voted in Congress on almost every question that has ever arisen in regard to the institution of slavery; and never, until it became necessary for the Know Nothings of the South to frame an excuse for dividing the South, did any southern man charge him with being unsound on the slavery question.

If further proof were needed of the high position he occupies on this question, it will be found in his letter to the Democratic State convention of Pennsylvania, written shortly before his nomination, and in his letter accepting the nomination for the Presidency, and pledging himself to earry out the principles set forth in the Democratic platform.

tion. Was Joseph Ritner (then running for Governor) an was, then no friend to the existence of our glorious Union Abolitionist?, This was a most interesting question. If he ought to vote in favor of his election as Governor." *

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Before the spirit of abolitionism had been conjured up from its dark abode by political fanatics and hot-headed enthusiasts, all was comparatively peaceful and tranquil in the southern States. Slavery had been most unfortunately introduced into these States by our British forefathers. It was there at the adoption of the Federal Constitution; and this Constitution did not merely leave it there, but expressly slaves, and the exclusive dominion over the question of guarantied to the slaveholding States their property in slavery within their respective borders. Such is the clear language of the Constitution itself, and such was the construction the first Congress placed upon it. Without this solemn constitutional compact the southern States would never have been parties to the Union; and the blessings and benefits which it has conferred, and will confer, not would never have been realized. Those in the free States who determine to violate this compact must determine to dissolve the Union. The one is the necessary consequence of the other." "At the session of 1835-36, (the Congress immediately preceding Mr. Fillmore's Erie letter,) the question of abolition had occupied much of the time and attention of Congress. It had been discussed in every possible aspect. Petitions for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, got up and circulated by the anti-slavery societies, poured into Congress from the free States. This was the only mode in which the Abolitionists could agitate the question in Congress, because no fanatic, to Mr. B.'s knowledge, had been so mad as to contend that Congress had any power over slavery within the slave States themselves. Petitions to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia formed part of the grand scheme of agitation by which the Abolitionists expected to accomplish their purposes. Throughout the spring, summer, and autumn of 1835, a combined attempt was made upon the southern States, not only by agitation in the North, but by scattering over the South, through the post office, and by traveling agents, the vilest publications and pictorial representations. He had himself seen many of them. Their natural effect was to produce dissatisfaction and revolt among the slaves, and to incite their wild passions to vengeance."

The Lancaster resolutions date back thirty-only upon our own country, but the whole human race, seven years, whilst Mr. Buchanan was a mere youth, and before the slavery agitation had assumed anything like its present form. In 1838, nearly twenty years afterwards, when in the prime of life, and a candidate for Congress, and when the abolition societies at the North were at the very height of their treasonable efforts against the South, Mr. Fillmore deliberately wrote as follows to an abolition society:

BUFFALO, October 17, 1838.

SIR: Your communication of the 15th instant, as chairman of a committee appointed by "The Anti Slavery So ciety of the coun'y of Erie," has just come to hand. You solicit my answer to the following interrogatories:

1. Do you believe that petitions to Congress on the subject of slavery and the slave trade ought to be received, read, and respectfully considered by the representatives of the people?

2. Are you opposed to the annexation of Texas to this Union, under any circumstances, so long as slaves are held therein?

3. Are you in favor of Congress exercising all the constitutional power it possesses to abolish the internal slave trade, between the States?

4. Are you in favor of immediate legislation for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia?

I am much engaged, and have no time to enter into an argument, or to explain at length my reasons for my opinion. I shall therefore content myself, for the present, by answering all your interrogatories in the affirmative, and leave for some future occasion a more extended discussion on the subject. MILLARD FILLMORE.

He was elected to Congress, and throughout his whole career there uniformly voted with Giddings, Slade, Adams, and the worst enemies of the South.

He then goes on to depict the horrors of servile insurrection, and to denounce the Abolitionists:

"Under the influence of the feelings excited by these causes, the southern members of Congress reached Washington in December, 1835. Many of them, with sorrow and anguish of heart, declared that if the southern States could not remain in the Union without having their doAbolitionists, the great law of self-preservation would commestic peace continually disturbed by the attempts of the pel them to separate from the North. Immediately after the commencement of the session, and throughout its continuance, the Abolitionists, intent upon their object, sent of slavery in the District of Columbia, couched in lanimmense number of petitions to Congress for the abolition guage calculated to exasperate the southern members." (It

was under these circumstances that Mr. Fillmore wrote his Erie letter.) What did they ask? That in the District, ten miles square, ceded to Congress by two slaveholding States, and surrounded by them, slavery should be abol ished."

