An argument from the abuse to the disuse of anything is the poorest kind of logic.

Never has Slavery inspired speaker or writer to more complete and scornful condemnation.

Every line bears upon the slave-drivers of our country, with greater force even than upon the slave-drivers of the West Indies; for audacity here goes further than it was ever pushed in the British dominions.

In the picture of illiberal men conspiring to support Slavery Macaulay seems to delineate us.

The slave-drivers may boast, that, if our cause has received support from honest men of all religious and political parties, theirs has tended in as great a degree to combine and conciliate every form of violence and illiberality.

Aiming to exhibit Slavery in its laws, without dwelling on the accumulated instances of cruelty, he puts the case on the strongest ground; and here his unimpeachable witness is the statute-book itself.

He seems also to have anticipated that flagrant sophism, which, under the guise of Popular Sovereignty, insists that men shall be at liberty--“perfectly free” is the phrase of the Nebraska Bill--to buy and sell fellow-men.

Are you, in point of fact, at this moment able to protect yourselves against your slaves without our assistance?

And it is shown that in a servile war the master must be loser; for his enemies are his chattels.

Whether the slave conquer or fall, he is alike lost to the owner.

Such is the philippic against Slavery by the first writer of the English language in our day, and one of the first in all times.

As testimony to a sacred cause, it is priceless; as a contribution to literature, it cannot be forgotten.

My purpose is simply to introduce this new-found testimony against Slavery, and not to dwell on the life or character of the author.

I send you for it one hundred dollars; but you will please not to measure my interest in this tribute to a public benefactor by the sum which I contribute.

Why not at once appeal to good men, and insist upon organization throughout the Commonwealth, reaching into every School District, so that all may have an opportunity to contribute?

Now, if it be conceded that the Senate is invested with all the large powers claimed by the Houses of Parliament, then I cannot doubt its power in the present case, although I might well question the expediency of exercising it.

The Senate has no such large powers; it is not “omnipotent,” but under the constraint of a written Constitution.

If the Senate can summon witnesses to its bar, and compel them to testify, under pains and penalties, it must be by virtue of powers delegated in the Constitution,--I do not say by express grant, but at least by positive intendment.

There are certain cases in which the power is clear: first, and most conspicuously, in the trial of impeachments; secondly, in determining the elections, returns, and qualifications of its members; and, thirdly, in punishing its members…

If I were asked to indicate the principle on which these two cases stood, I should say it was that just and universal right of self-defence inherent in every parliamentary body, as in every court, and also in every individual, but which is…

It is now proposed to add a new case, most clearly without any support in the Constitution, without any support in the right of self-defence inherent in the Senate, and without any support in the precedents of the Senate.

Surely, where the Constitution, and reason, and precedent, all three, are silent, we might well hesitate to exercise a power so transcendent.

The inquiry which it institutes is clearly judicial in character,--without, however, any judicial purpose, or looking to any judicial end.

If such a power is lodged anywhere outside of judicial tribunals, it must be in the House of Representatives, as the Grand Inquest of the Nation, with its power to impeach all civil officers, from the President down; but it cannot be in…

Let us at all hazards prevent the extension of Slavery and the increase of the Slave Power.