juncture, and not without reason, to be less threatening, owing to the course of events in the young republic.  Mr. Adams did not, however, stand alone in thinking that Mr. Webster, at this time, was lukewarm on the subject.  In 1839 Mr. Giddings says “that it was impossible for any man, who submitted so quietly to the dictation of slavery as Mr. Webster, to command that influence which was necessary to constitute a successful politician.”  How much Mr. Webster’s attitude had weakened, just at this period, is shown better by his own action than by anything Mr. Giddings could say.  The ship Enterprise, engaged in the domestic slave-trade from Virginia to New Orleans, had been driven into Port Hamilton, and the slaves had escaped.  Great Britain refused compensation.  Thereupon, early in 1840, Mr. Calhoun introduced resolutions declaratory of international law on this point, and setting forth that England had no right to interfere with, or to permit, the escape of slaves from vessels driven into her ports.  The resolutions were idle, because they could effect nothing, and mischievous because they represented that the sentiment of the Senate was in favor of protecting the slave-trade.  Upon these resolutions, absurd in character and barbarous in principle, Mr. Webster did not even vote.  There is a strange contrast here between the splendid denunciation of the Plymouth oration and this utter lack of opinion, upon resolutions designed to create a sentiment favorable to the protection of slave-ships engaged in the domestic traffic.  Soon afterwards, when Mr. Webster was Secretary of State, he advanced much the same doctrine in the discussion of the Creole case, and his letter was approved by Calhoun.  There may be merit in the legal argument, but the character of the cargo, which it was sought to protect, put it beyond the reach of law.  We have no need to go farther than the Plymouth oration to find the true character of the trade in human beings as carried on upon the high seas.