AHG 503 O1A NOTES

Sectionalism and the Civil War—Dr. Lucas E. Morel (Washington & Lee University)

8/27/18
Session 1: The American Founders on Freedom and Slavery
*Before 1776, religion & politics were a volatile and combustible combination, but the Founders
don’t shy away from talking about God in the Declaration. The Declaration talks about the laws
of Nature and of Nature’s god
*Prior to 1776, our appeals to the Crown (ex. Olive Branch Petition) had been appeals of
Englishmen. But once those appeals fell upon deaf ears, then the Founders decided that they no
longer wanted to be British subjects. Why would we want to continue being British subjects
when we could be something better? We have found something better—we could now rule
ourselves and no longer be subjects to a ruler that we did not consent to. Once the Revolutionary
War began in 1775, the Founders stopped appealing to Parliament & the Crown saying that their
rights as Englishmen were being violated. When it becomes apparent that we can no longer
remain with England, then we start appealing to a higher power (God) to say that our natural
rights are being violated by the Crown, which justifies our separation

Declaration of Independence
-Unlike the French Revolution’s rejection of the Divine, the American Revolution merely
rejected the divine right of kings. Europe’s understanding of God gave them the divine right of
kings, but with the Enlightenment, our understanding of man’s relationship with God changed.
America didn’t reject God like the French did, but we instead believed that He had endowed us
with unalienable rights that not even supposedly divinely appointed kings could take away
-The Founders believe that God is watching their actions: “We, therefore, the Representatives of
the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge
of the world for the rectitude of our intentions…And for the support of this Declaration, with a
firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives,
our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.”
-God is the only being who can see into people’s hearts and know their true intentions.
We understand God as being the only person to know the why, and before that entity is
who we appeal to. The Declaration is addressed to the Crown, but we appeal to God to
support us. If He were here now, then He would say that yes, the actions we are taking in
separating from England are consistent with what He intended by creating human beings
simply
-The Declaration of Independence was a claim, a list of grievances, to the world. They can’t
make an appeal to a particular god (“a decent respect to the opinions of mankind”). Not everyone
in the world worships the same god, so the Founders wanted to appeal to everyone, regardless of
religion
-“One people” meant that Americans were making the particular revolution
-The divine right of kings was based off of one god, one particular text, and one
particular interpretation of that text
-The Declaration was a blueprint for all mankind of how they could rule themselves
-The way that God is described in the Declaration, His characteristics/aspects are shared by most
major world religions based off of what can be observed about Him naturally (rationally);
describe God in a way that doesn’t divide people; neutral stance on God (Nature’s god). Then
He’s mentioned as the Creator, later as the Supreme Judge, and lastly as Providence. The
description & appeal to God is consistent with all of the major world religions, but we didn’t
appeal to one particular religion
*The French Revolution pitched the idea of God entirely, but the American Revolution
spoke of Him in a way that didn’t divide people spiritually
-Enlightenment: You can gain a personal understanding of God based off of what you observe
naturally. Prior to the Enlightenment, there was only one religious standard. The Founders
rejected the divine right of kings, cuz it implied a particular understanding of God
-“A decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the
causes which impel them to the separation.” For any rational being, one particular belief
doesn’t trump another person’s beliefs. Through dialogue, you can together come closer
to the truth. The Declaration is our claim that we are submitting to the entire world to
justify our independence
-Not everyone in the world possesses the same theology, so the Founders
appealed to the general Creator, cuz that would make our standard applicable to
all peoples. Through the Declaration, anyone anywhere in the world can know the
standard by which any human being can know the proper ground for rule; the just,
legitimate basis for human gov’t
*Prior to the Enlightenment, the authority of the divine right of kings rested upon a particular
revealed faith/understanding of the truth. There’s not a standard by which you can say that the
Angel Moroni trumps this particular shaman’s utterance about what God’s will is. The
Declaration made a claim that we believed about ourselves that could be understood by any
rational human being
*An opinion is the basis for knowledge. Why does Plato spend so much time writing
dialogues instead of treatises? Cuz the belief is that when two people express 2 different
opinions, in the process of that conversation (dialogue), then we can decide whose
opinion is closer to the truth, and that’s how knowledge comes about
-The Founders believed that as free men they were entitled to (by the laws of Nature and of
Nature’s god) life, liberty, and property (the pursuit of happiness), but that the King was
depriving them of those rights, even though those were their God-given rights. We are entitled to
those rights, but we weren’t allowed to enjoy it & access the full benefits of it
-Natural law (or the laws of nature’s god) entitled us to rule ourselves. We have a legit
right to govern ourselves (the action of governing ourselves), but that action is being
denied us. For the past year we’ve been at war with England, and through military force,
they’ve been denying us our right to rule ourselves
*The Declaration outlines truths that are “self-evident,” but they’re not self-evident to people
who have “some disorder in the organs of perception” or people who are influenced by “some
strong interest, or passion, or prejudice” (Federalist #31)
*Federalist #31 (CP 15): “IN DISQUISITIONS of every kind there are certain primary
truths, or first principles, upon which all subsequent reasonings must depend. These
contain an internal evidence which, antecedent to all reflection or combination,
commands the assent of the mind. Where it produces not this effect, it must proceed
either from some disorder in the organs of perception, or from the influence of some
strong interest, or passion, or prejudice.”
*Even on American soil, there were people (slaveowners) who had a strong
economic interest in denying blacks their self-evident rights.
 *“We’ll see that part of the growing divide in the United States is what began as
an economic interest became much more a part of the warp and woof of society,
especially in the South, and so they started coming up for other rationales for
maintaining that institution”-Dr. Morel
*At the time of the Revolution, the predominant form of prejudice came from
religion. By prejudice, we mean something that you hold to be true, but it’s not
something that you reasoned or thought your way to. You just believe it cuz that’s
the way you were brought up, or someone you respect believes that
*Some prejudices are true, but the problem with that is you don’t know
why they’re true. You believe it, but you don’t understand why you
believe it
*The prevailing political religious prejudice of the day was the divine right of
kings. Everyone grew up believing that only a few people got to tell everyone else
what to do. But is it a true prejudice?
-The Founders asserted that all men are created equal. Aristotle believed that in order to know
what a human being was like, you had to find this person as an adult, after they’re mature. You
look at a human after the family, laws, and courts have done their job. That’s what a human is
-For the Enlightenment, Locke took humans out of the city, and then he looked at them. He
examined humans before talking about gov’t cuz the purpose of looking at humans outside of
gov’t was to look at their natural rights before their civil rights that are granted to them by the
gov’t. Gov’t is mentioned after natural rights, cuz the purpose of gov’t is to secure for men their
unalienable rights. All humans are endowed by God with unalienable rights. But in order to
protect those unalienable rights for their enjoyment, Governments are instituted among Men.
God creates human with their unalienable rights, but it’s up to the men themselves to find a way
to protect those rights, and that comes by forming governments. Because of the Enlightenment,
men recognized that they possessed God-given rights, but they also recognized that they’re not
safe. The Social Contract is men forming governments in order to protect their inalienable rights
*Through the Enlightenment, when men are examined outside of the city, we see that
they all possess the rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness (property). They all
possess the impulse to want to better themselves, feel good, and be happy. But we
recognize that even though we have these rights, it does us no good unless there’s a way
for us to secure them. Locke believed that without gov’t, all that would exist would be
conflict and war. To be safe in the things that we already possess as human beings, we
decide to create a society based on an agreement. We agree to provide that security.
Nature (God) only took us so far. We have these rights, but now it’s left to us to decide
how to situate ourselves—how to structure our lives—so that we can enjoy our rights
*Governments aren’t natural. In a state of nature, there is no gov’t authority to protect
you. This Enlightenment thinking is a departure from the Classical idea regarding gov’t.
Aristotle insisted that you didn’t know what a human was if he wasn’t in a city (gov’t
society). He believed that if you saw a man outside of the city, then that man was either a
beast or a god. The Founders didn’t believe that any humans were beasts or gods—
humans are in-between. We need to be secure in our rights, and that will be accomplished
by men themselves, and not God, creating the artificial institution of gov’t
-And in creating a gov’t, the gov’t derives its powers from the consent of the
governed. No gov’t possesses the right to tell you what to do, naturally. Nobody is
born the ruler of anyone except himself. But if you try to be your own ruler, then
 a group of people can deprive you of your rights. To be secure, you need to accept
the Social Contract and enter into a society where you consent to others ruling
over you, for your own safety
*Through God, all men are entitled to their natural rights, but in order to enjoy
those rights, they need to establish a gov’t based on the consent of the governed.
You can possess rights, but be deprived of their use by some illegitimate force
*By signing their names at the end of the Declaration, the Founders were stating that they agreed
with everything that the document stated (including the Lockean political philosophy
statements), and not just the list of grievances
-The Founders knew from the get-go that slavery was inconsistent with the ideals of the
Declaration
-Nobody in the 1780s said that they had the right to continue slavery based on principle;
it was all based on practical arguments
-“We never see Jefferson justify the enslavement of anybody, by the laws of Virginia, as
something that is consistent with the laws of Nature and of Nature’s god. He always
affirms the injustice of the very thing he can’t give up”-Dr. Morel
-“It is almost universally held by the Founding generation that slavery was inconsistent
with the principles of their own separation from Great Britain”-Dr. Morel
*6 of the original 13 States eventually got rid of slavery. They recognized that they
couldn’t continue to live in a way that was inconsistent with their justification for
separating from England. However, the other States said that they liked slavery too much,
so since they wouldn’t change their practices, they had to come up with other principles
(reasons) to justify their unequal society. They changed their reading of the Declaration
(ex. Roger B. Taney), and came up with other sources to justify slavery
-“Almost no one argued in the 1770s and 1780s in the United States that—no American
who owned slaves—made a principled argument claiming that they deserved freedom,
but not their slave”-Dr. Morel
“Jefferson never said that what he is doing to the African on his own land (Monticello) is
right, that it is good, that it is legitimate”-Dr. Morel

Jefferson, “Notes on Debates in Congress” (July 2, 1776)

*The section that included Jefferson’s condemnation of the slave trade had to be removed, cuz it
wasn’t an opinion held by all of the Colonies. South Carolina and Georgia were in favor of the
continuation of the slave trade (at least for a time), and some of the Northern Colonies “felt a
little tender about the issue,” cuz while the North didn’t have a lot of slaves, they were “carriers”
of slaves to others
-One of the Brown brothers, for which Brown University is named, made part of his
fortune by building ships to carry slaves across the Middle Passage. But it wasn’t just the
ship builders who benefitted from slavery in the North. Other occupations in the North
also benefitted from the slave trade
-CP 5: “He has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights of
life and liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him, captivating and
carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere or to incur miserable death in their
transportation thither. This piratical warfare, the opprobrium in INFIDEL powers, is the warfare
of the CHRISTIAN king of Great Britain. Determined to keep open market where MEN should
be bought and sold, he has prostituted his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to
prohibit or to restrain his execrable commerce. And that this assemblage of horrors might want
no fact of distinguished die, he is now exciting those very people to rise in arms among us, and
to purchase that liberty of which he has deprived them, by murdering the people on whom he
also obtruded them: thus paying off former crimes committed against the LIBERTIES of one
people, with crimes which he urges them to commit against the LIVES of another.”
-Jefferson was condemning King George III for perpetuating the slave trade and blocking
Colonial legislation that would have ended it
-When the Declaration was written, the Founders couldn’t hope to free themselves and their
slaves, but certain Colonies had attempted to the stop the slave trade, but they were vetoed by
King George III. They couldn’t abolish slavery right away, but they wanted to condemn King
George III for prohibiting them from at least attempting to begin to end slavery by banning the
slave trade
-The fact that the Founders didn’t end slavery immediately doesn’t mean that they didn’t
at least try to begin to get rid of it. The beginning was individual Colonies trying to put
slavery on the ultimate course to extinction by banning the slave trade. Jefferson was
complaining that every time that the Colonies tried to end the importation of slaves, King
George III prostituted (sold) his use of the veto. He sold his veto to the moneyed interests
who wanted the slave trade to continue. As Hamilton said in Federalist #31, King George
III was following his economic self-interest. He allowed economics & wealth to
influence his duty to do what was good for the realm, and apparently that good did not
include the good of the kidnapped Africans
-Jefferson started by saying that the Africans were humans (human nature) and
that they were being deprived of their sacred rights of life and liberty through the
slave trade. And if the slave trade is wrong, then slavery itself must be wrong, too.
Jefferson was specifically condemning the slave trade, but his condemnation of
the slave trade comes from the fact that the institution of slavery itself is wrong.
He wasn’t condemning the trade of molasses or anything else. He condemned the
slave trade cuz human beings are the only beings who have the right to life &
liberty, which are sacred rights
*Jefferson equated the Crown’s actions (being a Christian king) with those of an
infidel, so he was sarcastically calling him an atheist
*During the Revolutionary War (vis-à-vis Lord Dunmore’s Proclamation), the Crown
granted slaves their freedom if they would flee their masters and join the British Army.
So even though the Crown seems to tell the slaves that their masters are to blame for their
enslavement, King George III is the one preventing the Colonies from beginning to do
away with the institution of slavery
*In 1776, the Founders didn’t believe that it was possible to free themselves from the British,
and at the same time free their slaves. But while they were still the Colonies, they did at least
attempt to end the slave trade, as the beginning of ultimately getting rid of slave. The Founders
wanted to start a new nation where they could rule themselves, but slavery is inconsistent with
that principle, and the Crown is making it even harder for them to begin to end the institution of
slavery. It doesn’t justify Jefferson’s personal slaveholding, but as a public document on behalf
of the American people, it’s cuz slavery is something that the colonists don’t believe that they
can get rid of right away, and anything (ex. the Crown) that makes the journey to emancipation
harder deserves condemnation
Jefferson, Letter to Benjamin Banneker (August 30, 1791)
-CP 28: Jefferson believed that slaves deserved their freedom, but the institution of slavery itself
was so awful that it affected slaves’ minds. It undermines slaves’ abilities to properly use their
freedom.

-For the Founders, ending slavery wasn’t a one-part solution but a two-part solution.
Emancipation and THEN what? What will happen to the freedmen, what will they do with their
freedom, and where will they live? What will the experience of slavery do to set their individual
agenda? Jefferson believes that the only practical solution post-abolition was emancipation and
expatriation (colonization). Freed slaves cannot remain in the same society where they were
formerly enslaved

Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia, Query XVIII: Manners (1781)

*Jefferson reflects throughout Notes about blacks, and he makes some harsh comments
about them. But he admits that maybe their behavior doesn’t have to do with blacks as a
race, but rather, that their attributes that whites see as being incompatible with a free
society are a result of their enslavement
*This essay is Jefferson talking about how slavery is bad for the white slaveowners. They
are the ones who need to be taught about the negative effect that owning slaves is having
on them. It has an impact on their manners
-The Founders’ expectations is that slavery would be abolished by a future generation.
But how can a future generation free their slaves if they grow up seeing their parents
abuse slaves? It is self-evident & manifest that slavery is wrong for blacks, but think
about how slavery affects whites. The current generation doesn’t believe that they can get
rid of slavery, but the expectation is that the future generation will. But how can they if
they are growing up seeing what one people is doing to another?
-CP 27: “There must doubtless be an unhappy influence on the manners of our
people produced by the existence of slavery among us. The whole commerce
between master and slave is a perpetual exercise of the most boisterous passions,
the most unremitting despotism on the one part, and degrading submissions on the
other. Our children see this, and learn to imitate it; for man is an imitative animal.
This quality is the germ of all education in him. From his cradle to his grave he is
learning to do what he sees others do. If a parent could find no motive either in his
philanthropy or his self-love, for restraining the intemperance of passion towards
his slave, it should always be a sufficient one that his child is present. But
generally it is not sufficient. The parent storms, the child looks on, catches the
lineaments of wrath, puts on the same airs in the circle of smaller slaves, gives a
loose to his worst of passions, and thus nursed, educated, and daily exercised in
tyranny, cannot but be stamped by it with odious peculiarities. The man must be a
prodigy who can retain his manners and morals undepraved by such
circumstances. And with what execration should the statesman be loaded, who
permitting one half the citizens thus to trample on the rights of the other,
transforms those into despots, and these into enemies, destroys the morals of the
one part, and the amor patriae of the other.”
-Jefferson calls blacks citizens, and he admits that him owning slaves is
wrong
-Jefferson believed that the wrath of God would inflict judgement upon them for
practicing slavery
-CP 27: “And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have
removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these
liberties are of the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with his
wrath? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just: that his
justice cannot sleep for ever: that considering numbers, nature and natural means
only, a revolution of the wheel of fortune, an exchange of situation, is among
possible events: that it may become probable by supernatural interference! The
Almighty has no attribute which can take side with us in such a contest.”
-God is not punishing this people (America) who claim to be in
accordance with Nature & with Nature’s God. Jefferson knows that
African slavery is wrong in the eyes of God—it is inconsistent with what
God intended for all human beings
-God is continuing to sleep because there hasn’t yet been a massive slave
revolt. If we don’t free the slaves and wait until they decide to free
themselves, God will not be on our side; God will side with those who
seek justice. It is right for the slaves to free themselves
-MLK: “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards
justice.” It only looks like God is sleeping now, but He will side
with the right and defend the right—He will side with those who
seek justice. And Jefferson repeatedly demonstrates that it is right
for the slaves to free themselves
-The motto of the Confederacy was Deo vindice (With God
as our defender/protector)
*Jefferson wrote another query in Notes on the State of Virginia (“Law”)
where he posed the question ‘Why don’t we free our slaves and make
them equal citizens? We know that whites won’t do it, cuz ten thousand
recollections on account of the blacks.’ The blacks don’t revolt now while
they’re enslaved cuz that would have been suicide (ex. Nat Turner,
Denmark Vesey). The reason why the whites don’t free all of their slaves
is cuz if all the slaves were freed at once, Jefferson was afraid that they
would immediately retaliate against their former masters. If it happened
immediately, it would result in a race war en masse; the freedmen would
take revenge upon those who violated their unalienable rights (Jefferson,
Madison, and de Tocqueville all believed this)
-Dr. Morel: Jefferson was a pivotal Founder who frequently commented
on the injustice of the very thing (slavery) he was unwilling to give up
-Dr. Morel: we think that it would have been simple for the Founders to
abolish slavery at the beginning of the country, but the Second Continental
Congress thought through the issue and what the near-term consequences
would be. They never justified slavery based on principle, but they raised
a bunch of practical considerations that weighed in on their decisions
 Jefferson, Letter to Edward Coles (August 25, 1814)
*Edward Coles freed his slaves and brought them from Virginia to the Illinois Territory
in 1818
-CP 31: “The laws do not permit us to turn them loose, if that were for their good: and to
commute them for other property is to commit them to those whose usage of them we
cannot control.”
-When Illinois was in the process of becoming a State, there was a debate when the State
constitution was being written whether or not to permit slavery, cuz the treaty for the
Louisiana Purchase allowed the French who were already residing there to keep their
slaves. Beginning of the State equality argument (all States on equal footing): have
Illinois start out as a Slave State, cuz the original States (except MA) had been Slave
States when they ratified the Constitution
*After moving to Illinois in 1818, Edward Coles became a political leader, and he
helped to make Illinois a Free State
*In 1860-1861, the South argued that their rights were being denied, cuz they
couldn’t take their slaves to the Western territories & have Congress pass a
federal slave code to protect them

Slavery in the Constitution

-The Founders believed that slavery would eventually resolve itself, but not mentioning it in the
Constitution didn’t mean that people wouldn’t know that it had existed. That’s what history
books are for. But by not mentioning it in the Constitution, that wouldn’t enshrine it as a
legitimate American institution
-James Madison didn’t want to use the word slave in the Constitution, because he felt that using
it would legitimize the institution, and he & Jefferson felt that the issue would eventually resolve
itself; they didn’t want that reminder to be in the Constitution to be seen by future generations
that we ever considered slavery to be a legitimate, American institution
-This more perfect Union would represent a break from an older (and wrong) way of thinking
about the purpose of gov’t. Slavery had existed in America long before independence was
achieved, but in order for this Novus Ordo Seclorum to be achieved, the lease on slavery had to
be extended through compromises, unfortunately. We didn’t want it in the new country, but we
couldn’t get rid of it immediately. History books will tell you that we had slavery, but our form
of gov’t (the Constitution) won’t remind you of that fact
“It wasn’t something we wanted in the new country, we just couldn’t get rid of it at the
outset”-Dr. Morel
-Slaves are being treated like a commodity, but by nature, they are entitled to the same
rights as any other human being

Three-Fifths Compromise: there was a debate with taxation whether it should be proportioned
according to wealth or to population
-CP 19: Dr. Johnson (CT) believed that wealth & population could be rolled into one, cuz wealth
comes from population. Wealth is generated from human labor, and free & slave labor both
factor into that
-Mr. King (CP 19): “Do us justice or we will separate”
-No taxation without representation. You can’t touch my property without my
permission. And if I have a lot of property, is it fair that a bunch of people who
 don’t get to tell me how my property is going to be regulated & taxed? Since I’ve
got so much skin in the game, I better have a say regarding how that’s dealt with.
And if my property is in danger, I’ll roll the dice and take my chances outside the
Union. These arguments come back in 1860 & 1861 when the ordinances of
secession are issued
-GA & SC couldn’t form a coalition with other States, so the only leverage they had was
leaving
-The 3/5 (federal ratio) was the compromise that was agreed upon. It comes from the Articles of
Confederation. The South wanted slaves to count as 5/5, and the North wanted slaves to count as
0/5. At the State level, the South would be able to treat blacks as slaves, and at the national level,
treat them as full persons

Importation Clause: the importation of slaves into States that now exist can’t be banned before
1808
-The Constitution doesn’t say that Congress has to ban the importation of slaves come
January 1, 1808. It merely says that it can’t be touched before that date. South Carolina &
Georgia wanted to keep the slave trade going forever, cuz it was a cheap way for them to
get new slaves. But since Virginia & Maryland had an excess number of slaves, they had
already banned the international slave trade within their own States, and they wanted it to
be banned in the entire country immediately, which would increase the price of their
excess slaves that they sold to other parts of the South. North Carolina was also in the
process of banning the international slave trade within its own borders. The compromise
that was agreed upon was that SC & GA would have 20 more years to import slaves, after
which time (1808) Congress could pass a law banning it in the entire country, if it so
desired
-Madison (CP 23): “Twenty years will produce all the mischief that can be
apprehended from the liberty to import slaves. So long a term will be more
dishonorable to the National character than to say nothing about it in the
Constitution”
-Madison hopes that over the course of a generation (roughly 20-30 years),
somehow the country finds a way to wean itself off of slavery. They can’t
do it immediately, but eventually they can
*Jefferson signed a law in 1807 that went into effect in 1808 that banned the international slave
trade. The ban may have gone into effect in 1808, but it didn’t become more severe until 1820,
when a law was passed that equated those who continued to engage in the international slave
trade with piracy, which carried the punishment of hanging until dead—capital punishment
-CP 42: James Tallmadge said that 14,000 slaves had been brought into the country
illegally (via the international slave trade from the West Indies & Spanish possessions) in
1818
-By 1808, cotton was well on its way to becoming king in the South. And even though slave
importation had been outlawed, people continued to do it illegally. But Virginia had such a large
slave population, that they bred slaves and sold them down the river to other Slave States in the
Deep South
*The interstate slave trade was a third rail of American politics that wasn’t touched by
Congress. Congress had the power (according to the Constitution) to regulate interstate
commerce, so they could have regulated the interstate slave trade, but they don’t touch it
 cuz they know that there’s the threat of separation if they do anything to upset the
interests of the South
*When the original 7 States of the Deep South seceded and Virginia initially
refused, the Confederate constitution banned the international slave trade, and
they used that as a way to try and get Virginia to join the Confederacy. That
would deprive Virginia of its domestic slave market. Ultimately, it wasn’t what
caused Virginia to secede (they seceded after Lincoln called on the militia after
the fall of Fort Sumter), but it was a tactic the CSA employed against them

Fugitive Slave Clause: a mandate by the Constitution that Congress pass a law regarding
fugitive slaves, which they do (Fugitive Slave Act (1793)). When the Fugitive Slave Act (1850)
is passed, it’s a revision of the original law. The South demanded the provision, otherwise they
wouldn’t join the Union. A slave could escape to a Free State in North & be freed under that
State’s personal liberty laws, but they were still a slave in the eyes of the law
-Between 1850-1860, over 300 alleged fugitive slaves were convicted of escaping from
their masters in front of a federal commission & returned. 11 were set free (remained
free).
-The ultimate goal of fugitive slaves was to get to Canada. MA & NH popular first stops,
after which agents of the Underground Railroad would aid them in crossing the
international border into Canada. The slaves could physically free themselves by fleeing
from their masters, but in the eyes of the law, they were still the property of their masters
in the South
-What does it take to reclaim not only your natural rights of life & liberty, but also
to be secure in the exercise of your rights? You can do everything to escape, but
you need gov’t to affirm your freedom
-There were slave patrols (patterrollers) in the South who hunted down escaped slaves
-Under the Fugitive Slave Act (1850), federal agents could deputize citizens to join the
posse to hunt down the escaped slave
9/3/18
Session 2A: 1820 Missouri Compromise

Missouri Compromise (March 6, 1820)

-CP 36 Sec 3: stated that State voting requirements were limited to white males over the age of
21 who had resided in there for at least 3 months prior to the election
-CP 38 Sec 8: Missouri is allowed to come in as a Slave State, but in all territory part of the
Louisiana Purchase above the 36° 30’ parallel (with the exception of Missouri), slavery is
outlawed