He then goes on to denounce in strong language the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, and concludes this branch of the sub

Whilst Mr. Fillmore was thus cordially endorsing the doctrines of the extreme Abolitionists, and, as a member of Congress, was on all occasions voting with Adams, Giddings, and Slade, Mr. Buchanan, both in Congress and at home in the midst of his constituents, was contending against these doctrines, and in favor of the constitutional rights of the South. On the 18th of August, 1838, Mr. Buchanan addressed his fellow-citizens at Lancaster, Pennsylvania, on the political ques-ject, as follows: tions in issue in the State elections then pending. It will be observed that this speech was almost cotemporaneous with Mr. Fillmore's Erie letter; and the contrast is most striking between the broad and comprehensive views of the statesman, and the narrow and illiberal dogmas of the abolition candidate for Congress. The whole speech will be found in Niles's Register, volume 55, page 90. Mr. Buchanan said:

"There was one subject of vital importance to the peace and prosperity of the Union, which had not occupied much of the attention of the former speakers, and therefore he would make a few remarks upon it. He referred to aboli

tion, after the petitions had been received, rejected the "Impelled by these motives, the Senate, upon his moprayer of the petitioners by a vote of thirty four to six, and refused to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia."

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"Thus stood the question on the 4th of July, 1836, from the slaveholding States and their constituents had a when Congress adjourned. The members of Congress right to expect peace. The question had been fully discussed, and deliberately decided by overwhelming majorities, and the South had reason to hope that the minority would acquiesce, at least for a season, in the will of a majority."

But Mr. Fillmore and the abolition societies at the North would not allow peace and quiet to the

South, but persisted in an agitation of the ques-pendent Treasury, Mr. Buchanan contended that tion which has repeatedly brought the Union to ten cents per day was sufficient wages for a laborthe brink of destruction. Where is the friend of ing man. It is a sufficient reply to this to say, Mr. Fillmore who will ever again charge Mr. that no such thing is in that or any other speech Buchanan with unsoundness on this question? of Mr. Buchanan; and his enemies, having been 4. It is said Mr. Buchanan is favorable to filli-repeatedly challenged to point it out, have not bustering; and the manifesto of the Ostend con- been able to do so. The whole basis of the charge ference is cited as proving that he favors attempts is that he advocated the independent Treasury. to acquire the Island of Cuba by that means. Mr. The enemies of that measure contended that it Buchanan's letter accepting the nomination ut- would reduce the wages of labor; Mr. Buchanan terly refutes any such charge. In it he says: denied it. The measure has been the law of the land for ten years, and experience has shown that. Mr. Buchanan was correct. The wages of labor and prices of produce have never been so high, nor the country so exempt from disastrous commercial revulsions, as they have been under the operation of the independent Treasury.

"Should I be placed in the executive chair, I shall use my best exertions to cultivate peace and friendship with all nations, believing this to be our highest policy as well as our most imperative duty."

From a statesman of his conservative eharacter, whose experience in the conduct of our foreign affairs is unequaled, and whose prudence is proverbial, no such declaration would be needed to satisfy the country that in his hands its peace and honor would be equally safe.

The manifesto of the Ostend conference declared that the possession of the Island of Cuba was of great importance to the commerce and the security of this country; that our Government ought to acquire it by purchase, if possible, and could afford to give for it a very high price; that if Spain should refuse to sell it to us, it ought to become the fixed policy of this Government, that in no event would we permit it to pass into the hands of a maritime Power, commanding, as it does, the whole of our southern coasts on the Atlantic and the Gulf, and shutting up the whole || of our Gulf States, including the mouth of the Mississippi, in the event of war between us and the Power possessing it. Such were the sentiments I avowed to my own constituents. And I go further and say, that if Spain should attempt to pursue such a course with the island as to render it a dangerous neighbor to us, the great law of self-preservation would imperatively demand of us to interpose and prevent it. If there is a party in this country entertaining different sentiments, I would like to hear them avowed.

Whilst Mr. Fillmore was President, the best appointed and most formidable fillibustering expedition that was ever fitted out from our shores left the Mississippi river almost, if not quite, without opposition from the Government. It was that led by Lopez for the conquest of the Island of Cuba. I do not censure Mr. Fillmore for it. He no doubt did all he felt justified in doing to arrest it. He issued his proclamation warning the adventurers that they need not expect the aid of their Government if they met the fate they might reasonably expect. That was doing no more than it was strictly his duty to do, both as a faithful President and a benevolent individual. But the then editor of the Union, Andrew J. Donelson, now the candidate for Vice President on the ticket with Mr. Fillmore, thought otherwise, and day after day, through the columns of the Union, denounced Mr. Fillmore for "truckling subserviency" to Spain, and for pusillanimously abandoning American citizens to Spanish vengeance. Indeed, of all the violent abuse heaped on Mr. Fillmore by Mr. Donelson, through the Union, none was more unqualified and more bitter than that founded on Mr. Fillmore's attempt to suppress fillibustering.

