otherwise would encourage anarchy and general disorder. The same
was true of those who defended the right of petition and the free
use of the mails and the entire list of the fundamental rights of
freemen which were threatened by the crusade against
abolitionists. Birney's contention that unless the slave is freed
no one can be free was thus vindicated: the issue involved vastly
more than the mere emancipation of slaves.

The attack made in defense of slavery upon the rights of freemen
was early recognized as involving civil war unless peaceable
emancipation could be attained. So soon as John Quincy Adams
faced the new spirit in Congress, he was convinced that it meant
probable war. As early as May, 1836, he warned the South, saying:
"From the instant that your slaveholding States become the
theater of war, civil, servile, or foreign, from that moment the
war powers of the Constitution extend to interference with the
institution of slavery." This sentiment he reiterated and
amplified on various occasions. The South was duly warned that an
attempt to disrupt the Union would involve a war of which
emancipation would be one of the consequences. With the exception
of Garrison and a few of his personal followers, abolitionists
were unionists: they stood for the perpetual union of the States.

This is not the place to give an extended account of the Mexican
War.* There are, however, certain incidents connected with the
annexation of Texas and the resulting war which profoundly
affected the crusade against slavery. Both Lundy and Birney in
their missions to promote emancipation through the process of
colonization believed that they had unearthed a plan on the part
of Southern leaders to acquire territory from Mexico for the