views of a minority of said Committee on Territories, proposing, without argument, the two following amendments: 1. Amend the section defining the boundary of Kansas, so as to make "the summit of the Rocky Mountains" the western boundary of said Territory. 2. Strike out of the 14th and 34th sections of said bill all after the words "United States," and insert in each instance (the one relating to Kansas, and the other to Nebraska) as follows: Provided, That nothing in this act shall be so construed as to prevent the people of said Territory, through the properly constituted legislative authority, from passing such laws, in relation to the institution of Slavery, as they may deem best adapted to their locality, and most conducive to their happiness and welfare; and so much of any existing act of Congress as may conflict with the above right of the people to regulate their domestic institutions in their own way, be, and the same is hereby, repealed. This appears to have been an attempt to give practical effect to the doctrine of Squatter Sovereignty; but it was not successful. May 8th.-On motion of Mr. Richardson, the House-Yeas, 109; Nays, 88-resolved itself into a Committee of the Whole, and took up the bill (House No. 236) to organize the Territories of Nebraska and Kansas, and discussed it —Mr. Olds, of Ohio, in the chair. Finally, at 11 o'clock, P.M., of Friday, 12th, after a continuous sitting of thirty-six hours, the House, on motion of Mr. Richardson, adjourned. May 13th.-The House sat but two hours, and effected nothing. May 15th.-Mr. Richardson withdrew his demand for the Previous Question on closing the debate, and moved instead that the debate close at noon on Friday the 19th instant. This he finally modified by substituting Saturday the 20th; and in this shape his motion prevailed by a two-thirds majority-Yeas, 137; Nays, 66the following opponents of the bill voting for the motion, namely: MAINE. Thomas J. D. Fuller, Samuel Mayall-2. rison-2. MASSACHUSETTS.-Nathaniel P. Banks, jr.-1. NEW-YORK.-Gilbert Dean, Charles Hughes-2. OHIO Alfred P. Edgerton, Harvey H. Johnson, An- MICHIGAN David A. Noble, Hestor L. Stevens-2. Mr. Richardson, having thus got in his resoOn coming out of Committee, Mr. George W. lution to close the debate, put on the previous Jones, of Tenn., moved that the rules be sus-question again, and the House-Yeas, 113; pended so as to enable him to move the print- Nays, 59-agreed to close the debate on the ing of Senate bill (No. 22, passed the Senate as 20th. aforesaid) and the amendment now pending to the House bill. No quorum voted-adjourned. May 9th.-This motion prevailed. After debate in Committee on the Kansas-Nebraska bill, the Committee found itself without a quorum, and thereupon rose and reported the fact to the House-only 106 Members were found to be present. After several fruitless attempts to adjourn, a call was ordered and a quorum obtained, at 9 P.M. At 10, an adjournment prerailed. May 10th.-Debate in Committee continued. May 11th.-Mr. Richardson moved that all debate in Committee close to-morrow at noon. Mr. English moved a call of the House: Refused; Yeas, 88; Nays, 97. Mr. Mace moved that Mr. Richardson's motion be laid on the table: Defeated. Yeas, 95; Nays 100. Mr. Edgerton, of Ohio, moved a call of the House. Refused: Yeas, 45; Nays, 80. The day was spent in what has come to be called "Filibustering "—that is, the minority moving adjournments, calls of the House, asking to be excused from voting, taking appeals, etc., etc. In the midst of this, Mr. Richardson withdrew his original motion, and moved instead that the debate in Committee be closed in five minutes after the House shall have sumed it. Debate having been closed, the opponents of the measure expected to defeat or cripple it by moving and taking a vote in Committee on various propositions of amendment, kindred to those moved and rejected in the Senate; some of which it was believed a majority of the House would not choose or dare) to vote down; and, though the names of those voting on one side or the other in Committee of the Whole are not recorded, yet any proposition moved and rejected there, may be renewed in the House after taking the bill out of committee, and is no longer cut off by the Previous Question, as it formerly was. But, when the hour for closing debate in Committee had arrived, Mr. Alex. H. Stephens moved that the enacting clause of the bill be stricken out; which was carried by a rally of the friends of the bill, and of course cut off all amendments. The bill was thus reported to the House with its head off; when, after a long struggle, the House refused to agree to the report of the Committee of the Whole-Yeas, (for agreeing) 97; Nays, 117-bringing the House to a direct vote on the engrossment of the bill. Mr. Richardson now moved an amendment, which was a substitute for the whole bill, being substantially the Senate's bill, with the clause re-admitting aliens, who have declared their intention to become citizens, to the right of suffrage. He thereupon called the Previous Question, which the House sustained-Yeas, 116; Nays, 90-when the House adopted his amendment-Yeas, 115; Nays, 95-and proceeded to engross the bill-Yeas, 112; Nays, 99-when he put on the Previous Question again, and passed the bill finally-Yeas, 113; Naye, 100as follows: The hour of noon of the 12th having arrived, Merзrs. Dean and Banks raised points of order as to the termination of the legislative day. The Speaker decided that the legislative day could only be terminated by the adjournment of the House, except by constitutional conclusion of the session. Mr. Banks appealed, but at length withdrew his appeal. YEAS-113. FROM THE FREE STATES. MAINE.