5. It is charged that in his speech on the inde

6. The charge of bargain and intrigue against Mr. Clay. Mr. Clay, in his lifetime, and his friends, including Prentice, his biographer, having exonerated Mr. Buchanan from all that was improper in that matter, it is too late to found on it a new charge, at least without some new evidence.

These frivolous charges are only intended, as I remarked just now, to excuse the Know Nothings for dividing the South, and to draw off public attention at the South from exposure brought upon the Know Nothing party by the proceedings of this Congress, and the verification of every charge made by us against it last summer.

But I do not intend to be placed on the defensive, nor, by any such clatter of small-arms, to be drawn off from the exposure of the misdeeds of "the order" of this Congress. Let us briefly trace its origin and history.

In the presidential election of 1852, the friends of General Scott made the most desperate efforts to secure the votes of the Roman Catholic and foreign-born population of the country. General Scott himself wrote letters, and made speeches throughout that portion of the country in which they are numerous, abounding in fulsome flattery and disgusting adulation of those classes, and affected a fondness for "the rich Irish brogue" and "sweet German accent," which no pelting storm nor howling wind could ever prevent him from distinguishing from the coarse and vulgar English of the native-born American. speech at Cleveland he said:

In a

"Fellow-citizens-when I say fellow-citizens I mean
native and adopted citizens as well as all who intend
to become citizens of this great and glorious country-
I thank you for the enthusiastic reception you have given
me. [Cheers.] But there is one thing I regret in visiting
this beautiful city, and that is. the rain. I was pained that,
while I was comfortably sheltered in a covered carriage,

you should have been exposed to rain and mud.
"Fellow-citizens, I have thought a man could hardly call
himself a citizen of this great country without passing over
these great lakes, of which this is justly celebrated as one
of the most beautiful of the whole West. [ You are wel-
come here,' from an Irishman.] I hear that rich brogue-
I love to hear it; it makes me remember noble deeds of
Irishmen, many of whom I have led to battle and to vie-
tory. [Great cheering.]"

If in his ardor he did not actually vituperate the natives of the country, their exploits as soldiers, their virtues as citizens, and the simple vigor of their language, were overlooked and despised, and the Irishman or German who had

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passed over these great lakes" was, in his estimation, a better citizen than a native of my State who had never seen them.

address signed by Governor Graham and others, dated January, 1834, as follows:

"The thirty-second article of the constitution excludes from civil office all who may deny the truth of the Protestant religion. This has no practical effect, for the plain reason that there is no tribunal established by the constitution to determine a man's faith. It is an odious badge of prejudice, which the enlightened liberality of the present day should scorn to wear. It is an unjust imputation against the fication. The patriotism, personal virtues, and ability, and the disinterested public services of a single individual in the State, brand with falsehood the idle fears that are implied by this paper restriction. How far it is consistent with the spirit of Protestantism itself-how far it is compatible with the bill of rights, which declares that all men have a natural and inalienable right to worship God according to the dictates of their own conscience,' we leave to that bigotry which would perpetuate this stigma."

In that celebrated letter in which he accepted the nomination," with the resolutions annexed,"|| he declared that, if elected to the Presidency, he would favor such a change in the naturalization laws as would "give to all foreigners the right of citizenship who shall faithfully serve, in time of war, one year on board of our public ships or in our land forces," thus proposing to give to a foreigner, who had served one year in the Mediter-Catholics of this State to attach to them any such disqualiranean, or on the coast of Africa, or in Mexico, who had never been in this country, nor attended an election, and who of course had no opportunity to learn anything of our laws and customs, the full rights of citizenship. He proposed to let such a foreigner vote the very first day his foot ever trod on American soil. Nine tenths of those who are now so clamorous for "Americans to rule America" were the warm friends of General Scott, defended this letter from the attacks of the Democrats, and gave to the people as many assurances of his soundness as they now give of the soundness of Mr. Fillmore. So much for the foreigners in 1852.

The Roman Catholics were equally courted. One of the reasons urged by those who are now Know Nothings against the election of General Pierce was, that the State in which he lived (New Hampshire) excluded them from office. The Louisville Journal, then one of the leading Scott papers, and now one of the leading Know Nothing organs, said:

"They (the American people) will not consent that the New Hampshire Democracy, who recently voted, by an overwhelming majority, in favor of Catholic disability to hold office, shall have the honor to give a President to the nation. They would greatly prefer that this honor shall be accorded to some State not disgraced by such abominable bigotry."

General Pierce's friends proved that he was opposed to excluding Roman Catholics from office on account of their religion, and that he had done all he could to get the disability removed; thereupon the same editor said:

"If that was all that General Pierce could say or do towards relieving New Hampshire of a disgrace that causes her to be regarded with scorn by every liberal-minded man in the United States and in the world, we ask if he is fit to be

President???

