Papers Relating to Foreign Affairs, Accompanying the Annual Message of the President to the Second Session Thirty-eighth Congress, Part I

Mr. Adams to Mr. Seward.

No. 622.]

Legation of the United States, London, March 18, 1864.

Sir: I have been requested to transmit to the President a copy of the Roch dale Observer of the 12th instant, containing a report of the proceedings of a public meeting held in that town on the 7th instant, on American affairs. The resolution appears to have been adopted unanimously.

I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant,

CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS.

Hon. William H. Seward, Secretary of State, Washington, D. C.

Mr. Ernest Jones on the American Slaveholders’ War.

On Monday evening, Mr. Ernest Jones, barrister-at-law, delivered an address in the public hall Rochdale, on the American slaveholders’ war. His worship the mayor, S. Stott, esq., presided. The appearance of Mr. Jones on the platform was the signal for most enthusiastic demonstrations on the part of the immense assembly by which the hall was crowded in every part. Mr. Jones was accompanied by the mayor, and a large number of the members of the Rochdale branch of the Union and Emancipation Society; among whom we observed Messrs. J. Petrie, jr., R. Ashworth, W. A. Scott, Alderman Healey, R. Mills, T. Booth, Smithies, Harley, &c.

The mayor, on rising, was heartily cheered, which having subsided, he said: Fellow-townsmen, we are met to-night to listen to an address from Mr. Ernest Jones, on the question of that great struggle which is now taking place in the United States of America. I have been invited by the committee of the Union and Emancipation Society to preside over this meeting, and I accept that invitation in my official position as the mayor of this borough. [Cheers.] I feel that it would be out of place on this occasion on my part to give any expression of opinion in favor either of one of the contending parties or the other. [Hear, hear.] Mr. Ernest Jones appears before us to-night as a comparative stranger to most of us, and I have no doubt, from what I know, and what I have read of that gentleman’s abilities, I can say you may expect that the address that he will deliver to-night will not only be eloquent but instructive, [cheers,] and I ask you, as the mayor of this borough, to give him a fair and impartial hearing, to give him that liberty which you expect at the hands of others, and I will promise you one thing, that at the close of this meeting, if there should be any gentleman anxious to put any question to Mr. Jones relative to the subject of his address, by making his appearance on this platform he shall have a fair and candid hearing. [Cheers.] I ask you (but I need not ask a Rochdale audience) to give Mr. Jones that attention the subject demands. We all deplore, indeed we need deplore, the struggle which is now taking place on a neighboring continent. [Hear, hear.] We all regret the spilling of blood and the great sacrifice of human life. We deplore the thousands of wives that have been left widows, and the thousands and tens of thousands of children that have been left orphans; we all sympathize with the bereaved, and we even hope that the time is not far distant when this war shall be ended and the sword shall be sheathed, and peace shall once more reign triumphant through that land. [Cheers.] We do not only desire this on their account, but also on our own. We all know what suffering the people of this town—nay, the people of Lancashire—have passed through during the last three years in consequence of this war. We all know the importance that this great struggle bears relatively to this district, when that important supply of cotton which kept our mills at work five days out of the six at least was cut off almost without a moment’s warning, and by one stroke; but even here I hope we shall learn lessons as merchants, manufacturers, and operatives; that the policy we have pursued has been of the most suicidal character; rendering ourselves, as you know, dependent upon one country alone for so important an article as cotton—an article which has kept dependent upon its supply some four millions of human beings. [Hear, hear.] I have not come here to-night to make a speech. I appear before you as the mayor of this borough, and I am glad to have the opportunity of presiding on any occasion over a Rochdale audience. [Cheers.] Let me again ask you to give the lecturer a careful and impartial hearing. [Cheers.] I have great pleasure in introducing him to your notice. [Applause.]

Mr. E. Jones, on rising, was received with rounds of cheers, again and again renewed. The learned gentleman said: Mr. Mayor and gentlemen, the subject that is to engross our attention to-night is one of such vital importance that it appeals not merely to the feelings of a Rochdale audience, or of a Lancashire audience, or of an English audience, but it is a subject that ought to enlist the sympathies, and shall enlist the attention, of the whole civilized world. [Cheers.] It is a subject involving not merely English interests or American interests; it is a subject not merely of pounds, shillings, and pence, vital and important as any pounds-shillings-and-pence question must be to a manufacturing community; but it is a subject involving questions of morality and humanity, and questions of religion itself. [Cheers.] Nor is it at all out of place, even abstracted from our own personal interests, that we should deeply ponder over and calmly deliberate upon the struggle proceeding in the United States of America. We are invited to do so. We are, if I may use the expression, challenged to do so by the originators of that war, and by those who are the chief actors in that struggle on the side of the south. The government of the Confederate States, by the manifestoes they have issued to the world, are asking the sympathies and claiming the opinion of the people of England and of all countries as to the course they have pursued. They have sent over ambassadors to England and France asking for sympathy, for recognition, and alliance at the hands of the English people and the French people; and therefore it behooves us, as citizens in a free country, as people claiming to have a voice in that which England does and that which England says, to give our answer to that invitation, to say on which side we believe that our sympathies ought to be enlisted; upon which side our duties really lie; and what is the attitude which we ought to hold between the belligerent parties. Bearing that view of the question in mind, I propose to analyze the subject-matter under the following heads: First, to endeavor to show what was the origin and what was the object of secession; second, to examine some of the assertions made by the defenders and advocates of the south; third, to consider what, in my humble judgment—and to submit for your consideration arguments in support of that judgment—appear to be the interests and the duties of the people of this country, because you have been told that it is a pocket question with England; you have been told that so long as this war lasts the supply of cotton from America would be kept away; and certain measures have been suggested to you which, if they were adopted, it is said would insure you a cotton supply. Under these three heads I purpose to address you to-night, and I purpose laying down before you and maintaining to the best of my poor ability the following arguments: First, that the sole origin and entire object of the secession war has been to perpetuate and to spread slavery, [cheers;] second, that the war was not originated for the purposes of free trade, not originated upon questions of tariff, not waged for national independence as such. [Cheers.] Those with reference to the first branch of the argument are the propositions which I purpose to maintain. Secondly, I purpose showing that the Confederate States had no right, constitutional, legal, or moral, for secession; that they labored under no grievances which would sanction their secession; and that, consequently, their rebellion is a rebellion, and an unjustifiable rebellion altogether. Thirdly, that with a view of obtaining cotton, with a view of securing the prosperity of the working classes of this country, a disruption of the American Union is not desirable, but the very reverse.