-Moses McDonald-1. RHODE ISLAND.-None. NEW-YORK.-Thomas W. Cumming, Francis B. Cutting, Peter Rowe, John J. Taylor, William M. Tweed, Hiram Walbridge, William a Walker, Mike Walsh, Theo. R. Westbrook-9. PENNSYLVANIA.-Samuel A. Bridges, John L. Dawson, Thomas B. Florence, J. Clancy Jones, William H. Kurtz, John McNair, Asa Packer, John Robbins, jr., Christian M. Straub, William H. Witte, Hendrick B. Wright—11. NEW-JERSEY-Samuel Lilly, George Vail-2. OHIO.-David T. Disney, Frederick W. Green, Edson B. Olds, Wilson Shannon-4. INDIANA. John G. Davis, Cyrus L. Dunham, Norman Eddy, William H. English, Thomas A. Hendricks, James H. Lane, Smith Miller-7. ILLINOIS.-James C. Allen, Willis Allen, Wm. A. Rich ardson-3. Total-44. FROM THE SLAVE STATES. DELAWARE.-George R. Riddle-1. B. Morgan, William Murray, Andrew Oliver, Jared V. NEW-JERSEY.-Alex. C. M. Pennington, Charles Skelton, Nathan T. Stratton-3. PENNSYLVANIA.-Joseph R. Chandler, Carlton B. Curtis, John Dick, Augustus Drum, William_Everhart, Thomas M. Howe, John McCulloch, Ner Middleswarth, James Gamble, Galusha A. Grow, Isaac E. Hiester, David Ritchie, Samuel L. Russell, Michael C. Trout 14. Edgerton, Andrew Ellison, JOSHUA R. GIDDINGS, Aaron Washburne, John Wentworth, Richard Yates-5. 2. IOWA.-None. CALIFORNIA.-None. Total-91. SOUTHERN STATES. VIRGINIA.-John S. Millson-1. NORTH CAROLINA.-Richard C. Puryear, Sion H. Rogers-2. MARYLAND.-William T. Hamilton, Henry May, Jacobson Etheridge, Nathaniel G. Taylor-4. Shower, Joshua Vansant-4. TENNESSEE.-Robert M. Bugg, William Cullom Emer VIRGINIA.-Thomas H. Bayly, Thomas S. Bocock, John S. Caskie, Henry A. Edmundson, Charles J. Faulkner, William O. Goode, Zedekiah Kidwell, John Letcher, Paulus Powell, William Smith, John F. Snodgrass-11. NORTH CAROLINA.-William S. Ashe, Burton Craige, Thomas L. Clingman, John Kerr, Thos. Ruffin, Henry M. Shaw-6. SOUTH CAROLINA.-William W. Boyce, President S. Brooks, James L. Orr-3. GEORGIA.-David J. Bailey, Elijah W. Chastain, Alfred H. Colquitt, Junius Hillyer, David A. Reese, Alex. H. Stephens-6. ALABAMA.-James Abercrombie, Williamson R. W. Cobb, James F. Dowdell, Sampson W. Harris, George S. Houston, Philip Phillips, William R. Smith-7. MISSISSIPPI.-William S. Barry, William Barksdale, Otho R. Singleton, Daniel B. Wright-4. LOUISIANA.-William Dunbar, Roland Jones, John Perkins, jr.-3 KENTUCKY.-John C. Breckinridge, James S. Chrisman, Leander M. Cox, Clement S. Hill, John M. Elliot, Benj. E. Grey, William Preston, Richard H. Stanton -8. TENNESSEE.-William M. Churchwell, George W. Jones, Charles Ready, Samuel A. Smith, Frederick P. Stanton, Felix Zollicoffer-6. MISSOURI. Alfred W. Lamb, James J. Lindley, John G. Miller, Mordecai Oliver, John S. Phelps-5. ARKASNAS.-Alfred B. Greenwood, Edwin A. Warren-2. FLORIDA.-Augustus E. Maxwell-1. TEXAS.-Peter H. Bell, Geo. W. Smyth-2. Total-69. Total, Free and Slave States-113. LOUISIANA.-Theodore G. Hunt-1. OTHER SOUTHERN STATES.-None. Total-9. N. ENGLAND STATES.- William Appleton, of Mass.-1. NEW-JERSEY.-None. OHIO.-George Bliss, Moses B. Corwin-2. CALIFORNIA.-None. INDIANA.-Eben M. Chamberlain-1. Iowa.-John P. Cook-1. Total from Free States-9. MARYLAND.-John R. Franklin, Augustus R. Sollers -2. VIRGINIA.-Fayette McMullen-1. NORTH CAROLINA.-None. DELAWARE.-None. SOUTH CAROLINA.-Wm. Aiken, Lawrence M. Keitt, GEORGIA.-Wm. B. W. Dent, James L. Seward-2. MISSISSIPPI.-Wiley P. Harris-1. KENTUCKY.-Linn Boyd, (Speaker,) Presley Ewing-2. ARKANSAS.-None. FLORIDA.-None. Total from Slave States-12. Whigs in Italics. Abolitionists in SMALL CAPITALS. Democrats in Roman. May 23d.-The bill being thus sent to the Senate (not as a Senate but as a House bill), was sent at once to the Committee of the Whole, and there briefly considered. May 24th.