answer to all the former.” * * * “It is a law that might be held constitutional by a bench of slaveholders, whose pecuniary interests connect them directly with slavery; or by those who have surrendered themselves to a pro-slavery policy from political hopes.  But if we gather the opinions of unbiassed and disinterested men, of those who have no money to make, and no office to hope for, through the triumph of this law, then I think the preponderance of opinion is decidedly against its constitutionality.  It is a fact universally known, that gentlemen who have occupied and adorned the highest judicial stations in their respective States, together with many of the ablest lawyers in the whole country, have expressed opinions against the constitutionality of this law.” * * * “When I am called upon to support such a law as this, while it lasts, or to desist from opposing it in all constitutional ways, my response is, Repeal the law! that I may no longer be called upon to support it.  I demand it, because it is a law which conflicts with the Constitution of the country, and with all the judicial interpretations of that Constitution, wherever they have been applied to the white race.  Because it is a law abhorrent to the moral and religious sentiments of a vast majority of the community called upon to enforce it.  Because it is a law which, if executed in the Free States, divests them of the character of Free States, and makes them voluntary participators in the guilt of slaveholding.  Because it is a law Which disgraces our country in the eyes of the whole civilized world, and gives plausible occasion to the votaries of despotic power to decry republican institutions.  Because it is a law which forbids us to do unto others as we would have them do unto us, and which makes it a crime to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, and to visit and succor the sick and imprisoned.  Because it is a law which renders the precepts of the Gospel and the teachings of Jesus Christ seditious; and were the Savior and his band of disciples now on earth, there is but one of them who would escape its penalties by pretending to ‘conquer his prejudices.’” * * * “Suppose the whole body of the white population should be as much endangered by this law, as the colored people now are, would the existence of the law be tolerated for an hour?  Would there not be a simultaneous and universal uprising of the people against it, and such a yell of execration as never before burst from mortal lips?”

The Hon. Charles Sumner, always true to the right, as the needle to the pole, in his learned and able speech in Congress, 1852, said:—­“The true principles of our political system, the history of the National Convention, the natural interpretation of the Constitution, all teach that this Act is a usurpation by Congress of powers that do not belong to it, and an infraction of rights secured to the States.  It is a sword, whose handle is at the National Capital, and whose point is every where in the States.  A weapon so terrible to personal liberty the nation has no power to grasp.” * * * “In the name of the Constitution, which it violates; of my country, which it dishonors; of humanity, which it degrades; of Christianity, which it offends, I arraign this enactment, and now hold it up to the judgment of the Senate and the world.” * * * *