And first I purpose laying before you what really the fighting question was before the sword was drawn between the north and south. You are aware that the United States of America, before the secession war began, consisted of States and Territories. The States were those portions of the community which had a municipal independence, which had State rights, and as States sent representatives to Congress. The Territories were merely provinces in the process of formation into States, ruled under the authority of the central executive. Each of these Territories could claim to be made a State as soon as it had a population of 124,000. For a long period the question of slavery and freedom had been at issue and debate between the north and south; and the origin of that question dates back to the very foundation of the American colonies of England. There are some people who say, “What a blot slavery is upon republican and democratic institutions in the greatest (and as they call it) model republic of the modern world!” [Laughter.] But, recollect when slavery was founded in the whole of the northern continent of America; recollect that it was established when America was a colony of the English crown; that slavery was not established by democrats or republicans, but that it was established by monarchy and aristocracy. [Cheers.] But although slavery existed generally throughout the Union when the States comprising the Union were English colonies, step by step slavery was purged from all the northern States, and it was only in the southern States, and in a portion of the western States, that it struck deep root and maintained itself as a growing and rampant institution. [Hear, hear.] Why was it so? Because there was a distinction between the men who colonized the north and the men who colonized the south. You will find that generally it is the aristocracy of this country, and those who are fond of clinging to the skirts of that aristocracy, those who would desire to be an aristocracy themselves, and the State church clergy of this country very generally, who support the south. [Cheers.] Now this is perfectly natural. [Laughter.] It is not to be wondered at, and I will tell you why. The northern colonies of America were colonized by the Puritans, by the Lollards, by the middle classes and the working classes of England, who fled from church and royal persecutions. The southern colonies were colonized by the fugitive cavaliers, by the malignants, by those who viewed with disgust the growth and supremacy of democratic institutions, who shrunk before the sword of Cromwell and the eloquence of Pym. [Cheers.] The south was colonized by the aristocracy of Britain, the north by the democracy of Britain. [Hear, hear.] Where does slavery exist, and where did slavery perish of itself? It perished in the democratic north, and it has struck deep root in the aristocratic south—[cheers]—where the aristocracy of England have claimed the land, partitioned it among 300,000 planters, and degraded labor to the lowest possible degree. [Cheers.] The north, purging slavery from its confines, sought to spread liberty further and further to the south; the south, determined to cling to slavery, sought to spread it further and further towards the north. And on that basis the battle was fought, first on the hustings, then on the floor of the Senate-house and House of Representatives at Washington. Of course everything now depended on who had the most votes in Congress. For a long series of years the south had supremacy. The south elected pro-slavery men as Presidents of the Union, and through these Presidents succeeded in putting southern officers in the command of Union regiments, dockyards and navy; in putting pro-slavery judges on the judicial bench, and thus we have the notorious decision in the Dred Scott case, in the teeth of justice and law. [Cheers.] Then arose the question whether the Territories should be admitted as free States or slave States; for every new State having the power to send two representatives to Congress, if the State was admitted as a free State, the northern party gained these votes; if as a slave State, the southern party. [Hear, hear.] Therefore the battle of freedom and slavery was fought for a long series of years on this basis—whether the new States should be admitted as free States or slave States. You remember the really terrific and blood-thirsty struggle that took place in reference to the admission of Kansas. In order to gain a majority of votes the south sent across the border a gang of Missouri ruffians, who drove away the honest free electors, and giving their spurious votes at the point of the revolver and bowie-knife, brought Kansas into the Union as a slave State. But when, in the year 1850, California was admitted as a free State, thus restoring the balance of power between freedom and slavery, the struggle became one of peculiar intensity, and in order to meet the issue the southern men, in defiance of law and treaties, reopened the slave trade, and for the following reasons. The Hon. L. W. Spratt, senator of South Carolina, tells us in a few words upon what basis that battle was fought:

“The revival of the slave trade will give political power to the south—imported slaves will give increased representation to the national legislature— more slaves will give us more States, and it is therefore within the power of the untutored savages we bring from Africa to restore to the south the influence she has lost by the suppression of the slave trade.”

Vice-President Stephens said: “We can divide Texas into five States, and it is plain that, unless the number of African stock be increased, we have not the population, and might as well abandon the race with our brothers of the north in the colonization of the Territories.” Therefore you see they have openly expressed their intention of renewing the slave trade in order that they might swamp the Territories with a slave population, and (five slaves counting as one white) then say: “Here are the requisite 124,000 votes required for the admission of the Territory into the Union as a State; it shall be made into a State, and it shall be made into a slave State; and the population being slaves will give us two more votes to set against the republican and abolitionist States.” Upon that ground, then, the battle was fought, and the slave trade reopened. In 1859 a convention met at Vicksburg, and unanimously voted that an American labor supply association be formed, with Mr. De Bow as president. The State of Georgia offered a premium of twenty-five dollars for the best specimen of a live African imported within twelve months. Alabama formed a league of United Southerners to reopen the slave trade; and Arkansas and Louisiana followed in the same direction. The slave trade was therefore reopened in defiance of the law; and they sought to fight the battle on the basis of the new States. This the north resisted; and to show you the exact ground upon which this battle was fought between the two parties, which led to the triumph of Lincoln and abolition principles, I will read you the principal clauses of therepublican platforms of Frémont and Lincoln:

“The new dogma that the Constitution, by its own force, carries slavery into any or all Territories is a dangerous heresy.

