66 northern restriction concerning slavery. Words continued to run high. Henry Clay, still in the House, wrote that the subject engrosses the whole thoughts of the members, and constitutes almost the only topic of conversation." A committee of conference led to the agreement of all the both Senate and House upon a bill admitting Missouri, ust cl after her constitution should be formed, free of restrictions, but prohibiting slavery north of the line of 36° 30', (March 3, 1820.) Maine was admitted at the same time, aa (March 3-15.) burilase. uka Different the The Compromise prohibited slavery in the desiginterpre- nated region forever. This was the letter; but it tations. was under different interpretations. When President Monroe consulted his cabinet upon approving the act of Congress, all but his secretary of state, John Quincy Adams, inclined to read the prohibition of slavery as applying only to the territories, and not to the states that might arise beyond the prescribed boundary. This was not a difference between northern and southern views, but one between strict and liberal constructions of the Constitution; the strict construction going against all power in Congress to restrict a state, while the liberal took the opposite ground. So with others besides the cabinet. Among the very men who voted for the Compromise were many, doubtless, who understood it as applying to territories alone. The northern party, unquestionably, adopted it in its broader sense, preventing the state as well as the territory from establishing slavery. That there should be two senses attached to it from the beginning was a dark presage of future differences. Admis Present differences were not yet overcome. Mission of souri, rejoicing in becoming a slaveholding state, adopted a constitution which forbade the legislature to emancipate slaves or to allow the immigration of Missouri. free negroes. On this being brought before Congress, towards the close of the year, (1820,) various tactics were adopted; the extreme southern party going for the immediate admission of the state, while the extreme northern side urged the overthrow of state, constitution, and Compromise, together. Henry Clay, at the head of the moderate men, succeeded, after long exertions, in carrying a measure providing for the admission of Missouri as soon as her legislature should solemnly covenant the rights of citizenship to "the citizens of either of the states," (February, 1821.) This was done, and Missouri became a state, (August 10.) Slave trade. While the nation thus refused to arrest slavery within its limits, it resisted the extension of the slave trade. Upwards of fourteen thousand slaves were said to have been imported in a single year, (1818.) Upon this an act of Congress attached fresh and severer penalties to the slave dealer, and provided for the return of his unhappy victims to their native country, (1819.) Another act denounced the traffic as piracy, (1820.) Independence of and South CHAPTER IV. THE MONROE DOCTRINE. THREE years after the treaty of Ghent, the foreign secretary of the British government asked Central the American minister, Richard Rush, at London, America. what the United States would do about Spanish America. He meant the colonies of Spain in Central and South America, which had some time before declared their independence, and afterwards maintained it in arms, but which the European powers desired to see restored to their former colonial condition. It was a time of reaction against freedom throughout Europe and European possessions. The Holy Alliance of Russia, Prussia, and Austria, to which France and Great Britain more or less adhered, had undertaken to remove all traces of the French revolution and its kindred movements; and of these the rising throughout Spanish America was one. The confidence of the American minister in the independent spirit of the government he represented, appeared in his reply to the question of the British secretary, that "the only basis" upon which the United States would negotiate concerning the Spanish colonies was their "independence." Four years later, this independence was formally recognized by the United States government, (1822.) The It was a brave act. Monroe evidently preparing to Doctrine. The European allies were interfere, first with Spain herself, where fresh revolutions had broken out, 66 and then with her revolted colonies. Only Great Britain was drawing back, and from her alone could the United States expect any sort of acquiescence in the recognition of the American states. Her foreign secretary, then George Canning, proposed to Mr. Rush, still minister at London, a concurrent declaration of Great Britain and the United States in opposition to the course of the continental powers. In a later interview, Canning spoke of the question as a new and complicated one in modern affairs," and, while seeking action, seemed to fail in finding any which could be adopted, or, if adopted, be effectual. A month or two later, (December 2, 1823,) President Monroe sent his seventh annual message to Congress, and here announced that, in negotiations with Russia, his administration had asserted, 66 as a principle in which the rights and interests of the United States are involved, that the American continents, by the free and independent position which they have assumed and maintained, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers." "We owe it," continued the president, "to candor, and to the amicable relations existing between the United States and those powers, to declare that we should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety. With the existing colonies or dependencies of any European power we have not interfered, and shall not interfere. But with the governments who have declared their independence, and maintained it, and whose independence we have on great consideration and on just principles acknowledged, we could not view any interposition for the purpose of oppressing them, or controlling in any other manner their destiny by any European power, in any other light than as the manifestation of an unfriendly disposition towards the United States." Such was what has since been called the Monroe Doctrine. Author If it had borne the name of its immediate author, ship. it would have been called after John Quincy Adams, then secretary of state, rather than the president. But the real authorship is to be traced, beyond any individual, to the nation, or to the thinking part of the nation. Such were the times, and such the politics of Europe, so adverse to every political principle which an American republican held dear, that he longed to have his government committed to a better course. "There will be, I trust," said Daniel Webster, 66 an American policy." As he was speaking a month after the message, he might have said, There is an American policy. Purpose. Its purpose, as far as the Monroe Doctrine went, was twofold. It showed the intention of the United States to prevent the European powers from extending their system across the Atlantic either to destroy free institutions where they existed, or to set up their own institutions wherever a spot could be found. The first point was to protect the republics of Central and South America. The second was to protect the yet unoccupied regions of the entire continent. As to the first, Mr. Rush wrote home from London, that it was expected and well received; but as to the second, he declared that it was unexpected, and would not be acquiesced in by England. It was of much greater consequence that the purpose of the Doctrine should be sustained at home. Congress declined to take any formal action; but, as Webster said, some time later, the tone of the president's message "found a corresponding response in the breasts of the free people of the United States." Aid to The same message which spoke for freedom in Greece. the new world spoke for it in the old. Two |