But he saw also that a blind conservatism was not less destructive than a blind reform.

By mingled caution, moderation, and earnestness, he seemed often to blend two characters in one, and to be at the same time a Reforming Conservative and a Conservative Reformer.

Some of his most devoted labors, commencing in the Legislature of Massachusetts, were for the Abolition of Capital Punishment.

With its final triumph, in the progress of civilization, his name will be indissolubly connected.

Fluent, earnest, rapid, sharp, incisive, his words came forth like a flashing scymitar.

He always understood his subject, and then, clear, logical, and determined, seeing his point before him, pressed forward with unrelenting power.

The death of such a man, so sudden, in mid-career, is well calculated to arrest attention and to furnish admonition.

An upright lawyer, a liberal statesman, a good citizen, studious of the Past, yet mindful of the Future.

Throughout an active life he strove for the improvement of his fellow-men.

The faithful friend of Education, he upheld our Public Schools.

A lover of Virtue, he opposed Intemperance by word and example.

In the name of Justice and Humanity, he labored to abolish the punishment of Death.

Sure I am that they who understand it best will be least disposed to the pretension which, on an assumed ground of inferiority, would condemn one race to be the property of another.

Inspired by Freedom, he gave his professional services to a slave hunted down by public clamor, and bore his testimony, in Court and Congress, against the cruel enactment which sanctioned the outrage.

He held many places of official trust and honor, but the Good Works filling his days were above these.

Among these, I cannot forget the early, though unsuccessful effort, to which you refer, for the prohibition of Slavery in the Territories of the United States.

If one should reason in that way, what would become of the distinguished honor of the author of the Declaration of Independence?

To Jefferson belongs the honor of the first effort to prohibit Slavery in the Territories: to Dane belongs the honor of finally embodying this Prohibition in the Ordinance drawn by his hand in 1787.

Allow me to express my sincere respect for your character, with which from childhood I have been familiar, and my gratitude for the steadfast support you have ever given to the principles of Freedom advocated by Jefferson.

We are accustomed, Sir, to praise the lawgivers of Antiquity; we help to perpetuate the fame of Solon and Lycurgus; but I doubt whether one single law of any lawgiver, ancient or modern, has produced effects of more distinct, marked, and…

It was adopted, as I think I have understood, without the slightest alteration; and certainly it has happened to few men to be the authors of a political measure of more large and enduring consequence.

It fixed forever the character of the population in the vast regions northwest of the Ohio, by excluding from them involuntary servitude.

It impressed on the soil itself, while it was yet a wilderness, an incapacity to sustain any other than freemen.

It laid the interdict against personal servitude in original compact, not only deeper than all local law, but deeper, also, than all local constitutions.

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