proved that one of these acts contained an express stipulation which
precludes the revival of the agitation in the form in which it is now
thrust upon the country, without manifest disregard of the provisions of
those acts themselves.

I have thus proved beyond controversy that the averment of the bill,
which my amendment proposes to strike out, is untrue. Senators, will you
unite in a statement which you know to be contradicted by the history of
the country? Will you incorporate into a public statute an affirmation
which is contradicted by every event which attended or followed the
adoption of the compromise acts? Will you here, acting under your high
responsibility as Senators of the States, assert as a fact, by a solemn
vote, that which the personal recollection of every Senator who was here
during the discussion of those compromise acts disproves? I will not
believe it until I see it. If you wish to break up the time-honored
compact embodied in the Missouri compromise, transferred into the joint
resolution for the annexation of Texas, preserved and affirmed by these
compromise acts themselves, do it openly--do it boldly. Repeal the
Missouri prohibition. Repeal it by a direct vote. Do not repeal it by
indirection. Do not "declare" it "inoperative," "because superseded by
the principles of the legislation of 1850."

Mr. President, three great eras have marked the history of this country
in respect to slavery. The first may be characterized as the Era of
ENFRANCHISEMENT. It commenced with the earliest struggles for national
independence. The spirit which inspired it animated the hearts and
prompted the efforts of Washington, of Jefferson, of Patrick Henry, of
Wythe, of Adams, of Jay, of Hamilton, of Morris--in short, of all the
great men of our early history. All these hoped for, all these labored
for, all these believed in, the final deliverance of the country