Alas for that security, so important to all, as the only foundation on which to build, politically or financially!

Alas for the Republic, degraded as never before, while the Whiskey Ring holds its orgy of corruption, and the Ku-Klux-Klan holds its orgy of blood!

Alas for the hearts of the people, bruised to unutterable sadness, as they witness a cruel tyranny installed once more!

Alas for that race so long oppressed, but at last redeemed from bondage, now plunged back into another hell of torment!

Alas for the fresh graves already beginning to yawn, while violence, armed with your verdict, goes forth, like another Fury, and murder is quickened anew!

They are fellow-citizens of a common country, brethren of a common humanity, two commanding titles, both strong against the deed.

I send them at this terrible moment the sympathy and fellowship of a heart that suffers with them.

Meanwhile, may they find in themselves, and in the goodness of an overruling Providence, that refuge and protection which the Senate refuses to give!

That done or provided for, all the rest will be easy; the best credit and the lowest rates of interest will follow.

Here I shall encounter the familiar pretensions of another time, no longer put forth by defiant Slave-Masters, but retailed by conscientious Senators, who think they are supporting the Constitution, when they are only echoing the voice of…

Among these is the famous prohibition of Slavery.

There is strong reason why this is the very moment for this effort.

It will be observed that the condition was in no respect temporary, but that it was “forever,”--thus outlasting any territorial government, and constituting a fundamental law, irrepealable through all time.

Surely this condition, perpetual in form, would not have been introduced, had it been supposed to be inoperative,--had it been regarded as a sham, and not a reality.

Because I desire to secure this great boon for my country I now make this effort.

Deeper than all local law, deeper than all local constitutions, is this fundamental law; and such is its essential quality, that the soil which it protects cannot sustain any other than freemen.

I know not that history records a sublimer act than this.

Every settler within the territory, by the very act of settlement, became a party to this compact, bound by its perpetual obligations, and entitled to the full benefit of its excellent provisions for himself and his posterity.

According to these words, which I am sure would not be disowned by the present Chief Justice of the United States, the Ordinance is a sublime act, having for its object nothing less than the perpetual maintenance of the genuine principles…

In form it is a compact, unalterable except by the consent of the parties, and therefore forever.

If anything in our history is settled by original authority, supported by tradition and time, it is the binding character of the Ordinance for the Government of the Northwest Territory.

Nobody presumed to call it in question, until at last Slavery flung down its challenge to everything that was settled for Freedom.

The enlightened civilization of the age was beginning to be felt against Slavery, when its representatives turned madly round to confront the angel of light.

The Slave-Masters forgot morals, history, and the Constitution.

These three pretensions entered into Congress, like so many devils, and possessed it.