Congressional Globe, Debate over the Tallmadge Amendment (February 15, 1819)
-James Tallmadge didn’t want slavery to expand beyond the original 13 States. He
wanted Missouri to be admitted as a Free State. The issue was that there were already
slaves in Missouri, so what happens if it’s admitted as a Free State?
-CP 39: “I was aware of the delicacy of the subject, and that I had learned from
Southern gentlemen the difficulties and the dangers of having free blacks
intermingling with slaves; and, on that account, and with view to the safety of the
white population of the adjoining States, I would not even advocate the
prohibition of slavery in the Alabama Territory; because, surrounded as it was by
slaveholding States, and with only imaginary lines of division, the intercourse
between slaves and free blacks could not be prevented, and a servile war might be
the result. While we deprecate and mourn over the evil of slavery, humanity and
good morals require us to wish its abolition, under circumstances, consistent with
the safety of the white population. Willingly, therefore, will I submit to an evil
which we cannot safely remedy. I admitted all that had been said of the danger of
having free blacks visible to slaves, and therefore did not hesitate to pledge
myself that I would neither advise nor attempt coercive manumission. But, sir, all
these reasons cease when we cross the banks of the Mississippi, a newly acquired
territory, never contemplated in the formation of our Government, not included
within the compromise or mutual pledge in the adoption of our Constitution, a
new territory acquired by our common fund, and ought justly to be subject to our
common legislation.”
-CP 44: “That the further introduction of slavery or involuntary servitude be
prohibited, except for the punishment of crimes, whereof the party shall have been
duly convicted.”
-Similar language to the Northwest Ordinance
-CP 45: “And that all children born within the said State, after the admission
thereof into the Union, shall be free at the age of twenty-five years.”
*Both of Tallmadge’s amendments passed the House, but they both failed in the Senate.
With the admission of Maine, it was 11 Free States to 11 Slaves States. The South figured
out early on that their population wasn’t keeping up with the North, so they realized that
they wouldn’t win in the House, so that’s why they needed to maintain parity in the
Senate to operate as a de facto legislative veto over any law that would be detrimental to
the slave interest. Because of this, the admission of new Territories & States is very
important to the South, cuz they need to ensure that as new States are admitted into the
Union that they get just as many new States as the North does
 *The fact that Missouri already has slaves does not guarantee that it will come
into the Union as a Slave State. The South needs to remain vigilant in the Senate
to ensure that they can prevent & stop legislation like the Tallmadge Amendment
(trying to apply the Northwest Ordinance to new Territories) that can emerge
from the House
-CP 39-40: “Sir, the honorable gentleman from Missouri, (Mr. Scott,) who has just
resumed his seat, has told us of the ides of March, and has cautioned us to “beware the
fate of Caesar and of Rome.” Another gentleman, (Mr. Cobb,) from Georgia, in addition
to other expression of great warmth, has said, “that, if we persist, the Union will be
dissolved;” and, with a look fixed on me, has told us, “we have kindled a fire which all
the waters of the ocean cannot put out, which seas of blood can only extinguish.” Sir,
language of this sort has no effect on me; my purpose is fixed, it is interwoven with my
existence, its durability is limited with my life, it is a great and glorious cause, setting
bounds to a slavery the most cruel and debasing the world ever witnessed; it is the
freedom of man; it is the cause of unredeemed and unregenerated human beings. Sir, if a
dissolution of the Union must take place, let it be so! If civil war, which gentlemen so
much threaten, must come, I can only say, let it come! My hold on life is probably as frail
as that of any man who now hears me; but, while that hold lasts, it shall be devoted to the
service of my country—to the freedom of man. If blood is necessary to extinguish any
fire which I have assisted to kindle, I can assure gentlemen, while I regret the necessity, I
shall not forbear to contribute my unite. Sir, the violence to which gentlemen have
resorted on this subject will not move my purpose, nor drive me from my place. I have
the fortune and the honor to stand here as the representative of freemen, who possess
intelligence to know their rights, who have the spirit to maintain them. Whatever might
be my own private sentiments on this subject, standing here as the representative of
others, no choice is left me. I know the will of my constituents, and, regardless of
consequence, I will avow it; as their representative, I will proclaim their hatred to slavery
in every shape; as their representative, here will I hold my stand, until this floor, with the
Constitution of my country which supports it, shall sink beneath me. If I am doomed to
fall, I shall at least have the painful consolation to believe that I fall, as a fragment, in the
ruins of my country.”
-CP 43: “Sir, on this subject the eyes of Europe are turned upon you. You boast of the
freedom of your Constitution and your laws; you have proclaimed, in the Declaration of
Independence, “That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator
with certain inalienable rights; that amongst these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of
happiness;” and yet you have slaves in your country. The enemies of your Government,
and the legitimates of Europe, point to your inconsistencies, and blazon your supposed
defects. If you allow slavery to pass into Territories where you have the lawful power to
exclude it, you will justly take upon yourself all the charges of inconsistency; but, confine
it to the original slaveholding States, where you found it at the formation of your
Government, and you stand acquitted of all imputation. Sir, this is a subject upon which I
have great feeling for the honor of my country. In a former debate upon the Illinois
constitution, I mentioned that our enemies had drawn a picture of our country, as holding
in one hand the Declaration of Independence, and with the other brandishing a whip over
our affrighted slaves. I then made it my boast that we could cast back upon England the
accusation, and that she had committed the original sin of bringing slaves into our
country. Sir, I have since received, through the post office, a letter, post marked in South
Carolina, and signed “A native of England,” desiring that when I again had occasion to
repeat my boast against England, I would also state that she had atoned for her original
sin, by establishing in her slave colonies a system of humane laws, ameliorating their
condition, and providing for their safety, while America had committed the secondary sin
of disregarding their condition, and providing for their safety, while America had
committed the secondary sin of disregarding their condition, and had even provided laws
by which it was not murder to kill a slave. Sir, I felt the severity of the reproof; I felt for
my country. I have inquired on the subject, and I find such were formerly the laws in
some of the slaveholding States; and that even now, in the State of South Carolina, by
law, the penalty of death is provided for stealing a slave, while the murder of a slave is
punished by a trivial fine. Such, sir, is the contrast and the relative value which is placed,
in the opinion of a slaveholding State, between the property of the master and the life of a
slave.”
-CP 41: “The Constitution applies equally to all, or to none.”
*Tallmadge was a step down from an abolitionist, cuz he didn’t want to touch slavery
where it already existed, in the original States & the States that were carved out of the
original States (ex. Alabama, Kentucky, Tennessee). He didn’t want there to be a
contradiction with the principles expressed in the Declaration. He was worried about
America’s reputation in the world—if we block slavery from going into Missouri, then
the blame of slavery is on England, but if we allow it to expand outside of the original
States, then the blame for our continued practice of slavery (since we’re allowing it to
spread) falls on us alone
-In Jefferson’s original draft of the Declaration, he said that slavery was
introduced into the Colonies by England, and the Crown had blocked any
attempts to abolish the slave trade. America’s original sin, the albatross around
our neck, comes from England—it didn’t originate with us, but rather, from a
country who claimed to rule on our behalf. The blame is on them. But once we
break away and say that we can govern ourselves, then anything that happens with
slavery once we’re independent falls on us. We say that we can run the system
better, but is that really true if we have slavery any longer than is absolutely
necessary? By choosing to allow for America to expand in a way where America
expands as well, Tallmadge views that as a contradiction of the Founders’
intentions
*Tallmadge was sympathetic both to the injustice of slavery upon the Africans as well as
the legitimate worries & concerns of their white masters that there would be a servile war
if the slaves were manumitted. For him, the preservation of the Union was the most
important issue
-In Lincoln (2012), one of the strongest critics of the 13th Amendment was Senator
Fernando Wood (D-NY). Cuz Wall Street (the financial hub of America) is in
NYC, NYC had a great interest/sympathy in the Southern economy remaining
productive, more so than NY generally. By 1819 when Tallmadge is proposing
his amendment, there were still Africans in NY who were enslaved, since the
State’s gradual emancipation law had been passed in 1799. Since Tallmadge is a
NY Congressman, his views on slavery could be seen as a reflection on the
State’s views, in general, with the exception of NYC
 -CP 40: “Whatever might be my own private sentiments on this subject, standing
here as the representative of others, no choice is left me. I know the will of my
constituents, and, regardless of consequence, I will avow it; as their
representative, I will proclaim their hatred to slavery in every shape; as their
representative, here will I hold my stand, until this floor, with the Constitution of
my country which supports it, shall sink beneath me. If I am doomed to fall, I
shall at least have the painful consolation to believe that I fall, as a fragment, in
the ruins of my country.”
-Dr. Morel: what also distanced Tallmadge from an abolitionist like William Lloyd
Garrison was his respect for the Constitution. His respect for the Constitution is such that
he does not believe that Congress has the authority to touch slavery where it already
exists, cuz if that occurs in a place like Alabama, he believes that will result in a servile
war. But in a new place like Missouri (and the Louisiana Purchase in general) we should
decide as a nation what its character should be
-CP 39: “I would not even advocate the prohibition of slavery in the Alabama
Territory; because, surrounded as it was by slaveholding States, and with only
imaginary lines of division, the intercourse between slaves and free blacks could
not be prevented, and a servile war might be the result.”
-CP 43: “As an evil brought upon us without our own fault, before the formation
of our Government, and as one of the sins of that nation from which we have
revolted, we must of necessity legislate upon this subject. It is our business so to
legislate, as never to encourage, but always to control this evil; and, while we
strive to eradicate it, we ought to fix its limits, and render it subordinate to the
safety of the white population, and the good order of civil society. Sir, on this
subject the eyes of Europe are turned upon you. You boast of the freedom of your
Constitution and your laws; you have proclaimed, in the Declaration of
Independence, ‘That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their
Creator with certain inalienable rights; that amongst these are life, liberty, and the
pursuit of happiness;’ and yet you have slaves in your country. The enemies of
your Government, and the legitimates of Europe, point to your inconsistencies,
and blazon your supposed defects. If you allow slavery to pass into Territories
where you have the lawful power to exclude it, you will justly take upon yourself
all the charges of inconsistency; but, confine it to the original slaveholding States,
where you found it at the formation of your Government, and you stand acquitted
of all imputation.”
*The Declaration is our lodestar. By separating from England, we wanted
to do the right thing. We could not get rid of slavery right away, but we
tried to hem it in (end of the international slave trade in 1808 & 1820) as
well as its expansion (the Northwest Ordinance in 1787). Since the words
slave or slavery don’t appear in the Constitution, Tallmadge was using
Madison’s argument to show that America is a freedom loving country, in
spite of the fact that slaves still exist. Slavery is a domestic institution in
several of the States, we want to avoid servile war, but Missouri is new
territory, so as a nation, we should decide what its character will be
*In the Lincoln-Douglas Debates, Lincoln believed that Congress had the
authority to prohibit slavery in the Territories, and that it ought to ban it,
 while Douglas made the opposite argument. Tallmadge made the same
arguments that Lincoln will make later on
-Tallmadge acknowledged the Southern sympathies, but he also
addressed the new issue of what should happen to new Territories
that the country acquires. He believed that the Declaration made
that pretty obvious: we believe in freedom here, and we should
commit ourselves to Missouri becoming a Free State. Yes, there
are already slaves there, but I have a plan for that
-CP 41: “Sir, we have been told that this is a new principle
for which we contend, never before adopted, or thought of.
So far from this being correct, it is due to the memory of
our ancestors to say, is an old principle, adopted by them,
as the policy of our country. Whenever the United States
have had the right and the power, they have heretofore
prevented the extension of slavery. The States of Kentucky
and Tennessee were taken off from other States, and were
admitted into the Union without condition, because their
lands were never owned by the United States. The Territory
Northwest of the Ohio is all the land which ever belonged
to them. Shortly after the cession of those lands to the
Union, Congress passed, in 1787, a compact which was
declared to be unalterable, the sixth article of which
provides that ‘there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary
servitude in the said territory, otherwise than in the
punishment for crimes, whereof the party shall have been
duly convicted.’ In pursuance of this compact, all the States
formed from that territory have been admitted into the
Union upon various considerations, and among which the
sixth article of this compact is included as one.”

Jefferson “Letter to John Holmes” (April 22, 1820)

*Jefferson makes the Missouri Compromise THE issue in this letter. He’s commenting on the
event, which has already happened
-CP 47: “I considered it at once as the knell of the Union. It is hushed, indeed, for the moment.
But this is a reprieve only, not a final sentence. A geographical line, coinciding with a marked
principle, moral and political, once conceived and held up to the angry passions of men, will
never be obliterated; and every new irritation will mark it deeper and deeper…But as it is, we
have the wolf by the ears, and we can neither hold him, nor safely let him go. Justice is in one
scale, and self-preservation in the other.”
-With the Missouri Compromise, we have postponed the question of freedom or slavery
in this country
-CP 47: “I regret that I am now to die in the belief, that the useless sacrifice of themselves by the
generation of 1776, to acquire self- government and happiness to their country, is to be thrown
away by the unwise and unworthy passions of their sons, and that my only consolation is to be,
that I live not to weep over it. If they would but dispassionately weigh the blessings they will
throw away, against an abstract principle more likely to be effected by union than by scission,
they would pause before they would perpetrate this act of suicide on themselves, and of treason
against the hopes of the world.”
-Jefferson hoped that the generation that came after the Founders would be able to solve
the slavery issue. He was saddened that they only seemed to be perpetuating it with
Missouri, but he can’t blame them, cuz the issue is like holding a wolf by the ears—you
can’t hold them nor let them go. The longer you hold them, the danger is still there
*Jefferson’s solution (CP 47): “The cession of that kind of property, for so it is misnamed, is a
bagatelle which would not cost me a second thought, if, in that way, a general emancipation
and expatriation could be effected; and, gradually, and with due sacrifices, I think it might be.”
-Lincoln attempted colonization (called deportation) efforts for freedmen (always
voluntary) with congressional funding
*Jefferson thinks that slavery is wrong (“that kind of property, for so it is misnamed”),
but if there is a general emancipation, then he believes that the freedmen will engage in a
race war against their former masters. And that race war would be just (“Justice is in one
scale, and self-preservation in the other”)
-Diffusion Project: (CP 47): “Of one thing I am certain, that as the passage of slaves from one
State to another, would not make a slave of a single human being who would not be so without
it, so their diffusion over a greater surface would make them individually happier, and
proportionally facilitate the accomplishment of their emancipation, by dividing the burthen on a
greater number of coadjutors. An abstinence too, from this act of power, would remove the
jealousy excited by the undertaking of Congress to regulate the condition of the different
descriptions of men composing a State. This certainly is the exclusive right of every State, which
nothing in the constitution has taken from them and given to the General Government. Could
Congress, for example, say, that the non-freemen of Connecticut shall be freemen, or that they
shall not emigrate into any other State?”
-Jefferson was a States’ right Democrat. He didn’t believe that Congress had the authority
to tell Missouri whether it should have slaves or not
-Slavery should be diffused thinly throughout the entire country: there wouldn’t be large
plantations in the West, and that would lead to the gradual emancipation—white owners
could free their few slaves and not fear retribution like in regions of the South (Georgia,
South Carolina) where there were dense slave populations. If slavery spreads, but not the
slave plantation system, then is it likely that you’re going to recreate South Carolina in
the West? The kind of person who takes slaves with him to the West is only going to take
a handful of slaves with him, and due to there not being a massive amount of slaves on
the farm, it is likely that over time among those masters, that the odds will be greater that
the masters will come to the realization that slavery is wrong. The difference with the
massive cotton plantations is that cotton has to be grown & picked on such a large scale,
so the master will never have to work alongside his slaves in the field, whereas master &
slave would be working side by side in the West
*The only way for emancipation to come about peacefully is for slavery’s diffusion, so
that you have areas where the blacks don’t vastly outnumber the white masterclass, where
if they were emancipated, it would be more likely that they would take vengeance
-Edward Coles took his slaves out of Virginia, freed them in Illinois, and then
gave them their own land so that they could carve out a new life for themselves.
And none of the slaves took revenge on Edward Coles. This is precisely
Jefferson’s solution. Coles’ slaves appreciated him taking them out of Virginia
 and giving them a new life in Illinois. They saw that he had genuinely repented of
an institution that he had grown up with, and then came to realize was wrong
-Let slavery spread thinly. Dr. Morel: “Whites will have a greater incentive to free their
slaves when they don’t think that they’re going to get stabbed the next day. It’s not going
to be justice on one hand, self-preservation on the other. It will truly be win-win”

Session 2B: The Nullification Crisis of 1828-1833

Calhoun, “Exposition and Protest” (December 19, 1828)

-Congress has the constitutional power to impose tariffs, but they can’t pass tariffs that only
benefit one region of the country over another
-The Confederate constitution didn’t include a General Welfare Clause, cuz they believed
that it was a provision that the North drove a truck through to suit their own ends. Plus,
it’s listed in the Preamble, so is it technically an enumerated power of Congress?
-There was no purpose for the tariff. Instead of trying to raise revenue generally, it was being
used as a protective tariff. A protective tariff would turn the gov’t into consolidated gov’t, which
would subvert federalism (confederate—States’ rights). The State governments would cease to
have any power. The national legislature should not have that authority
-CP 84: “6. Because that whilst the power to protect manufactures is no where expressly granted
to Congress, nor can be considered as necessary and proper to carry into effect any specified
power, it seems to be expressly reserved to the States by the tenth section of the first article of
the Constitution.”
-The Necessary & Proper Clause is #18 of Congress’ enumerated powers in the
Constitution, which allows Congress to do basically whatever to carry out the other 17, so
which of the preceding 17 enumerated powers allows Congress to do this? Calhoun
couldn’t find any that permitted Congress to impose this tariff
-CP 83-84: “4. Because such acts considered in the light of a regulation of commerce are equally
liable to objection-since although the power to regulate commerce, may like other powers, be
exercised so as to protect domestic manufactures, yet it is clearly distinguishable from a power to
do so eo nomine, both in the nature of the thing and in the common acceptation of the terms; and
because the confounding of them would lead to the most extravagant results, since the
encouragement of domestic industry implies an absolute control over all the interests, resources
and pursuits of a people, and is inconsistent with the idea of any other than a simple consolidated
government.”
-You can’t protect a domestic industry, cuz they should be regulated by the domestic
(State) gov’t. If Congress does this, they are reaching down and usurping the
authority/power of the State governments, which belongs to them. Congress can’t act like
a State gov’t by protecting a particular industry in a particular State or group of States
-Calhoun is raising the Anti-Federalist argument that it will get to the point under the
Constitution that the central gov’t will grow so powerful that the State governments will
become irrelevant, and it would subvert the principle of federalism. The national
legislature should not have that authority
-CP 84: “8. Finally, because South Carolina, from her climate, situation, and peculiar
institutions, is, and must ever continue to be, wholly dependent upon agriculture and commerce,
not only for her prosperity, but for her very existence as a state—because the valuable products
of her soil—the blessings by which Divine Providence seems to have designed to compensate for
the great disadvantages under which she suffers in other respects—are among the very few that
can be cultivated with any profit by slave labor—and if by the loss of her foreign commerce,
these products should be confined to an inadequate market, the fate of this fertile State would be
poverty and utter desolation; her citizens in despair would emigrate to more fortunate regions,
and the whole frame and constitution of her civil polity be impaired and deranged, if not
dissolved entirely.”
-South Carolina needs to live off the land. The State is wholly dependent on agriculture &
commerce (i.e. selling their excess crops), and he doesn’t see any other way future
outside of agriculture (cotton). It’s hard to grow stuff down here, but we can grow cotton
with slave labor. If you take this away from us (by raising tariffs, foreign nations will
raise their tariffs on exports from America (i.e. South Carolina’s exported cotton)), and
you make it harder for us to buy the things we need cuz you’re putting taxes on them (the
things we can’t make for ourselves—imports from Europe), then we’re burning the
candle at both ends. It will make it difficult for the State to export cotton, which will
cause “poverty and utter desolation.” Anyone who has any sense will move somewhere
else, cuz this is a recipe for despair. We’ve got no choice. With the blessing of
Providence, we’ve found a way to turn the desert of South Carolina into fertile land, and
we can only do this at a profit with slave labor growing cotton, and there is no alternative

Calhoun, “South Carolina’s Ordinance of Nullification” (November 24, 1832)

-South Carolina is done with words, now they’re ready for action
-They believe that they are exercising a particular existing political power that is consistent with
the Constitution: nullification
-The Supremacy Clause: the Constitution and laws of the land (made in pursuance of the
Constitution) are the supreme law of the land. South Carolina is represented in Congress, which
passes the laws. They have had a hand in passing laws & making treaties. It’s not as if they’ve
been ignored. They’re simply in the minority, but that’s just how majority rule works. They were
part of the process that produced the tariffs. They participated at the national level, and they
don’t like the outcome
-Dr. Morel: “You couldn’t get any governing accomplished if you required unanimity.
We learned what that cost us under the Articles”
-Even though the Constitution has the Supremacy Clause, South Carolina believes that they can
legitimately ignore federal legislation, cuz according to them, that legislation favors one section
over another
-Crony capitalism
*The Confederate constitution didn’t include a General Welfare Clause, cuz they
believed that it was a provision that the North drove a truck through to suit their own
ends. Plus, it’s listed in the Preamble, so is it technically an enumerated power of
Congress?
-Dr. Morel: anything dealing with interstate commerce is going to benefit a particular
port, city, or State, but it will have general benefits. People in Kentucky can’t complain
that Norfolk, Virginia is getting all this favoritism cuz there are shipyards for the Navy
there. It is unavoidable that a certain city or State will benefit. But if the Navy is
successful, then the entire country benefits. But SC is making the argument that they’re
not a manufacturing cosmopolis—they’re mainly an agricultural society
-CP 116: “And whereas the said Congress, exceeding its just power to impose taxes and collect
revenue for the purpose of effecting and accomplishing the specific objects and purposes which
the constitution of the United States authorizes it to effect and accomplish, hath raised and
collected unnecessary revenue for objects unauthorized by the constitution.”
-Prior to the income tax, the federal gov’t got most of its money from selling land and
imposing tariffs. But Calhoun’s argument is that the gov’t only has enough power to raise
revenue to meet its budget—it shouldn’t be raising revenue just for the sake of raising
revenue. They’re just raising money even though it’s not tagged to a specific purpose
that’s explicitly laid out in the Constitution
*Favoring certain industries over others, and raising money that goes beyond its
constitutional means. That’s what they find wrong with Congress
-In response, SC announces to Congress that: they claim to be nullifying the tariff, and
furthermore:
“And we, the people of South Carolina, to the end that it may be fully understood by the
government of the United States, and the people of the co-States, that we are determined
to maintain this our ordinance and declaration, at every hazard, do further declare that we
will not submit to the application of force on the part of the federal government, to reduce
this State to obedience, but that we will consider the passage, by Congress, of any act
authorizing the employment of a military or naval force against the State of South
Carolina, her constitutional authorities or citizens; or any act abolishing or closing the
ports of this State, or any of them, or otherwise obstructing the free ingress and egress of
vessels to and from the said ports, or any other act on the part of the federal government,
to coerce the State, shut up her ports, destroy or harass her commerce or to enforce the
acts hereby declared to be null and void, otherwise than through the civil tribunals of the
country, as inconsistent with the longer continuance of South Carolina in the Union; and
that the people of this State will henceforth hold themselves absolved from all further
obligation to maintain or preserve their political connection with the people of the other
States; and will forthwith proceed to organize a separate government, and do all other
acts and things which sovereign and independent States may of right do.” (CP 117)
*Dr. Morel: this is de facto secession. This is their definition of secession. They
have described precisely what secession is: they believe that as a State that they
can unilaterally secede from the Union. SC believes that the country is formed by
an association of States: the State Compact Theory holds that the central gov’t is
not a real national gov’t, but simply a compact of States, and as a compact
(contract), any of the parties can decide if the other members have violated the
compact, and if so, that they can leave. SC can be the judge & decide if the other
States are behaving unconstitutionally, and if so, then SC is no longer
constitutionally obliged to follow the laws. And that they “will not submit to the
application of force on the part of the federal government, to reduce this State to
obedience.”
-Dr. Morel: “No other Southern State saluted when South Carolina sent that flag
up the pole”
-CP 116: “And it is further ordained, that in no case of law or equity, decided in the courts of this
State, wherein shall be drawn in question the authority of this ordinance, or the validity of such
act or acts of the legislature as may be passed for the purpose of giving effect thereto, or the
validity of the aforesaid acts of Congress, imposing duties, shall any appeal be taken or allowed
to the Supreme Court of the United States, nor shall any copy of the record be permitted or
allowed for that purpose; and if any such appeal shall be attempted to be taken, the courts of this
State shall proceed to execute and enforce their judgments according to the laws and usages of
the State, without reference to such attempted appeal, and the person or persons attempting to
take such appeal may be dealt with as for a contempt of the court.”
-No federal court (even the SCOTUS) is going to be allowed to adjudicate regarding SC’s
nullification—only the State has the power to decide. The SCOTUS cannot judge the
matter, cuz SC has already judged it. And if a South Carolinian decides that there’s an
issue with the State’s nullification and tried to take the issue to a federal court, then the
State’s courts will hold that person in contempt and execute judgement against them
*The UN is a league, similar to the gov’t under the Articles of Confederation. The other
is a real, national gov’t under the Constitution
*SC proposed that we didn’t have a true national gov’t with national sovereignty. It is
more like a league—similar to the Articles of Confederation—where almost all of the
power still resides in the States. With the Articles, when any official action (resolution) is
taken, it applied to the States, not the People. The Articles depended on the consent &
actions of the States to be carried out. The resolutions under the Articles did not apply to
individual citizens. The States interposed itself between the People and the Confederation
Congress

Andrew Jackson, Proclamation Regarding Nullification (December 10, 1832)

-CP 122-123: “The Constitution of the United States, then, forms a government, not a league,
and whether it be formed by compact between the States, or in any other manner, its character is
the same. It is a government in which all the people are represented, which operates directly on
the people individually, not upon the States; they retained all the power they did not grant. But
each State having expressly parted with so many powers as to constitute jointly with the other
States a single nation, cannot from that period possess any right to secede, because such
secession does not break a league, but destroys the unity of a nation, and any injury to that unity
is not only a breach which would result from the contravention of a compact, but it is an offense
against the whole Union. To say that any State may at pleasure secede from the Union, is to say
that the United States are not a nation because it would be a solecism to contend that any part of
a nation might dissolve its connection with the other parts, to their injury or ruin, without
committing any offense. Secession, like any other revolutionary act, may be morally justified by
the extremity of oppression; but to call it a constitutional right, is confounding the meaning of
terms, and can only be done through gross error, or to deceive those who are willing to assert a
right, but would pause before they made a revolution, or incur the penalties consequent upon a
failure. Because the Union was formed by compact, it is said the parties to that compact may,
when they feel themselves aggrieved, depart from it; but it is precisely because it is a compact
that they cannot. A compact is an agreement or binding obligation. It may by its terms have a
sanction or penalty for its breach, or it may not. If it contains no sanction, it may be broken with
no other consequence than moral guilt; if it have a sanction, then the breach incurs the designated
or implied penalty. A league between independent nations, generally, has no sanction other than
a moral one; or if it should contain a penalty, as there is no common superior, it cannot be
enforced. A government, on the contrary, always has a sanction, express or implied; and, in our
case, it is both necessarily implied and expressly given. An attempt by force of arms to destroy a
government is an offense, by whatever means the constitutional compact may have been formed;
and such government has the right, by the law of self-defense, to pass acts for punishing the
offender, unless that right is modified, restrained, or resumed by the constitutional act. In our
system, although it is modified in the case of treason, yet authority is expressly given to pass all
laws necessary to carry its powers into effect, and under this grant provision has been made for
punishing acts which obstruct the due administration of the laws.”
-Jackson takes SC’s argument and flips it. Since the federal gov’t is supreme, if a State
gov’t resists it, then that counts as an act of war, and it has the right to self-defense
-CP 119: “The ordinance is founded, not on the indefeasible right of resisting acts which are
plainly unconstitutional, and too oppressive to be endured, but on the strange position that any
one State may not only declare an act of Congress void, but prohibit its execution — that they
may do this consistently with the Constitution — that the true construction of that instrument
permits a State to retain its place in the Union, and yet be bound by no other of its laws than
those it may choose to consider as constitutional. It is true they add, that to justify this abrogation
of a law, it must be palpably contrary to the Constitution, but it is evident, that to give the right
of resisting laws of that description, coupled with the uncontrolled right to decide what laws
deserve that character, is to give the power of resisting all laws.”
-CP 119: “Look, for a moment, to the consequence. If South Carolina considers the
revenue laws unconstitutional, and has a right to prevent their execution in the port of
Charleston, there would be a clear constitutional objection to their collection in every
other port, and no revenue could be collected anywhere; for all imposts must be equal. It
is no answer to repeat that an unconstitutional law is no law, so long as the question of its
legality is to be decided by the State itself, for every law operating injuriously upon any
local interest will be perhaps thought, and certainly represented, as unconstitutional, and,
as has been shown, there is no appeal.”
-Since the laws are applied equally to everyone, if it’s unconstitutional towards
SC, then it’s unconstitutional for everyone. So even though SC says that it can
simply nullify the law within their own boundaries, that would nullify it for
everyone, and then the federal gov’t wouldn’t collect any revenue anywhere
*Sovereignty lies with the People, not with the States
*In 1860, some of the secessionists will hearken back to the Hartford Convention (1814) and say
that they’re not coming up with a new concept, but rather, with something that’s been around all
along. It’s a way for them to bolster their interpretation of the Constitution, not as the supreme
law of the land, not as a truly national gov’t, but simply as a league of States. The proof of that is
what the New England States declared in writing back in 1814. This isn’t some peculiar,
Southern slaveholding argument that they were making, but rather, a principled argument based
on their understanding of the Constitution as a compact of States rather than the product of the
American People; yes, ratified by the States through their conventions, but obligatory upon
individual citizens, no. Obligatory upon the individual States, yes, but the States themselves get
to decide that
-CP 119: “But reasoning on this subject is superfluous, when our social compact in express terms
declares, that the laws of the United States, its Constitution, and treaties made under it, are the
supreme law of the land; and for greater caution adds, “that the judges in every State shall be
bound thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding.
And it may be asserted, without fear of refutation, that no federative government could exist
without a similar provision.”
-For Jackson, the Supremacy Clause is not a throwaway line or window dressing. In it, he
sees a practical acknowledgement by the People that they are going to submit themselves
not just to their State governments, but also to this superintending gov’t (the federal gov’t
—the Constitution) that is going to apply to them, which is very explicit about courts,
treaties, and laws. According to the Constitution, the SCOTUS decides constitutionality,
not the States. For Jackson, it can’t be more direct than that. It’s explicitly & implicitly in
the document. When the federal gov’t acts, the States submit. It doesn’t work any other
way
-CP 122: “To say that any State may at pleasure secede from the Union, is to say
that the United States are not a nation because it would be a solecism to contend
that any part of a nation might dissolve its connection with the other parts, to their
injury or ruin, without committing any offense. Secession, like any other
revolutionary act, may be morally justified by the extremity of oppression; but to
call it a constitutional right, is confounding the meaning of terms, and can only be
done through gross error, or to deceive those who are willing to assert a right, but
would pause before they made a revolution, or incur the penalties consequent
upon a failure.”
-Jackson doesn’t rule out the right of revolution that a people possess
against a tyrannical gov’t, but he explains how what SC is doing is not
revolution, but rebellion. Lincoln will repeat this argument in his First
Inaugural Address in 1861. Buchanan makes the same argument in his
1860 SOTU Address
-CP 122: “Secession, like any other revolutionary act, may be morally justified by
the extremity of oppression; but to call it a constitutional right, is confounding the
meaning of terms, and can only be done through gross error, or to deceive those
who are willing to assert a right, but would pause before they made a revolution,
or incur the penalties consequent upon a failure.”
-The difference between the American Revolution and SC’s act of
secession is that the colonists’ (individuals) natural rights were being
violated by the British. Here, Calhoun is arguing that the interests of SC &
its people are being violated, but he’s not saying that their natural rights
are being violated. This is a precursor to the secessionist movements in
1860: secession is an act that is peaceful, political, constitutional, and
legal. No drama, no bullets have to be fired, nothing to see here, we just
don’t want to belong to the Union anymore, cuz we don’t think that our
interests are any longer aligned with yours, so we’re just going to politely
leave here. We’re not gonna mess with you, so you don’t have to mess
with us. And just like Jackson, Lincoln didn’t buy this
*Jackson does not want to deny that there may come a time where you
would have the authority and the right to resist your gov’t, but this isn’t
one of those situations, and calling it this new thing (secession—Calhoun
isn’t making an argument about the right to revolution, and neither will the
CSA in 1860-1861) means that they don’t want to appeal to Nature like
the Founders did (for the obvious reason that they want to secede to
preserve slavery & their herrenvolk democracy, and the Founders
denounced slavery as being against natural rights), but make a legal
argument/political exercise of authority—not an individual right of
revolution, but one of mere legal separation. Jackson responded by saying
that secession wasn’t a thing, so they were really exercising the right of
revolution, but it didn’t apply in this situation, cuz SC’s list of grievances
didn’t rise to the level of a right of revolution, which would be deemed
legitimate
-Dr. Morel: once the political process has treated you fairly, you have no
argument if you lose. None of the seceding States said that the Election of
1860 was illegitimate. None of them said that it was unfair or that Lincoln
cheated. The South just believed that Lincoln & the GOP weren’t going to
abide by the Constitution as they (the South) understood it, so they took
preemptive action and left before Lincoln was even inaugurated. They
didn’t want to wait around for Lincoln to make them his slaves
-In a republican or democratic gov’t, it’s majority rule. But not just
majority rule. There’s a Constitution to prevent tyranny, but when the
votes are in, majority rules, cuz that’s the only way that self-government
works. Republics require 2 things: good winners and good losers. In this
case, SC is being a poor loser. Cuz they didn’t get their way, they want to
take their marbles and go home, and republics can’t work that way. If you
participate in the election, the premise is that you will abide by its
outcome. It can’t be my way or the highway. As long as the process is fair
and the vote is legitimate, you commit ahead of time that you will abide
by the result. In 1860, if John Breckenridge had won, he would have been
the President of all the States, not just the ones that voted for him. We’ll
never have unanimity in that kind of vote or in the passing of laws unless
it’s something like National Ice Cream Day or National Puppy Day, but
those don’t have an impact on your lives. Only the cat lovers would have
an issue with National Puppy Day cuz they weren’t represented, but who
knows?
9/10/18
Session 3A: Defenders of Slavery