“The normal condition of all the territories in the United States is freedom. As our republican fathers, when they abolished slavery in all our national territories, ordained that ‘no person should be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due course of law,’ it becomes our duty to maintain this principle inviolate; and we deny the authority of Congress, of the territorial legislature, or of individuals, to give existence to slavery in any territory of the United States.

“That we brand the recent reopening of the African slave trade under cover of our national flag, aided by perversions of judicial power, as a crime against humanity, and a burning shame to our country and our age; and we call on Congress to take prompt and efficient measures for the total and final suppression of that execrable traffic.”

That was the platform and basis upon which the battle was fought. The triumph of Buchanan over Frémont, in 1856, caused a momentary lull in the action of the republican party of the north. But the south felt that at the next election of President they must be in the minority; and from that moment they prepared for active war, for the present rebellion. I am not here to advance my own opinions on this subject; I am here to bring the southern leaders themselves on this platform, and to prove my case in their own words, from their own declarations and state papers. [Cheers.] If I can show you that the south told us they intended to draw the sword for slavery; if I can show you upon what terms they offered to return the sword to the scabbard; if I can show you that they offered a slavery compromise; that the ordinances of the seceding States all turned mainly upon slavery; and if I can show you that the crowning work of all this was a slavery constitution—a constitution differing from the federal Constitution only on this single point—then I shall ask you to accept one of two propositions—either that the south speaks the truth, and if it does, that this is a struggle for slavery, and for slavery alone, or else that its declarations are a lie, that its compromise is a lie, its ultimatum a lie, its secession ordinances lies, its constitution a lie; and if so, I wish the southern advocates joy of the honorable clients which they appear here for. [Cheers.] Now, one word with reference to the slave trade. As the mayor has told you, I shall be happy to answer any objections that may arise at the close of my address; but perhaps I may be permitted to anticipate one or two as they do arise. You may have been, you may be told, “Well, if slavery is the object of the struggle, why is it that in the confederate constitution the slave trade is prohibited?” Undoubtedly it is prohibited, but under what circumstances? By an overwhelming majority in both houses of the confederate legislature the slave trade was formally reopened; but then it was said by Jefferson Davis and the leading statesmen of the south, “We are seeking the support of England and France; and if they see that the slave trade is legalized by one of the clauses of our constitution they will not give us their support.” Therefore he put his veto upon that clause of the constitution. But the Hon. W. L. Spratt has explained the motive—that it was a sprat to catch a herring. [Laughter.] Then, when it was found probable that an abolition President would be elected, the Richmond Enquirer, the Moniteur of the Confederate States, wrote thus: “If Frémont is elected, the Union will not last an hour after Pierce’s (the then President’s) term of office expires.” Preston Brooks, of South Carolina, said:

“The only mode available for meeting it [the issue between slavery and freedom] is just to tear the Constitution of the United States, [thus admitting that the Constitution did not provide for slavery,] trample it under foot, and form a southern confederacy, every State of which shall be a slaveholding State.”

Jefferson Davis, speaking at Jackson, Mississippi, in 1858, said:

“If an abolitionist be chosen President, you will have to consider whether you will permit the government to pass into the hands of your enemies. In that event, in such manner as should be most expedient, I should deem it your duty to provide for your safety outside the Union.”

And Buchanan, the southern President, in his message to Congress in December, 1860, throwing off the presidential mask as far as he could, said:

“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 immediate peril arises from the incessant and violent agitation of the slavery question throughout the north for the last quarter of a century, which has at length produced its malign influence on the slaves, and inspired them with vague notions of freedom.”

Now, I say, if all these men, representative men, before the sword is drawn, tell you why they mean to draw it, are you to believe what they say or what you are told by amateur politicians in England, three thousand miles from the scene of conflict, who tell you that these men, who led the rebellion, did not know what the rebellion was really for? [Cheers.] But more than this, at the close of 1860 a committee of thirty-three, or a committee consisting of a representative from each of the States then in the Union, was appointed to ascertain what were the points of difference between the northern and southern States. The report of this committee was published, and, as Mr. Cobden has told you, every one of the grievances of the south arose out of slavery, and nothing else. [Cheers.] So much for the declarations of the south when the sword was drawn. After it was drawn, a compromise—the Crittenden compromise—was proposed. Some gentlemen here tell you that the rebellion is for free trade—that it was a revolt against the Morrill tariff. But what were the terms of this compromise? Why, that “by amendment of the Constitution,” thus admitting that the Constitution does not provide for slavery—[cheers]—slavery should be recognized as a permanent and legal institution in all territory south of the geographical line of 36 degrees 30 minutes; that Congress should have no power to abolish slavery in the States permitting it; that slavery should be sanctioned in the District of Columbia, while it existed in Virginia and Maryland, and that the officers of government and members of Congress should not be prohibited from bringing their slaves there, and holding them there as such; that Congress should have no power to hinder the transportation of slaves from State to State; that Congress should have full power to pay the owners of fugitive slaves their full value, where the national officer was prevented from arresting the fugitive; that Congress should never have the power of interfering with slavery in the States where it was then permitted; that the right to have property in man should be legal not only in the territories then in possession, but in all territories to be thereafter acquired. That was the compromise called the Crittenden compromise. It is slavery in the beginning, slavery to the end. [Cheers.] Not one word about free trade or the Morrill tariff. [Cheers.] Then Jefferson Davis offered to the north an ultimatum— on these conditions, and these only, we (the south) will return to the Union; and what are these conditions?

“That it shall be resolved by amendment of the Constitution [again that word amendment’] that property in slaves, recognized as such by the local law of any State, shall stand on the same footing in all constitutional and federal relations as any other property so recognized, and, like other property, not be subject to be divested or impaired by the local law of any other State, either in escape thereto, or transit, or sojourn of the owner therein, and, in no case whatever, shall such property be divested or impaired by any legislative act of the United States, or any of the Territories thereof.”