-Mr. Pearce, of Maryland, moved to strike out the clause in section 5, which extends the right of suffrage to those who shall have declared on oath their inten oath to support the Constitution of the United States, and tion to become such, [citizens] and shall have taken an the provisions of this act. Negatived-Yeas: Bayard, Bell, Brodhead, Brown, Clayton, Pearce, and Thompson of Kentucky. Nays, 41. The bill was then ordered to be engrossed for a third reading-Yeas, 35; Nays, 13, as (Dec. 31st) his Annual Message, and next (Jan. follows: Democrats in Roman; Whigs in Italics; Free Demo crats in SMALL CAPS. 24th) a special message with regard to the condition of Kansas, in which he thus alludes to those who think Slavery not the best institution to make a prosperous and happy State, and to those who opposed the repeal of the Missouri restriction: This interference, in so far as concerns its primary causes and its immediate commencement, was one of the incidents of that pernicious agitation on the subject of the condition of the colored persons held to service in some of the States, which has so long disturbed the repose of our country, and excited individuals, otherwise patriotic and law-abiding, to toil with misdirected zeal in the attempt to propagate their social theories by the perversion and abuse of the powers of Congress. The persons and parties whom the tenor of the act to organize the Territories of Nebraska and Kansas thwarted in the endeavor to impose, through the agency of Congress, their particular views of social organization on the people of the future new States, now perceiving that the policy of leaving the inhabitants of each State to judge for themselves in this respect was ineradicably rooted in the convictions of the people of the Union, then had recourse, in the pursuit of their general object, to the extraordinary measure of propagandist colonization of the Territory of Kansas, to prevent the free and natural action of its inhabitants in its internal organization and thus to anticipate or to force the determination of that question in this inchoate State. The President makes the following referThe bill was then passed without further ence to the action of the people of Kansas, division, and, being approved by the President, who, claiming the right "peaceably to assem became a law. The clause in the 14th section,ble and petition for a redress of grievances," which repealed the Missouri Compromise, with the Badger proviso, is as follows: That the Constitution and all the laws of the United States which are not locally inapplicable, shall have the same force and effect within the said territory of Nebraska, as elsewhere within the United States, except the eighth section of the act preparatory to the admission of Missouri into the Union, approved March sixth, eighteen hundred and twenty, which being inconsistent with the principles of non-intervention by Congress with Slavery in the States and Territories, as recognized by the legislation of eighteen hundred and fifty, commonly called the Compromise Measures, is hereby declared inoperative and void; it being the true intent and meaning of this act not to legislate Slavery into any Territory or State, nor to exclude it therefrom, but to leave the people there of perfectly free to form and regulate their domestic institutions in their own way, subject only to the Constitution of the United States; Provided, That nothing here in contained shall be construed to revive or put in force any law or regulation which may have existed prior to the act of sixth of March, eighteen hundred and twenty, either protecting, establishing, prohibiting or abolishing Slavery. Dec. 3, 1855.-The XXXIVth Congress convened at the Capitol, in Washington.-Jesse D. Bright, of Ind., holding over as President pro tempore of the Senate, in place of Vice-President William R. King, of Alabama, deceased. A quorum of either House was found to be present. did so assemble, and sent a petition to Congress, to permit them to form a State Government, with the Constitution submitted: Following upon this movement was another and more important one of the same general character. Persons confessedly not constituting the body politic, or all the inhabitants, but merely a party of the inhabitants, and without law, have undertaken to summon a convention for the purpose of transforming the Territory into a State, and have framed a constitution, adopted it, and under it elected a governor and other offers, and a representative to Congress. March 12.-In Senate, Mr. Douglas, of Illinois, from the Committee on Territories, made a report on matters relating to Kansas affairs, in which he says: The act of Congress for the organization o the Ter ritories of Kansas and Nebraska, was designed to conform to the spirit and letter of the Federal Constitution, by preserving and maintaining the fundamental principle of equality among all the States of the Union, notwithstanding the restriction contained in the 8th section of the act of March 6, 1820, (preparatory to the admission of Missouri into the Union,) which assumed to deny to Slavery for themselves, provided they should make their the people forever the right to settle the question of homes and organize States north of thirty-six degrees and thirty minutes north latitude. Conforming to the cardinal principles of State equality and self-govern ment, in obedience to the Constitution, the KansasNebraska act declared, in the precise language of the Compromise Measures of 1850, that, "when admitted as a State, the said Territory, or any portion of the same, shall be received into the Union, with or without Slavery, as their constitutions may prescribe at the time