John C. Calhoun, “Slavery a Positive Good” (February 6, 1837)

*Calhoun gave this speech during the time that Congress had imposed a gag rule regarding the
topic of slavery. The pro-slavery camp in Congress said that the Constitution only explicitly gave
the legislature power to deal with slavery when it came to interstate commerce or the
international slave trade, so for us to receive these petitions from abolitionists (the initial
petitions were mostly sent by Quakers) was a waste of our time, so let’s just impose a gag rule
for whenever an abolition petition arrives, it just gets tabled. In parliamentary procedure, if an
issue gets tabled by the majority, then it’s dead. So Calhoun is speaking in the context of his
frustration with those Congressmen who still want to hear these abolition petitions
*Calhoun’s argument in favor of slavery is a departure from what we saw during the Founding
era, when slavery was more widespread—when it was legal in practically all of the States
-CP 129: “But let me not be understood as admitting, even by implication, that the existing
relations between the two races in the slaveholding States is an evil:–far otherwise; I hold it to be
a good, as it has thus far proved itself to be to both, and will continue to prove so if not disturbed
by the fell spirit of abolition. I appeal to facts. Never before has the black race of Central Africa,
from the dawn of history to the present day, attained a condition so civilized and so improved,
not only physically, but morally and intellectually.”
-CP 129: “I hold that in the present state of civilization, where two races of different origin, and
distinguished by color, and other physical differences, as well as intellectual, are brought
together, the relation now existing in the slaveholding States between the two, is, instead of an
evil, a good–a positive good. I feel myself called upon to speak freely upon the subject where the
honor and interests of those I represent are involved. I hold then, that there never has yet existed
a wealthy and civilized society in which one portion of the community did not, in point of fact,
live on the labor of the other. Broad and general as is this assertion, it is fully borne out by
history. This is not the proper occasion, but, if it were, it would not be difficult to trace the
various devices by which the wealth of all civilized communities has been so unequally divided,
and to show by what means so small a share has been allotted to those by whose labor it was
produced, and so large a share given to the non-producing classes. The devices are almost
innumerable, from the brute force and gross superstition of ancient times, to the subtle and artful
fiscal contrivances of modern. I might well challenge a comparison between them and the more
direct, simple, and patriarchal mode by which the labor of the African race is, among us,
commanded by the European. I may say with truth, that in few countries so much is left to the
share of the laborer, and so little exacted from him, or where there is more kind attention paid to
him in sickness or infirmities of age. Compare his condition with the tenants of the poor houses
in the more civilized portions of Europe–look at the sick, and the old and infirm slave, on one
hand, in the midst of his family and friends, under the kind superintending care of his master and
mistress, and compare it with the forlorn and wretched condition of the pauper in the
poorhouse.”
-The North says that slavery is bad, and yet, they themselves do nothing to care for the
poor among them in the cities. Whereas the poor black slaves of the South are cared for
by their masters from cradle until grave (cradle to grave welfare)
 -Dr. Morel: Calhoun was painting the most idealistic portrait of slavery in the
South, especially if you consider slavery on a plantation, which was abysmal,
compared with someone who only owned 1 or 2 slaves
-Dr. Morel: “You never hear of anybody running South to join this wonderful
system of labor. It’s always one direction. Slaves run away from the slave
plantations, not towards them”
-Dr. Morel: “Calhoun never said that blacks were naturally the inferiors of
whites”
-CP 129: “But I take higher ground. I hold that in the present state of
civilization, where two races of different origin, and distinguished by
color, and other physical differences, as well as intellectual, are brought
together, the relation now existing in the slaveholding States between the
two, is, instead of an evil, a good–a positive good.”
-If you look at the present state of civilization, blacks are ruled by
whites. It wasn’t destined to be that way, but that’s how it turned
out. And the way we’ve got it set up in the South benefits both
races. Calhoun didn’t say that God ordained blacks to be the slaves
of whites, but rather, he has a proto-Darwinian theory of
civilizations. History shows us that there is a lot of variation and
shifting in terms of gov’t power and freedom. If you look at
American history, the first blacks who came here came as slaves,
and over time, the whites, being more numerous & powerful,
became the dominant class of human being, and they used that
conventional superiority to enslave a particular race of people
(blacks), and by the 1830s, Calhoun thinks that the South has
discovered a wonderful relationship between the races that benefits
both parties

John C. Calhoun, “Speech on the Oregon Bill” (June 27, 1848)

-CP 131: “If he should possess a philosophical turn of mind, and be disposed to look to more
remote and recondite causes, he will trace it to a proposition which originated in a hypothetical
truism, but which, as now expressed and now understood, is the most false and dangerous of all
political errors. The proposition to which I allude, has become an axiom in the minds of a vast
majority on both sides of the Atlantic, and is repeated daily from tongue to tongue, as an
established and incontrovertible truth; it is, that “all men are born free and equal.” I am not afraid
to attack error, however deeply it may be intrenched, or however widely extended, whenever it
becomes my duty to do so, as I believe it to be on this subject and occasion. Taking the
proposition literally (it is in that sense it is understood), there is not a word of truth in it. It begins
with “all men are born,” which is utterly untrue. Men are not born. Infants are born. They grow
to be men. And concludes with asserting that they are born “free and equal,” which is not less
false. They are not born free. While infants they are incapable of freedom, being destitute alike
of the capacity of thinking and acting, without which there can be no freedom. Besides, they are
necessarily born subject to their parents, and remain so among all people, savage and civilized,
until the development of their intellect and physical capacity enables them to take care of
themselves. They grow to all the freedom of which the condition in which they were born
permits, by growing to be men. Nor is it less false that they are born “equal.” They are not so in
any sense in which it can be regarded; and thus, as I have asserted, there is not a word of truth in
the whole proposition, as expressed and generally understood.”
-Calhoun rejects that there are natural rights that are possessed by all human beings
-Jefferson owned slaves at Monticello, but it was legal authority over them. He wasn’t
their master by right—I’m not entitled by nature to be the master. My society empowers
me to be a master, and therefore, I organize my life accordingly. But we need to find a
way to get rid of this institution, or the slaves may decide to get rid of it themselves,
resulting in a race war, and they will have every right to attempt it. Whites won’t free
their slaves, on the main, cuz they fear retaliation
-Calhoun believed that nobody was born with rights
-CP 131: “Nor is the social state of itself his natural state; for society can no more
exist without government, in one form or another, than man without society. It is
the political, then, which includes the social, that is his natural state. It is the one
for which his Creator formed him, into which he is impelled irresistibly, and in
which only his race can exist and all its faculties be fully developed. Such being
the case, it follows that any, the worst form of government, is better than anarchy;
and that individual liberty, or freedom, must be subordinate to whatever power
may be necessary to protect society against anarchy within or destruction from
without; for the safety and well-being of society is as paramount to individual
liberty, as the safety and well-being of the race is to that of individuals; and in the
same proportion, the power necessary for the safety of society is paramount to
individual liberty. On the contrary, government has no right to control individual
liberty beyond what is necessary to the safety and well-being of society. Such is
the boundary which separates the power of government and the liberty of the
citizen or subject in the political state, which, as I have shown, is the natural state
of man — the only one in which his race can exist, and the one in which he is
born, lives, and dies.”
-According to the Founders, the purpose of gov’t is to protect natural
rights, whereas Calhoun believes that the purpose of gov’t is to prevent
anarchy. Nobody is born equal or free. You have to grow into liberty over
time, and government’s job is not to protect that from the outset, but by
ensuring order. The fundamental thing that gov’t exists to do is to avoid
anarchy and chaos. Over time, if gov’t has control over individuals, if it
sees people acting responsibly, it can limit its own power. The more
responsible people are with their liberty, the less gov’t needs to exercise
restraint and power. It has nothing to do with race, in principle
-CP 132: “It follows from all this that the quantum of power on the
part of the government, and of liberty on that of individuals,
instead of being equal in all cases, must necessarily be very
unequal among different people, according to their different
conditions. For just in proportion as a people are ignorant, stupid,
debased, corrupt, exposed to violence within and danger from
without, the power necessary for government to possess, in order
to preserve society against anarchy and destruction becomes
greater and greater, and individual liberty less and less, until the
lowest condition is reached, when absolute and despotic power
becomes necessary on the part of the government, and individual
liberty extinct. So, on the contrary, just as a people rise in the scale
of intelligence, virtue, and patriotism, and the more perfectly they
become acquainted with the nature of government, the ends for
which it was ordered, and how it ought to be administered, and the
less the tendency to violence and disorder within, and danger from
abroad, the power necessary for government becomes less and less,
and individual liberty greater and greater. Instead, then, of all men
having the same right to liberty and equality, as is claimed by those
who hold that they are all born free and equal, liberty is the noble
and highest reward bestowed on mental and moral development,
combined with favorable circumstances. Instead, then, of liberty
and equality being born with man; instead of all men and all
classes and descriptions being equally entitled to them, they are
high prizes to be won, and are in their most perfect state, not only
the highest reward that can be bestowed on our race, but the most
difficult to be won — and when won, the most difficult to be
preserved.”
-South Carolina has evolved as an agrarian society over
time to the point now where they cannot exist without
slavery, and for them, slavery has to have a racial basis, in
order for there to be peace in that society. That is Calhoun’s
argument. Gov’t has calibrated the balance between order
and freedom, but not based upon what humans are owed
through natural rights. To him, that’s an erroneous idea. If
you don’t control blacks, then chaos reigns, and the
primary purpose of gov’t is to maintain order
-CP 131: “Such being the case, it follows that any,
the worst form of government, is better than
anarchy; and that individual liberty, or freedom,
must be subordinate to whatever power may be
necessary to protect society against anarchy within
or destruction from without… It follows from all
this that the quantum of power on the part of the
government, and of liberty on that of individuals,
instead of being equal in all cases, must necessarily
be very unequal among different people, according
to their different conditions.”
-CP 132: “So, on the contrary, just as a
people rise in the scale of intelligence,
virtue, and patriotism, and the more
perfectly they become acquainted with the
nature of government, the ends for which it
was ordered, and how it ought to be
administered, and the less the tendency to
violence and disorder within, and danger
 from abroad, the power necessary for
government becomes less and less, and
individual liberty greater and greater.
Instead, then, of all men having the same
right to liberty and equality, as is claimed by
those who hold that they are all born free
and equal, liberty is the noble and highest
reward bestowed on mental and moral
development, combined with favorable
circumstances.”
*For Calhoun, freedom is a very precarious entity.
It’s not won and done. Difficult to achieve and very
difficult to hold on to. His predisposition is for the
gov’t to have more power rather than less;
individuals having less freedom rather than more.
The worst thing is anarchy
*Despite saying that a society can advance on the
civilization hierarchy based on intelligence, there
were laws in the South that prevented slaves from
learning to read & rising in intellect, so according to
Calhoun’s definition, that would forever relegate
them to being slaves. That was specifically done
cuz those in power (the slavocracy) wanted to
remain in power
*Given the priority that Calhoun places on order,
and given what Jefferson believed would ensue if
blacks asserted their natural rights en masse,
Calhoun would say that cuz nothing is worse than
anarchy, that he would be unwilling to risk, as a
matter of prudence, the anarchy that would ensue if
they permitted blacks to read. Cuz the more the
enslaved developed as a human being in terms of
their natural faculties (intellect), the less they would
allow their lives to be controlled as slaves. You
would be sowing the seeds of revolution in doing
so. We who are in control now (the whites in the
South) are justified in maintaining this control over
blacks, knowing that they are being elevated to a
certain extent (but not the fullest extent), and the
whites are benefitting as well. It’s a win-win
situation, and this can go on, as he hoped,
indefinitely. But if the blacks develop as human
beings, the time would come when they would
never long put up with being enslaved. They would
have the force of numbers in certain areas, which
they don’t right now, to assert their will
 *Teaching blacks how to read would lead to chaos,
and there’s nothing worse than that. We like the
order we’ve achieved, how it advances both races,
but freedom is something difficult to achieve &
difficult to hold on to, so who knows?
-He believes that the North has an inferior system of
producing wealth and of maintaining order in
society

James Henry Hammond, “The ‘Mudsill’ Theory” (March 4, 1858)

*Mudsill is a layer that you pour over the foundation to support a house. Without that mudsill the
house is structurally unstable, and it will fall. The same can be said about a society. Without a
mudsill class, a society cannot function and it will fall
-CP 133: “In all social systems there must be a class to do the menial duties, to perform the
drudgery of life. That is, a class requiring but a low order of intellect and but little skill. Its
requisites are vigor, docility, fidelity. Such a class you must have, or you would not have that
other class which leads progress, civilization, and refinement. It constitutes the very mud-sill of
society and of political government; and you might as well attempt to build a house in the air, as
to build either the one or the other, except on this mud- sill. Fortunately for the South, she found
a race adapted to that purpose to her hand. A race inferior to her own, but eminently qualified in
temper, in vigor, in docility, in capacity to stand the climate, to answer all her purposes. We use
them for our purpose, and call them slaves.”
-Hammond makes an argument based on universal principles that every society in the
world has a class of citizens that is the bottom of society—the ones that do menial labor.
And then he takes the universality of this principle and applies it to the South, which he
approves of
-Cuz there’s a menial class to do the dirty work, it allows everyone else to follow other
pursuits like intellectual research, economic development, etc. Since you don’t have to
dirty your hands with the mere subsistence of life, allowing the lower class to deal with
the necessities of life (owing to the fact that their work doesn’t require a lot of
intelligence), you don’t have to pay them a lot cuz it’s not skilled employment (there are
scores of people who can perform the same task). This frees up and gives the rest of
society the leisure to read, think, reflect, make laws, and make adjustments. The upper
class is allowed to do the work necessary to advance society socially. This is the only
way a civilization can advance. The dirty work has to be performed, and the upper class
improving the finer things of society benefits everyone as the society progresses
-CP 133: “Our slaves are black, of another and inferior race. The status in which we have placed
them is an elevation. They are elevated from the condition in which God first created them, by
being made our slaves. None of that race on the whole face of the globe can be compared with
the slaves of the South. They are happy, content, unaspiring, and utterly incapable, from
intellectual weakness, ever to give us any trouble by their aspirations. Yours are white, of your
own race; you are brothers of one blood. They are your equals in natural endowment of intellect,
and they feel galled by their degradation. Our slaves do not vote. We give them no political
power. Yours do vote, and, being the majority, they are the depositories of all your political
power. If they knew the tremendous secret, that the ballot-box is stronger than “an army with
banners,” and could combine, where would you be? Your society would be reconstructed, your
government overthrown, your property divided, not as they have mistakenly attempted to initiate
such proceedings by meeting in parks, with arms in their hands, but by the quiet process of the
ballot-box. You have been making war upon us to our very hearthstones. How would you like for
us to send lecturers and agitators North, to teach these people this, to aid in combining, and to
lead them?”
-It is within our best interest to deprive the vote & education to our black slaves in the
South, otherwise they would rise up, take to the ballot box, and overthrow the ruling
class. But in the North, your slaves (poor white laborers) are enfranchised & literate, and
if they became aware of their condition and how they outnumber you, then they would
take to the ballot box and overthrow the ruling class. How would you like it if the South
sent lecturers to the North to inform the poor whites about their true potential the same
way that the North sends abolitionists to the South to preach freedom & rebellion to the
slaves? That’s not right. The abolitionists need to stay out of the South’s affairs, the same
way that the South has not meddled with the North’s societal order up until now
-The abolitionists are trying to upset the ordered system in the South, cuz when everyone
does their job, it works out better for everybody. But the North is sitting on a powder keg,
cuz you’ve given poor whites the vote. You don’t realize that the order in the North is
precarious once the masses realize that they’re enfranchised. On the other hand, the South
is ordered & governed better cuz the lower class (slaves can’t vote)
-Hammond believes that it’s useless to enfranchise slaves. They’re uneducated, so
why would we allow them to exercise a privilege that they wouldn’t be able to use
well?
-Calhoun’s rebuttal would be that most people don’t know how to run
their lives, and therefore, they’re better off being ruled by the few who do
-George Fitzhugh (Cannibals All!): Maybe 1 person in 20 knows how to
handle their freedom well. He believed that most people deserved, if not to
be enslaved, to be told what to do without their permission. This is what
produces good, civilized society. That didn’t depend on race, it was just
the state of humanity
*The Mudsill Theory exists, regardless of regime, wherever you look. Society has the
haves and the have nots. Every society has it. Somebody has to raise the corn and make
clothes, but how do the finer things in life come about? Intellectual activity can’t take
place in a society if everyone has to wake up before to crack of dawn to farm corn—
people won’t have the leisure time to follow intellectual pursuits & try and think about
the ultimate questions of life. The people who can are the people of means who can
afford to do that. They are the ones who hire the lower class to do the dirty work. That’s
just the reality. And if that’s the reality, what’s the nature of the qualities of the people
who can do the finer things, and what are the requirements of the segment of society who
will perform the drudgery? In the South, we’ve discovered an entire class of people who
are black (we can identify them). They are docile, unintelligent (the product of condition,
not nature). Hammond believes that blacks are conditioned by nature (Calhoun would
disagree with that) to be slaves. Nature has designed & equipped them for this. The
blacks can perform the drudgery, freeing the whites to perform the finer things of society.
Based off of natural design, blacks are only capable of performing drudgery
-Calhoun believed that the role of blacks in society could change—they didn’t
have to be slaves ad infinitum. In our present circumstances with the relationship
between the races, blacks are slaves. Hammond believed that blacks, by nature,
were only fit to be slaves
-Even in a society where much of the authority & control of information is
held by the master class, that didn’t mean that slaves knew nothing about
life beyond the plantation. That being said, that kind of information was
hard to come by. Most slaves couldn’t read, the Southern postmasters
censored the mail, so slaves had to rely on hearsay. A lot of that depended
on how big the plantation was, and whether you were allowed to leave the
plantation to work. Slaves found a way to find out what was going on
elsewhere, and that’s why the laws dictating what free blacks could do in
slave societies were so strict. The last thing that slaveowners wanted was
for free blacks to be roaming around, cuz that would give slaves an idea
about an alternative way of living that wasn’t the one that they were
currently engaged in
*Hammond argued that blacks fulfilled the role of the lower class
in the Southern mudsill, so the question arose about how advanced
the race should be. How much education should they be given,
how much freedom should they be allowed to exercise? According
to Calhoun, there will come a time when race cannot remain the
basis of a slave society, cuz that race won’t put up with it anymore.
That’s a recipe for revolt
*Dr. Morel: Hammond is more consistent here than
Calhoun. If Calhoun is not willing to say that blacks by
nature are inferior to whites, but Hammond says they are, it
really is the case that there’s only a certain amount of
education that would benefit the enslaved, cuz they’re
naturally inferior, if they really are only equipped to do
menial tasks, then there would never be a point where they
could become the master class. There would never be a
time where they could run their own lives. Hammond has
the more logical argument, cuz he can say that the South is
justified in limiting the education that blacks receive, cuz
they’re only naturally capable of doing so many things.
Calhoun has the tougher argument. He likes the fact that
whites enslave blacks, but he has to argue on principle that
it could be different, or even the opposite. Blacks could
reach the point where they’re better at using their freedom
than whites, at which point whites would deserve to be the
servants of blacks, if the tables were turned. They aren’t
yet, and it doesn’t look like (in the 1830s & 1840s) that that
change of events will take place, but Calhoun’s argument,
in principle, has to admit that possibility. So Calhoun has
the harder time justifying slavery based on race, cuz he
admits that things can change
James Henley Thornwell, “A Southern Christian View of Slavery” (December 4, 1861)
-A historian named Eugene Genovese analyzed the sermons of preachers during the Civil War.
Many preachers viewed the war as God’s intervention in the affairs of men, which makes sense
to say if you’re a preacher, but when the war was over, clearly the seceding States had lost &
emancipation was produced by the 13th Amendment, they did not read that as God’s judgement
against the South for the sin of slavery. Instead, they interpreted it as God’s judgement on the
South for practicing slavery in an un-Christian manner. In other words, it wasn’t God’s
judgement that slavery was wrong, it [the Civil War] was God’s judgement on the South for
doing it wrong. They did not act as good Christians towards their slaves when they broke up
families, thus breaking the commandment in Genesis 2:24 about husbands cleaving to their
wives. To separate couples, as the slave market did, was a violation of biblical law. You
prevented slave children from honoring their father & mother when they didn’t know who their
parents were. Dr. Morel: “Greed and a whole host of other human vices & sins were conducted
under the auspices of slavery.” These preachers were not saying that the Civil War was God’s
judgement for the sin of slavery, but that they should have been better masters
*Dr. Morel: the South used the biblical argument saying that slavery is never condemned in
neither the Old nor New Testament. They criticized the arguments of the abolitionists who went
beyond the Bible who looked to the Enlightenment thinkers/philosophers like Locke & Jefferson
to condemn slavery based on intuition, claiming that they were at best, deists, at worst, atheists &
infidels. For the South, you need to stick to the Bible, and nowhere does the Bible condemn
slavery. However, the Old Testament does have a prohibition against Hebrews enslaving their
fellow Hebrews, but that didn’t mean that they couldn’t enslave Goy (the Gentiles). Lincoln used
this argument to point out that the Bible proved too much about slavery. Appealing to the Bible
to justify slavery didn’t work, cuz enslavement in the New Testament wasn’t the enslavement of
blacks, but it was the enslavement of whites
-Frederick Augustus Ross (Slavery As Ordained of God): the North is full of hypocrites,
for while you condemn slavery in your rhetoric, it doesn’t bother you to make clothes out
of Southern cotton harvested by slaves. You won’t enslave blacks yourself, but you don’t
mind taking from their hands the fruit of their labors

Session 3B: Abolitionism and the U.S. Constitution

*Dr. Morel: William Lloyd Garrison was the most well-known abolitionist in the United States,
if not the world, in the 1840s & 1850s. He was the godfather of abolitionism. Frederick Douglass
became famous after escaping slavery in Maryland, and then later under the auspices of
Garrison, went on speaking tour, and then published his book Narrative of the Life of Frederick
Douglass (1845), after which he had to flee the country cuz he named names and explained how
he got away from his master. He physically fled slavery, but so long as he didn’t have the
protection of the law, he remained a fugitive from justice precisely cuz according to the state of
Maryland, and backed up by the Constitution, if his owner tried to apprehend him, then he has to
go back. So he fled to England & Ireland and started giving speeches over there, until such time
as his friends (including William Lloyd Garrison) were able to collect enough money to pay for
his manumission. After that, he was free to return to America without threat of being returned to
his former master
-Prigg v. Pennsylvania (1842): “As to the authority so conferred upon state magistrates
[to deal with runaway slaves], while a difference of opinion has existed, and may exist
still on the point, in different states, whether state magistrates are bound to act under it;
 none is entertained by this Court that state magistrates may, if they choose, exercise that
authority, unless prohibited by state legislation.”
-The Fugitive Slave Act (1793) could only be enforced by federal agents. This led
Pennsylvania & several other Northern States (particularly in New England) to
pass personal liberty laws. State officials & State courts could not participate or
interfere with runaway slaves. The Constitution says that runaway slaves have to
be returned, but the North starts saying that it’s a federal matter, so they’re not
going to get involved. The slaveholding States believed that the State
governments should be involved, contrary to what the North was saying by
passing personal liberty laws. The revised Fugitive Slave Act (1850) said that
federal commissioners could deputize people, and you had no choice—you had to
participate in the posse sent to apprehend an accused fugitive slave. The runaway
had no say in this matter. They had no right to counsel nor to speak on their on
behalf. The judge would be paid $10 if he convicted the runaway and only $5 if
he didn’t
-The personal liberty laws were passed to protect Northern black citizens, cuz
under the Fugitive Slave Act (1850), you could be accused of being an escaped
slave, and you weren’t allowed to say a word in your own defense. Essentially,
free blacks could be kidnapped and sent down South. To prevent that, Northern
States (particularly in New England) passed laws to at least ensure due process so
that their black citizens would not be unjustly seized under the federal law.
Southerners would started citing those personal liberty laws as a reason for why
they thought that the state compact theory had been broken, and they were no
longer bound to stick with the Union, cuz it was clear that the other States weren’t
going to uphold their end of the bargain
*Anthony Burns was the most famous runaway slave case (in the 1850s
after the passage of the Fugitive Slave Act (1850))
*Frederick Douglass remained under the tutelage of William Lloyd Garrison until he started to
publish his own abolitionist newspaper (The North Star) in 1849-1850, and he began to think
through his own interpretation of the Constitution more deeply—more widely. He then changed
his mind about the Constitution from what Garrison believed about it

William Lloyd Garrison, “To the Public” (January 1, 1831)

*Garrison was famous for editing his own abolitionist newspaper, The Liberator, which stayed in
existence (print/circulation) until December 1865 when the 13th Amendment was ratified
-Garrison’s ends & means regarding slavery were emancipation (the ends. He was an
abolitionist) through moral suasion (means). People could be persuaded through Garrison’s
appeal to morality to end slavery
-CP 140: “I am aware, that many object to the severity of my language; but is there not cause for
severity? I will be as harsh as truth, and as uncompromising as justice. On this subject, I do not
wish to think, or speak, or write, with moderation. No! no! Tell a man whose house is on fire, to
give a moderate alarm; tell him to moderately rescue his wife from the hands of the ravisher; tell
the mother to gradually extricate her babe from the fire into which it has fallen; —but urge me
not to use moderation in a cause like the present. I am in earnest—I will not equivocate—I will
not excuse—I will not retreat a single inch—AND I WILL BE HEARD. The apathy of the
people is enough to make every statue leap from its pedestal, and to hasten the resurrection of the
dead.”
-Slavery cannot be approached in a moderate, compromising way. Many claimed that
Garrison was being too radical, and that you needed to cool down cuz he was “all on
fire.” Garrison’s response to that was “I have a need to be all on fire, for I have
mountains of ice about me to melt”
-Garrison acknowledged that some people would find his editorials to be inflammatory,
even incendiary. But he embraced his extremism. He called things as he saw them. And if
you owned slaves, he was gonna tell you to your face that that is wrong
-Garrison’s editorials were written as a condemnation of slavery, and they were directed at the
North, who he saw as being apathetic to the existence of slavery. Prejudice isn’t just a Southern
thing
-CP 140: “During my recent tour for the purpose of exciting the minds of the people by a
series of discourses on the subject of slavery, every place that I visited gave fresh
evidence of the fact, that a greater revolution in public sentiment was to be effected in the
free states—and particularly in New-England—than at the south. I found contempt more
bitter, opposition more active, detraction more relentless, prejudice more stubborn, and
apathy more frozen, than among slave owners themselves. Of course, there were
individual exceptions to the contrary. This state of things afflicted, but did not dishearten
me. I determined, at every hazard, to lift up the standard of emancipation in the eyes of
the nation, within sight of Bunker Hill and in the birth place of liberty. That standard is
now unfurled; and long may it float, unhurt by the spoliation of time or the missiles of a
desperate foe—yea, till every chain be broken, and every bondman set free! Let southern
oppressors tremble—let their secret abettors tremble—let their northern apologists
tremble-let all the enemies of the persecuted blacks tremble.”
-The North doesn’t like the institution of slavery, which is why they abolished it
within their own States, but they’re fine with its existence in the South. They
don’t want to do anything that will upset the status quo in the Union. They don’t
want to call the South’s bluff regarding secession if the North tries to abolish it, or
even if they say anything bad about it. Garrison will have known of that. He will
tell the truth as he sees it, regardless of the consequences. He views himself as
being accountable not to the apathetic North, but instead to God, the country (as a
whole), and to the slaves
-CP 146: “We fully and unanimously recognise the sovereignty of each
State, to legislate exclusively on the subject of the slavery which is
tolerated within its limits. We concede that Congress, under the present
national compact, has no right to interfere with any of the slave States, in
relation to this momentous subject. But we maintain that Congress has a
right, and is solemnly bound, to suppress the domestic slave trade between
the several States, and to abolish slavery in those portions of our territory
which the Constitution has placed under its exclusive jurisdiction.”
-CP 140: “Assenting to the “self-evident truth” maintained in the
American Declaration of Independence, “that all men are created equal,
and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights—among
which are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” I shall strenuously
contend for the immediate enfranchisement of our slave population. In
 Park-street Church, on the Fourth of July, 1829, in an address on slavery, I
unreflectingly assented to the popular but pernicious doctrine of gradual
abolition. I seize this opportunity to make a full and unequivocal
recantation, and thus publicly to ask pardon of my God, of my country,
and of my brethren the poor slaves, for having uttered a sentiment so full
of timidity, injustice and absurdity. A similar recantation, from my pen,
was published in the Genius of Universal Emancipation at Baltimore, in
September, 1829. My con-science is now satisfied.”
*In “To the Public”, Garrison recanted previous views he had held (and
statements he had made) regarding gradual emancipation & colonization
*Garrison referred to the slaves as Americans. Whereas there were some who
wanted to free the slaves and then expatriate them to Africa, Garrison believed
that they should stay here. They were born here, so they have a right to remain
here. At the time, many referred to slaves as Africans, to emphasize the fact that
their skin color (which according to the Declaration, shouldn’t matter) meant that
they weren’t Americans, and that they belonged somewhere else. They were
Africans in America. And Garrison said no. Douglass also believed that freedmen
should remain in America, cuz what they knew were American things
-CP 146: “We regard, as delusive, cruel and dangerous, any scheme of
expatriation which pretends to aid, either directly or indirectly, in the
emancipation of the slaves, or to be a substitute for the immediate and
total abolition of slavery.”
*In Lincoln’s meeting with a deputation of negroes (August 14, 1862), he
told them that even in the freest State that they were not the equal of any
white man, according to the law. At this time, Lincoln was preparing the
nation for the reception of the Emancipation Proclamation, and the
promotion of colonization would be the spoonful of sugar that would help
the medicine (emancipation) go down. He wanted to persuade the black
leaders to persuade their communities to get the ball rolling on
colonization, cuz he believes that due to the intransigence of white
prejudice, that blacks won’t want to live in a country where whites
continue to act in a prejudiced manner towards them, even if they are not
slaves but freedmen
-God’s role in emancipation was that He has given Garrison the ability to “speak his truth in its
simplicity and power” (CP 140). At the time, there was a belief in polygenesis where God
created separate, independent races of people. Garrison rejects this. He believed the account in
Genesis that all of humanity sprang forth from Adam & Eve—the original couple—and in imago
Dei: all men are stamped with the image of God. That’s why he can say that the slaves are his
brethren
-Now if you believe that you are speaking God’s truth and that He superintends the affairs of
men, how open do you have to be to compromise? Compromise & political prudence are
completely absent from Garrison’s rhetoric