Where’s the free trade—where’s the Morrill tariff—where’s the independence? [Cheers.] Every State that has slaves now shall have slaves forever; every Territory that has slaves shall keep its slaves forever; every future State admitted into the Union to be a slave State. [Hear, hear.] Throughout every chamber of the republican palace the foot of liberty shall never fall. [Cheers.] Every new State emblazoned as a silver star upon the banner of the United States shall be but the widening of a dungeon instead of the enlarging of a palace. [Cheers.] But the north said “No;” they spurned the compromise, and they said, “Every new star shall be bathed in the light of liberty, and shall help to shine” —— [enthusiastic cheering, in which the sentence was lost.] Now, then, these men have told us why they meant to draw the sword; they have told you what compromise they would accept; they have told you upon what conditions they would return to the Union. Their compromise was spurned, and secession took place. As they seceded, State by State issued State documents called secession ordinances, in which they undertook to show the grounds upon which they seceded, and the justification of their secession. I will read to you one of them, that of South Carolina. This was the first of the States to secede, and so great was her hurry to get out of the Union, that, though seceding upon Mr. Lincoln’s election, her secession ordinance was actually dated before his inauguration. [Laughter.] And what were the reasons by which South Carolina justified secession?

“That the fugitive slaves had not been recovered from the free States. That the slave-hunter had not been assisted in recapturing the slaves. That the free States had not caused their officers to become slave-catchers in pursuance of the slave law. That the right of property in man had been denounced as sinful. That societies for teaching abolition principles had been openly allowed for twenty-five years. That by Lincoln’s election this anti-slavery agitation had received the and of the President, and that Lincoln had said “government cannot endure half slave, half free,” and “slavery is in the course of ultimate extinction.”

Alabama, on the 11th of January, 1861, Texas, on the 1st of February, Virginia, on the 17th of April, issued secession ordinances in the same tone and spirit. [Cheers.] Now, then, by its fruits ye shall know the tree. What was the constitution of the Confederate States? In that, if anywhere, you must look to find the aim and object of the south. The federal Constitution does not provide for slavery—I speak on that point advisedly—but the confederate constitution deliberately provides, in three of its principal clauses, for perpetual slavery. These clauses are the only great distinctive marks between the constitutions of the north and south; and these clauses I will read to you:

“All citizens may travel about the confederacy with their slaves, and the right of property in such slaves shall not thereby be impaired.

“No slave escaping to another State shall in consequence of any State law become free, but shall be delivered up to the owner.

“The confederacy may acquire new territories. In all such territories slavery shall be.”

That is the constitution of the Confederate States. [Cheers.] Now, have these men shown by their own words and acts that their movement was for slavery, and for slavery only, or not? Shall we believe the great criminal himself, who, before the tribunal of history, pleads guilty, not with bated breath, but as glorying in his crime?—[cheers]—or shall we believe his advocate here, the quibbling lawyer who, bribed with his cotton fee, is yet ashamed of his own client, and makes himself the apologist of a liar that he may not appear the confederate of a knave? [Cheers.] Mr. Jones described the southern victory at Bull run, and to show the effect of this victory quoted several declarations by Vice-President Stephens and others to show that the south, when the sword was drawn, adhered to the object for which they said they intended to draw the sword. Mr. Jones laid particular emphasis on the following passage from a sermon by Dr. Palmer, a leading southern divine, as explicit confirmation of the famous speech of Mr. Stephens:

“The providential southern trust is to perpetuate the institution of domestic slavery as at present existing, with freest scope for its natural development. We should at once lift ourselves intelligently to the highest moral ground, and proclaim to all the world that we hold this trust from God, and in its occupancy are prepared to stand or fall. It is a duty we owe to ourselves, to our slaves, and to Almighty God (!!) to preserve and transmit our existing system of domestic servitude, with the right unchallenged by man, to go and root itself wherever Providence and nature may carry it.”

Following up this train of observations and quotations Mr. E. Jones said: Now I am going to read to you something that should make your blood curdle—I refer to the manifesto of the hundred southern ministers of the Gospel. I have the most profound respect for ministers of the Gospel of every denomination and persuasion who consistently and conscientiously teach what they believe. [Cheers.] But I say this, that while most sincerely respecting them, I believe there is no man worse than a bad parson. [Great laughter.] When the devil has any ordinary piece of dirty work an ordinary man will do it, but when something peculiarly atrocious is to be done he generally finds a bad parson to do it. [Renewed laughter.] And this is the manifesto which these one hundred southern ministers of the Gospel put forth—

“The practical plan for benefiting the African race must be the providential, the scriptural plan. We adopt that plan in the south. We regard abolitionism as an interference with the plans of Divine Providence.” [Laughter and hisses.]

