The development of the moral principle which pronounced slavery a crime of man against his brother-man had not yet reached the conscience of Christendom.

England, earnestly and zealously occupied in rallying the physical, moral, and intellectual energies of the civilized world against the African slave-trade, had scarcely yet discovered that it was but an instrument, and in truth a…

Enough has been given to indicate the great influence Van Buren had acquired, for his own political advancement, by an unscrupulous subserviency to the overbearing violence of the President.

Adams, he deliberately declared to the Legislature of Tennessee his firm conviction that no member of Congress ought to be appointed to any office except a seat on the bench; and he added that he himself would conform to that rule.

In his hands was lodged the power of reward and punishment, to be exercised ruthlessly for party support and perpetuation; resulting, in the higher departments, in tame submission to the will of the chief, and, in the lower, in the…

The domineering spirit naturally springs from the institution of slavery; and when, as in South Carolina, the slaves are more numerous than their masters, the domineering spirit is wrought up to its highest pitch of intenseness.

The South Carolinians are attempting to govern the Union as they govern their slaves, and there are too many indications that, abetted as they are by all the slave-driving interest of the Union, the free portion will cower before them, and…

After examining their proceedings with minuteness and searching severity, he asserted that they were without authority, and in flagrant violation of the rights of the bank, and of the principles on which the freedom of this people had been…

It is not my right alone, but the rights of all the members, and of the people of the United States, which are concerned in this question, and I cannot evade it.

Neither seduced by the number nor quailing under the threats and violence of his assailants, he maintained the rights of his public station, and with silent dignity set at defiance their overbearing attempts to terrify, until they…

Adams, "Jackson has cast away all the neutrality he heretofore maintained upon the conflicting opinions and interests of the different sections of the country, and surrenders the whole Union to the nullifiers of the South and the land…

This is always the high road to popularity, and it is always travelled by those who have not resolution, intelligence, and energy, to attempt the exploration of any other.

The doctrine is in opposition to the Declaration of Independence and the government of the Union, which are founded on a very different principle--the principle that all men are born equal, and with equal rights.

Its doctrine, which divides the people into the best and worst part of the population, is here denounced as "the never-failing source of tyranny and oppression, of civil strife, the shedding of brothers' blood, and the total extinction of…

Imperfect civilization, in all stages of human society, shackles itself with fanatical prejudices of exclusive favor to its own occupations; as the owner of a plantation with a hundred slaves believes the summit of human virtue to be…

He reprobates thus giving away lands which were purchased by the blood and treasure of our revolutionary fathers and ourselves, which, if duly managed, might prove an inexhaustible fund for centuries to come.

In this report the absurd doctrines of nullification and secession are canvassed, and it is shown that they never can be carried out in practice but by a dissolution of the Union.

The encouragement given by the policy of the administration to the unjust claims and groundless pretensions of South Carolina is exposed.

The consequent disproportion of numbers of the slaveholding representation in the House of Representatives has secured the absolute control of the general policy of the government, and especially of the fiscal system, the revenues and…

Thus, while the free states are represented only according to their numbers, the slaveholders are represented also for their property.

But, by the ascendency which their excess of representation gives them in the enactment of laws, they have invariably in time of peace excluded all direct taxation, and thereby enjoyed their excess of representation without any equivalent…

The infatuating influence of military success over the human mind, and the readiness with which intelligent and well-disposed men, living under a constitution of limited powers, while dazzled by its splendor, endure and encourage acts of…

Violations of constitutional duty, known and voluntarily acquiesced in by a whole people, subservient to the will of a popular chieftain, may, and probably will, in time, change their constitution, and destroy their liberties.

In every movement Jackson had displayed an arbitrary will, determined on success, regardless of the means, and had applied without reserve the corrupting temptation of office to members of Congress.

These have been, through life, perpetual admonitions to do nothing unworthy of it.