William Lloyd Garrison, “On the Constitution and the Union” (December 29, 1832)
-CP 142: “There is much declamation about the sacredness of the compact which was
formed between the free and slave states, on the adoption of the Constitution. A sacred
compact, forsooth! We pronounce it the most bloody and heaven-daring arrangement
ever made by men for the continuance and protection of a system of the most atrocious
villainy [sic] ever exhibited on earth. Yes—we recognize the compact, but with feelings
of shame and indignation; and it will be held in everlasting infamy by the friends of
justice and humanity throughout the world. It was a compact formed at the sacrifice of
the bodies and souls of millions of our race, for the sake of achieving a political object—
an unblushing and monstrous coalition to do evil that good might come. Such a compact
was, in the nature of things and according to the law of God, null and void from the
beginning. No body of men ever had the right to guarantee the holding of human beings
in bondage. Who or what were the framers of our government, that they should dare
confirm and authorise such high-handed villany—such a flagrant robbery of the
inalienable rights of man-such a glaring violation of all the precepts and injunctions of
the gospel-such a savage war upon a sixth part of our whole population? —They were
men, like ourselves—as fallible, as sinful, as weak, as ourselves. By the infamous bargain
which they made between themselves, they virtually dethroned the Most High God, and
trampled beneath their feet their own solemn and heaven-attested Declaration, that all
men are created equal, and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights —
among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. They had no lawful power to
bind themselves, or their posterity, for one hour-for one moment — by such an unholy
alliance. It was not valid then—it is not valid now. Still they persisted in maintaining it
— and still do their successors, the people of Massachusetts, of New-England, and of the
twelve free States, persist in maintaining it. A sacred compact! a sacred compact! What,
then, is wicked and ignominious?”
-The very American regime is a Heaven-daring arrangement dripping with human
blood. If you are to participate in the constitutional way to make change, whether
by amendment or by law, that you are aiding & abetting the very thing that has
extended slavery’s life on American soil. He doesn’t argue for a strictly political
solution to slavery. In fact, he condemns the Constitution and burned a copy of it
in public. The Constitution is part of the problem. The political process is part of
the problem (things only get worse if you try to solve them politically). He
believes that he’s in possession of God’s truth, and not just God’s truth, but he
thinks that God superintends the affairs of man, so it’s as if he’s a prophet (even
though he never explicitly says this). The responsibility of a prophet is to speak
the will of God, and then let the chips fall where they may. This form of
persuasion is known as moral suasion. You can’t compel, either by force or by
law (which has a sanction: do this or else), people to be righteous. The only way
people will become righteous is if they have a change of heart, and that was not
the product of laws, but it was the product of an appeal to their conscience, and
then their resultant repentance. And since God is the only one who can change the
hearts of men, the purest way to accomplish abolition was not through a bloody
document like the Constitution or corrupt compromises with fallible & simple
human beings. The way to accomplish the righteous objective of abolition was
simply to have the courage to speak God’s truth, and God would change the
slaveholder’s heart, and the slaveholder would free his slaves (not cuz the law
made him do it—the law can’t produce righteousness. It can’t produce something
 inward, only outward). Garrison put most of his eggs in the basket of moral
suasion—appealing to the conscience of your slaveholding neighbor

Garrison, “Declaration of the National Anti-Slavery Convention” (December 14, 1833)

*Garrison published The Liberator from 1831 until the passage of the 13th Amendment in Dec
1865. He was an abiding commodity in terms of political activism in the United States
-CP 144: “Their principles led them to wage war against their oppressors, and to spill human
blood like water, in order to be free. Ours forbid the doing of evil that good may come, and lead
us to reject, and to entreat the oppressed to reject, the use of all carnal weapons for deliverance
from bondage—relying solely upon those which are spiritual, and mighty through God to the
pulling down of strong holds. Their measures were physical resistance—the marshalling in arms
—the hostile array—the mortal encounter. Ours shall be such only as the opposition of moral
purity to moral corruption—the destruction of error by the potency of truth—the overthrow of
prejudice by the power of love—and the abolition of slavery by the spirit of repentance.”
-The patriots during the Revolution used warfare to gain their freedom, but abolition
cannot be accomplished that way. The Declaration declared that the Founders were
willing to risk their lives for their freedom so that they could tell themselves what to do—
to rule themselves. If they faced resistance, they anticipated that it would be physical
resistance. Force used illegitimately against them, so that meant that they (the Founders)
could use force legitimately in self-defense
-CP 145: “We maintain that no compensation should be given to the planters emancipating their
slaves—Because it would be a surrender of the great fundamental principle that man cannot hold
property in man; Because SLAVERY IS A CRIME, AND THEREFORE IT IS NOT AN
ARTICLE TO BE SOLD; Because the holders of slaves are not the just proprietors of what they
claim; —freeing the slaves is not depriving them of property, but restoring it to the right owner;
—it is not wronging the master, but righting the slave—restoring him to himself; Because
immediate and general emancipation would only destroy nominal, not real property: it would not
amputate a limb or break a bone of the slaves, but by infusing motives into their breasts, would
make them doubly valuable to the masters as free laborers; and Because if compensation is to be
given at all, it should be given to the outraged and guiltless slaves, and not to those who have
plundered and abused them.”
-CP 146: “We shall organize Anti-Slavery Societies, if possible, in every city, town and village
of our land. We shall send forth Agents to lift up the voice of remonstrance, of warning, of
entreaty and rebuke. We shall circulate, unsparingly and extensively, anti-slavery tracts and
periodicals. We shall enlist the PULPIT and the PRESS in the cause of the suffering and the
dumb.”
-Words, words, words. Garrison wants to use the spoken word and the written word to
spread the message of abolition where they can, cuz the South quickly begins to censor
the mail and ban the printing of any anti-slavery material that they believe is conducive
of revolt, tumble, and insurrection. The slaves are dumb (mute) cuz the laws do not allow
them to speak freely on their own behalf
-Moral suasion as part of persuasion. Garrison was a pacifist. He didn’t believe that you
could use physical compulsion to accomplish moral ends
-CP 146: “Submitting this DECLARATION to the candid examination of the people of this
country, and of the friends of liberty all over the world, we hereby affix our signatures to it;—
pledging ourselves that, under the guidance and by the help of Almighty God, we will do all that
in us lies, consistently with this Declaration of our principles, to overthrow the most execrable
system of slavery that has ever been witnessed upon earth—to deliver our land from its deadliest
curse—to wipe out the foulest stain which rests upon our national escutcheon—and to secure to
the colored population of the United States all the rights and privileges which belong to them as
men and as Americans—come what may to our persons, our interests, or our reputations—
whether we live to witness the triumph of JUSTICE, LIBERTY and HUMANITY, or perish
untimely as martyrs in this great, benevolent and holy cause.”
-Martyrs don’t bring martyrdom upon themselves—they’re apprehended, and when they
refused to renounce their commitment to God, they were sacrificed. They’re bearing
witness to something that they experienced. It wasn’t a fight—they got in trouble for
something they said or refused to do. It was a one-sided battle. Unlike the patriots who
were willing to fight for their freedom from the British, Garrison’s abolitionists didn’t
advocate for violence or force in order to accomplish abolition; he believed in being
martyrs for the cause—bear witness to the truths (all men are created equal) and die for
them. We’re not gonna use force—no carnal measures will be used to accomplish
spiritual objectives
-CP 146: “We fully and unanimously recognise the sovereignty of each State, to legislate
exclusively on the subject of the slavery which is tolerated within its limits. We concede that
Congress, under the present national compact, has no right to interfere with any of the slave
States, in relation to this momentous subject. But we maintain that Congress has a right, and is
solemnly bound, to suppress the domestic slave trade between the several States, and to abolish
slavery in those portions of our territory which the Constitution has placed under its exclusive
jurisdiction.”
-Ultimately, if slavery is to be abolished, Garrison believes that after he & his followers
(the abolitionists) have preached their moral suasion, it will be God that will change the
hearts of men to want to abolish slavery
-CP 146: “Our trust for victory is solely in GOD. We may be personally defeated,
but our principles never. TRUTH, JUSTICE, REASON, HUMANITY, must and
will gloriously triumph. Already a host is coming up to the help of the Lord
against the mighty, and the prospect before us is full of encouragement.”
-Garrison believes that his job is to declare the godly truth that slavery is
wrong, and then God will use his preaching to bring people around to want
to abolish slavery

Garrison, “Address to the Slaves of the United States” (June 2, 1843)

-SCP 37: “The weapons with which the abolitionists seek to effect your
deliverance are not bowie knives, pistols, swords, guns, or any other deadly
implements. They consist of appeals, warnings, rebukes, arguments and facts,
addressed to the understandings, consciences and hearts of the people. Many of
your friends believe that not even those who are op-pressed, whether their skins
are white or black, can shed the blood of their oppressors in accordance with the
will of God; while many others believe that it is right for the oppressed to rise and
take their liberty by violence, if they can secure it in no other manner; but they, in
common with all your friends, believe that every attempt at insurrection would be
attended with disaster and defeat, on your part, because you are not strong enough
to contend with the military power of the nation; consequently, their advice to you
 is, to be patient, long-suffering, and sub-missive, yet awhile longer—trusting that,
by the blessing of the Most High on their labors, you will yet be emancipated
without shedding a drop of your masters’ blood, or losing a drop of your own.”
-Garrison doesn’t think it’s right for the abolitionists to use violence,
however, if slaves were to take up arms, that would be justified, since it’s
a way for them to get back their natural rights—if that were to occur, if
would be God giving them the opportunity to use violence to free
themselves. But the abolitionists have no right to use violence—he wants
the change to happen inward, and only God can change the hearts of men

Garrison, “Declaration of Sentiments Adopted by the Peace Convention”

(September 28, 1838)
-SCP 34: “We advocate no jacobinical doctrines. The spirit of jacobinism is the
spirit of retaliation, violence, and murder. It neither fears God nor regards man.
We would be filled with the spirit of CHRIST. If we abide by our principles, it is
impossible for us to be disorderly, or plot treason, or participate in any evil work;
we shall submit to every ordinance of man, FOR THE LORD’S SAKE; obey all
the requirements of Government, except such as we deem contrary to the
commands of the gospel; and in no case resist the operation of law, except by
meekly submitting to the penalty of disobedience.”

Garrison, “The American Union” (January 10, 1845)

-CP 147: “Man is superior to all political compacts, all governmental
arrangements, all religious institutions. As means to an end, these may sometimes
be useful, though never indispensable; but that end must always be the freedom
and happiness of man, INDIVIDUAL MAN. It can never be true that the public
good requires the violent sacrifice of any, even the humblest citizen; for it is
absolutely dependent on his preservation, not destruction. To do evil that good
may come, is equally absurd and criminal. The time for the overthrow of any
government, the abandonment of any alliance, the subversion of any institution,
is, whenever it justifies the immolation of the individual to secure the general
welfare; for the welfare of the many cannot be hostile to the safety of the few. In
all agreements, in all measures, in all political or religious enterprises, in all
attempts to redeem the human race, man, as an individual, is to be held
paramount.”
-You cannot compel or force anyone to be good. Any form of compulsion
cannot produce righteousness

Douglass, “The Right to Criticize American Institutions” (May 11, 1847)

*Even before the Compromise of 1850 was passed, Douglass was beginning to rethink his view
about the Constitution and about America. This came about when he stopped simply being to
protégé of Garrison & Wendell Phillips, and decided to publish his own newspaper, The North
Star. Once he struck out on his own path, he began to think through the tactics of moral suasion
& non-violence, and he did a lot more reading on his own, along with conversing with Gerrit
Smith & Lysander Spooner (and among others), and he came to a different conclusion about the
Constitution, and therefore what would be tactically the best way that abolition could be
accomplished
-CP 41: “I cannot agree with my friend Mr. Garrison, in relation to my love and attachment to
this land. I have no love for America, as such; I have no patriotism. I have no country. What
country have I? The institutions of this country do not know me, do not recognize me as a man. I
am not thought\t of, spoken of, in any direction, out of the anti-slavery ranks, as a man. I am not
thought of, or spoken of, except as a piece of property belonging to some Christian slaveholder,
and all the religious and political institutions of this country, alike pronounce me a slave and a
chattel. Now, in such a country as this, I cannot have patriotism. The only thing that links me to
this land is my family, and the painful consciousness that here and there are three millions of my
fellow-creatures, groaning beneath the iron rod of the worst despotism that could be devised,
even in Pandemonium; that here are men and brethren, who are identified with me by their
complexion, identified with me by their hatred of Slavery, identified with me by their love and
aspirations for liberty, identified with me by the stripes upon their backs, their inhuman wrongs
and cruel sufferings. This, and this only, attaches me to this land, and brings me here to plead
with you, and with this country at large, for the disenthralment of my oppressed countrymen, and
to overthrow this system of Slavery which is crushing them to the earth. How can I love a
country that dooms three millions of my brethren, some of them my own kindred, my own
brothers, my own sisters, who are now clanking the chains of Slavery upon the plans of the
South, whose warm blood is now making fat the soil of Maryland and of Alabama, and over
whose crushed spirits rolls the darks shadow of oppression, shutting out and extinguishing
forever, the cheering rays of that bright sun of Liberty lighted in the souls of all God’s children
by the Omnipotent hand of Deity itself? How can I, I say, love a country thus cursed, thus
bedewed with the blood o f my brethren? A country, the Church of which, and the Government
of which, and the Constitution of which, is in favour of supporting and perpetuation this
monstrous system of injustice and blood? I have not, I cannot have, any love for this country, as
such, or for its Constitution. I desire to see its overthrow as speedily as possible, and its
Constitution shriveled in a thousand fragments, rather than this foul curse should continue to
remain as now.”
-Douglass has no patriotism, cuz in America he is only thought of as a slave, and not as a
man, which is what he knows he is. Inasmuch as this country does not recognize him for
what he is, he has no love for it
-Dr. Morel: even though Douglass had no love for America, he was not indifferent
towards what was transpiring there. He could have stayed in England or even moved to
Canada, but he chose to come back. He was not indifferent towards the plight of the other
slaves. He had an attachment to his family in Maryland and to the other slaves. If the
institutions were changed, then he will feel an attachment towards America
-There were people who were sympathetic towards Douglass & the abolitionist
cause, but they weren’t happy that he was traveling abroad and complaining about
America. They thought that that was bad form. Which is why he wrote this
speech. People weren’t listening to him in America, but they were listening to him
in Europe
-CP 41: “But why expose the sins of one nation in the eyes of another?
But why expose the sins of one nation in the eyes of another? Why attempt
to bring one people under the odium of another people? There is much
force in this question. I admit that there are sins in almost every country
 which can be best removed by means confined exclusively to their
immediate locality. But such evils and such sins pre-suppose the existence
of a moral power in this immediate locality sufficient to accomplish the
work of renovation. But where, pray, can we go to find moral power in
this nation, sufficient to overthrow Slavery? To what institution, to what
party shall we apply for aid? I say, we admit that there are evils which can
be best removed by influences confined to their immediate locality. But in
regard to American Slavery, it is not so. It is such a giant crime, so
darkening to the soul, so blinding in its moral influence, so well calculated
to blast and corrupt all the human principles of our nature, so well adapted
to infuse its own accursed spirit into all around it, that the people among
whom it exists have not the moral power to abolish it. Shall we go to the
Church for this influence? We have heard its character described. Shall we
go to politicians or political parties? Have they the moral power necessary
to accomplish this mighty task? They have not. What are they doing at this
moment? Voting supplies for Slavery — voting supplies for the extension,
the stability, the perpetuation of Slavery in this land. What is the Press
doing? The same. The pulpit? Almost the same. I do not flatter myself that
there is moral power in the land sufficient to overthrow Slavery, and I
welcome the aid of England. And that aid will come.”
-CP 41: “How can I, I say, love a country thus cursed, thus bedewed with the blood of my
brethren? A country, the Church of which, and the Government of which, and the Constitution of
which, is in favour of supporting and perpetuation this monstrous system of injustice and blood?
I have not, I cannot have, any love for this country, as such, or for its Constitution. I desire to see
its overthrow as speedily as possible, and its Constitution shriveled in a thousand fragments,
rather than this foul curse should continue to remain as now. [Hisses and Cheers.]”

Douglass, “What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?” (July 5, 1852)

*Douglass barely mention the Founders’ slaveholding. Everyone knows that the major Founders
owned slaves
*Lincoln didn’t agree with Douglass’ interpretation of the Constitution that he expresses here
-pg.153: “It was fashionable, hundreds of years ago, for the children of Jacob to boast, we have
“Abraham to our father,” when they had long lost Abraham’s faith and spirit. That people
contented themselves under the shadow of Abraham’s great name, while they repudiated the
deeds which made his name great. Need I remind you that a similar thing is being done all over
this country to-day? Need I tell you that the Jews are not the only people who built the tombs of
the prophets, and garnished the sepulchres of the righteous? Washington could not die till he had
broken the chains of his slaves. Yet his monument is built up by the price of human blood, and
the traders in the bodies and souls of men shout — “We have Washington to our father.” —
Alas! that it should be so; yet so it is.”
-pg.151: “To say now that America was right, and England wrong, is exceedingly easy.
Everybody can say it; the dastard, not less than the noble brave, can flippantly discant on the
tyranny of England towards the American Colonies. It is fashionable to do so; but there was a
time when to pronounce against England, and in favor of the cause of the colonies, tried men’s
souls. They who did so were accounted in their day, plotters of mischief, agitators and rebels,
dangerous men. To side with the right, against the wrong, with the weak against the strong, and
with the oppressed against the oppressor! here lies the merit, and the one which, of all others,
seems unfashionable in our day. The cause of liberty may be stabbed by the men who glory in
the deeds of your fathers. But, to proceed.”
-Who doesn’t get invited to parties? Abolitionists. They’re radicals—a fringe movement.
In a good number of circles, people are in favor of freedom, but not of abolitionism.
Abolitionism was not seen by a majority of the population as being a means to
accomplish freedom for slaves
-pg.152: “I have said that the Declaration of Independence is the ring-bolt to the chain of your
nation’s destiny; so, indeed, I regard it. The principles contained in that instrument are saving
principles. Stand by those principles, be true to them on all occasions, in all places, against all
foes, and at whatever cost.”
-pg.152: “How circumspect, exact and proportionate were all their movements! How unlike the
politicians of an hour! Their statesmanship looked beyond the passing moment, and stretched
away in strength into the distant future. They seized upon eternal principles, and set a glorious
example in their defense. Mark them!”
-The Founders didn’t just think of their own comfort. The principles of the Declaration
are applicable anywhere, anytime, anyplace. The current generation needs to put into
practice the principles of the Founding
-pg.151: “Feeling themselves harshly and unjustly treated by the home government, your fathers,
like men of honesty, and men of spirit, earnestly sought redress. They petitioned and
remonstrated; they did so in a decorous, respectful, and loyal manner. Their conduct was wholly
unexceptionable. This, however, did not answer the purpose. They saw themselves treated with
sovereign indifference, coldness and scorn. Yet they persevered. They were not the men to look
back…Oppression makes a wise man mad. Your fathers were wise men, and if they did not go
mad, they became restive under this treatment. They felt themselves the victims of grievous
wrongs, wholly incurable in their colonial capacity. With brave men there is always a remedy for
oppression. Just here, the idea of a total separation of the colonies from the crown was born! It
was a startling idea, much more so, than we, at this distance of time, regard it. The timid and the
prudent (as has been intimated) of that day, were, of course, shocked and alarmed by it.”
-pg.160: “Fellow-citizens! there is no matter in respect to which, the people of the North
have allowed themselves to be so ruinously imposed upon, as that of the pro-slavery
character of the Constitution. In that instrument I hold there is neither warrant, license,
nor sanction of the hateful thing; but, interpreted as it ought to be interpreted, the
Constitution is a GLORIOUS LIBERTY DOCUMENT. Read its preamble, consider its
purposes. Is slavery among them? Is it at the gateway? or is it in the temple? It is neither.
While I do not intend to argue this question on the present occasion, let me ask, if it be
not somewhat singular that, if the Constitution were intended to be, by its framers and
adopters, a slave-holding instrument, why neither slavery, slaveholding, nor slave can
anywhere be found in it. What would be thought of an instrument, drawn up, legally
drawn up, for the purpose of entitling the city of Rochester to a track of land, in which no
mention of land was made? Now, there are certain rules of interpretation, for the proper
understanding of all legal instruments. These rules are well established. They are plain,
common- sense rules, such as you and I, and all of us, can understand and apply, without
having passed years in the study of law. I scout the idea that the question of the
constitutionality or unconstitutionality of slavery is not a question for the people. I hold
that every American citizen has a right to form an opinion of the constitution, and to
 propagate that opinion, and to use all honorable means to make his opinion the prevailing
one. Without this right, the liberty of an American citizen would be as insecure as that of
a Frenchman. Ex-Vice-President Dallas tells us that the Constitution is an object to which
no American mind can be too attentive, and no American heart too devoted. He further
says, the Constitution, in its words, is plain and intelligible, and is meant for the home-
bred, unsophisticated understandings of our fellow-citizens. Senator Berrien tell us that
the Constitution is the fundamental law, that which controls all others. The charter of our
liberties, which every citizen has a personal interest in understanding thoroughly. The
testimony of Senator Breese, Lewis Cass, and many others that might be named, who are
everywhere esteemed as sound lawyers, so regard the constitution. I take it, therefore,
that it is not presumption in a private citizen to form an opinion of that instrument. Now,
take the Constitution according to its plain reading, and I defy the presentation of a single
pro-slavery clause in it. On the other hand it will be found to contain principles and
purposes, entirely hostile to the existence of slavery.”
-The Constitution has been used by the slavepower for their own nefarious deeds
all these years, but there’s no reason why that should continue for 1 more second
-pg.160: “Fellow-citizens! there is no matter in respect to which, the people of the North have
allowed themselves to be so ruinously imposed upon, as that of the pro-slavery character of the
Constitution. In that instrument I hold there is neither warrant, license, nor sanction of the hateful
thing; but, interpreted as it ought to be interpreted, the Constitution is a GLORIOUS LIBERTY
DOCUMENT. Read its preamble, consider its purposes. Is slavery among them? Is it at the
gateway? or is it in the temple? It is neither. While I do not intend to argue this question on the
present occasion, let me ask, if it be not somewhat singular that, if the Constitution were
intended to be, by its framers and adopters, a slave-holding instrument, why neither slavery,
slaveholding, nor slave can anywhere be found in it. What would be thought of an instrument,
drawn up, legally drawn up, for the purpose of entitling the city of Rochester to a track of land,
in which no mention of land was made? Now, there are certain rules of interpretation, for the
proper understanding of all legal instruments. These rules are well established. They are plain,
common- sense rules, such as you and I, and all of us, can understand and apply, without having
passed years in the study of law. I scout the idea that the question of the constitutionality or
unconstitutionality of slavery is not a question for the people. I hold that every American citizen
has a right to form an opinion of the constitution, and to propagate that opinion, and to use all
honorable means to make his opinion the prevailing one.”
-If you do a plain reading of the Constitution, slavery isn’t mentioned at all. The purpose
of the Preamble is incompatible with slavery. The burden is on the pro-slavery crowd to
show that the Constitution is a pro-slavery document. The slavepower is corrupting the
true meaning of the document by using it to justify slavery
*If you compare the Constitution to the Confederate constitution, it is much easier
to see that the Confederates had a pro-slavery document as opposed to the
Constitution. The Confederates didn’t want there to be any ambiguity about the
institution of slavery in their constitution
*Douglass was trying to unmask the various arguments about the Constitution. People
use the Constitution to justify slavery, but he wanted to show that in fact it was made for
freedom—it was made for human beings. Each generation can decide for itself the
meaning of the Constitution based off of a plain reading of the document. If a majority of
Americans believe that it supports freedom and not slavery, then Douglass has no
 problem with Congress abolishing slavery in the U.S., including where it already exists.
Lincoln, the Whigs, and especially the Democrats will not go there
*Douglass is trying to shape public opinion, to the end that the People decide that the
federal gov’t does have the right to abolish slavery in the entire country
-pg.157: “But a still more inhuman, disgraceful, and scandalous state of things remains to be
presented. By an act of the American Congress, not yet two years old, slavery has been
nationalized in its most horrible and revolting form. By that act, Mason and Dixon’s line has
been obliterated; New York has become as Virginia; and the power to hold, hunt, and sell men,
women, and children as slaves remains no longer a mere state institution, but is now an
institution of the whole United States. The power is co-extensive with the Star-Spangled Banner
and American Christianity. Where these go, may also go the merciless slave-hunter. Where these
are, man is not sacred. He is a bird for the sportsman’s gun. By that most foul and fiendish of all
human decrees, the liberty and person of every man are put in peril. Your broad republican
domain is hunting ground for men. Not for thieves and robbers, enemies of society, merely, but
for men guilty of no crime. Your lawmakers have commanded all good citizens to engage in this
hellish sport. Your President, your Secretary of State, our lords, nobles, and ecclesiastics,
enforce, as a duty you owe to your free and glorious country, and to your God, that you do this
accursed thing. Not fewer than forty Americans have, within the past two years, been hunted
down and, without a moment’s warning, hurried away in chains, and consigned to slavery and
excruciating torture. Some of these have had wives and children, dependent on them for bread;
but of this, no account was made. The right of the hunter to his prey stands superior to the right
of marriage, and to all rights in this republic, the rights of God included! For black men there are
neither law, justice, humanity, not religion. The Fugitive Slave Law makes mercy to them a
crime; and bribes the judge who tries them. An American judge gets ten dollars for every victim
he consigns to slavery, and five, when he fails to do so. The oath of any two villains is sufficient,
under this hell-black enactment, to send the most pious and exemplary black man into the
remorseless jaws of slavery! His own testimony is nothing. He can bring no witnesses for
himself. The minister of American justice is bound by the law to hear but one side; and that side,
is the side of the oppressor. Let this damning fact be perpetually told. Let it be thundered around
the world, that, in tyrant-killing, king-hating, people-loving, democratic, Christian America, the
seats of justice are filled with judges, who hold their offices under an open and palpable bribe,
and are bound, in deciding in the case of a man’s liberty, hear only his accusers! In glaring
violation of justice, in shameless disregard of the forms of administering law, in cunning
arrangement to entrap the defenseless, and in diabolical intent, this Fugitive Slave Law stands
alone in the annals of tyrannical legislation. I doubt if there be another nation on the globe,
having the brass and the baseness to put such a law on the statute-book. If any man in this
assembly thinks differently from me in this matter, and feels able to disprove my statements, I
will gladly confront him at any suitable time and place he may select.”
9/17/18
*Dr. Morel: this course is about how sectionalism led to the Civil War. It’s a good preparation
for the Civil War & Reconstruction class where you will discuss Lincoln’s use or hesitation to
use presidential powers to touch slavery, in particular where it already exists

Session 4A: Emancipation and Constitutional Self-Government

Christopher Flannery, “O Captain! My Captain!”