of their admission." He then refers to the formation of the "Emi But the House found itself unable to organize by the choice of a Speaker, until after an unprecedented struggle of nine weeks duration. Finally, on Saturday, Feb. 20, 1856, the plurality-rule was adopted-Yeas, 113; Nays, 104 -and the House proceeded under it to its one hundred and thirty-third ballot for speaker, ized on the principle of "State equality grant Aid Company," which had been organwhen Nathaniel P. Banks, jr. (anti-Nebraska) the people of Massachusetts. This proceeding of Massachusetts, was chosen, having 103 he calls "a perversion of the plain provisions' votes to 100, for William Aiken, of South Caro- of the Kansas-Nebraska Act-that the only lina. Eleven votes scattered on other persons did not count against a choice. It was there by "The Emigrant Aid Company," with five millions dollars, fore resolved-Yeas, 155; Nays, 40-that Mr. to which Mr. Douglas alludes, and from the existence of which Banks was duly elected Speaker. But, during the pendency of this election, the President had transmitted to both Houses, first he makes a special plea for the Border Ruffians, was never organized: See Report of Special Committee of Con gress, (page 100.) kind of lawful emigration was "such as has effort to send at least an equal number, to counteract the filled up our new States and Territories, when apprehended result of the new importation. each individual has gone on his own account, to improve his condition and that of his family." The report then states that the people of Missouri were greatly alarmed at the rapid filling up of Kansas by people opposed to Slavery-that this might endanger the existence of Slavery in Missouri-and that, as the people of Missouri had a right to defend their own institutions, they might properly resist the formation of an Anti-Slavery State in their neighborhood. The report continues: For the successful prosecution of such a scheme, the Missourians who lived in the immediate vicinity possessed peculiar advantages over their rivals from the more remote portions of the Union. Each family could send one of its members across the line to mark out his claim, erect a cabin, and put in a small crop, sufficient to give him as valid a right to be deemed an actual settler and qualified voter as those who were being imported by the Emigrant Aid Societies. In an unoccupied Territory, where the lands have not been surveyed, and where there were no marks or lines to indicate the boundaries of sections and quartersections, and where no legal title could be had until after the surveys should be made, disputes, quarrels, violence, and bloodshed might have been expected as the natural and inevitable consequences of such extraordinary systems of emigration, which divided and arrayed the settlers into two great hostile parties, each having an inducement to claim more than was his right, in order to hold it for some new-comer of his own party, and at the same time prevent persons belonging to the opposite party from settling in the neighborhood. As a result of this state of things, the great mass of emigrants from the northwest and from other States who went there on their own account, with no other object, and influenced by no other motives than to improve their condition and secure good homes for their families, were compelled to array themselves under the banner of one of these hostile parties, in order to insure protection to themselves and their claims against the ions and violence of the other. The report then gives a history of the Legislature elected March 30th, 1855, its removal from Pawnee City to the Shawnee Mission, its subsequent quarrel with Gov. Reeder, and continues: relations with the legislature, on account of the removal A few days after, Governor Reeder dissolved his official of the seat of government, and while that body was still in session, a meeting was called by "many voters," to assemble at Lawrence, on the 14th or 15th of August, 1855, ritorial Convention, preliminary to the formation of a State "to take into consideration the propriety of calling a Ter Government, and other subjects of public interest." At that meeting, the following preamble and resolutions were adopted with but one dissenting voice: "Whereas, the people of Kansas Territory have been since the settlement, and now are, without any law-making power; therefore "Be it resolved, That we, the people of Kansas Territory, in fluenced by a common necessity, and greatly desirous of promass meeting assembled, irrespective of party distinctions, inmoting the common good, do hereby call upon and request all bona fide citizens of Kansas Territory, of whatever political views and predilections, to consult together in their respective election districts, and in mass convention or otherwise, elect three delegates for each representative in the legislative asMarch, 1855; said delegates to assembly in convention at the sembly, by proclamation of Governor Reeder of date 10th town of Topeka, on the 19th day of September, 1855, then