Violence All this drove the abolitionists to a new and of aboli- extreme position. "The grand rallying point," tionists. according to Garrison and his associates, was the repeal of the Union, (1842.) Other repeals were proposed -that of the pulpit, which had not thundered as it ought against slavery, that of the churches, which had not forced their pulpits to thunder. These passionate demands threw back abolitionism, instead of advancing it. Men willing to act against slavery were not willing to act against their country or their church, and instead of becoming abolitionists they became anti-abolitionists. Another party would have to be formed to take the lead, and this could not be done in a day. Massa For twenty years and more, colored sailors arriving chusetts in a port of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, missions. and Louisiana; had been subject to imprisonment during the stay of the vessel in which they came. William Wirt, Attorney General of the United States, gave the opinion that the act of South Carolina, where this practice originated, was unconstitutional, and incompatible with the rights of other nations, (1824.) But though South Carolina yielded as far as British seamen were concerned, she refused to yield with regard to Americans; and in this she, with her sister states, was upheld by Congress when that body refused, by a large majority, to interfere, (1842.) In 1844 the Massachusetts legislature authorized the governor to appoint agents to inquire into the imprisonment of Massachusetts seamen in Charleston and New Orleans, the two great ports of the Southern States. The governor sent Samuel Hoar to Charleston, and Henry Hubbard to New Orleans, but both were driven off. South Carolina asserted her right to exclude "seditious persons or others whose presence may be dangerous," and on this ground the Massachusetts agent was expelled. The state had previous iy contented itself with shutting out colored citizens; it now shut out white. "Has the Constitution of the United States," asked the expelled agent in his report to the State of Massachusetts, "the least practical validity or binding force in South Carolina, except where she thinks its operation favorable to her? Necessity Our narrative has not been too brief to show of anti- how great a necessity the anti-slavery movement slavery. had become, and how certain, therefore, it was to grow and spread, notwithstanding all the weakness of its friends and all the strength of its foes. United States CHAPTER VII. ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. TURNING back to some events which we have passed by, we enter upon a controversy no less severe than that between freedom and slavery. It is between President Jackson and the democratic party on the one side, and on the other the United States Bank and the whig party, then in opposition, and under the leadership of Clay and Webster. After putting a veto on the renewal of the bank charter, (1832,) the president, now in his second term, (1833,) directed the secretary of the treasury to remove the treasury deposits from the bank; and when the secretary then in office declined to do so, he was displaced by another, Roger B. Taney, who consented. The Senate charged the president with violating the Constitution, and Webster called upon "all who mean to die as they live, citizens of a free country," to "stand together for the supremacy of the laws." The question was political as well as financial, and thus excited universal interest. Financially, the country was in a singular condition. The public debt was paid off, (1835,) and twenty-eight millions of surplus revenue were distributed among the states, (1837.) But the course of trade, the speculations and disorders among business men, brought about a commercial crisis, from which almost every body suffered - capitalists failing, laborers losing employment, and families sinking into want. Specie pay Finances. ments were suspended by the banks, first of New York, then of other cities; and a deputation waited upon the president, now Martin Van Buren, to ask the suspension of payment in specie to the treasury, and the summons of Congress in an extra session. The extra session was held in September, but the president's proposal of a system by which the public moneys should be deposited in public offices, instead of banks, was not adopted until a later time. It was not for the government, but for the people themselves, to restore their broken fortunes. State in One great obstacle was the financial condition of solvency. the states. In the two years preceding the crisis, state debts had been contracted to the amount of nearly one hundred millions. It soon became difficult to meet even the interest on these obligations. Indiana, Arkansas, and Illinois stopped paying interest; Maryland and Pennsylvania paid only by certificates, and by those only in part. Michigan and Louisiana ceased not merely to pay, but also to acknowledge their debts, while Mississippi repudiated five millions at once, on the ground that the bank in whose favor her bonds had been issued had sold them on terms contrary to its charter. Eight states and a territory (Florida) thus became bankrupt, or worse than bankrupt, in the course of eighteen months, (1841-2.) Civil war Rhode Island met with a peculiar trial. Its in Rhode charter government, now a century and a quarter Island. old, had long been the object of reform. Two new constitutions were proposed, (1841,) one by a convention called by a Suffrage Association, the other by a convention which the legislature had summoned. The latter was rejected; the former was accepted by popular vote; but not having been framed according to the forms of law, it was opposed by the state authorities. Its supporters chose Thomas W. Dorr governor, who, with an armed force, attacked the arsenal at Providence, and, failing there, af terwards threw up intrenchments, ten miles off, at Chepachet. Three thousand volunteers marched against this post, but found it abandoned; and so the civil war ended, (June, 1842.) A few months later, a new constitution, providing for the reforms which Dorr and his party had sought through strife, was adopted. New tories. Other states were organizing themselves more states peaceably. Arkansas, the first state admitted since and terri- Missouri, (June 15, 1836,) was followed by Michigan, (January 26, 1837.) Wisconsin, organized as a single territory, (1836,) was presently divided as Wisconsin and Iowa, (1838.) Then Iowa was admitted a state, (March 3, 1845,*) and at the same date Florida became a member of the Union. Indian Relations with the Indians were frequently diswars. turbed. A war with the Sacs and Foxes, under Black Hawk, broke out on the north-west frontier, but was soon brought to an end by a vigorous campaign on the part of the United States troops and the militia, under Generals Scott and Atkinson, (1832.) Another war arose with the Seminoles, under their chief Osceola, in Florida. It was attended by serious losses from the beginning,(1835.) On the junction of the Creeks with the Seminoles, affairs grew still worse, the war extending into Georgia and Alabama, (1836.) The Creeks were subdued under the directions of General Jessup; but the Seminoles continued in Ever-arms amidst the thickets of Florida for many years. The standing grievance of the United States relations: against the European powers consisted in the inFrance. demnities long due for spoliations of American commerce. These were at last settled with Denmark, Portugal, Spain, and Naples, (1830-4.) But with France * Again in 1846, but not actually entering until 1848. |