*Dr. Morel: if you understand this story, then it helps a lot with understanding Lincoln’s later
speeches
-Lincoln said later in life that there was no election more pleasing to him than being chosen to be
the captain of this militia group
-Aristotle said that a natural slave was someone who could only obey instructions—they can’t
even give instructions to themselves. They’re just a human tool
-The argument of the Declaration was Americans trying to prove to the world that no one else
(England) should rule them, and also that they were capable of ruling themselves
-Since Lincoln’s militia was composed of rough men, they could only be controlled by force or
persuasion. When the militia wanted to kill the elderly Indian that wandered into their camp,
even though he had a gov’t paper granting him safe passage, Lincoln stepped in to save his life
-Dr. Morel: “We have got to become a people who submit to rule voluntarily, not simply
because we must be forced to do so. Because in that case, we might as well be ruled by
despots. We’ve tried that before. If we refuse to be ruled by a despot, the only alternative
is to rule ourselves, which is to say, be ruled voluntarily—willingly submit ourselves to
the rule of those who we have given the responsibility to issue those rules”
-The men were much bigger & much stronger than the Indian, but they thought it unfair when
Lincoln intervened cuz he was much bigger & much stronger than they were. The men had the
force of might on their side, but the genius of Lincoln’s interposition forced them to act justly
towards the Indian. It was a condescension on Lincoln’s part: he slowed them down so that they
would stop & think about what they were doing. They consented to Lincoln’s leadership, but he
did not act for them. They respected him enough that when he interposed himself, he got them to
pause & not follow through on their first impulse, which was to kill the Indian, regardless of the
gov’t paper. He slowed them down so that they could recognize the error of their ways—instead
of being ruled by emotion, they listened to reason. An action they wouldn’t have taken without
Lincoln’s help. Lincoln’s genius allowed the men to use reason to think for themselves—it
allowed them to follow the better angels of their nature
*Lincoln didn’t think for the men. Lincoln used his genius to think for himself, and then he
allowed the men to reason for themselves. If Americans can’t think for themselves, then self-
gov’t is impossible. We would be saying that there’s only a few people who deserve to tell us
what to do, and we should just let them do the thinking for us. Lincoln used his genius to help his
men elevate themselves—to follow through on the better angels of their nature—so that they
could see the right way to proceed, and they did so
-pg.4: “At their sober best, they saw that his strength of character was greater even than his
storied strength of limb, and they admired him the more for it. His still greater strength of mind,
so decisive in Lincoln’s later celebrated political battles, they could only wonder at. His magical
storytelling delighted and entranced them. That he never talked down to them, that he met them,
and bested them, on their own ground—this made it possible for them to think of him as their
friend, even though he didn’t drink, swear, or chew. His genuine liking for them they warmly
reciprocated. But what made them love him to the point of worship was the most exquisite and
essential thing about him. It was his goodness—that firmness in the right, as God gave him to see
the right, that was sovereign in his noble soul even at a young age. It was their love of this
beautiful goodness, I like to think, more than fear of the native mightiness of Lincoln, that
brought the boys to reason, in that wild, murderous moment, against the pull of their most unruly
passions.”
-The task of a constitution (and of self-gov’t) is to get people to listen to reason instead of
their passions. That is the task of free gov’t: submitting our passions to the rule of our
mind. Lincoln’s mind was able to get his men to use their own minds. This is how
Lincoln views the concept of consent and for it to be viable over time
*In a regime such as ours, you have to persuade people to do what you want them to do
—they have to come along willingly. They have to do it of their own volition. This is the
price that has to be paid in order for equality to be secured: you have to get people’s
permission (Dr. Morel: the flip side of the equality coin)

*In contrast with Garrison & Douglass, Lincoln believed that working through the constitutional
system was the only legitimate way to bring about change. Equal rights balanced with consent

Lincoln, “Protest in Illinois Legislature on Slavery” (March 3, 1837)

*Lincoln & Dan Stone were the only members in Illinois’ legislature who signed the petition.
They issued the statement cuz the South wanted the North to be on the record as being against
abolitionism. The South didn’t like the abolitionists trying to make their cause a federal matter. It
doesn’t come within the purview of Congress, so State after State in the North issued similar
statements to Lincoln’s
*In regards to the federal gov’t being unable to touch slavery as it presently existed in the Slave
States, Lincoln defers to the concept of federalism
-Later when Lincoln serves in Congress, he proposed a law that would ban slavery in D.C.:
compensated emancipation with D.C.’s consent, as well as consent from VA & MD, which
border D.C., and therefore in some form or fashion affected by what happens to slaves in D.C.
-Principles vs. prudential consideration
*The States as states don’t possess sovereignty, as Lincoln understood it. People as human
beings possess sovereignty, otherwise we’re back in England where there is a king who is above
the law. When the American people bound themselves together under the Constitution (with
limited powers for the federal gov’t & most of the power remaining with the State governments),
they did so by accepting various compromises to get the Constitution ratified, otherwise we
would not have remained as one people. Art. I Sec. 8 says that Congress does not have power
over internal matters within the States, and that includes the institution of slavery. Slavery is a
State institution, not a national institution
In Lincoln’s mind, the establishment of the American Union under the Constitution was
of such importance that it was worth allowing the institution of slavery to continue, in the
hopes that eventually the nation would be able to live up to its principles & what it
professed and one day abolish it completely
*Lincoln is anti-slavery, but he’s not an abolitionist, because the abolitionists don’t believe in
following the constitutional procedures (ex. Fugitive Slave Clause). If you have people who pick
& choose which parts of the Constitution they follow, then pretty soon you’re not going to have a
constitution at all

Lincoln, “The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions” (January 27, 1838)

*Dr. Morel: this speech is not an ordinary speech. He takes you to a level & depth about the
challenges of self-gov’t that is really rare. Lincoln only had about 12 months of formal education
in his entire life, so all of this is stuff that he learned on his own. He’s a self-taught man. He was
a big-time reader
*This speech shows Lincoln’s understanding of America’s form of self-gov’t, not just in terms of
what consent gets you, but the challenges of consent (the problems that will never go away in a
self-governing society that need attention, and particularly attention from those who are in
charge (voted into office))
*There are elements (passions) from the Founding that helped the Founders during the
Revolution & to establish the country, but they can be dangerous now: justice and fame

PASSION FOR JUSTICE

*Lincoln notices that both people in the South as well as the North are resorting to mob violence.
Now mobs are as American as apple pie & hot dogs (racial mobs that practiced widespread
lynching wouldn’t become a thing until after the Civil War) that existed back during the colonial
period, but Lincoln sees it as a problem—a problem that’s growing
-Basler pg.77: “At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever
reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we
must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time,
or die by suicide.”
-The prevailing view of the day in America was that tyranny is when you have a tyrant,
and that’s not possible in a democracy, since we’re not ruled by one man. But as Lincoln
points out, a majority (of people) can act despotically. And that’s the easiest thing for a
free people to forget. Yes, the gov’t can’t do anything without the consent of the majority
of the people. But people thought that so long as the majority got its way that nothing ill
could befall us that would hurt us
-pg.77: “When men take it in their heads to day, to hang gamblers, or burn
murderers, they should recollect, that, in the confusion usually attending such
transactions, they will be as likely to hang or burn some one who is neither a
gambler nor a murderer as one who is; and that, acting upon the example they set,
the mob of to-morrow, may, and probably will, hang or burn some of them by the
very same mistake. And not only so; the innocent, those who have ever set their
faces against violations of law in every shape, alike with the guilty, fall victims to
the ravages of mob law; and thus it goes on, step by step, till all the walls erected
for the defense of the persons and property of individuals, are trodden down, and
disregarded. But all this even, is not the full extent of the evil… Having ever
regarded Government as their deadliest bane, they make a jubilee of the
suspension of its operations; and pray for nothing so much, as its total
annihilation. While, on the other hand, good men, men who love tranquility, who
desire to abide by the laws, and enjoy their benefits, who would gladly spill their
blood in the defense of their country; seeing their property destroyed; their
families insulted, and their lives endangered; their persons injured; and seeing
 nothing in prospect that forebodes a change for the better; become tired of, and
disgusted with, a Government that offers them no protection; and are not much
averse to a change in which they imagine they have nothing to lose. Thus, then,
by the operation of this mobocractic spirit, which all must admit, is now abroad in
the land, the strongest bulwark of any Government, and particularly of those
constituted like ours, may effectually be broken down and destroyed--I mean the
attachment of the People. Whenever this effect shall be produced among us;
whenever the vicious portion of population shall be permitted to gather in bands
of hundreds and thousands, and burn churches, ravage and rob provision-stores,
throw printing presses into rivers, shoot editors, and hang and burn obnoxious
persons at pleasure, and with impunity; depend on it, this Government cannot
last”
-Dr. Morel: in self-gov’t, who or what is supposed to hold up a mirror so
that the society can be self-reflective about its actions? The best politicians
(ex. Lincoln) are supposed to show us who we are and who we could be
-pg.80-81: “The question recurs, ‘how shall we fortify against it?’ The answer is simple. Let
every American, every lover of liberty, every well wisher to his posterity, swear by the blood of
the Revolution, never to violate in the least particular, the laws of the country; and never to
tolerate their violation by others. As the patriots of seventy-six did to the support of the
Declaration of Independence, so to the support of the Constitution and Laws, let every American
pledge his life, his property, and his sacred honor;—let every man remember that to violate the
law, is to trample on the blood of his father, and to tear the character of his own, and his
children's liberty. Let reverence for the laws, be breathed by every American mother, to the
lisping babe, that prattles on her lap—let it be taught in schools, in seminaries, and in colleges;
let it be written in Primers, spelling books, and in Almanacs;—let it be preached from the pulpit,
proclaimed in legislative halls, and enforced in courts of justice. And, in short, let it become the
political religion of the nation; and let the old and the young, the rich and the poor, the grave and
the gay, of all sexes and tongues, and colors and conditions, sacrifice unceasingly upon its
altars.”
-Dr. Morel: in revealed religion, the preacher helps his congregation to better understand
the word of God. In his Speech at Peoria, Lincoln calls the principles of the Declaration
our “ancient faith.” Even though the Declaration wasn’t written until 1776, Lincoln
believes that its principles & truths are eternal
-The convenient thing about vigilante justice (mobocracy) is that it can be satisfied right
now. All you need to do is find the nearest tree to hang someone. The issue with the
judicial process (due process) is that it takes steps (sometimes too many) to bring about
justice. The steps are there to ensure that an innocent person is not declared guilt, and that
a guilty person is held responsible for his crimes
-Mobocracy is driven by anger that something wrong has occurred, but the
question is how do we find the right culprit. At that point, emotion is actually a
hindrance, cuz even if we feel good after dispensing quick justice, you might
dispense it against the wrong person, and then the true culprit would still be at-
large. Madison said in Federalist #51 that justice is the purpose of gov’t: the
innocent are protected & the guilty are punished. The question then becomes what
is the process to ensure that the guilty are brought to justice?
-Dr. Morel: in his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail”, MLK gives the most
detailed, sophisticated, and rigorous account justifying civil disobedience.
It is in striking contrast to what Lincoln says here:
-pg.81: “When I so pressingly urge a strict observance of all the
laws, let me not be understood as saying there are no bad laws, nor
that grievances may not arise, for the redress of which, no legal
provisions have been made.—I mean to say no such thing. But I do
mean to say, that, although bad laws, if they exist, should be
repealed as soon as possible, still while they continue in force, for
the sake of example, they should be religiously observed. So also
in unprovided cases. If such arise, let proper legal provisions be
made for them with the least possible delay; but, till then, let them,
if not too intolerable, be borne with.”
-Dr. Morel: civil disobedience as MLK practiced it argued for a
disobedience to certain laws. MLK was thrown in solitary confinement for
disobeying a State circuit court order. MLK, Ralph Abernathy, Fred
Shuttlesworth, and anyone related to their actions were told by name that
they were not allowed to march, protest, or gather on Easter weekend
(Good Friday), but they did so anyways. Lincoln never discounts the right
to revolution. But the right to revolution is not a civil right, it is a natural
right. If the civil situation reaches a point where it is truly intolerable,
Lincoln would condone civil disobedience, even to the point of revolution,
if necessary. Ultimately, individuals are who decide if their rights are
being violated, and they can be wrong in thinking that their rights are
being violated (ex. the South in 1860). Justice is determined by point of
sword. The Colonies were right in rebelling against England, but if we
were not successful in the Revolutionary War, then England would have
continued to rule us, without our permission, and we would have simply
continued to say that it was unjust, except that does us no good if we
couldn’t free ourselves militarily. Justice can be on your side & demand
certain things (ex. your freedom), but that does you no good if you can’t
physically free yourself from bondage
-Dr. Morel: for a free people to demonstrate that they can govern
themselves responsibly, self-gov’t needs to mean on a regular basis that
they exercise self-control. A people who want justice have to decide not to
seek it in a vigilante way—they have to trust that the political & judicial
systems will bring about justice. They can’t take judgement into their own
hands. A people who willingly do not seek justice on their own terms, but
instead entrust it to a process where deliberation, reason, evidence,
impartial jury, etc. are allowed to take place to best secure protection for
the innocent & punishment for the guilty
*Once the social contract is made, the parties have to acknowledge that
going forward, unanimity is going to be impossible to achieve on every
matter. Operationally, the majority is going to rule, and if you have a
prudently designed constitution, then that majority will rule in the interest
of everyone, not just their own
 -When Lincoln was elected in 1860, the minority did not trust the
majority

PASSION FOR FAME

-pg.82-83: But new reapers will arise, and they, too, will seek a field. It is to deny, what the
history of the world tells us is true, to suppose that men of ambition and talents will not continue
to spring up amongst us. And, when they do, they will as naturally seek the gratification of their
ruling passion, as others have so done before them. The question then, is, can that gratification be
found in supporting and maintaining an edifice that has been erected by others? Most certainly it
cannot. Many great and good men sufficiently qualified for any task they should undertake, may
ever be found, whose ambition would inspire to nothing beyond a seat in Congress, a
gubernatorial or a presidential chair; but such belong not to the family of the lion, or the tribe of
the eagle. What! think you these places would satisfy an Alexander, a Caesar, or a Napoleon?—
Never! Towering genius distains a beaten path. It seeks regions hitherto unexplored.—It sees no
distinction in adding story to story, upon the monuments of fame, erected to the memory of
others. It denies that it is glory enough to serve under any chief. It scorns to tread in the footsteps
of any predecessor, however illustrious. It thirsts and burns for distinction; and, if possible, it
will have it, whether at the expense of emancipating slaves, or enslaving freemen. Is it
unreasonable then to expect, that some man possessed of the loftiest genius, coupled with
ambition sufficient to push it to its utmost stretch, will at some time, spring up among us? And
when such a one does, it will require the people to be united with each other, attached to the
government and laws, and generally intelligent, to successfully frustrate his designs.”
-At the time of the Founding, the Founders made their mark by (pg.82): “Then, all that
sought celebrity and fame, and distinction, expected to find them in the success of that
experiment. Their all was staked upon it:—their destiny was inseparably linked with it.
Their ambition aspired to display before an admiring world, a practical demonstration of
the truth of a proposition, which had hitherto been considered, at best no better, than
problematical; namely, the capability of a people to govern themselves.” The Founders
achieved fame by doing good—they didn’t do good just to become famous. Alexander
the Great, Julius Caesar, and Napoleon sought fame by pursuing their own interests &
ambitions. The opportunity to get fame in the same way that the Founders did is no
longer available (“This field of glory is harvested, and the crop is already appropriated”).
If a new Washington arises, then the only way for him to get fame for himself is to be a
conquering tyrant, and if that occurs, the people need to be of a certain character that they
can rebuke him (“And when such a one does, it will require the people to be united with
each other, attached to the government and laws, and generally intelligent, to successfully
frustrate his designs”)
-Dr. Morel: if history shows us that the many have certain passions (ex. justice),
then it also shows us that the few have certain passions (ex. fame). In both cases,
those passions can be detrimental to American self-gov’t. The Founders started
the machine of the country, but there is no guarantee that it will last forever.
There is always a possibility that will die by suicide. There may come a time
when we are no longer self-governing. Lincoln is already seeing it occur: there is
a passion for justice that is leading to mob violence; there is a passion for
ambition, and with the mob violence that is occurring across the country (since a
mob is mindless & easily-directed) if mob justice gets bad enough, it is precisely
 the situation that would seized by someone who wants to become famous like
Napoleon. They may not be able to become President (due their tyrannical
desires), but if mob justice gets bad enough, then they can seize on the
opportunity to become (with the help of the mob) a tyrant instead. They claim to
be acting on behalf of the people in the pursuit of justice & freedom, when in fact
they are using that as an excuse to hoist themselves up to become authoritarian, if
not totalitarian. The solution to the problem of potential tyrants is that the
character of the people has to be shaped in a way so that they can’t be tricked or
exploited by a potential tyrant
*Lincoln is considering matters that most people have probably never thought
about. After all, if you have a free, self-governing society, what do you think is
going to be the solution to all of your problems? What do you think will never
happen? You think that tyranny is impossible, cuz the greatest self-deception in a
democracy is a tyranny of the majority. The grand temptation in a democracy is to
think that the majority can never be wrong. The precisely cuz it is the majority;
precisely cuz consent is one of the great principles of the Declaration—in fact, it
is the great legitimator of free gov’t (nobody can tell me what to do without my
consent)—then whatever the majority consents to must equal justice; must
produce the protection of freedom. However, freedom shows us that that is not
true, and Lincoln shows us that the majority can be deceived to tolerate something
that isn’t true
-Lincoln showed through the example of McIntosh that by changing your
rhetoric you can sway a group of people to act on their passions. Vigilante
justice disregards evidence. Even if the outcome is what a court of law
would have handed out to McIntosh, he still should have been given a
chance to have the evidence examined, in case he was innocent. Innocent
before proven guilty—let the legal process run its course
-pg.84-85: Passion has helped us; but can do so no more. It will in future be our enemy. Reason,
cold, calculating, unimpassioned reason, must furnish all the materials for our future support and
defence.—Let those materials be moulded into general intelligence, sound morality, and in
particular, a reverence for the constitution and laws
-Dr. Morel: this is the sum & substance of Lincoln’s speech. If he can’t be the founder of
America, he has decided to be a contributor to its preservation, using speeches not to
subvert what Washington founded, but to support it, reinforce it, and do so in a way that
Washington didn’t get an opportunity to do, simply cuz they were in different
circumstances
-Dr. Morel: later on when Lincoln is President, his self-imposed restraint limits what he
can do vis-à-vis slavery. One of the criticisms of Lincoln both during his day and now is
that the Emancipation Proclamation didn’t free all of the slaves. He freed the slaves
where the Army wasn’t in control, and he left them enslaved where the Army was in
control. Lincoln believed that the war powers of the President only allowed him to free
the slaves in the rebellious States. That was cuz he was respectful of the constitutional
restraints placed on the President, and he didn’t want to undermine the very form of gov’t
that he was trying to preserve
*Lincoln put his hopes on a process through which justice could be dispensed (political religion)
as well as a particular kind of character that the American people need to possess to prevent both
mobs & the manipulators of mobs

Lincoln, “Temperance Address” (February 22, 1842)

*Dr. Morel: this isn’t a typically temperance address. It isn’t an argument for giving up alcohol,
and preaching that everyone else do the same. His temperance address is an analog to the
abolitionist movement, which is who Lincoln is really criticizing
*When it came to alcohol, Lincoln was a teetotaler. He drank alcohol one time, and afterwards
he said that he didn’t like it, cuz it made him feel flabby (in his mind). He learned very early on
in life that his key to prosperity in the future, as strong as he was physically, was to get off the
farm. Prosperity for him was going to be a product of his mind, and he wanted to stay sharp
-Basler pg.135: “It is true, that even then, it was known and acknowledged, that many were
greatly injured by it; but none seemed to think the injury arose from the use of a bad thing, but
from the abuse of a very good thing. The victims of it were pitied, and compassionated, just as
now are the heirs of consumptions, and other hereditary diseases. Their failing was treated as
a misfortune, and not as a crime, or even as a disgrace.”
-Lincoln doesn’t think that the tactics of the abolitionists are successful, and in fact, he
believes that they’re going to undermine the very ends that they want to pursue. For
Garrison, it is enough to condemn the sinner. The abolitionists preach the truth, and God
will sort it out. Lincoln says no. In a republic, something more is required than simply
pointing out what you perceive to be the sins of your neighbor, especially when your
neighbor lives across the state line. The principle of federalism restricts the ability of
Northerners to attack slavery in other States
*Lincoln is preaching temperance in regards to how we treat each other with words. It’s a
speech about speech. Lincoln wants slavery to go away, but how we go about
accomplishing that is as important as that we do it
-Sympathy from the Free States towards the Slave States, in a way that will
convince the Slave States themselves to give up the institution; in a way that is
better than how the abolitionists are currently going about it
-pg.140: “And what a noble ally this, to the cause of political freedom. With such an aid, its
march cannot fail to be on and on, till every son of earth shall drink in rich fruition, the sorrow
quenching draughts of perfect liberty. Happy day, when, all appetites controlled, all poisons
subdued, all matter subjected, mind, all conquering mind, shall live and move the monarch of the
world. Glorious consummation! Hail fall of Fury! Reign of Reason, all hail!”
-Lincoln is speaking in an intemperate manner here. It’s a hint on his part that he’s not
talking about temperance in regards to alcohol. He’s speaking about speech
*Dr. Morel: Lincoln makes the point in this speech that alcohol can be a good thing, but
that it can also be abused. However, we are never given the indication in any of his
writings that he thinks that slavery is a good thing that was abused by Southerners. The
people who made that argument were Southern preachers at the end of the Civil War.
Preachers in both the North & the South believed that the Civil War was an instrument in
the hands of God (Lincoln gave his own spin on that idea in the Second Inaugural). But
the historian Eugene Genovese gave lectures on Southern clergymen, based on his
research of them during & after the war. And unlike Lincoln, who stated in the Second
Inaugural that we ought to think of the civil War as a divine scourge (a punishment by
God on both the North & South for the sin of slavery—what he called American slavery,
not Southern slavery—and now that we’ve been punished (but not fully), maybe it would
be charity or mercy on God’s part to let us off of being fully punished for the sin, and if
we appreciate that, there won’t be condemnation, but rather, charity. Maybe we should
imitate God’s mercy towards us: withholding His (full) just punishment for our sin of
slavery, which had been around for a lot longer than 4 years. Maybe if we learn from that
example, we can afford to be charitable & forgiving to one another). However, when
Eugene Genovese analyzed the writings of Southern preachers, they didn’t conclude that
they had lost the war due to the sin of slavery. The Southern preachers concluded that the
South lost the war cuz they weren’t good Christians as slaveowners. They didn’t practice
proper biblical slavery. It wasn’t the practice of a bad thing, it was the abuse of a good
thing. They weren’t repentant at all for slavery, per se, but that their congregations
needed to repent cuz they practiced slavery in an unchristian way
*Dr. Morel: Jefferson didn’t think his generation was capable of getting rid of
slavery right away. They were too enmeshed. It was the pre-existing condition
that was around even before the formation of the United States, and to form the
United States, we couldn’t get rid out it at the same time, but in order for us to
practice self-gov’t with integrity, it had to be (on the part of the American people)
a commitment to eradicate slavery—because otherwise, the very foundation of
their society would be a sham—because the very basis of the Revolution was
precisely that no one can govern another man without that man’s consent. That
was the signal condemnation of King George III. For Americans to continue to
enslave their fellow man, and not make a point of trying to get rid of it at some
point in the future, would be the height of hypocrisy. There had to be a
commitment to doing that, otherwise their arguments for their own enslavement
by King George III are vain, shallow, and cannot be taken seriously
-Lincoln (August 1, 1858—“Fragment on Slavery”): “As I would not be a
slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy.
Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the difference, is not
democracy.”
-Dr. Morel: the very same reason I do not believe that I do not
deserve to be anyone’s slave should be the very same reason I
should not enslave anyone else. This is what I call Lincoln’s
Political Golden Rule. And that had to be the commitment of the
American people, except that Lincoln lived at a time when that
commitment was waning among a portion of the people, and he
struggled to figure out how to convince them to come back to the
Spirit of ’76. How do I convince them to do something about an
institution in their midst that I don’t have any political authority or
right to touch? How do I get them to see that they need to do this
good thing? And the only thing that he had at his disposal was
words. He saw other people (the abolitionists) using words in a
way that was backfiring, such that the South was clinging even
more to an institution which they knew to be unjust. Lincoln
wanted to use words in a way that was more empathetic, not in a
 way that would create a Southern faction which eventually produce
the Civil War
-The only way to peacefully get rid of slavery would have to be some form
of inducement or incentive to get people who have only known
slaveholding as a part & parcel of how they make a living (even though
it’s wrong) would be to find a way for them to glide into a different
occupation that wouldn’t also expose them to the just retribution of the
newly-freed slaves. That’s the difficulty—that’s the true obstacle
-For Lincoln, law follows public opinion. If you can shape public
opinion, the laws will follow, and then one hopes that it’s a
virtuous cycle

Lincoln, “Letter to Williamson Durley (October 3, 1845)

-Based on principle, the abolitionists refused to support Henry Clay for President cuz he was a
slaveholder, even though he would have enacted legislation against slavery, and instead they
supported the Liberty Party (an abolitionist party), which had no chance of winning. And by not
supporting Clay, that allowed Polk to win, which brought about more evil
-However, by voting for the Liberty Party, even though it didn’t win, allowed the abolitionists to
have good consciences about the matter that they didn’t vote for Clay, a slaveholder
-Good fruit could come from a bad tree (Clay), cuz even as a slaveowner, he was against
the expansion of slavery, which would have led to its ultimate demise
-Basler pg.170: “It is possibly true, to some extent, that with annexation, some slaves may be
sent to Texas and continued in slavery, that otherwise might have been liberated. To whatever
extent this may be true, I think annexation an evil. I hold it to be a paramount duty of us in the
free states, due to the Union of the states, and perhaps to liberty itself (paradox though it may
seem) to let the slavery of the other states alone; while, on the other hand, I hold it to be equally
clear, that we should never knowingly lend ourselves directly or indirectly, to prevent that
slavery from dying a natural death---to find new places for it to live in, when it can no longer
exist in the old.”
-Lincoln is against the annexation of Texas, because of the spread of slavery into the
State. Slavery should be left alone in the Slave States where it already exists, but not be
allowed to spread & expand into new States or Territories. If the institution is contained
where it is, the nature of it (plantation slavery with King Cotton) will eventually cause it
to die out
*Follow the rule of law as the means, so that the end is emancipation. Lincoln wants all
men to be free

Lincoln, “Eulogy on Henry Clay” (July 6, 1852)