and there to consider and determine upon all subjects of public interest, and particularly upon that having reference to the speedy formation of a State Constitution, with an intention of an immediate application to be admitted as a State into the Union of the United States of America." This meeting, so far as your Committee have been able to ascertain, was the first step in that series of proceedings which resulted in the adoption of a Constitution and State Government, to be put in operation on the 4th of the present month, in subversion of the Territorial Government established under the authority of Congress. The right to set up the State Government in defiance of the constituted authorities of the Territory, is based on the assumption "that the people of Kansas Territory have been since its in the face of the well-known fact, that the Territorial Lesettlement, and now are, without any law-making power;" aggress-gislature was then in session, in pursuance of the pro On the 29th of November, 1854, the first election in the Territory was held for a delegate to Congress. This was a very short time after the arrival of the Free State emigrants in suffi cient bodies to protect themselves. At this election, according to the returns, J. W. Whitfield had received 2,268 votes; other persons, 575. Whitfield, of course, received the Governor's certificate, but great dissatisfaction was expressed by the Free State settlers, charging that many of the votes received by Whitfield were given by men living in Missouri; and it afterward appeared that at the time of the first election there were but 1,114 legal voters in the Territory. Nevertheless, the report continues: Certain it is, that there could not have been a system of fraud and violence such as has been charged by the agents and supporters of the emigrant aid societies, unless the Governor and judges of election were parties to it; and your committee are not prepared to assume a fact so disreputable to them, and so improbable upon the state of facts presented, without specific charges and direct proof. In the absence of all proof and probable truth, the charge that the Missourians had invaded the Territory and controlled the congressional election by fraud and violence was circulated throughout the Free States, and made the basis of the most inflammatory appeals to all men opposed to the principles of the Kansas-Nebraska act to emigrate or send emigrants to Kansas, for the purpose of repelling the invaders, and assisting their friends who were then in the Territory in putting down the slave-power, and prohibiting Slavery in Kansas, with the view of making it a Free State. Exaggerated accounts of the large number of emigrants on their way under the auspices of the emigrant aid companies, with the view of controlling the election for members of the Territorial Legislature, which was to take place on the 30th of March, 1855, were published and circulated. These accounts, being republished and believed in Missouri, where the excitement had already been inflamed to a fearful intensity, induced a corresponding clamation of Governor Reeder, and the organic law of the Territory. The report then proceeds to narrate the cir cumstances attending the formation of a State Government in Michigan, Arkansas, Florida and California, and states that "in every instance the proceeding has originated with, and been conducted in subordination to, the authority of the local governments established or recognized by the Government of the United States." then refers to the case of the effort to change the organic law, made in Rhode Island some years ago, from which it says the "insurgents" (as the Free-State party in Kansas is called) "can derive no aid or comfort." It The following concludes the Report; the words in Italics below perhaps explain in what sense the people of a Territory are "perfectly free to form their own institutions, in their own way:" Without deeming it necessary to express any opinion on this occasion, in reference to the merits of that controversy, [referring to Rhode Island,] it is evident that the principles upon which it was conducted are not involved in the revolutionary struggle now going on in Kansas; for the reason, that the sovereignty of a Territory remains in abeyance, suspended in the United States, in trust for the people, until they shall be admitted into the Union as a State. In the meantime, they are entitled to enjoy and exercise all the privileges and rights of self-government, in subordination to the Constitution of the United States, and in obedience to their organic law passed by Congress in pursuance of that instru ment. These rights and privileges are all derived from the Constitution, through the act of Congress, and must be exercised and enjoyed in subjection to all the limitations and restrictions which that Constitution imposes. Hence, it is clear that the people of the Territory have no inherent sovereign right, under the Constitution of the United States, to annul the laws and resist the authority of the Territorial