Permit me, gentlemen, to tell you, before I pass to the next branch of the argument, why the south triumphed at Bull run. As I have already said, this rebellion had been preparing from the moment of Mr. Buchanan’s election. By that election the south placed a pro-slavery man in the presidential chair of the United States. Under this administration they placed southern officers in the command of Union regiments, southern officers in command of Union dockyards and arsenals. They had been training and drilling the State militias; they were therefore able, on the outbreak of war, to place a veteran army of trained and drilled soldiers in the field, while the north, lulled to slumber by the treachery of Buchanan, could not believe in the existence of so gross and gigantic a conspiracy. [Cheers.] Can you wonder at this, can you doubt it, when you find Jefferson Davis Secretary of War for the United States of America? [Cheers.] At the first sound of war the north rushed to arms and took the field against the trained troops of the south, troops trained and armed out of their taxation, [cheers;] they came from the plough-tail, from the shop, from the factory, from the loom, from the office, from the counting-house, unarmed and undrilled; they bared their breasts with honest hearts within cannon shot of the south. [Cheers.] They fought well, they fell gloriously; but a panic arose at the eleventh hour, as panics do arise, and thus the south triumphed at Bull run. [Hear, hear.] But nobly has the north retrieved that defeat. [Cheers.] The north has shown that it could do a little fighting too; and yet now the advocates of the south come before you and say you ought to sympathize with the south—see how gallantly they fight. [Laughter.] So they do. Give the devil his due. [Hear, hear, and laughter.] So did the Austrians in Italy and in Hungary, yet I am for the Italians and the Hungarians. [Cheers.] So do the Russians in Poland, yet I am for the Poles and not for the Russians. [Cheers.] Unfortunately the minions of despotisms have but too often fought well. [Hear, hear.] But is it not extraordinary that some people can never see bravery but on one side, and only cheer when the devil makes a hit? [Cheers.] Now, then, I submit that from the mouth of the south itself—from the press of the south, from the pulpit of the south, from the statesmen of the south, from the state papers of the south, from the constitution of the south, that the recognized object of this rebellion was slavery, and slavery alone. [Enthusiastic cheering.] But there are some gentlemen who say that the strugggle was for free trade, and not for slavery. Permit me to show you the enormous fallacy of that argument. Properly stated, of course, this argument means, and you are asked to believe, that the north had passed protective tariffs, and that the south had opposed these tariffs. [Hear, hear.] Now, two of the very last tariffs passed, excepting the Morrill tariff, were passed by the south against the votes of the north. The tariff of 1846 was voted as follows: For, 50 northern votes, against 73; making a northern majority of 23 against the measure. [Cheers.] For, 64 southern votes, against 21; making a majority of 42 southern votes for it. [Cheers.] For the tariff of 1857 there were 60 northern votes, against 64; making a majority of 5 against it in the north. [Cheers.] For, 63 southern votes, against only 7, [cheers;] making a majority for it in the south of 56. [Cheers.] These were the two last protective tariffs before the Morrill tariff; and they were, as you see, passed by the south in the teeth and in defiance of the north. [Cheers.] And yet, in the face of this, the south comes before you to say, “We are for free trade, the north are protectionists.” [Laughter.] But you are asked to sympathize with the south upon free trade principles, and more especially with the view of getting free trade cotton. This is the favorite argument of Lords Wharnrcliffe and Campbell. Yet one of the first acts of the southern confederacy was to impose a tax of eight, and then of ten per cent. upon cotton—and why? Why, in their own words, to raise their revenue for the war in England, and thus “to make the English pay their taxes.” [Cheers.] They boasted that they should by this means drive the manufacturers and operatives of Lancashire to desperation and war. [Hear, hear.] After speaking at some length of the “secession trick” by which the Morrill tariff was passed, Mr. Jones passed on to speak of the right of the south to secede. There are [said the learned gentleman] southern apologists who say that, irrespective of slavery or free trade, their clients had a right to secede. On what ground? “Oh,” say they, “the States are sovereign and can do as they like.” The Constitution gives them no such right. On the contrary, it takes all such power away. By the first Constitution, of November, 1777, the States preserved their sovereignty, and such rights as were not delegated to the general Congress, [in itself an important reservation;] but this was found to work badly. Washington wrote the celebrated letter of 1783, pointing out the evil, and the present Constitution of the United States was passed on the 4th of March, 1789, for the especial purpose of putting an end to the independent sovereignty of the States. This it does most effectually. The preamble says: “We, the people of the United States, ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America”—a Constitution established by the whole people for all the States; and that Constitution specially and succinctly takes away every attribute of sovereignty from every individual State. It prohibits all taxes and duties between States, all treaties and alliances by States, all coining of money, all emission of bills of credit, all duties on exports and imports, all duty on tonnage, all keeping of troops or ships-of-war in time of peace, all agreements with a foreign power, all acts of war (unless actually invaded, and no time existing for delay) on the part of any State, and all agreements or compacts of one State with another, without consent of Congress. This Constitution shall be the supreme law of the land, and the judges of every State shall be bound thereby, anything in the constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding. Article 5 provides for the amendment of the Constitution on the sole condition that three-fourths of the States ot the entire Union, after long and great formalities, consent to such amendment, thus taking away the power of any individual State to separate from the bonds of union the Constitution imposed. [Cheers.] Who will now maintain that the States are individually sovereign, and could hy right secede of their own will? [Cheers.] But how did the south itself construe this Constitution? What do the slave States themselves say of it? Virginia was the first to set ahout altering this evil of State sovereignty. In the Virginia convention, assembled to ratify the Constitution, Patrick Henry opposed it because it took State sovereignty away! Yet, hearing this, Virginia voted for it on that very ground. [Cheers.] Mr. Benton, a southern man, one of the fathers of the democratic party, and for thirty years a representative in Congress, tells us that, “At the time of its first appearance, the right of secession was repulsed and repudiated by the democracy generally, and in a large degree by the enfeebled party, the difference between a union and a league being better understood at the time when the fathers of the new government were alive. The leading language in respect to it, south of the Potomac, was that no State had a right to withdraw from the Union, and that any attempt to dissolve it, or obstruct the action of constitutional laws, was treason.” [Cheers.] The same views were propounded by Presidents Madison, Jefferson, Jackson, by the representatives of the secession and slave States, Randolph, Millson, and Leake, of Virginia; Nicholson, of Maryland; Kennedy, of the same State; Rousseau, of Kentucky; Hamilton, of Texas; Etheridge, of Tennessee; and many other leading southern men, including Stephens himself, the vice-president of the southern confederacy. [Cheers.] Thus much for the right of secession. The States are, in fact, municipally independent, but politically provincial. [Cheers] But the right of secession may be urged from higher ground. I believe that, irrespective of any written law—of any human laws—there are circumstances in which a people have a right to rise in rebellion and take up arms. [Cheers.] I can conceive of circumstances in