-pg.270: “Mr. Clay's predominant sentiment, from first to last, was a deep devotion to the cause
of human liberty – a strong sympathy with the oppressed everywhere, and an ardent wish for
their elevation. With him, this was a primary and all controlling passion. Subsidiary to this was
the conduct of his whole life. He loved his country partly because it was his own country, but
mostly because it was a free country; and he burned with a zeal for its advancement, prosperity
and glory, because he saw in such, the advancement, prosperity and glory, of human liberty,
human right and human nature. He desired the prosperity of his countrymen partly because they
were his countrymen, but chiefly to show to the world that freemen could be prosperous.”
 -The great thing about Clay is not just that he loved America (due to it being his own
country), but that there was something great about America for him to love. Clay saw
something about the nature of liberty in the United States, even in a country that still
recognized the institution of slavery, the legality of it. As a slaveowner, Clay recognized
that the practice of slavery was contrary to why the nation existed: human liberty, human
right, and human nature
Even the Democrats recognized the greatness of Henry Clay. Stephen A. Douglas
had been trying to don the mantle of Henry Clay for the past 2 years as a great
Unionizer, or preserver of Union
-pg.274: “He did not perceive, that on a question of human right, the negroes were to be excepted
from the human race. And yet Mr. Clay was the owner of slaves. Cast into life where slavery was
already widely spread and deeply seated, he did not perceive, as I think no wise man has
perceived, how it could be at once eradicated, without producing a greater evil, even to the cause
of human liberty itself. His feeling and his judgment, therefore, ever led him to oppose both
extremes of opinion on the subject. Those who would shiver into fragments the Union of these
States; tear to tatters its now venerated constitution; and even burn the last copy of the Bible,
rather than slavery should continue a single hour, together with all their more halting
sympathisers, have received, and are receiving their just execration; and the name, and opinions,
and influence of Mr. Clay, are fully, and, as I trust, effectually and enduringly, arrayed against
them.”
-After Clay’s death, many politicians would claim to be moderates, and they would paint
Lincoln as an extremist (Douglas does this during the Lincoln-Douglas Debates).
Douglas claimed that, as a moderate, he could chart the course between the extremists in
the South & the abolitionists
-pg.274: “The very earliest, and one of the latest public efforts of his life, separated by a
period of more than fifty years, were both made in favor of gradual emancipation of the
slaves in Kentucky.”
-Early on in his political career, Clay tried to get the Kentucky State legislature to
pass a law for gradual emancipation, but even he couldn’t get it passed
*Both William Lloyd Garrison & Frederick Douglass were immediatists: they
both believed that slavery was so bad that it needs to be gotten rid of immediately
(JQA: “Let justice be done though the heavens fall”). Lincoln thought that the
way that slavery could be abolished peacefully was gradual. He wishes that it
could be abolished overnight, but he does view it as possible. The only way to get
the Southerners to do the right thing (abolition) is for them to do it over time, in a
way that they themselves do not feel vulnerable to retaliation by a people who
would have every right to retaliate & take vengeance against them
-pg.274: “But I would also, if I could, array his name, opinions, and influence against the
opposite extreme – against a few, but an increasing number of men, who, for the sake of
perpetuating slavery, are beginning to assail and to ridicule the white man's charter of freedom –
the declaration that ‘all men are created free and equal.’ So far as I have learned, the first
American, of any note, to do or attempt this, was the late John C. Calhoun; and if I mistake not,
it soon after found its way into some of the messages of the Governors of South Carolina.”
-Lincoln & Clay chart a course for the nation between extremists like John C. Calhoun,
who thought that slavery was not just good for whites, but also for the enslaved; the other
extremists are those who are so in favor of emancipation that they’re not interested in
consent—they’re not interested in doing it legally, constitutionally, and politically
(although, Douglass might be interested in pursuing that). Garrison is in favor of the
North separating from the South so that we don’t have the taint of slavery on our hands
-pg.274: “His feeling and his judgment, therefore, ever led him to oppose both extremes
of opinion on the subject. Those who would shiver into fragments the Union of these
States; tear to tatters its now venerated constitution; and even burn the last copy of the
Bible, rather than slavery should continue a single hour.”
-Lincoln condemning Garrison
-pg.274: “But I would also, if I could, array his name, opinions, and influence against the
opposite extreme – against a few, but an increasing number of men, who, for the sake of
perpetuating slavery, are beginning to assail and to ridicule the white man’s charter of
freedom – the declaration that ‘all men are created free and equal.’”
-These “increasing number of men” are the slaveowners, who need to be open to
incentives & inducement to do the right thing. But in reaction to the abolitionists,
they’re digging in their heels even further. They’re entrenching slavery to an
extent that it will make it even harder for them to get rid of it
*These “increasing number of men” are reinterpreting the Declaration in order to
justify slavery: nobody at the time of the Founding thought that enslaving
Africans was justified. It used to be just a few people (ex. Calhoun) who said that
the Declaration only applied to white people. In 1776 at the time of the Founding,
nobody said that. But in 1852, people are beginning to reinterpret the Declaration,
cuz the original meaning of the Declaration condemns slavery—the principle of
freedom was not a racial principle, but a human principle. Even Clay recognized
that his own freedom was not due to the whiteness of his skin, but due to his
humanity—that was the only legitimate ground upon which he was free. If he
(Clay), or anyone else on American soil thought that the reason why they
deserved to be free was due to their race, Lincoln would say that they did not
understand the Declaration. Our justification to England was that all men are
created equal. Yes, at the time of the Revolution only white men were free, but
over time, their commitment had to be to a country that would free everybody,
precisely cuz that was every person’s birthright
*The people who want to perpetuate slavery—the men who don’t want to give it
up—those people who still honor the Constitution are now being forced to
interpret it the way that Calhoun does (Stephen Douglas & Roger b. Taney will
also make this argument). That is a completely different interpretation than how
the Founders intended it. All of Jefferson’s writings claimed that even though he
had the legal right to own slaves, he did not think that he had the natural right to
do so. If they were to revolt against him, they would be justified in their rebellion.
He would fight to defend his life, cuz every animate creatures strives to preserve
itself, but that would be an argument of self-preservation, not an argument for
justice. Yes, it is just cuz you have a right to defend yourself, but in the case of
slaves taking vengeance against their masters, the masters would not be right to
defend themselves—they are defending themselves, but at the same time they are
defending the right to continue to enslave their fellow human beings, but there is
no right to enslave others
-pg.276: “If they would repress all tendencies towards liberty, and ultimate emancipation, they
must do more than put down the benevolent efforts of this society. They must go back to the era
of our liberty and independence, and muzzle the cannon which thunders its annual joyous return.
They must renew the slave trade with all its train of atrocities. They must suppress the workings
of British philanthropy, seeking to meliorate the condition of the unfortunate West Indian slave.
They must arrest the career of South American deliverance from thraldom. They must blow out
the moral lights around us, and extinguish that greatest torch of all which America presents to a
benighted world – pointing the way to their rights, their liberties, and their happiness. And when
they have achieved all those purposes their work will be yet incomplete. They must penetrate the
human soul, and eradicate the light of reason, and the love of liberty. Then, and not till then,
when universal darkness and despair prevail, can you perpetuate slavery, and repress all
sympathy, and all humane, and benevolent efforts among free men, in behalf of the unhappy
portion of our race doomed to bondage.”
-America points the world toward their rights, their liberties, and their happiness. We’re
an example of self-gov’t to the world, based on the principle of humanity, not race. If that
was not the case (and the Declaration only applied to white people, as Calhoun preached),
then we couldn’t point the way to the world, cuz the world is multiracial. In order to
make the institution of slavery permanent, the slaveowners “must penetrate the human
soul, and eradicate the light of reason, and the love of liberty. Then, and not till then,
when universal darkness and despair prevail, can you perpetuate slavery, and repress all
sympathy, and all humane, and benevolent efforts among free men, in behalf of the
unhappy portion of our race doomed to bondage.” Freedom is the birthright of every
human being, and that is what America is teaching the world. And we’re having a harder
time doing so when more and more Americans (principally in the South) are changing
their minds about the Declaration, and now reading it in order to support & perpetuate
slavery, interpreting it as only being applicable to white people—something that
Jefferson & the Second Continental Congress couldn’t possibly have meant. That’s
what’s is becoming corrupt in Lincoln’s mind with people’s interpretation of the
Declaration
*Lincoln will criticize Stephen Douglas for doing it in 1854 (for saying that the
Declaration applied only to white people in both principle & practice), he
criticized the Compromise of 1850 measures in 1850, and he will criticize Roger
B. Taney for doing it in 1857 with the Dred Scott decision

Session 4B: The Mexican War

Lincoln, “Speech in the U.S. House of Representatives on the War with Mexico” (January 12,
1848)
-Lincoln was a Congressman from 1847-1849. When he entered office, the Mexican War was
basically over, but we still had troops in the field
-Lincoln got the reputation as “Spotty Lincoln,” cuz he kept saying that Polk needed to show us
the spot when blood was supposedly spilled that started the war, knowing that Polk couldn’t do
that. Polk’s decision to declare war was spurious, and in Lincoln’s mind, it was unconstitutional
—it wasn’t truly a war of self-defense
*Lincoln only served a single term in Congress, cuz the Whigs in his congressional district had
agreed to rotate among themselves & each only serve for a single term—he did not intend to run
for re-election
-pg.209: “The extent of our territory in that region depended, not on any treaty-fixed boundary
(for no treaty had attempted it) but on revolution. Any people anywhere, being inclined and
having the power, have the right to rise up, and shake off the existing government, and form a
new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable,—most sacred right—a right, which we
hope and believe, is to liberate the world. Nor is this right confined to cases in which the whole
people of an existing government, may choose to exercise it. Any portion of such people that
can, may revolutionize, and make their own, of so much of the territory as they inhabit. More
than this, a majority of any portion of such people may revolutionize, putting down a minority,
intermingled with, or near about them, who may oppose their movement.”
-In 1848, we are the only republic that stands on the principles of the Declaration—the
right of revolution for a people to free itself from tyranny. Lincoln thinks that if we
continue to succeed as a republic, the we are the only example for others around the
world to follow; that greatest torch of all which America presents to a benighted world—
pointing the way to their rights, their liberties, and their happiness. The right of
revolution is the key to universal emancipation, but it is not one that we can do for others
—they have to do it in the same way that we did it for ourselves
9/24/18
Session 5: The 1850 Compromise Measures and the Future of Slavery

Compromise Measures of 1850 (September 1850)

-With the Missouri Compromise, once Maine & Missouri both were admitted as States into the
Union, the Southerners maintained parity in the Senate to veto any national anti-slavery
measures from the North. The example is the Wilmot Proviso: it passed in the House but was
defeated in the Senate
-Plantation-style slavery wouldn’t be effective in places such as Utah & New Mexico, but most
people who owned slaves didn’t own plantations. The institution of slavery could be applied to a
whole diversity of industries (ex. mining)

John C. Calhoun, “Speech Against Henry Clay’s Compromise Measures” (March 4, 1850)
-pg.182: “There is another lying back of it—with which this is intimately connected—that may
be regarded as the great and primary cause. This is to be found in the fact that the equilibrium
between the two sections in the government as it stood when the Constitution was ratified and
the government put in action has been destroyed. At that time there was nearly a perfect
equilibrium between the two, which afforded ample means to each to protect itself against the
aggression of the other; but, as it now stands, one section has the exclusive power of controlling
the government, which leaves the other without any adequate means of protecting itself against
its encroachment and oppression. The result of the whole is to give the Northern section a
predominance in every department of the government, and thereby concentrate in it the two
elements which constitute the federal government: a majority of States, and a majority of their
population, estimated in federal numbers. Whatever section concentrates the two in itself
possesses the control of the entire government.”
*Dr. Morel: Calhoun says that the South demands justice, cuz as the Southerners viewed
the gov’t it should be more of a league (confederation) than a republic (a real gov’t—a
gov’t proper)
-pg.183: “The census is to be taken this year, which must add greatly to the decided
preponderance of the North in the House of Representatives and in the Electoral College. The
prospect is, also, that a great increase will be added to its present preponderance in the Senate,
during the period of the decade, by the addition of new States. Two Territories, Oregon and
Minnesota, are already in progress, and strenuous efforts are making to bring in three additional
States from the Territory recently conquered from Mexico; which, if successful, will add three
other States in a short time to the Northern section, making five States, and increasing the present
number of its States from fifteen to twenty, and of its senators from thirty to forty. On the
contrary, there is not a single Territory in progress in the Southern section, and no certainty that
any additional State will be added to it during the decade. The prospect then is, that the two
sections in the Senate, should the efforts now made to exclude the South from the newly
acquired Territories succeed, will stand, before the end of the decade, twenty Northern States to
fourteen Southern (considering Delaware as neutral), and forty Northern senators to twenty-eight
Southern. This great increase of senators, added to the great increase of members of the House of
Representatives and the Electoral College on the part of the North, which must take place under
the next decade, will effectually and irretrievably destroy the equilibrium which existed when the
government commenced. Had this destruction been the operation of time without the interference
of government, the South would have had no reason to complain; but such was not the fact. It
was caused by the legislation of this government, which was appointed as the common agent of
all and charged with the protection of the interests and security of all.”
-pg.183: “The legislation by which it has been effected may be classed under three heads: The
first is that series of acts by which the South has been excluded from the common territory
belonging to all the States as members of the federal Union--which have had the effect of
extending vastly the portion allotted to the Northern section, and restricting within narrow limits
the portion left the South. The next consists in adopting a system of revenue and disbursements
by which an undue proportion of the burden of taxation has been imposed upon the South, and an
undue proportion of its proceeds appropriated to the North. And the last is a system of political
measures by which the original character of the government has been radically changed. I
propose to bestow upon each of these, in the order they stand, a few remarks, with the view of
showing that it is owing to the action of this government that the equilibrium between the two
sections has been destroyed, and the whole powers of the system centered in a sectional majority.
I have not included the territory recently acquired by the treaty with Mexico. The North is
making the most strenuous efforts to appropriate the whole to herself, by excluding the South
from every foot of it. If she should succeed, it will add to that from which the South has already
been excluded 526,078 square miles, and would increase the whole which the North has
appropriated to herself to 1,764,023, not including the portion that she may succeed in excluding
us from in Texas. To sum up the whole, the United States, since they declared their
independence, have acquired 2,373,046 square miles of territory, from which the North will have
excluded the South, if she should succeed in monopolizing the newly-acquired Territories, about
three- fourths of the whole, leaving to the South but about one-fourth. Such is the first and great
cause that has destroyed the equilibrium between the two sections in the government.”
-pg.185: “Those less opposed and hostile regard it as a crime--an offense against humanity, as
they call it and, altho not so fanatical, feel themselves bound to use all efforts to effect the same
object; while those who are least opposed and hostile regard it as a blot and a stain on the
character of what they call the "nation," and feel themselves accordingly bound to give it no
countenance or support. On the contrary, the Southern section regards the relation as one which
can not be destroyed without subjecting the two races to the greatest calamity, and the section to
poverty, desolation, and wretchedness; and accordingly they feel bound by every consideration
of interest and safety to defend it.”
*Dr. Morel: the South sees the country as 2 separate entities that can continue to coexist.
In 1837, Calhoun said that the abolitionists were a fringe element in the North, but we
can’t write them off. They are going to snowball, and when they do, even a constitution
isn’t going to prevent them from getting their way. We need to stop them now. That’s
why he was so adamant in “Slavery, a Positive Good” to not let abolition petitions be
read on the House or Senate floor. We’re getting along for right now, but if we (the
South) allow this abolitionist sentiment to grow, then we will split & become 2 countries.
Aristotle referred to a split such as this as faction, and after faction comes revolution. But
in 1860, the South didn’t exercise the right of revolution—they exercised their so-called
right to secession. What Calhoun predicted in 1837 seems to be coming to pass in 1850:
the sections are solidifying, and they’re solidifying especially over slavery
-pg.187: “The North has only to will it to accomplish it--to do justice by conceding to the South
an equal right in the acquired territory, and to do her duty by causing the stipulations relative to
fugitive slaves to be faithfully fulfilled—to cease the agitation of the slave question, and to
provide for the insertion of a provision in the Constitution, by an amendment, which will restore
to the South, in substance, the power she possessed of protecting herself before the equilibrium
between the sections was destroyed by the action of this government. There will be no difficulty
in devising such a provision—one that will protect the South, and which at the same time will
improve and strengthen the government instead of impairing and weakening it.”
*Dr. Morel: Calhoun is advocating for a concurrent majority in Congress, so that the
South can protect its interests. Whenever Calhoun or the Southerners use the word
“agitation,” they are talking about the abolitionists. In his last SOTU address in 1860,
Buchanan blamed the coming Civil War on the abolitionists. It’s amazing how much
power the South attributes to the abolitionists, considering how they are looked down
upon by other Northerners. They’re an unpopular minority, even in the North. They’re
mobbed & even lynched. In 1837 (and even in 1850), apart from the abolitionists, it is the
common understanding that the Constitution does not empower congress to abolish
slavery where it already exists. However, if the abolitionist movement isn’t snuffed out,
then Calhoun believes that their ideology will take root in the North, that it will infect
Northern Congressmen, and that it will become the majority ideology over time. It will
become irresistible, and not even the Constitution will be able to save slavery. In 1850,
Calhoun said that it would either be abolition or secession. Words would fail with the
abolitionists; the peaceful process of politics would not convince them

Henry Clay, “General Review of the Debate on the Compromise Bills” (July 22, 1850)
*Dr. Morel: William Lloyd Garrison was so bothered by Union with slavery that he wanted the
South & the North to split so that the Union would no longer be tainted by the stain of slavery.
We’re better off without them, and then let them try & get their fugitive slaves back. Ha! We
won’t be responsible at that point to return their fugitive slaves to them. Very few people were in
that camp. Most people saw disunion as leading to war. This doesn’t go away over the next
decade, and it comes to the forefront in the Election of 1856 when the GOP loses to Buchanan,
but they still perform very well
*Dr. Morel: States’ rights is not an end. States don’t exist to exercise their prerogative. You
exercise prerogative for a particular end. When somebody says that the Civil War was about
States’ rights and not slavery, one tactic you can employ is to agree with them, and then ask why
States’ rights was so important to them. States’ rights were a means to an end. They were so vital
that the South needed it in order to secure an end, which they would be unable to secure/protect
through the ordinary process of the federal gov’t

Stephen Douglas, “The Measures of Adjustment” (October 23, 1850)

-pg.2: “These measures are predicated on the great fundamental principle that every people ought
to possess the right of forming and regulating their own internal concerns and institutions in their
own way…To question their competency to do this, was to deny their capacity for self-
government. If they have the requisite intelligence and honesty to be intrusted with the
enactment of laws for the government of white men, I know of no reason why they should not be
deemed competent to legislate for the negro.”
*Dr. Morel: Douglas believed that there was a racial hierarchy in the world with whites
on the top. Not only were blacks an inferior race, but all non-white races were inferior.
He was a white supremacist, and that was as American as voting & apple pie. Douglas is
consistent is asserting the right of popular sovereignty, and that’s what loses him the
support of the South in 1860. The Democrats split in 1860 cuz Douglas didn’t receive 2/3
 of the vote at the convention, cuz he wouldn’t grant them a federal statue to guarantee
them protection for their slaves in the Territories
*Dr. Morel: it’s always good to have history on your side. In our society today, if you say that
something is new, it’s implied that it’s improved—it’s better than the thing we released last year.
The older way of thinking is that the old is tried & tested, so let’s not change it. The onus is on
the innovator to do things a different way. In 1858, Douglas claimed that Lincoln was the
innovator, which puts the burden on Lincoln to explain why his way is better than Douglas’ tried
& true way
*Dr. Morel: this is the most detailed defense of the Fugitive Slave Act (1850)
-pg.22: Prigg v. Pennsylvania (1842). We couldn’t get the Constitution unless there had been a
Fugitive Slave Act included, and the North hoped that they wouldn’t have to live with it for long,
since the Founders assumed that slavery would die out soon (this assumption was made before
the invention of the cotton gin). The act should be written in a way so that innocent blacks are
protected & the guilty aren’t. Neither the 1793 nor the 1850 are written in that way. The original
1793 act tells you what must be done in the case of a fugitive slave, but not how it must be done.
The Constitution doesn’t say that the States have to do one thing. If a criminal escapes from
Tennessee to Virginia, Virginia helps catch & extradite the criminal back to Tennessee because
of reciprocity (comity). That gives everyone the protection & punishment of the law. The
difference is that with fugitive slaves, there is no comity with Free States. The North doesn’t like
that the South is practicing slavery, so they don’t want to return fugitive slaves. The ruling in
Priggs is that since the Fugitive Slave Act (1793) is a federal law, State governments are not
responsible to help enforce it
-pg.24: “[Here a gentleman rose, and inquired of Mr. Douglas, whether the clause in the
Constitution providing for the surrender of fugitive slaves was not in violation of the law of
God?] Mr. Douglas in reply—The divine law is appealed to as authority for disregarding our
most sacred duties to society. The city council have appealed to it, as their excuse for nullifying
an act of Congress; and a committee embodied the same principle in their resolutions to the
meeting in this hall last night, as applicable both to the Constitution and laws. The general
proposition that there is a law paramount to all human enactments—the law of the Supreme
Ruler of the Universe—I trust that no civilized and Christian people is prepared to question,
much less deny. We should all recognise, respect, and revere the divine law. But we should bear
in mind that the law of God, as revealed to is, is intended to operate on our consciences, and
insure the performance of our duties as individuals and Christians. The divine law does not
prescribe the form of government under which we shall live, and the character of our political
and civil institutions. Revelation has not furnished us with a constitution—a code of international
law—and a system of civil and municipal jurisprudence. It has not determined the right of
personas and property—much less the peculiar privileges which shall be awarded to each class of
persons under any particular form of government. God has created man in his own image, and
endowed him with the right of self-government, so soon as he shall evince the requisite
intelligence, virtue, and capacity to assert and enjoy the privilege.”
-pg.26: “If the Constitution of the United States is to be repudiated upon the ground that it is
repugnant to the divine law, where are the friends of freedom and Christianity to look for another
and a better? Who is to be the prophet to reveal the will of God and establish a Theocracy for
us?”
*Dr. Morel: read the Thornwell article (“A Southern Christian View of Slavery”)
10/1/18
Session 6A: The 1854 Kansas-Nebraska Act
-Popular Sovereignty (local popular sovereignty)—Congressional Non-Interference (or
congressional non-intervention). Douglas wanted Congress to stop interfering with slavery in the
Territories, and instead leave the matter to the people (the white people) who lived there
-The Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854) was the beginning of the split in the Democratic Party, cuz
this is a violation of the national trust & the good faith of the parties that accomplished a
compromise that had been on the books for over 30 years

Stephen Douglas, “Nebraska Territory” (January 30, 1854)

*Same language as the clauses in the Compromise of 1850 that organized the Utah & New
Mexico territories under the principle of popular sovereignty
*Dr. Morel: as far as precedence goes, it’s better to cite something older rather than newer.
However, Douglas is going to claim that popular sovereignty goes back to the 13 Colonies

Lincoln, Peoria Speech (October 16, 1854)

-Lincoln believed that slavery should be allowed to continue where it already exists, and that it
would gradually die out. But he was against slavery spreading beyond where it already existed
*The only thing needed for slavery to expand is for the white Northerners to be indifferent about
the matter and not care; slavery will expand if the existing Northern States do nothing to prevent
it; if the matter is left to popular sovereignty, it will spread if no one makes an argument against
it. It will be determined by self-interest
*Protect the rights of minorities; protect the common welfare. Don’t let it turn into a
tyranny of the majority
-We have no excuse to allow slavery to expand into the Mexican Cession or even into Kansas &
Nebraska. The Founders tried to do something about slavery, but we (Douglas) are throwing our
hands up and not caring about it
-Restore the Missouri Compromise—the spirit of compromise will be gone if we undo
everything
-Speeches of Lincoln pg.314, “sacred right”
-pg.315 let slavery rest (die) in peace

Session 6B: The 1857 Dred Scott Case and Lincoln’s Response

Dred Scott v. Sandford (March 6, 1857)

*This case makes 2 fundamental rulings: as a black man (non-citizen), Dred Scott never had
standing to sue, so the Circuit Court never should have heard his case in the first place;
-Dred Scott’s case makes its way to the SCOTUS cuz it’s a diversity case. Sanford held legal
ownership over Dred Scott, and he lived in New York while Dred Scott resided in Missouri.
Diversity on the basis on State residence. Cuz it’s people from different States suing each other,
they each want the case tried in their own respective State, so that’s where the federal court steps
in so that justice will be served; more impartial
*Within a month of the case being decided against Dred Scott, he was granted his
freedom, after which he died on September 17, 1858
*The State courts of the South ruled that if a slave was taken North to a Free State by his master
and then returned to the South, those courts considered that action a de facto manumission. That
was the case in Missouri until Dred Scott came about. The South followed the doctrine of ‘once
free, always free.’ If that happened, the slave was now treated as a free person (not a free citizen,
but a free person). The idea was to discourage slaveowners from taking their slaves to the North,
cuz in the North they would see & taste freedom, and the South didn’t want that infection
coming back and tainting the enslaved blacks with the news of what it’s like to live in a place
that is free; a disincentive to masters
*Because of this, it was a shock that Dred Scott was handled the way it was, since he had resided
in both the Free State of Illinois & the Free Territory of Minnesota. When he returned, he
returned having been civilly married & he had a child. Dred Scott’s owner allowing him to be
civilly married in a Free Territory was a de facto act of manumission, so it’s unclear why Dred
Scott & his family returned with the master to Missouri
-Dred Scott dissenters: Benjamin Curtis, John McLean; Curtis’ is quoted a lot by Lincoln. Curtis
quit the Court after Dred Scott
-Dr. Morel: “I’m persuaded that Curtis quit the Court because he thought Taney was no
longer somebody he could work with, especially as a result of their actions in this
particular case”
-Dred Scott did not have standing for the SCOTUS to hear the case, because he was not a citizen
-Taney’s opinion CP pg.231: “They had for more than a century…” Instead of deciding the case
based on what his contemporaries thought, Taney went back to the Declaration & the
Constitution. The Constitution was the most important to Taney. These two documents will tell
us whether or not blacks were considered to be citizens at the time of the Founding
-pg.231: according to the Constitution (Importation Clause & Fugitive Slave Clause), the
understanding of the Founders was that this class of individuals (blacks) was “so far inferior that
they had no rights that the white man was bound to respect, and that the negro might justly and
lawfully be reduced to slavery for his benefit”; he’s channeling the muse of Calhoun. By
examining the Declaration & the Constitution, Taney wanted to know the minds of the Founders.
And for a constitution that protected rights, do they think that the blacks had rights that the white
man was bound to respect?
-Dual federalism: though Dred Scott had been taken to the Free State of Illinois, Taney declared
that Illinois’ personal liberty laws couldn’t free him
-Taney: in the Declaration, the Founders believed that all didn’t mean all. Because the Founders
didn’t free all of their slaves, they couldn’t have believed that “all men are created equal” meant
all men
-Taney focused on Dred Scott not being able to sue because he was black; he never mentioned
that he was a slave. The Circuit Court should’ve thrown out the case because Dred Scott did not
have standing
-Taney believed that Congress did not have authority to ban slavery in the Territories; the
Republican Party believed that Congress did have the authority to regulate slavery in the
Territories
*Taney read every single word of his opinion in court, which took forever. After the dissenting
opinions were given the next day, Taney held onto his opinion & didn’t share it with any of the
other Justices (which went against SCOTUS norms of sharing opinions with the other Justices).
After the dissenting opinions were published, Taney added 14-16 pages to his majority opinion,
where he addressed some of dissenting opinions. However, he did not address the most telling
dissent
-June 1862, Congress banned slavery in all the remaining federal Territories

The Dred Scott Decision: Speech at Springfield, Illinois (June 26, 1857)
-Lincoln’s response to Dred Scott: on July 4, 1776, nobody’s rights were being
protected/secured, cuz the Colonies were at war with Britain. There’s a difference between
declaring rights and actually being able to enforce those rights
10/8/18
Session 7A: The 1858 Lincoln-Douglas Debates
Lincoln, “House Divided” Speech (June 16, 1858)
-Basler pg.360-362
-pg.379: with Dred Scott, slaveholders are allowed to bring slaves into Free States because
they’re property
-pg.378: if people in Free States acquiesce to Dred Scott, since Congress can’t interfere with
slavery in the Territories, the only thing that can stop it is the Constitution. But then a case will
come along that prohibits the Free States from banning slavery within their own boundaries.
Dred Scott will become the precedent to allow for slavery to be legalized in the Free States, thus
turning the country into All Slave, which is the opposite of what the Founders wanted, which
was All Free
-Lemmon Slave Case (1860)
*The Crisis of the House Divided is precisely this: the country right now is divided into Free
States and Slave States, and if you’re divided, you’re soon to be conquered, whether internally or
externally, and the nation is trending in one direction or the other. And based off what Lincoln
sees, the nation is trending towards All Slave. In order to prevent the house from falling,
Americans are going to go one way or the other. Unlike Douglas (and Calhoun), who claims that
we can coexist as Free States and Slave States—so long as those berserker abolitionists don’t get
in charge—Lincoln believes that the house will become either All Free or All Slave. And he
believes that there’s a conspiracy among the Democrats to make the house All Slave
-pg.377: “We cannot absolutely know that all these exact adaptations are the result of
preconcert. But when we see a lot of framed timbers, different portions of which we
know have been gotten out at different times and places and by different workmen–
Stephen, Franklin, Roger and James, for instance–and when we see these timbers joined
together, and see they exactly make the frame of a house or a mill, all the tenons and
mortices exactly fitting, and all the lengths and proportions of the different pieces exactly
adapted to their respective places, and not a piece too many or too few–not omitting even
scaffolding–or, if a single piece be lacking, we see the place in the frame exactly fitted
and prepared yet to bring such a piece in–in such a case, we find it impossible not to
believe that Stephen and Franklin and Roger and James all understood one another from
the beginning, and all worked upon a common plan or draft drawn up before the first
blow was struck.”
-We know that Douglas & Buchanan aren’t going to conspire together based off
their differences regarding the Lecompton Constitution
*Lincoln knows that even if there’s not preconcert between the four, it’s more
than a coincidence that these key decisions are all pointing in the same direction
—all of them are contributing towards a slaveholding republic. Even if there’s not
preconcert, all the pieces fit together, meaning that the four mean to take slavery
everywhere
*It’s interesting that Lincoln includes Douglas, since his doctrine of popular sovereignty allows
the local population to decide for themselves. So how does Lincoln loop him in with the other 3?
Douglas isn’t making any argument based on principle to prevent slavery from spreading. He is
against Congress getting involved in the slavery issue in the Territories, so he can’t possibly be
the Republicans’ man
 *In 1858, Northeastern Republicans, particularly in New York, were thinking about
nominating Douglas to be the GOP candidate for the Election of 1860, due to his stance
against Buchanan & the Lecompton Constitution
-pg.379: “They remind us that he is a great man, and that the largest of us are very small
ones. Let this be granted. But ‘a living dog is better than a dead lion.’ Judge Douglas, if
not a dead lion, for this work, is at least a caged and toothless one. How can he oppose
the advances of slavery? He don’t care anything about it. His avowed mission is
impressing the ‘public heart’ to care nothing about it.”
*Douglas’ popular sovereignty is conducive to the spread of slavery. Cuz in order
for it to spread, there just has to be no argument made against it. All you have to
do is teach white people in the Free States not to care if the expansion of black
slavery occurs elsewhere. As long as that’s allowed to happen, that’s all that
needs to happen in order for slavery to become national. And that’s why Douglas
is one of the horsemen. He may claim that he’s all in for local popular
sovereignty, but that’s actually facilitating the spread of slavery

-Lincoln’s Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse: Stephen Douglas (Kansas-Nebraska Act),