government which Congress has established in obedience to the Constitution. to their admission into the Union on an equal footing with the original States, so soon as it shall appear, by a census to be taken under the direction of the Governor, by the authority of the Legislature, that the Territory contains ninety-three thousand, four hundred and twenty inhabitants-that being the number required by the present ratio of representation for a member of Congress. In tracing, step by step, the origin and history of these Kansas difficulties, your Committee have been profoundly impressed with the significant fact, that each one has resulted from an attempt to violate or circumvent the principles and provisions of the act of Congress for the organization of Kansas and Nebraska. The leading idea and fundamental principle of the Kansas-Nebraska act, as expressed in the law itself, was to leave the actual set- In compliance with the other recommendation, your tlers and bona-fide inhabitants of each Territory Committee propose to offer to the appropriation bill an perfectly free to form and regulate their domestic amendment appropriating such sum as shall be found neinstitutions in their own way, subject only to the Con-cessary, by the estimates to be obtained, for the purpose stitution of the United States." While this is declared indicated in the recommendation of the President. to be the "true intent and meaning of the act," those All of which is respectfully submitted to the Senate by who were opposed to allowing the people of the Territory, your Committee. preparatory to their admission into the Union as a State, to decide the Slavery question for themselves, failing to accomplish their purpose in the halls of Congress, and under the authority of the Constitution, immediately resorted, in their respective States, to unusual and extraordinary means to control the political destinies and shape the domestic institutions of Kansas, in defiance of the wishes, and regardless of the rights, of the people of that Territory, as guaranteed by their organic law. Combinations, in one section of the Union, to stimulate an unnatural and false system of emigration, with the view of controlling the elections, and forcing the domestic institutions of the Territory to assimilate to those of the non-slaveholding States, were followed, as might have been foreseen, by the use of similar means in the slaveholding States, to produce directly the opposite result. To these causes, and to these alone, in the opinion of your Committee, may be traced the origin and progress of all the controversies and disturbances with which Kansas is now convulsed. Mr. Collamer, of Vermont, the Republican member of same Committee, submitted a minority report, in which he says: Thirteen of the present prosperous States of this Union passed through the period of apprenticeship or pupilage of territorial training, under the guardianship of Congress, preparatory to assuming their proud rank of manhood as sovereign and independent States. This period of their pupilage was, in every case, a period of the good offi ces of parent and child, in the kind relationship sustained between the National and the Territorial Government, and may be remembered with feelings of gratitude and pride. We have fallen on different times. A territory of our government is now convulsed with violence and discord, and the whole family of our nation is in a state of excitement and anxiety. The National Executive power is put in motion, the army in requisition, and Congress is invoked for interference. If these unfortunate troubles have resulted, as natural consequences, from unauthorized and improper schemes In this case, as in all others of difficulty, it becomes neof foreign interference with the internal affairs and domes-cessary to inquire what is the true cause of existing troutic concerns of the Territory, it is apparent that the remedy ble, in order to apply effectual cure. It is but a temporary must be sought in a strict adherence to the principles and palliative to deal with the external and more obvious mani rigid enforcement of the provisions of the organic law. festations and developments, while the real, procuring In this connection, your Committee feel sincere satisfaction cause lies unattended to, and uncorrected, and unrein commending the messages and proclamation of the Pre- moved. sident of the United States, in which we have the gratifying assurance that the supremacy of the laws will be maintained; that rebellion will be crushed; that insurrection will be suppressed; that aggressive intrusion for the purpose of deciding elections, or any other purpose, will be repelled; that unauthorized intermeddling in the local concerns of the Territory, both from adjoining and distant States, will be prevented; that the federal and local laws will be vindicated against all attempts at organized resistance; and that the people of the Territory will be protected in the establishment of their own institutions, undisturbed by encroachments from without, and