which the sacred right of rebellion would not only be a right, but a duty. [Enthusiastic cheers.] I fully indorse the “sacred right of insurrection.” But it is not to be lightly used: but on good and adequate ground insurrection is more than a right—it is a duty. In some cases rebellion to man is obedience to God. But to justify rebellion two conditions are indispensable: firstly, there must be an intolerable grievance; and secondly, every moral, legal, and constitutional means for obtaining redress must have been exhausted before the sword is drawn. Then a people have a right to rebel, and God defend the right. [Cheers.] Is this the case with the south? Did it use the constitutional means at its disposal? The Constitution gives, as I have already stated, the right of the veto to the President. Southern Presidents held office—did the south make an appeal for the veto? The Constitution gives, as I have said before, a power of amendment by its 5th article; did the south seek redress by means of that power? No; the veto was the surprise of Norfolk navy yard, its petition was the bombardment of Fort Sumter! Even before the Crittenden compromise was offered it was maturing insurrection; when the Jefferson Davis ultimatum was issued it was an armed insurgent. [Cheers.] Even if it suffered under grievances, the south, as we have seen, was bound to seek relief from them by constitutional means; but had it any grievances? Let the south itself answer. The governor of Florida declared, “The rebellion was made without complaint of wrong or injustice.” Rousseau, of Kentucky, asserted, “Our government has oppressed no man, neither has it burdened us a feather’s weight.” Kennedy, of Maryland, said, in May, 1861, “Maryland has no cause for revolution; no man can lay his hand on his heart and say ‘this government of ours has done him wrong.’” Holman, of Indiana, a democrat, told his hearers, “No intolerable oppression exists. Therefore, if the government is overturned, it will be without justification or excuse.” Millson, of Virginia, Hamilton, of Texas, and Etheridge, of Tennessee, all maintained that “That there was no cause for rebellion, no tyranny.” [Cheers.] The people of Virginia, in convention at Wheeling, spoke to the same effect. The convention of the border States, at Frankfort, uttered the same sentiment in the face of the united south, and Mr. Stephens himself, the present vice-president cf the Confederate States, on the 14th of November, 1860, made the following memorable statement in the Georgia State convention: “This government of our fathers, with all its defects, comes nearer the object of all good government than any other on the face of the earth. Have we not at the south, as well as the north, grown great, prosperous, and happy under its operation? Has any part of the world ever shown such rapid progress in the development of wealth and all the material resources of national power and greatness as the southern States have under the general government?” In the Georgia State convention, held in January, 1861, to decide on secession, Mr. Stephens said further: “What right has the north assailed? What interest of the south has been invaded? What justice has been denied? What claim founded in justice and right has been withheld? Can any one name one governmental act of wrong deliberately and purposely done by the government of Washington of which the south has a right to complain? I challenge the answer. Now for you to attempt to overthrow such a government as this, under which we have lived for more than three quarters of a century, in which we have gained our wealth, our stand as a nation, our domestic safety while the elements of perils are around us, with peace and prosperity, accompanied with unbounded prosperity and rights unassailed, is the height of madness, folly, and wickedness.” Therefore they had not a grievance. The Constitution did not give them a right to secede. Had they had a grievance, they did not take the constitutional means to obtain redress. [Hear, hear.] Therefore this is not a rebellion sanctioned by the laws of God or the feelings of men, [cheers;] but it is a rebellion against a just government, and a rebellion to perpetuate one of the foulest crimes that has ever stained the historical annals of any country. [Cheers.] Mr. Jones, in continuation, showed that the rebellion was as much a rebellion against the south itself as against the north, by citing the number of votes recorded at Mr. Lincoln’s election for the Union candidate in the southern States; and then resuming the general thread of his oration, the speaker, referring to the aristocratic sympathy with the south in this country, said: It is not that they love slavery, but that they hate freedom. They are afraid of the great example of the modern republic; they are afraid that when the workingmen of England see how under republican institutions every man has a vote; when they know that every workingman tills the land for his own and not for other men’s benefit, that the example will be too taking before the eyes of Englishmen, and will render the people of this country more discontented with the institutions under which they live. [Cheers.] Passing on to notice the assertion of Lords Wharncliffe and Campbell, that the prosperity and growth of America is dangerous to the prosperity of England, Mr. Jones said: My friends, I am an Englishman, and I believe I love my country as much as any man. [Cheers.] But I say at once, perish the prosperity of my own country if that prosperity is to be founded on the ruin of any other country. [Cheers.] But it is not so. The prosperity of England is the prosperity of America too. [Cheers.] America and England are the two hands of freedom with which He lifts the oppressed people of the earth up to dignity and freedom. [Cheers.] The success of American institutions and principles is a Godsend to the workingmen of England and to the oppressed people of the European continent. [Cheers.] Now let us proceed to the next branch of the argument. What are the duties and interest of the English people in reference to cotton? Don’t for one moment believe that the south, in the long run, can successfully resist the north—that is, of course, if she has the will. [Cheers.] It is a mere question whether the north has the will. She has the means, if she only has the will. You often hear it stated, 1st, that the north is giving way; that it is overwhelmed with debt, exhausted in men, money, and resources, and cannot hold out much longer; 2d, that the struggle is “so frightful and so hopeless for the north that it ought to be stopped;” and 3d, that to “stop the war is the way to get the cotton.” Now, is the north overwhelmed with debt? On the 1st of September, 1863, its debt was $1,200,000,000, less than one-fourth of the debt of England. This American debt, however, we are reminded, was incurred in two years, while England’s took forty to accumulate. True. I accept the comparison; but during that time England raised 63 per cent. of its total outlay by taxation, while America has so raised only 141/3 per cent. True, but America (I mean the loyal northern States alone) have over Great Britain as during that period an advantage of 28 per cent. in property, 30 per cent. in population, and 110 per cent. in annual produce. True, but with their ordinary resources, without raising an extraordinary tax, or burdening the people by one feather’s weight, the northern States could pay off this debt in less than sixteen years! Yes! the north is still practically untaxed, untouched, undrained. Such it is actually. But what is its rate of progress? The increase of wealth in the loyal States alone was, from 1840 to 1850, 64 per cent.; 1850 to 1860, 126 per cent. [Cheers.] What was the increase of the wealth of Great Britain during the same period? Only 37 per cent. What was the increase of the southern States? Only 3 per cent., and in that they reckon the increase of slave property, which is in fact their weakness, not their strength—their poverty, not their riches, as you will see hereafter. [Cheers.] But you may say this increase was before the war. So it was—and what has it been since the war? Take the great war year, 1861–’62. The north has never before been so prosperous. Its material well-being has grown with unparalleled rapidity. From beef to books, from books to beef, the progress has been alike remarkable. In that year the booksellers’ circulars show an unprecedented rise in the demand for literature. In that year, besides supporting all its armies in the field, the north exported $80,000,000 worth of breadstuffs more than it ever exported in any one year before. In that year the depositors in the savings banks exceeded by 28,842 the number of depositors that have ever been annually recorded. In that year the amounts deposited were $5,618,225 more than any other year had ever witnessed. Does that look like being overwhelmed with debt? Nay! the very debt is a guaranty of northern strength and a bond of union between north and west. The money borrowed is borrowed, not from foreigners, but by the government from the people; it is a national vote of confidence in the administration; every dollar subscribed is a pledge of loyalty from the subscribed; it is a link connecting west and north. From Mexico to Maine the loan has been subscribed for, and while the south seeks to separate west and north by an iron sword, west and north are sealing their eternal union with a ring of gold. [Cheers.] If you reflect, you will see that the capital of the north is inexhaustible, alike in land, in men, in bullion. In land, one thousand million acres of public lands are still at the disposal of the government. In men, twenty-four millions of people inhabit the loyal States, increasing at the rate of 50 per cent. in every decade. In bullion, the gold regions of the north extend 1,100 miles in length, 1,100 miles in breadth—1,210,000 square miles of gold-enshrining soil—land fruitful to support a teeming population, leaving its surplus labor to the golden harvest. Such is the power of the north, such is its wealth. The granite mountains are its treasure chests, whose ingots illimitable labor coins in the sparkling gold of the wheat-field and the silvery tissues of the untiring loom. [Cheers.] What has the south to array against this? An average of 3 per cent. of wealth against 122 per cent.; seven million whites and four million blacks against twenty-four millions. Nay! not four million blacks. The negroes are its weakness. The slaves require an army to watch them, taking away from the rebel numbers in the field. Nay! not seven million whites. They had seven millions while their confines still remined untouched. But parish after parish, county after county, State after State, with all their population, white and black, have been wrested from the southern grasp, leaving diminished numbers with perishing resources to meet the ever-growing power of their foe. Where are the gold regions, where the public lands of the south? Nay! while the riches of northern soil become greater every year, the south is decaying beneath the curse of slavery. Slavery exhausts the soil. The slave system is practicable only where labor is carried on in masses. The slaves are trained to one especial kind of toil. Under this system the rotation of crops is impracticable, and therefore the planter tries to make as much out of the land in as short a time as possible. Therefore sugar follows sugar, rice succeeds rice, and cotton cotton, and the soil rapidly becomes impoverished. The south teems with worn-out plantations and exhausted soil. [Cheers.] Such being the relative strength of the combatants, is the perseverance of the north equal to its resources? Let the last vote tell; the republican majority, the Union party, the party determined to enforce Union and emancipation in America, has carried the last election by majorities such as it has never known before; and where democratic falterers were hitherto in the ascendant, abolitionists and unionists have been elected by overwhelming numbers. [Cheers.] The southern advocates in England further say, “Stop the war,” that we may “get the cotton,” and they back their words by pointing to the horrors of the struggle, and urging that it is to the interest of English workingmen to recognize the south. “Stop the war!” So say I—would to heaven it could be stopped on a just basis—and therefore I say, leave the north alone to stop it. “Stop the war!” Will those gentlemen be kind enough to tell us how they propose to do this? I have never heard that yet. Is it by the “recognition” which they advocate? What does this recognition mean? How will it stop the war? They must intend one of two things: either bare recognition on paper, or recognition backed by arms. If the former, will recognition alone dismount a single battery, sink one monitor, or silence a solitary gun? A clever way, certainly, to “stop the war!” It won’t do that; but I’ll tell you what it will do—disgrace the English people forever; make them the abettors of the vilest criminals that ever stained the page of history, and bring down on the heads of those base allies the hatred of the noblest republic the world has ever known. [Cheers.] No, gentlemen, if we needs must sell ourselves to the devil, let us, at least, get something for our bargain! “Stop the war!” No! it would create another. [Cheers.] Do you think America would ever forgive that recognition? England undoubtedly can hold its own, but, if we are to plunge into a conflict, do let us, at least, be the on right side, not the wrong; on the side of freedom, not of slavery; on the side of a good government, not on that of an unjustified rebellion. [Cheers.] But if their recognition means anything, it means armed intervention. If it don’t, it moans worse than nothing. “Break the blockade and get the cotton,” that is what it moans. Do you know what that would cost? England’s commerce swept by privateers from off the seas. Debt, taxation, and misery for all time to come. You know the price of the Crimean war; an American war would cost three times as much. Who would pay that? You, the people; you the shop-keeping and working classes of this country; you and your children’s children through all posterity burdened with a crushing load of taxes—and for what? Perhaps that the subscribers to the cotton loan may save the guilty guineas they have invested in the devil’s bank of slavery in the south. [Enthusiastic applause.] Which do you think the most profitable course, to wait a little longer for the cotton, or to buy it at such a cost? And these are the men who cry out against the horrors of war with forty-parson power, who inveigh against the bloodshed, and would plunge us into a war and slaughter ten times more horrible than that which they denounce! [Cheers.] Are these safe counsellors? They would give us carnage instead of cotton, taxation instead of trade, and want instead of wages. [Cheers.] But would you get the cotton even by these means? If we are to have it, we want our supply to rest on a safe basis. If so, I say separation of the south from the north destroys our cotton manufacture—union alone can save it. Two rival states, parted against the will of the more powerful, and parted through foreign interference, would never be long at peace. Every steamer might bring us tidings of a fresh rupture; we should look forward to every mail with fear, not with hope, lest each new telegram should announce to us another conflict, another war, a new blockade—a fresh panic for our cotton mills—and the old battle of misery and destitution have to be fought once more. And yet you are told it is to the interest of workingmen to recognize the south! Workingmen! I say the south is your enemy—the enemy of your trade, the foe of your freedom—a standing threat to your prosperity. [Applause.] Is it for the slaveholders to appeal to workingmen for sympathy? Slave labor is a direct aggression on the free labor of the world. It competes with you in the world’s market, and you must crush it, or it will ruin you. Not yet, perhaps, but ere long. Free scope for the development of slave labor would produce such a labor surplus in the north that immigration would become impossible. Is not America the chief hope and home of the emigrant? Who emigrates to the southern States? Slave labor has closed its portals in your faces—yet it embraces one of the fairest portions of the habitable globe. But that slave power has shown itself not content with its old dominion. It has sought to invade the north, it has sought to overrun the west with slavery. Nay! “Maxico and Central America are open to us,” cry the southern leaders— they publicly avow their intention of spreading slavery among the nations—they are “God-sent missionaries,” they say, and their mission is to “extend slavery wherever God and nature carry it.” Help them, workingmen! help them to close the great continent of America before the army of emigration; help them to roll back the escaping tide upon our surcharged shores, and to meet it all the better, cripple your commerce by war and destroy your resources by taxation.