Franklin Pierce (signed the Kansas-Nebraska Act), Roger Taney (Dred Scott decision), and
James Buchanan (supported Lecompton Constitution) (pg.377)
-Douglas believed that what prevented slavery in the Northwest Territory wasn’t the arm of the
federal government, but that it was rather the local people who prevented its introduction into
their midst—Douglas sided with the Kansas-Nebraska Act over Dred Scott (Freeport Doctrine)

Debate at Ottawa (August 21, 1858)

*The debate is happening in the Free State of Illinois, but Lincoln makes the national issue of
slavery THE issue of his campaign
*Douglas was lumping Lincoln in with a bunch of local Republicans, who were doing things that
were closer to being abolitionists than what Lincoln was in line with, so Lincoln disavowed it
-pg.432: “I want his answer to these questions. Your affirmative cheers in favor of this Abolition
platform is not satisfactory. I ask Abraham Lincoln to answer these questions, in order that when
I trot him down to lower Egypt I may put the same questions to him. (Enthusiastic applause.) My
principles are the same everywhere. (Cheers, and “hark.”) I can proclaim them alike in the North,
the South, the East, and the West. My principles will apply wherever the Constitution prevails
and the American flag waves. (“Good,” and applause.) I desire to know whether Mr. Lincoln’s
principles will bear transplanting from Ottawa to Jonesboro? I put these questions to him to-day
distinctly, and ask an answer. I have a right to an answer (“that’s so,” “he can’t dodge you,” etc.),
for I quote from the platform of the Republican party, made by himself and others at the time
that party was formed, and the bargain made by Lincoln to dissolve and kill the old Whig party,
and transfer its members, bound hand and foot, to the Abolition party, under the direction of
Giddings and Fred Douglass.”
-This debate was held in northern Illinois, so it was an area more favorable to the
Republicans. Douglas countered this by calling the GOP an abolitionist party (the Black
Republican Party)
-Douglas says that he’s going to “trot [Lincoln] down to lower Egypt,” which is a
reference to Cairo, Illinois. Lincoln’s principles will change depending on where he is,
 but Douglas claims that his won’t. Popular sovereignty works everywhere, cuz you just
let the people do what they want
*Douglas said North, South, East, and West, cuz he was thinking about a
presidential run in 1860. He knew that transcripts of the debates were going to be
printed, so he was trying to show that what was good for Illinois was good for all
of the States & Territories. He wasn’t telling people how to vote—he was only
fighting for their right to vote. He was against the Lecompton Constitution cuz it
wasn’t a fair vote—the vote had been boycotted by most of the citizens, so it
wasn’t an accurate portrayal of what Kansans believed—but Buchanan was going
to approve it anyways
*Lincoln was the uniformity candidate: he was going to press a particular opinion
about slavery everywhere, regardless of what people think. But by debating
Lincoln from Ottawa all the way to Jonesboro, Douglas claimed that Lincoln was
gonna have to change his stance on the banning slavery in the Territories when
they debated in southern Illinois (Jonesboro), which bordered Slave States

Debate at Freeport (August 27, 1858)

*Douglas had previously expressed his support for popular sovereignty over Dred Scott, but
Lincoln forced him to repeat it now when everyone was paying attention
-“The next question propounded to me by Mr. Lincoln is, can the people of a Territory in
any lawful way, against the wishes of any citizen of the United States, exclude slavery
from their limits prior to the formation of a State Constitution? I answer emphatically, as
Mr. Lincoln has heard me answer a hundred times from every stump in Illinois, that in
my opinion the people of a Territory can, by lawful means, exclude slavery from their
limits prior to the formation of a State Constitution. Mr. Lincoln knew that I had
answered that question over and over again. He heard me argue the Nebraska bill on that
principle all over the State in 1854, in 1855, and in 1856, and he has no excuse for
pretending to be in doubt as to my position on that question. It matters not what way the
Supreme Court may hereafter decide as to the abstract question whether slavery may or
may not go into a Territory under the Constitution, the people have the lawful means to
introduce it or exclude it as they please, for the reason that slavery cannot exist a day or
an hour anywhere, unless it is supported by local police regulations. (Right, right.) Those
police regulations can only be established by the local legislature, and if the people are
opposed to slavery they will elect representatives to that body who will by unfriendly
legislation effectually prevent the introduction of it into their midst. If, on the contrary,
they are for it, their legislation will favor its extension. Hence, no matter what the
decision of the Supreme Court may be on that abstract question, still the right of the
people to make a slave Territory or a free Territory is perfect and complete under the
Nebraska bill. I hope Mr. Lincoln deems my answer satisfactory on that point.”
*Douglas did agree with Taney’s decision in Dred Scott, but he still is in favor of popular
sovereignty. Douglas had stated previously that Congress had outlawed slavery in the
Northwest Territories, but was it the law that kept slavery out? No, cuz the arm of the
federal gov’t doesn’t reach that far. He believed that ultimately what kept slavery out of
the Northwest Territory was the people
-“It matters not what way the Supreme Court may hereafter decide as to the
abstract question whether slavery may or may not go into a Territory under the
 Constitution, the people have the lawful means to introduce it or exclude it as they
please, for the reason that slavery cannot exist a day or an hour anywhere, unless
it is supported by local police regulations. Those police regulations can only be
established by the local legislature, and if the people are opposed to slavery they
will elect representatives to that body who will by unfriendly legislation
effectually prevent the introduction of it into their midst. If, on the contrary, they
are for it, their legislation will favor its extension. Hence, no matter what the
decision of the Supreme Court may be on that abstract question, still the right of
the people to make a slave Territory or a free Territory is perfect and complete
under the Nebraska bill.”
*Douglas put all of his eggs in the popular sovereignty basket, and this is
what doomed his chances for the Democratic nomination in 1860. This is
what produces the split in the Democratic Party

Debate at Alton (October 15, 1858)

*Douglas has been claiming this whole time that Lincoln is a Black Republican, equating him to
an abolitionist, which is death in the Free States, since the abolitionists were a fringe movement.
But Lincoln turned Douglas’ own argument against him, and made it seem that Douglas was
more of an abolitionist than he was, which is ironic, cuz the Republicans want to get rid of
slavery and Douglas’ opinion is that he doesn’t care
-“The first thing I ask attention to is the fact that Judge Douglas constantly said, before the
decision, that whether they could or not, was a question for the Supreme Court. But after the
court has made the decision he virtually says it is not a question for the Supreme Court, but for
the people. And how is it he tells us they can exclude it? He says it needs “police regulations,”
and that admits of “unfriendly legislation.” Although it is a right established by the Constitution
of the United States to take a slave into a Territory of the United States and hold him as property,
yet unless the Territorial Legislature will give friendly legislation, and, more especially, if they
adopt unfriendly legislation, they can practically exclude him.”
-Some Northern States had passed personal liberty laws, which went against the
Constitution, cuz it allowed the States to ignore federal legislation (Fugitive Slave Act
(1820)). A reason why a lot of people didn’t like the abolitionists was cuz they advocated
for ignoring the Fugitive Slave Act (1850), which was set forth in the original
Constitution. But isn’t that what Douglas is preaching right now? Under the Dred Scott
decision, slaveowners believe that they have every right to take their slaves into the
Territories, but Douglas is saying that territorial legislatures can pass anti-slavery laws,
and then nobody will try to come with their slaves. In principle, there is no difference
between Douglas’ popular sovereignty and a personal liberty law
-“I defy anybody to go before a body of men whose minds are educated to
estimating evidence and reasoning, and show that there is an iota of difference
between the Constitutional right to reclaim a fugitive, and the Constitutional right
to hold a slave, in a Territory, provided this Dred Scott decision is correct. I defy
any man to make an argument that will justify unfriendly legislation to deprive a
slaveholder of his right to hold his slave in a Territory, that will not equally, in all
its length, breadth and thickness, furnish an argument for nullifying the Fugitive
Slave law. Why, there is not such an Abolitionist in the nation as Douglas, after
all.”
 *If you buy Douglas’ argument at Freeport, there is no difference between
that and the North’s arguments for nullifying the Fugitive Slave Act
(1850) by passing personal liberty laws

Session 7B: The 1860 Presidential Campaigns—The Democrats Split, the Republicans
Restrict, and the Constitutional Unionists…Stick Together?
*In 1859, Stephen A. Douglas was the leading candidate to be the Democratic nominee in 1860,
and he was the favorite to win the presidential election. Lincoln touches on this in his Cooper
Institute speech: the Democrats paint the GOP as being a sectional party, which they were (due
to the fact that the GOP was basically outlawed in the South). If the Democrats could just keep it
together, and peel off the electoral votes of some Free States as they did in 1856, they should be
able to win. However, Douglas did something pivotal by showing his support for popular
sovereignty over Dred Scott, which is ultimately what caused the Democrats to split in the
Election of 1860
*With Dred Scott, the Democrats wanted a commitment from Douglas ahead of time that he
would support a federal slave code—putting teeth into the bite of Dred Scott. The ruling needed
enforcement by the federal gov’t. But in the Freeport Doctrine, he had outlined that even if the
federal gov’t passes a law, it’s up to the will of the local population to help enforce it, and if the
locals don’t want slavery in their Territory, then their territorial gov’t will pass anti-slavery
legislation, regardless of if there’s a federal slave code or not. The Southern Democrats wanted
their nominee to endorse Congress passing a slave code, but Douglas said if that was the case,
then they needed to find another candidate. Which is remarkable, cuz Douglas really wanted to
be President. He had been a leading candidate in 1856, but since the Democrats required a 2/3
vote at the DNC, the nomination ultimately went to Buchanan

Stephen A. Douglas, Letter to J. B. Dorr (June 22, 1859)

-CP 240: “If, on the contrary, it shall become the policy of the Democratic party, which I cannot
anticipate, to repudiate these their time- honored principles, on which we have achieved so many
patriotic triumphs; and, in lieu of them, the Convention shall interpolate into the creed of the
party such new issues as the revival of the African slave trade, or a Congressional slave code for
the Territories, or the doctrine that the Constitution of the United States either establishes or
prohibits slavery in the Territories beyond the power of the people legally to control it as other
property—it is due to candor to say that, in such an event, I could not accept the nomination if
tendered to me.”
-Douglas is saying that he could not accept the Democratic nomination if the platform
called for an enforcement of Dred Scott (federal slave code) in the Territories. There is a
right to property under the Due Process Clause of the 5th Amendment—Taney has
spoken, but the Court can’t enforce its own edict. The enforcement of Dred Scott requires
the President to enforce the law, but Dred Scott is not a law—Congress needs to create a
statute that reflects Dred Scott (federal slave code) that the President could then enforce.
This statute won’t come from the Territories. The South is expecting it to come from
Congress. And Douglas says no. He is going to live or die on the mountain of popular
sovereignty, and Lincoln made him say it in all caps at Freeport
*The Democrats have decided that in order to win the nomination at the DNC, candidates have
to win a supermajority (2/3) of the delegates. That allows the Southern delegates to act as
something of a minority veto over any Northern Democratic push for a candidate if they can’t get
their way
*Douglas’ letter to Dorr doomed his chances of getting all the Democratic support for the
presidency—his refusal to commit to a federal slave code is what caused the party to split.
However, under Dred Scott, technically slaveowners were owed a federal slave code, since the
SCOTUS said that Congress couldn’t ban slavery in the Territories

Lincoln, Letter to Henry L. Pierce and Others (April 6, 1859)

*Dr. Morel: this letter is one of the true gems of Lincoln’s mind where we can see him actually
expound upon the meaning of the Declaration
-Basler pg.489: “Remembering too, that the Jefferson party were formed upon their supposed
superior devotion to the personal rights of men, holding the rights of property to be secondary
only, and greatly inferior, and then assuming that the so-called democracy of to-day, are the
Jefferson, and their opponents, the anti-Jefferson parties, it will be equally interesting to note
how completely the two have changed hands as to the principle upon which they were originally
supposed to be divided. The democracy of to-day hold the liberty of one man to be absolutely
nothing, when in conflict with another man's right of property. Republicans, on the contrary, are
for both the man and the dollar; but in cases of conflict, the man before the dollar.”
*There is an irony when the Republicans are doing a better job at being Jeffersonians
than the Democrats, who are Jefferson’s own party
-pg.489: “One would start with great confidence that he could convince any sane child that the
simpler propositions of Euclid are true; but, nevertheless, he would fail, utterly, with one who
should deny the definitions and axioms. The principles of Jefferson are the definitions and
axioms of free society.”
-The proofs follow from the axioms. You don’t prove the axioms—you take them as
such. If you don’t see with your mind immediately the truths of an axiom, there is
nothing that anyone can do to prove it to you. You don’t go to a lab for someone to prove
to you that all men are created equal. You’re supposed to immediately apprehend that
amidst the various human societies that there is something fundamentally the same about
everyone, and that’s where the Declaration begins. Lincoln then continues by explaining
how the truth of all men being created equal is being denied
-pg.489: “This is a world of compensations; and he who would be no slave, must consent to have
no slave. Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves; and, under a just
God, can not long retain it.”
-Jefferson: “I tremble when I think that God is just” (Notes on the State of Virginia)
-We have established our freedom on the basis of our humanity, not on the basis of race,
or sex or wealth. God appears to be sleeping for now cuz He’s not wrecking His divine
justice upon us for our enslavement of our fellow man, but it’s only a matter of time
before He does
-pg.489: “All honor to Jefferson—to the man who, in the concrete pressure of a struggle for
national independence by a single people, had the coolness, forecast, and capacity to introduce
into a merely revolutionary document, an abstract truth, applicable to all men and all times, and
so to embalm it there, that to-day, and in all coming days, it shall be a rebuke and a stumbling-
block to the very harbingers of re-appearing tyranny and oppression.”
 -The Declaration’s usefulness was not just in declaring our independence, but also for
later administrations & free populations to remind them that despotism is something we
shook off, and therefore we should strive to keep ourselves free

Lincoln, “Address at Cooper Institute” (February 27, 1860)

Basler pg.517: Part 1—Response to Douglas
*Douglas made a speech and published an article in Harper’s Magazine that his emphatic
understanding of Congress’ authority that they did not have the power to regulate slavery in the
Territories, and therefore the locals have the ability to practice popular sovereignty in their
institutions. Douglas is essentially inviting Lincoln to contest that interpretation
*Back in 1858, the Northeastern Republicans rejected Lincoln and kept Douglas in the Senate,
cuz Douglas was bucking against Buchanan for supporting the Lecompton Constitution.
Lincoln’s response to them was that a live dog is better than a dead lion. Republicans need to
back candidates who are clearly against slavery, and the first step to getting rid of it is to restrict
it from going into the Territories. Now Lincoln is back in their front yard in New York. This is
his coming out party on the national stage. He is publicly not a candidate for the GOP
nomination, but he is making sure not to burn any bridges. If the favorite son candidates from
places like Ohio and Indiana don’t win on the first ballot, he is trying to position himself as the
second guy that people can consider if their first guy is no longer in the running
*This is Lincoln’s speech to convince people why he should be the standard bearer for the
Republican Party, should that opportunity present itself
*Both Lincoln and Douglas claimed to be the inheritors of the mantle of the Founders
-Even though Dred Scott was passed 3 years ago, Lincoln still does not believe that Congress
doesn’t have the authority to regulate slavery in the Territories
-pg.519: “This shows that, in their understanding, no line dividing local from federal authority,
nor anything in the Constitution, properly forbade Congress to prohibit slavery in the federal
territory.”
-A clear majority of the Founders believed that Congress had the authority to ban slavery
in the Territories. There are those who were the original Founders who remained in
Congress after 1787, and even when issues like the Louisiana Purchase arose, the
remaining Founders unanimously voted in favor of congressional regulation of slavery in
the Territories. It never occurred to them that Congress did not possess the authority to
regulate slavery in the Territories

Basler pg.526: Part II—Response to the South

*Response to the South and their complaints about the GOP. The Democrats blame the GOP for
John Brown & inciting slave rebellions. John Brown is the fault of the Republican Party
-pg.528: “Again, you say we have made the slavery question more prominent than it formerly
was. We deny it. We admit that it is more prominent, but we deny that we made it so. It was not
we, but you, who discarded the old policy of the fathers. We resisted, and still resist, your
innovation; and thence comes the greater prominence of the question. Would you have that
question reduced to its former proportions? Go back to that old policy. What has been will be
again, under the same conditions. If you would have the peace of the old times, readopt the
precepts and policy of the old times.”
-pg.529: “True, we do, in common with "our fathers, who framed the Government under which
we live," declare our belief that slavery is wrong; but the slaves do not hear us declare even this.
For anything we say or do, the slaves would scarcely know there is a Republican party. I believe
they would not, in fact, generally know it but for your misrepresentations of us, in their hearing.
In your political contests among yourselves, each faction charges the other with sympathy with
Black Republicanism; and then, to give point to the charge, defines Black Republicanism to
simply be insurrection, blood and thunder among the slaves.”
-Abolitionist mail is censored in the South, and nobody is allowed to come and give
abolitionist sermons. The First Amendment is not enforced in the South. You could be
lynched in the South if you said anything about human equality. Reading the Declaration
aloud to highlight the Founders’ belief in human equality could get you killed
-The South knows exactly what Lincoln is talking about. Their claim that the GOP is
going to stir up slave insurrections is laughable, since the Democrats don’t allow the
GOP to exist as a party in the South
-pg.530: “Slave insurrections are no more common now than they were before the Republican
party was organized. What induced the Southampton insurrection, twenty-eight years ago, in
which, at least three times as many lives were lost as at Harper's Ferry? You can scarcely stretch
your very elastic fancy to the conclusion that Southampton was "got up by Black
Republicanism." In the present state of things in the United States, I do not think a general, or
even a very extensive slave insurrection is possible. The indispensable concert of action cannot
be attained. The slaves have no means of rapid communication; nor can incendiary freemen,
black or white, supply it. The explosive materials are everywhere in parcels; but there neither
are, nor can be supplied, the indispensable connecting trains.”
-pg.531: “In the language of Mr. Jefferson, uttered many years ago, "It is still in our power to
direct the process of emancipation, and deportation, peaceably, and in such slow degrees, as that
the evil will wear off insensibly; and their places be, pari passu, filled up by free white laborers.
If, on the contrary, it is left to force itself on, human nature must shudder at the prospect held
up." Mr. Jefferson did not mean to say, nor do I, that the power of emancipation is in the Federal
Government. He spoke of Virginia; and, as to the power of emancipation, I speak of the
slaveholding States only. The Federal Government, however, as we insist, has the power of
restraining the extension of the institution - the power to insure that a slave insurrection shall
never occur on any American soil which is now free from slavery.
-pg.531: “John Brown's effort was peculiar. It was not a slave insurrection. It was an attempt by
white men to get up a revolt among slaves, in which the slaves refused to participate. In fact, it
was so absurd that the slaves, with all their ignorance, saw plainly enough it could not succeed.
That affair, in its philosophy, corresponds with the many attempts, related in history, at the
assassination of kings and emperors. An enthusiast broods over the oppression of a people till he
fancies himself commissioned by Heaven to liberate them. He ventures the attempt, which ends
in little else than his own execution. Orsini's attempt on Louis Napoleon, and John Brown's
attempt at Harper's Ferry were, in their philosophy, precisely the same. The eagerness to cast
blame on old England in the one case, and on New England in the other, does not disprove the
sameness of the two things.”
-The South was freaked out by John Brown’s raid. Frederick Douglass did everything he
could to not be associated with it, even though he was very good friends with John
Brown and never said anything unfavorable about him. Even he thought that it was a
suicide mission
-Even the slaves could see that John Brown’s raid was going to fail. Even the dumbest
slave can see that insurrection is futile, and there are slaves who would report such
 activities to their masters. Slaves are dumb not by nature, but cuz they are kept that way
by law in the South—it was illegal to teach slaves how to read
-pg.530: “No general insurrection of slaves, as I think, can happen in this country
for a long time. Whoever much fears, or much hopes for such an event, will be
alike disappointed.”
*The problems that the South faces have nothing to do with the GOP, and everything to
do with the customs & statutes that they passed to protect the institution (slavery) that is
the greatest contradiction to self-government & democracy. This is a bed that you’ve
made yourself—don’t go pointing your finger at anyone else. If you want these problems
to go away, then you know what you have to do
-pg.531: “And how much would it avail you, if you could, by the use of John Brown, Helper's
Book, and the like, break up the Republican organization? Human action can be modified to
some extent, but human nature cannot be changed. There is a judgment and a feeling against
slavery in this nation, which cast at least a million and a half of votes. You cannot destroy that
judgment and feeling - that sentiment - by breaking up the political organization which rallies
around it. You can scarcely scatter and disperse an army which has been formed into order in the
face of your heaviest fire; but if you could, how much would you gain by forcing the sentiment
which created it out of the peaceful channel of the ballot-box, into some other channel? What
would that other channel probably be? Would the number of John Browns be lessened or
enlarged by the operation?”
*Dr. Morel: “This is one of the most profound observations that Lincoln has made about
American politics. Lincoln is a master of taking an opposing viewpoint, an opposing
argument; if it’s a fallacious argument, he’s a master of taking it to its logical conclusion
to demonstrate all the more clearly why it’s wrong.”
-Even if the Democrats were to get rid of the GOP, the anti-slavery sentiment in the
country wouldn’t disappear. The South believes that if they can get rid of the GOP that
all of their fears are assuaged, but that’s not so. Wouldn’t it be better for the anti-slavery
movement, in the form of the Republicans, to remain visible, so that if the Democrats are
right, that they’ll be able to persuade voters to their side? If they rob the opportunity of
anti-slavery sentiment—of expressing itself in a peaceful way—what venue would it
take? If we do precisely what the South wants—disband the GOP—have you made more
John Browns possible, or fewer? The GOP believes that slavery is wrong, not that they’re
going to attack it where it is, but they want to stop spreading it as the beginning of getting
rid of slavery. Lincoln’s claim is that you will multiply them. If you don’t give anti-
slavery sentiment a peaceful political avenue & forum for expressing itself—to be able to
appeal to the American people for their consent & approval to promote that policy—your
John Browns will only multiply and be violent. If you don’t want John Brown, protect the
First Amendment. If you don’t want John Brown, give that sentiment a peaceful avenue
of expressing itself, and if you are right, what are you worried about? The anti-slavery
sentiment will get voted down. If you are so confident in your position, let them air their
views, and then take a vote. Lo and behold, if you’re right, you will always be in the
majority, no worry. You beat Frémont in 1856, so what are you worried about in 1860?
-If you think of kids, if they can’t get attention by doing positive things, are they
willing to not be noticed? If kids can’t get adults to pay attention to them by doing
positive things, then they will find other ways to get your attention
 *Lincoln is trying to reinforce what it means to be a self-governing people—
reinforce the habits & practices of self-government, and he’s pointing out these
many ways in the South that they have strayed from the typical way that we solve
our disagreements & differences, and he thinks that the more you foreclose
opportunity for differences of opinion, even over these hot button issues, those
opinions aren’t going to disappear & fade away. They’re going to find other
avenues; avenues that are beyond your control; avenues that are beyond your
surveillance; avenues that are less safe, less peaceful, less political
-Dr. Morel: “Parties don’t create ideas—ideas create parties”
*In the Peoria Address, Lincoln talks about how as property, freedmen are left alone in
D.C. when they’re manumitted. That’s not the case with say a horse. If there’s a loose
horse wandering around without a brand, then it’s snatched up. Clearly, a good number of
you in the South gave up your investment in making mere humans chattel—commodity
to buy & sell. You allow millions of dollars of potential property (freedmen) to walk
around without an owner. Why is it that you will allow your children to play with slaves’
children, but not with the children of slave traders? It’s cuz slave traders are trading in
human beings, and you recognize that these are people that you don’t invite to parties—
you don’t even want to shake that person’s hand
-pg.532: “An inspection of the Constitution will show that the right of property in a slave is not
"distinctly and expressly affirmed" in it. Bear in mind, the Judges do not pledge their judicial
opinion that such right is impliedly affirmed in the Constitution; but they pledge their veracity
that it is "distinctly and expressly" affirmed there - "distinctly," that is, not mingled with anything
else - "expressly," that is, in words meaning just that, without the aid of any inference, and
susceptible of no other meaning. If they had only pledged their judicial opinion that such right is
affirmed in the instrument by implication, it would be open to others to show that neither the
word "slave" nor "slavery" is to be found in the Constitution, nor the word "property" even, in
any connection with language alluding to the things slave, or slavery; and that wherever in that
instrument the slave is alluded to, he is called a "person;"—and wherever his master's legal right
in relation to him is alluded to, it is spoken of as "service or labor which may be due,"—as a debt
payable in service or labor. Also, it would be open to show, by contemporaneous history, that
this mode of alluding to slaves and slavery, instead of speaking of them, was employed on
purpose to exclude from the Constitution the idea that there could be property in man. To show
all this, is easy and certain.”

Basler pg.534: Part III—Response to the Republicans

-pg.535: “These natural, and apparently adequate means all failing, what will convince them?
This, and this only: cease to call slavery wrong, and join them in calling it right. And this must
be done thoroughly—done in acts as well as in words. Silence will not be tolerated—we must
place ourselves avowedly with them. Senator Douglas’ new sedition law must be enacted and
enforced, suppressing all declarations that slavery is wrong, whether made in politics, in presses,
in pulpits, or in private. We must arrest and return their fugitive slaves with greedy pleasure. We
must pull down our Free State constitutions. The whole atmosphere must be disinfected from all
taint of opposition to slavery, before they will cease to believe that all their troubles proceed
from us. I am quite aware they do not state their case precisely in this way. Most of them would
probably say to us, "Let us alone, do nothing to us, and say what you please about slavery." But
we do let them alone—have never disturbed them—so that, after all, it is what we say, which
dissatisfies them. They will continue to accuse us of doing, until we cease saying. I am also
aware they have not, as yet, in terms, demanded the overthrow of our Free-State Constitutions.
Yet those Constitutions declare the wrong of slavery, with more solemn emphasis, than do all
other sayings against it; and when all these other sayings shall have been silenced, the overthrow
of these Constitutions will be demanded, and nothing be left to resist the demand. It is nothing to
the contrary, that they do not demand the whole of this just now. Demanding what they do, and
for the reason they do, they can voluntarily stop nowhere short of this consummation. Holding,
as they do, that slavery is morally right, and socially elevating, they cannot cease to demand a
full national recognition of it, as a legal right, and a social blessing.”
-pg.536: “Wrong as we think slavery is, we can yet afford to let it alone where it is,
because that much is due to the necessity arising from its actual presence in the nation;
but can we, while our votes will prevent it, allow it to spread into the National Territories,
and to overrun us here in these Free States? If our sense of duty forbids this, then let us
stand by our duty, fearlessly and effectively. Let us be diverted by none of those
sophistical contrivances wherewith we are so industriously plied and belabored -
contrivances such as groping for some middle ground between the right and the wrong,
vain as the search for a man who should be neither a living man nor a dead man - such as
a policy of "don't care" on a question about which all true men do care - such as Union
appeals beseeching true Union men to yield to Disunionists, reversing the divine rule, and
calling, not the sinners, but the righteous to repentance - such as invocations to
Washington, imploring men to unsay what Washington said, and undo what Washington
did.”
-Washington signed all of the congressional bills that prevented the spread of
slavery into the Territories (ex. Northwest Ordinance)
-pg.535: “Nor can we justifiably withhold this, on any ground save our conviction that slavery is
wrong. If slavery is right, all words, acts, laws, and constitutions against it, are themselves
wrong, and should be silenced, and swept away. If it is right, we cannot justly object to its
nationality—its universality; if it is wrong, they cannot justly insist upon its extension—its
enlargement. All they ask, we could readily grant, if we thought slavery right; all we ask, they
could as readily grant, if they thought it wrong. Their thinking it right, and our thinking it wrong,
is the precise fact upon which depends the whole controversy. Thinking it right, as they do, they
are not to blame for desiring its full recognition, as being right; but, thinking it wrong, as we do,
can we yield to them? Can we cast our votes with their view, and against our own? In view of
our moral, social, and political responsibilities, can we do this?”
-Here Lincoln comes full circle and links Stephen Douglas’ “Don’t Care” policy with the
Southern demands. Douglas’ professed indifference masks a real zeal for the spread of
slavery. All that slavery needs to become national in this country is to teach white
Northerners in Free States to be indifferent about its spread. But don’t you see what’s
going to happen because of that? Over time, you’ll be forced to changed your State
constitutions & your laws to actually permit slavery, cuz once we’ve said that Congress
& Territorial legislatures can’t deny the right of property in a human being, the only thing
left is States
-pg.536: “Their thinking it right, and our thinking it wrong, is the precise fact upon which
depends the whole controversy. Thinking it right, as they do, they are not to blame for desiring
its full recognition, as being right; but, thinking it wrong, as we do, can we yield to them? Can
we cast our votes with their view, and against our own? In view of our moral, social, and
political responsibilities, can we do this?”
-pg.536: “Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor
frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government nor of dungeons to ourselves.
LET US HAVE FAITH THAT RIGHT MAKES MIGHT, AND IN THAT FAITH, LET US, TO
THE END, DARE TO DO OUR DUTY AS WE UNDERSTAND IT.”
-The destruction of gov’t refers to secession, and being thrown into dungeons for
preaching against slavery refers to a proposed sedition act that Stephen Douglas
presented on the Senate floor (Jan 23, 1860), that would prevent people from talking
about things (slavery) in a way that could lead to insurrection. Douglas makes it seem
that he agrees with the South that there should be laws against preaching that slavery is
wrong
*Dr. Morel: what people remember from a speech, if they hear it, is the first thing and the
last thing. Lincoln makes this the last thing they will hear. It’s a zinger
-In 1860, the GOP could point to the fact that Frémont lost in 1856. By 1860, the
threats of secession & disunion are coming hot and heavy. This is an exhortation
to the GOP to stay the course that slavery is wrong. The federal principle deprives
us of the authority of touching slavery where it already exists, but let us at least
contain it—let’s not let it spread. Let’s have faith that there are enough people
who think this way, so much that we could become politically mighty this time
around if we run the table. This time, if the GOP wins all of the Free States (they
don’t need a popular vote majority to do so); have faith that there are enough
Americans who believe that all men are created equal, that they will vote for the
GOP candidate. Have faith not just in the Republican Party, but also have faith
that right makes might. If right doesn’t translate into political might, then the
alternative is might makes right. Popular sovereignty, the “Don’t Care” policy,
doesn’t care about voting slavery up or down. Douglas just cares about people
being able to vote. It wasn’t the pro-slavery element of the Lecompton
Constitution that Douglas hated. He disliked the fact that it wasn’t a fair
representation of what Kansans wanted, since the anti-slavery residents boycotted
the constitution (by a supermajority of the settlers), cuz they knew that it did not
represent their true political interests. It was a sham election. If it ignores all of
the people, Popular Sovereignty is simply crude majoritarianism. All that matters
is ‘Are you in the majority?’ And what the majority wants, the majority gets.
Douglas doesn’t care what the majority votes on, as long as it’s a legitimate vote,
that’s the only thing that matters. That is the American way. Lincoln disagrees.
That is the spirit of Nebraska and Popular Sovereignty, but that’s not the Spirit of
‘76
*Dr. Morel: majority rule, minority rights. Jefferson argues in the
Declaration that voting is only legitimate cuz individuals have rights. The
smallest minority in a democracy that has rights is the individual. Because
all men are created equal, nobody can tell somebody else what to do
unless they get their consent. Cuz no one is born the natural ruler of
anyone except for himself. Lincoln is trying to get the nation to recognize
that this is the fundamental foundation of their form of gov’t. The only
reason why voting is legitimate, what Douglas calls the great and sacred
principle of self-gov’t; the reason why it’s great and sacred is cuz human
beings are sacred. They’re created in God’s image. They’re endowed by
their Creator with certain inalienable rights. If we’re all equal, nobody can
tell someone else what to do unless you get their permission. That’s why
voting is legitimate. The basis of voting & majority rule is the belief in
individual rights—that all men are created equal. Cuz men are created
equal, the only legitimate way to rule yourself is asking people’s
permission. That’s what voting does. Unanimity is impossible, so majority
rule is the fairest way to protect what we all possess by Nature: our right
to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. Lincoln wants us to have
faith that it is right principle that legitimates political force (forcing people
to do X, Y, and Z—also known as law). Cuz if we don’t remind ourselves
that that is the ground of majority rule (Popular Sovereignty, as Stephen
Douglas calls it), then at the end of the day if we stop believing that every
individual deserves the protection of gov’t, then even self-gov’t becomes
political might—mere majoritarian rule. And as Madison warned in
Federalist #10, the great danger in self-gov’t is that they become majority
factions. White enslavement of blacks is the glaring example of majority
faction in American history. They got away with it not cuz it was right,
fair, or legitimate, but cuz they had the votes & outnumbered the blacks.
That’s how they made it legal. Lincoln reminds us that it was never
legitimate in principle—it was never naturally just for white people to rule
black people this way, cuz it wouldn’t be just for white people to rule
white people this way
-According to Douglas, the rights of blacks & other inferior races
depend on the majority vote of white people (legal positivism).
South Carolina enslaves blacks cuz the white majority voted that
way. Illinois doesn’t enslave blacks but neither are they granted
suffrage, cuz the white majority voted that way. New York allows
blacks to vote if they have x-amount of money in the bank, cuz the
white majority voted that way. All of those examples work fine for
Douglas, cuz that’s how the white majority voted
10/15/18
Session 8A: Lincoln’s Election, Secession, and the Confederate States of America