in the full enjoyment of the rights of self-government assured to them by the Constitution and the organic law. In view of these assurances, given under the conviction that the existing laws confer all the authority necessary to the performance of these important duties, and that the whole available force of the United States will be exerted to the extent required for their performance, your Committee repose in entire confidence that peace, and security, and law, will prevail in Kansas. If any further evidence were necessary to prove that all the collisions and difficulties in Kansas have been produced by the schemes of foreign interference which have been developed in this report, in violation of the principles and in evasion of the provisions of the Kansas-Nebraska act, it may be found in the fact that in Nebraska, to which the emigrant-aid societies did not extend their operations, and into which the stream of emigration was permitted to flow in its usual and natural channels, nothing has occurred to disturb the peace and harmony of the Territory, while the principle of self-government, in obedience to the Constitution, has had fair play, and is quietly working out its legitimate results. It now only remains for your Committee to respond to the two specific recommendations of the President, in his special message. They are as follows: It is said that organized opposition to law exists in Kansas. That, if existing, may probably be suppressed by the President, by the use of the army, and so, too, may invasions by armed bodies from Missouri, if the Executive be sincere in its efforts; but when this is done, while the cause of trouble remains, the results will continue with renewed and increased developments of danger. Let us, then, look fairly and undisguisedly at this subject, in its true character and history. Wherein does this Kansas Territory differ from all our other Territories which have been so peacefully and successfully carried through, and been developed into the manhood of independent States? Can that difference account for existing troubles? Can that difference, as a cause of trouble, be removed? The first and great point of difference between the Territorial government of Kansas and that of the thirteen Territorial governments before mentioned, consists in the subject of Slavery-the undoubted cause of present trouble. The action of Congress in relation to all these thirteen Territories was conducted on a uniform and prudent principle, to wit: To settle, by a clear provision, the law in relation to the subject of Slavery to be operative in the Territory, while it remained such; not leaving it in any one of those cases to be a subject of controversy within the same, while in the plastic gristle of its youth. This was done by Congress in the exercise of the same power which molded the form of their organic laws, and appointed their executive and judiciary, and sometimes their legislative officers; it was the power provided in the Constitution, in these words: "Congress shall have power to dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations respecting the territory or other property belonging to the United States." Settling the subject of Slavery while the country remained a Territory, was no higher ex "This, it seems to me, can be best accomplished by provid-ercise of power in Congress, than the regulation of the funcing that, when the inhabitants of Kansas may desire it, and shall be of sufficient numbers to constitute a State, a convention of delegates, duly elected by the qualified voters, shall assemble to frame a Constitution, and thus prepare, through regular and lawful means, for its admission into the Union as a State. I respectfully recommend the enactment of a law to that effect. "I recommend, also, that a special appropriation be made to defray any expense which may become requisite in the execution of the laws, or the maintenance of public order in the Territory of Kansas." In compliance with the first recommendation, your Committee ask leave to report a bill authorizing the Legislature of the Territory to provide by law for the election of delegates by the people, and the assembling of a Convention to form a Constitution and State Government preparatory tions of the territorial government, and actually appointing its principal functionaries. This practice commenced with this National Government, and was continued, with uninterrupted uniformity, for more than sixty years. This practical contemporaneous construction of the constitutional power of this government is too clear to leave room for doubt, or opportunity for skepticism. The peace, prosperity, and success which attended this course, and the results which have ensued, in the formation and admission of the thirteen States therefrom, are most conclusive and satisfactory evidence, also, of the wisdom and prudence with which this power was exercised. Deluded must be that people who, in the pursuit of plausible theories, become deaf to the lessons, and blind to the results, of their own experience. |