After speaking at some length of the character of the blacks and of their probable destiny in the race of civilization, Mr. Jones said, in conclusion, I thank you for your kind attention. It is a long time since I last addressed you, and those were stormier times than these. [Cheers and laughter.] I have not forgotten the meetings and gatherings which we had then. [Cheers.] I have not forgotten the men of Rochdale, their love of freedom and truth; and I trust that those who are now struggling, honorably and constitutionally, for the freedom of the black will join in every effort for a fresh instalment towards the charter of an Englishman’s liberty. [Applause.] Those who pat the slave-owners of America on the back would like to be slave-owners in England as well. [Cheers, and hear, hear.] I believe that those who come forward at this crisis to advocate the natural rights of the negro in America are really coming forward to advocate the rights of the workingmen in England, [cheers,] and I trust we shall find that in establishing liberty universally throughout the American continent, we shall be placing the crowning pinnacle on the edifice of freedom here as well. [Loud, prolonged, and enthusiastic applause.]

The mayor said before they separated a resolution was to be submitted to the meeting. He thought that as the meeting had been so enthusiastic there would be no opposition; however, the platform was now at liberty for any gentleman who might wish to ask questions.

No person appeared inclined to come forward for that purpose.

Mr. Harley remarked that he was glad of having had the opportunity of listening to an address which he was sure would commend itself to the judgment and intelligence of that large assembly. He should not attempt to make a speech, as his speech was embodied in the resolution he held in his hand, and that resolution he had great pleasure in moving. [Cheers.]

This meeting hereby records its sympathy with President Lincoln in endeavors to maintain the federal Union of America, believing that its disruption would prove a calamity to the cause of freedom and to the interests of civilization. This meeting further expresses its gratitude to President Lincoln for having procured the liberation of the slaves in the District of Columbia, interdicted slavery in the Territories, enforced the laws against the African slave trade, proposed to purchase the liberty of all slaves in the loyal States, and, as commander-in-chief of the forces, proclaimed unconditional freedom to all bondsmen of the rebel States. This meeting is also desirous that he may continue his noble efforts until a safe and enduring peace be established on the basis of the complete emancipation of every slave in the American States.

The Rev. L. Seddon said he would follow the good example set by the mover of the resolution, and content himself by seconding it. [Cheers.] He agreed with the remarks made by Mr. Jones respecting the negroes; but why were they inferior to other races? Let them treat a white man as negroes had been used, and the negro would rise above him in the scale of intellect. Negroes had been kept down, ill used, and not treated as men. [Hear, hear.]

The resolution was put to the meeting, and carried without a single dissentient.

Mr. R. Ashworth observed that his task was a very easy one, and he was sure all would agree with the resolution he had to propose. He moved that a vote of thanks be given to Mr. Jones for the eloquent way he had made known his views, which views he felt persuaded were held by those present. [Hear, hear, and cheers.]

Mr. Smithies said that he was sure all would agree in saying that Mr. Jones had explained an important subject which but few people understood two years ago. He must acknowledge that his views had changed since that time, and it was through hearing such lectures as the one they had heard that night. He had great pleasure in seconding the resolution.

Mr. Isaac Hoyle, who was in the body of the room, rose and was about to speak, when he was invited on to the platform. After accepting the invitation, he remarked that he was an old chartist of the days alluded to, and as one who had suffered a long term of imprisonment for advocating the rights of his own class, he could not allow the present opportunity to pass without very cordially supporting the vote of thanks to Mr. Jones, and personally thanking that gentleman for the sacrifices and for the exertions he had made in the cause of the people. [Enthusiastic cheers.]

The motion, on being submitted to the meeting, was carried unanimously.

Mr. Jones on rising to acknowledge the compliment was greeted with vociferous cheers. He thanked the audience for listening so attentively, and the mayor for presiding.

Mr. Alderman Healey proposed a vote of thanks to the mayor, remarking that his worship had had comparatively little to do that evening; indeed they had been too unanimous for his own liking. He expected to have seen some Opposition, but it appeared the southern gentlemen did not like to show that evening. [Hear, hear.]

Mr. T. Booth seconded the resolution, and on Mr. W. A. Scott putting it to the meeting, the vast assembly signified their approval by unmistakable applause.

After his worship had acknowledged this expression of thanks, the meeting broke up.