Thus the truth was made
plain that emancipation, by any process, was not desired. In a debate
upon a cognate measure, another Kentuckian said that there was "no
division of sentiment on this question of emancipation, whether it is to
be brought about by force, by fraud, or by purchase of slaves out of the
public treasury." Democrats from Northern States, natural allies of the
border-state men, protested vehemently against taxing their constituents
to buy slave property in other States. Many Republicans also joined the
Democracy against Mr. Lincoln, and spoke even with anger and insult.
Thaddeus Stevens, the fierce and formidable leader of the Radicals, gave
his voice against "the most diluted milk-and-water gruel proposition
that had ever been given to the American nation." Hickman of
Pennsylvania, until 1860 a Democrat, but now a Republican, with the
characteristic vehemence of a proselyte said: "Neither the message nor
the resolution is manly and open. They are both covert and insidious.
They do not become the dignity of the President of the United States.
The message is not such a document as a full-grown, independent man
should publish to the nation at such a time as the present, when
positions should be freely and fully defined." In the Senate, Mr. Powell
of Kentucky translated the second paragraph into blunt words. He said
that it held a threat of ultimate coercion, if the cooperative plan
should fail; and he regarded "the whole thing" as "a pill of arsenic,
sugar-coated.
Pages:
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36