Buchanan, State of the Union Address (December 3, 1860)

-pg.1: “The long-continued and intemperate interference of the Northern people with the
question of slavery in the Southern States has at length produced its natural effects. The different
sections of the Union are now arrayed against each other, and the time has arrived, so much
dreaded by the Father of his Country, when hostile geographical parties have been formed.”
-pg.1: “The immediate peril arises not so much from these causes as from the fact that the
incessant and violent agitation of the slavery question throughout the North for the last quarter of
a century has at length produced its malign influence on the slaves and inspired them with vague
notions of freedom. Hence a sense of security no longer exists around the family altar. This
feeling of peace at home has given place to apprehensions of servile insurrections.”
-Buchanan blamed the Northern abolitionists for the disunion occurring in the country.
He’s a ‘dough-face’ who was being molded by the Southern Democrats (even though
he’s from Pennsylvania) any way they want him. He is a Northern man of South views
(or positions). He is sympathetic to the slavepower. He thinks that the country wouldn’t
be in the midst of a secession crisis if it weren’t for the abolitionists. He sounds an awful
lot like John C. Calhoun when he says that
-The secessionists believed that secession was a legal, constitutional, peaceful, political
prerogative of each State
*Dr. Morel: the nature of the Constitution is extremely important. If you get into a conversation
with anyone who is a neo-Confederate or an un-Reconstructed Southerner—people today who
believed that the Civil War was about States’ rights and not about slavery—if you want to have a
productive conversation with anyone about the Civil War, and especially about secession & the
reason why white Southerners fought, you have to answer this question first: what is the nature
of the United States Constitution? If you don’t talk about that, then you will talk past each other.
You have got to recognize that the premise is in understanding the nature of the Constitution, and
if you have one understanding of it, and the neo-Confederate has a different understanding, then
you’ll get nowhere. Secession as a political, legal, constitutional prerogative (or power) is based
on the notion that the United States Constitution is not a national gov’t. I’m not saying that it
doesn’t represent the nation, but as a political constitution, it is not a national gov’t—it is a
confederacy. And as a confederacy, they can secede from the Union unilaterally, cuz the States
are sovereign. The Constitution is not sovereign, but the States are
-The United Nations is a confederate system. When the UN passes a resolution, in order
for them to be put into force, they require the good faith of the constituent parties to the
compact. When the UN passes a resolution, it doesn’t apply to you as individuals, but
rather, to countries. But the member nations themselves choose whether to comply to the
resolution, depending on what mood they’re in—depending on whether it serves their
interests. That’s not a real gov’t
-The logic of the South regarding secession revolved around the fact that they believed that the
individual States were sovereign, and that the Constitution was not the sovereign force of the
land—the individual States created the Constitution, so they can leave the constitutional Union
when they feel that their rights are being violated (State Compact Theory). Buchanan calls that a
rope of sand. If the States can decide when they’re in and when they’re out, that’s not a real
gov’t. Even Andrew Jackson didn’t believe in that. He believed that we had a national gov’t
 -The Supremacy Clause of the Constitution states that the Constitution is the supreme law
of the land, above the States. When Congress passes a law, it applies to individuals. In a
confederation, laws applied only to the States
*The difference between South Carolina in 1832 (Nullification Crisis) vs. South Carolina in
1860 is that in 1860, Buchanan (and not Andrew Jackson) was President. Did Buchanan believe
that secession was legal? No. Did he believe that the President could do anything about
secession? No
-In 1832, both Jackson and Congress were willing to send an army down to South
Carolina (Force Bill) to force the State to comply with the tariffs. That was what was
lacking in 1860
-The State Compact Theory consists of a State being able to unilaterally decide when the
Constitution is serving the interest that they thought it would serve when they joined that
compact—when they, as a State, ratified the Constitution. But Buchanan rejected that
view. If that were the case, it would be a rope of sand, and surely our forefathers did not
sacrifice their lives to create a gov’t that could be dissolved within a matter of weeks. We
have a real national gov’t
-pg.3: “In order to justify secession as a constitutional remedy, it must be on the
principle that the Federal Government is a mere voluntary association of States, to
be dissolved at pleasure by any one of the contracting parties. If this be so, the
Confederacy is a rope of sand, to be penetrated and dissolved by the first adverse
wave of public opinion in any of the States. In this manner our thirty-three States
may resolve themselves into as many petty, jarring, and hostile republics, each
one retiring from the Union without responsibility whenever any sudden
excitement might impel them to such a course. By this process a Union might be
entirely broken into fragments in a few weeks which cost our forefathers many
years of toil, privation, and blood to establish.”
*Dr. Morel: I don’t think that Lincoln can improve on Buchanan’s
argument here about secession
-pg.5: “This Constitution and the laws of the United States which shall be made in
pursuance thereof, and all treaties made or which shall be made under the
authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land, and the judges
in every State shall be bound thereby, anything in the constitution or laws of any
State to the contrary notwithstanding.”
-When the gov’t acts (passes a law, to whom does is apply: to States or to
individuals? Federal laws apply to individuals. Under the Articles, when
the Confederation Congress passed a law, it didn’t apply to individual
Marylanders or Virginians. The law was sent to the governors & States
legislatures, and they decided how best to (if at all) apply it to their
residents. But under the Constitution, when Congress passes a law, the
States no longer need to interpose themselves (as they did under the
Articles) to determine whether or not to apply a law, cuz they were
incorporated in the decision-making process in the Senate. So when the
federal gov’t passes a law, it goes through the States to the individuals,
cuz the States are now part of the process through which it is made.
*The federal gov’t is not a consolidated gov’t as the Anti-
Federalists feared, but it is a national gov’t. It is a real gov’t whose
 laws apply to individuals—they do not apply to States qua States.
The laws have teeth. You obey or you pay. Fine or punish. You
don’t fine or punish States, you punish individuals. You don’t
apply laws to States, you apply laws to individuals. Therefore,
since we have a real gov’t, that denies the States sovereignty,
meaning that they can’t secede
*The SOTU Address is always long, cuz the President needs to catch Congress up to date on
everything that’s happened while they were out of session, and he has a list of ideas that he
wants implemented
*When Buchanan took office in 1857, he said that he was only going to serve 1 term, and this
SOTU Address was his parting gift to Lincoln: secession is illegal but I can’t do anything about
it. He certainly thinks that the President can’t do anything about it, and if anyone could do
something about it, it would be Congress, but Buchanan doesn’t believe that either. So when
Lincoln takes office on March 4, 1861, he has to outline his own understanding of secession and
what he believes that he can do
-pg.6: “Apart from the execution of the laws, so far as this may be practicable, the
Executive has no authority to decide what shall be the relations between the Federal
Government and South Carolina. He has been invested with no such discretion. . . It is
therefore my duty to submit to Congress the whole question in all its beatings. The course
of events is so rapidly hastening forward that the emergency may soon arise when you
may be called upon to decide the momentous question whether you possess the power by
force of arms to compel a State to remain in the Union. I should feel myself recreant to
my duty were I not to express an opinion on this important subject. The question fairly
stated is, Has the Constitution delegated to Congress the power to coerce a State into
submission which is attempting to withdraw or has actually withdrawn from the
Confederacy? If answered in the affirmative, it must be on the principle that the power
has been conferred upon Congress to declare and to make war against a State. After much
serious reflection I have arrived at the conclusion that no such power has been delegated
to Congress or to any other department of the Federal Government. It is manifest upon an
inspection of the Constitution that this is not among the specific and enumerated powers
granted to Congress, and it is equally apparent that its exercise is not “necessary and
proper for carrying into execution” any one of these powers. So far from this power
having been delegated to Congress, it was expressly refused by the Convention which
framed the Constitution. Without descending to particulars, it may be safely asserted that
the power to make war against a State is at variance with the whole spirit and intent of the
Constitution. Suppose such a war should result in the conquest of a State; how are we to
govern it afterwards? Shall we hold it as a province and govern it by despotic power? In
the nature of things, we could not by physical force control the will of the people and
compel them to elect Senators and Representatives to Congress and to perform all the
other duties depending upon their own volition and required from the free citizens of a
free State as a constituent member of the Confederacy.”
-After the original 7 States of the Confederacy secede, they don’t just secede.
They begin to act in peculiar ways and start to seize federal forts & munitions.
They’re not just seceding—they’re preparing for war for when Lincoln & the
GOP take office in March and try to coerce them back into the Union, which
Buchanan says the federal gov’t doesn’t have the power to do
South Carolina Secession Declaration (December 20, 1860)
-In South Carolina’s Declaration of Secession, they cite the North’s refusal to follow the Fugitive
Slave Clause as a breach of the State Compact Theory
-Personal liberty laws were an attempt by the North to give due process to blacks in the face of
the Fugitive Slave Clause
-pg.274: “We affirm that these ends for which this Government was instituted have been
defeated, and the Government itself has been made destructive of them by the action of the non-
slaveholding States. Those States have assumed the right of deciding upon the propriety of our
domestic institutions; and have denied the rights of property established in fifteen of the States
and recognized by the Constitution; they have denounced as sinful the institution of Slavery; they
have permitted the open establishment among them of societies, whose avowed object is to
disturb the peace and to eloign the property of the citizens of other States. They have encouraged
and assisted thousands of our slaves to leave their homes; and those who remain, have been
incited by emissaries, books and pictures to servile insurrection.”
-The federal government’s refusal to force the Northern States to enforce the Fugitive
Slave Act (1850) means that there’s a breach in the constitutional compact, so South
Carolina is now free to leave the Union. And once it leaves the Union, the powers of the
federal gov’t devolve back to the State (even though the gov’t derives its powers from the
People)
-pg.273: “Thus were established the two great principles asserted by the Colonies, namely: the
right of a State to govern itself; and the right of a people to abolish a Government when it
becomes destructive of the ends for which it was instituted. And concurrent with the
establishment of these principles, was the fact, that each Colony became and was recognized by
the mother Country as a FREE, SOVEREIGN AND INDEPENDENT STATE.”
-South Carolina points back to the Treaty of Paris (1783) to claim that following the
Revolution, the States were each recognized as free & sovereign entities in their own
right. Though they can make that argument based on the language used in the treaty,
nobody in 1783 believed that the States were independent countries who would each
make separate trade treaties & whatnot with France, Russia, or Spain. All the States
recognized that while they do exist as states (countries), they wouldn’t exist as states for
long if they went in alone. They realized that their very independence relied upon them
sticking together (Lincoln points to this later)
-pg.274: “For twenty-five years this agitation has been steadily increasing, until it has now
secured to its aid the power of the Common Government. Observing the form of the
Constitution, a sectional party has found within that article establishing the Executive
Department, the means of subverting the Constitution itself. A geographical line has been drawn
across the Union, and all the States north of that line have united in the election of a man to the
high office of President of the United States whose opinions and purposes are hostile to slavery.
He is to be entrusted with the administration of the Common Government, because he has
declared that that “Government cannot endure permanently half slave, half free,” and that the
public mind must rest in the belief that Slavery is in the course of ultimate extinction.
-With Lincoln’s election, they know what is going to happen to slavery. So instead of
pointing to the Constitution (which Buchanan has used to prove that secession is illegal),
the South points to the Declaration, equating what they’re doing with the Revolution to
legitimize their actions. The South isn’t being innovative or radical with secession—
 they’re merely doing the same thing that the Colonies did when they broke away from
England

New Orleans Daily Crescent, “The Policy of Aggression” (December 14, 1860)
-Lincoln’s ascension to the presidency is the culmination of a series of affronts & abuses
that we’ve been suffering. With him as President, we know where the future is heading,
and we don’t have to wait to see what will happen—we should take preemptive action
before it’s too late. We can see the pattern already

-pg.274: “This sectional combination for the subversion of the Constitution, has been aided in
some of the States by elevating to citizenship, persons, who, by the Supreme Law of the land, are
incapable of becoming citizens; and their votes have been used to inaugurate a new policy,
hostile to the South, and destructive of its peace and safety. On the 4th March next, this party
will take possession of the Government. It has announced, that the South shall be excluded from
the common Territory; that the Judicial Tribunals shall be made sectional, and that a war must be
waged against slavery until it shall cease throughout the United States. The Guaranties of the
Constitution will then no longer exist; the equal rights of the States will be lost. The slaveholding
States will no longer have the power of self-government, or self-protection, and the Federal
Government will have become their enemy.”
-All of the Northern States agreed to enforcing the Fugitive Slave Clause in the
Constitution, but they’ve ignored the Fugitive Slave Act (1850). In reality, 300 escaped
slaves were convicted under the act and returned to their masters, while less than 20 were
let go
-pg.273: “We hold that the Government thus established is subject to the two great principles
asserted in the Declaration of Independence; and we hold further, that the mode of its formation
subjects it to a third fundamental principle, namely: the law of compact. We maintain that in
every compact between two or more parties the obligation is mutual; that the failure of one of the
contracting parties, to perform a material part of the agreement, entirely releases the obligation of
the other; and that where no arbiter is provided, each party is remitted to his own judgment to
determine the fact of failure, with all its consequences.”
-South Carolina believes that Northern personal liberty laws are nullifying the Fugitive
Slave Act (1850). In reality, the personal liberty laws didn’t nullify the act, but it was an
attempt to give the accused black due process to speak in his own defense. It just
frustrated it
-South Carolina was mad that the North wasn’t enforcing the Fugitive Slave Act
(1850), but at the same time, it wasn’t allowing freedom of speech, cuz they
censored anyone who spoke out against slavery. The South wanted their preferred
provisions in the Constitution enforced, but not others

Alexander H. Stephens, “Cornerstone Speech” (March 21, 1861)

-Stephens had given an address in Georgia back in November 1860 saying that secession was
wrong & dishonorable. Nevertheless, Georgia seceded anyways, Stephens was appointed vice
president of the Confederacy, and he had a hand in drafting the Confederate constitution—a new,
improved, better constitution than the old Constitution
-Stephen Douglas and Lincoln had been wrestling for the mantle of the Founders—that one or
the other understood the Founders better, especially in terms of what the federal gov’t could do
in regards to slavery
-Alexander Stephens brings in a new argument to the debate. Instead of Lincoln or
Douglas who claim that they know what the Founders truly wanted to do with slavery,
Stephens believed that the Founders were wrong regarding their view of slavery
-pg.281: “The constitution, it is true, secured every essential guarantee to the
institution while it should last, and hence no argument can be justly urged against
the constitutional guarantees thus secured, because of the common sentiment of
the day. Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the
assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. It was a sandy foundation,
and the government built upon it fell when the ‘storm came and the wind blew.’
Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations
are laid, its corner-stone rests upon the great truth, that the negro is not equal to
the white man; that slavery – subordination to the superior race – is his natural
and normal condition. [Applause.] This, our new government, is the first, in the
history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral
truth.”
-Stephens talks about how the Founders knew that slavery was wrong, but why then
didn’t they emancipate their slaves?
-pg.281: “The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the leading
statesmen at the time of the formation of the old constitution, were that the
enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature; that it was
wrong in principle, socially, morally, and politically. It was an evil they knew not
well how to deal with, but the general opinion of the men of that day was that,
somehow or other in the order of Providence, the institution would be evanescent
and pass away. This idea, though not incorporated in the constitution, was the
prevailing idea at that time.”
-Dr. Morel: this sounds like Lincoln. I don’t know how Lincoln could
improve upon Stephens’ account, both in principle & in practice. If you
read the Founders’ letters, none of them knew that Eli Whitney was
coming & that cotton would become king. The cotton gin turned slavery
into such an important & lucrative industry. Cotton became the new gold
of the New World. They thought that slavery was going to burn itself out.
Madison believed that when 1808 came along & the slave trade was
outlawed, that slavery would die by that time. But with the cotton gin,
cotton became the export of the South. Stephens had to clear the table of
the Founders, and he did so by rejecting them in terms of their principles:
their understanding of equality & consent. By clearing away the Founders
based on their erroneous principles, this allowed him to explain why the
Confederate constitution was better. The Confederate constitution isn’t
better cuz it’s founded on slavery; slavery has existed since time
immemorial. It’s better cuz it’s founded on African slavery. The
Confederates have discovered that racial slavery is the key to civilization
& progress, and with this discovery, it’s only a matter of time until other
States recognize the superiority of this new constitution, and they will join
 us as well. VA, TN, NC, and AR haven’t joined yet (but Stephens believes
that they will), and so will the Border States (DE, MD, KY, and MO). He
begins to then cite leading scientists who were originally scorned, but over
time, they were proven to be correct (ex. Galileo). Others will discover
that we are right, and then we will grow & expand.

Charles B. Dew, “Apostles of Secession” (April 2001)

-An apostle is someone who is sent with a special message. An ambassador sent to convey a
particular message from someone else
-Charles B. Dew grew up in the South as an unReconstructed Southerner, believing that the Civil
War was about States’ rights. But then when he went to graduate school, he needed to write a
dissertation, and his advisor told him about other Southern States following South Carolina’s
lead in seceding. After the first 7 States seceded, they sent commissioners (apostles) to VA, NC,
TN, and AR to persuade them to secede as well
-Most of their message persuading the other States to secede was not just the race card, but the
entire deck. Dew expected it to be States’ rights & tariffs, not race
-If Dew had been completely honest about what his book was about, he would have called it
‘Apostles of White Supremacy’ instead of Apostles of Disunion. What you find when you read
these speeches & letters is racial mongering & scare tactics. Lincoln is going to free the slaves &
make them your equal. This race of people, who we can only co-exist with cuz we control them,
will soon control us—either politically or through violence
-The apostles justified secession based on racial control
-In Dew’s updated version of the book, he has done research & found that the original 7 States of
the Confederacy tried to convince VA to secede by threatening them that if they didn’t, that they
(VA) would no longer be able to sell their excess slaves to the Lower South. But what really got
VA on board was Lincoln calling out the militia in response to Fort Sumter
-The international slave trade was banned in the Confederate constitution

Session 8B: Lincoln’s Inauguration and the Civil War

Lincoln, “First Inaugural Address” (March 4, 1861)

-Basler pg.585: “Plainly, the central idea of secession, is the essence of anarchy. A majority, held
in restraint by constitutional checks, and limitations, and always changing easily, with deliberate
changes of popular opinions and sentiments, is the only true sovereign of a free people. Whoever
rejects it, does, of necessity, fly to anarchy or to despotism. Unanimity is impossible; the rule of
a minority, as a permanent arrangement, is wholly inadmissible; so that, rejecting the majority
principle, anarchy, or despotism in some form, is all that is left.”
-Sooner or later, if they believe that this principle works, then the Confederacy itself will
fall apart
-The fundamental thing that the Confederacy has done to prove that secession is anarchy
(to live without rule) is claiming that they’re no longer part of the Union cuz Lincoln won
the election. The South acknowledged that Lincoln won fairly, but they were a minority
(population wise) in the constitutional system. Lincoln only won 39% of the popular
vote, but according to how the American people set up how we elect the President
(reflecting the popular majority (in part) as well as the role that the States have in the
Electoral College), Lincoln was the clear winner. In 1860, a portion of the minority
 refused to abide by the result. Self-government can’t work when people don’t follow the
rules. When you participate in an election, the premise is that you will abide by the
outcome, whomever is elected, as long as the rules are followed. The South was willing
to follow any candidate except Lincoln, and that is anarchy. Republics require 2 things:
good winners and good losers. The mission of Lincoln’s first inaugural was that he would
be a good winner. He would preside over all the States, not employing his power in a way
that would be unconstitutional, and the Southern States (as bad losers) just did not believe
him. The first 7 States didn’t even wait for him to take office—they took preemptive
action
-pg.582: “Again, if the United States be not a government proper, but an association of States in
the nature of contract merely, can it, as a contract, be peaceably unmade, by less than all the
parties who made it? One party to a contract may violate it–break it, so to speak; but does it not
require all to lawfully rescind it?”

*Calhoun predicted in 1837 that if they didn’t nip abolitionism in the butt, that we would
become, inevitably, two countries. One would hope that they could co-exist peacefully, but that it
may come to war. He believed that the South should take preemptive action if it looked like the
abolitionists were controlling the federal gov’t
*In 1860, Stephen A. Douglas saw how State elections were going in September & October, and
as soon as he found out that the States who didn’t vote for Frémont in 1856 were electing
Republican governors & State legislatures, he started to travel throughout the Upper South
(candidates usually didn’t travel to campaign) to convince them not to secede, telling them that
no 1 man (not even Lincoln) could ruin the constitutional system. If you stay in the Union, the
GOP isn’t the majority party in Congress (they’re close in the Senate but not in the House), if
you stay in. We will have ways to control Lincoln, so secession isn’t the answer to your
problems. Douglas knew that Lincoln was going to win, cuz he was counting that State elections
that the GOP was winning that Frémont lost in 1856
-During the Compromise of 1850, 5 Southern States held secession conventions, but then they
voted it down. Prior to Lincoln, the Democrats were electing every President, and they
maintained parity in the Senate, so they could effectively veto any legislation from the House
that was hostile towards slavery. At least by 1850, they didn’t think that civil war was inevitable,
but they were keeping their powder (gun powder) dry
QUOTES
“We think that Lincoln is crucial in the growing division in this country, and at least his attempt
to keep us one country, and of course a good number of people disagreed with that attempt.”
-8/27/18

“We think that the seeds of sectionalism were planted at the Founding…We were not destined, I
don’t think, to have a civil war…But the fact that slavery—this institution that was a preexisting
condition to the formation of the United States, that had been around for so long—when we
actually decided to become a nation, apart from another nation (Mother England), we had this
thing in our nest that was inconsistent with this new thing that the slaveholding Founders were
starting; this new way of governing themselves. And the question was if we, as a people, were
going to be able to wean ourselves off of this institution, in a way that could avoid what
eventually happened, which was the Civil War.”
-8/27/18

“At the Founding, we see things that were said, and professed, and presumably believed in, and
yet there were practices that were inconsistent with that.”
-8/27/18

“The rational for the Constitution and America happened on July 4, 1776 with the Declaration of
Independence.”
-8/27/18

“An opinion is the basis for knowledge.”

-8/27/18

“King George III thinks adults need to be taken care of, politically, and he does not think he has
to ask your permission to take care of you. That’s what it means to be a subject, and he’s a king.”
-8/27/18

“We’ll see that part of the growing divide in the United States is what began as an economic
interest became much more a part of the warp and woof of society, especially in the South, and
so they started coming up for other rationales for maintaining that institution.”
-8/27/18

“The liberals arts is all about explaining why the things we hold to be true that aren’t, aren’t true,
and also, it helps us figure out why the certain things that we believe that are true, why they’re
true.”
-8/27/18

“We never see Jefferson justify the enslavement of anybody, by the laws of Virginia, as
something that is consistent with the laws of Nature and of Nature’s God. He always affirms the
injustice of the very thing he can’t give up.”
-8/27/18
“It is almost universally held by the Founding generation that slavery was inconsistent with the
principles of their own separation from Great Britain.”
-8/27/18

“Almost no one argued in the 1770s and 1780s in the United States that—no American who
owned slaves—made a principled argument claiming that they deserved freedom, but not their
slaves.”
-8/27/18

“Jefferson never said that what he is doing to the African on his own land (Monticello) is right,
that it is good, that it is legitimate.”
-8/27/18

“New technology doesn’t always mean progress, at least in terms of civilization.”

-9/3/18

“Over time, Virginia became the feeder State for the domestic supply of slaves.”
-9/3/18

“South Carolina is not progressive on the race question.”

-9/3/18

“You couldn’t get any governing accomplished if you required unanimity. We learned what that
cost us under the Articles.”
-9/3/18

“Republics require 2 things: good winners and good losers.”

-9/3/18

“If anybody could be considered the Founding Father, it was George Washington. Remove him
from the equation, America is impossible. You can remove Ben Franklin, you could even
remove Jefferson, you could remove Hamilton, and I think that things might have still been
achieved (the separation, independence, etc.). But you remove Washington, I don’t think there’s
an America, and certainly not a United States of America.”
-9/17/18

“If you don’t assign something and test that something, the kids pretty quickly realize, ‘Oh, I
don’t have to read this. He won’t notice.’ You notice, but since you didn’t assign anything, you
can’t really hold their feet to the fire.”
-9/17/18
“We have got to become a people who submit to rule voluntarily, not simply because we must be
forced to do so. Because in that case, we might as well be ruled by despots. We’ve tried that
before. If we refuse to be ruled by a despot, the only alternative is to rule ourselves, which is to
say, be ruled voluntarily—willingly submit ourselves to the rule of those who we have given the
responsibility to issue those rules.”
-9/17/18

“Lincoln thinks the only peaceful way to get rid of slavery is gradually.”
-9/24/18

“If we continue to succeed and maintain our republic, we are the only light out for a benighted
world. The right to revolution is the key to universal emancipation, but it is not one that we can
do for them. It’s one that they have to do for themselves in the same way we attempted to do it
for ourselves.”
-9/24/18

“The grand temptation in a democracy is to think that the majority can never be wrong.”
-9/24/18

“We’ll see that for Lincoln, that by the time 1857 and 1858 rolls around, he does not like the
trend. He thinks that things are going off the rails, in a way that, unless we arrest that trend, the
country will become something he no longer recognizes.”
-10/1/18

“If Frederick Douglass had a tattoo, it would probably be John Brown, not Abraham Lincoln.”
-10/15/18

“Maybe I shouldn’t compare kids to terrorists.”

-10/15/18