The constitution of North Carolina had, at one time, like that of New Hampshire, contained a clause excluding Catholics from holding office. I find in the National Intelligencer of 4th September, 1852, a defense of Governor Graham, the candidate for Vice President, against what was then considered by his friends a most heinous charge-a suspicion that he was in favor of excluding Catholics from office. I read from it as follows:

"GOVERNOR GRAHAM AND RELIGIOUS TESTS.-Several of the Democratic presses, perceiving that their candidate for the Presidency is likely to be prejudiced by the odious religious test in the constitution of New Hampshire, affect to believe that Governor Graham, the Whig candidate for

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Vice President, is not as tolerant as he should be, and one of them has even gone so far as to declare that Mr. Graham was opposed to the reform in the constitution of North Carolina, by which a similar restriction was abrogated." "In an address to the people, dated June, 1833, while the election of Governor Graham was pending, they (his friends) declared that it was a 'disgrace to any free people to tyrannize over the consciences of others, and pronounced the obnoxious provision 'an odious restriction upon conscience.'"

The article quotes, in his further defense, an

Up to this period Catholics and foreigners were in high favor. In two years from that time we find these same persons swearing voters, on the Holy Bible, to exclude from all offices all Roman Catholics, and even those having Roman Catholic wives or parents; inflicting on the rebellious member who should vote for a Catholic, or continue one in office under him, " cruel and unusual punishments," such as the Constitution forbids the courts to inflict, and such as no humane juryman would prescribe for a thief or a robber; posting him from council to council as a liar and a traitor, as a dangerous and outlawed runaway negro would be posted from cross-road to crossroad; demanding of every true and faithful "brother" to shun and despise him, and to use every possible effort to reduce him and his family to beggary and starvation. The foreigners and Roman Catholics refused to take the bait held out to them, and, as was alleged by, General Scott's friends, generally voted for General Pierce-thus proving that, as a class, they are not so easily duped by politicians and misled by demagogues as the Know Nothings allege.

Having wooed warmly, General Scott's friends hated intensely the classes who had thus, innocently on their part, been made the object of so much lust. The same individuals who had endeavored, two years before, to bring about such a change in the naturalization law as to permit a foreigner to be naturalized on one year's service in the Army or Navy, proposed, in 1854, that no foreigner should ever be permitted to vote. And Pierce ought not to be elected President, because those who, in 1852, had contended that General his State retained in its constitution a clause excluding Catholics from office, endeavored, in 1854, with just as much appearance of sincerity, to convince the people that to permit Catholics to hold office was in effect to place the country under the dominion of the Pope of Rome.

Such was the origin of the party; and there is too much reason to believe that it arose more from spite and disappointment, than from solicitude about our institutions or our religion.

The party sprang up in the North just pre vious to the passage of the Kansas and Nebraska bill in May, 1854. In the midst of the excitement produced by the passage of that bill, the elections for members of the present House took place; and availing itself thereof, it defeated the Democratic party in every northern State. Of the one hundred and forty-three members of this House from the North, ninety-one were elected as Know Nothings; and of these ninety-one,

seventy-five voted for Mr. BANKS, also a Know Know Nothingism at the North was the triumphR Nothing, for Speaker. Every Black Republican of Abolitionism, fully proven by every test vote voted with them; not a single Democrat voted yet taken in this House? And" the end is not for him. A list of the names having been read yet.' Day by day the country is being precipon this floor in April last, by my friend from itated towards revolution by the blind and frenzied Tennessee, [Mr. SMITH,] and properly corrected, Free-Soil fanaticism of the Know Nothing maI will append it to my printed speech as authentic. jority of this House. Even now we are threatOn the 26th January, the gentleman from In- ened with a consummation of the fell purpose to diana, [Mr. DUNN,] now at the head of the Fill-paralyze the Government of the country by remore electoral ticket in that State, introduced into fusing supplies to carry it on, unless the Demthis House the following resolution, which, it ocratic Senate and Democratic President will 'will be observed, goes further than the Black permit this House to dictate legislation incomRepublican platform: patible with the peace of the country, if not destructive of the Union. The gentleman from Indiana, [Mr. DUNN,] who stands at the head of the Fillmore electoral ticket of his State, openly proclaims that he will never agree to appropriate a dollar to carry on the Government, unless it is coupled with the restoration of the Missouri restriction. It will not be forgotten how boldly it was denied last summer, and with what assurance it was declared by the initiated, that a third degree Know Nothing could not be an Aboli

"Resolved, That said restriction (the Missouri compromise) ought to be restored, as an act of justice to all the people of the United States, as a proper vindication of the wisdom, patriotism, and plighted honor of the great statesmen who imposed it, and as a necessary and certain, means of reviving that concord and harmony among the States of the American Union which are essential to the welfare of our people, and the perpetuity of our institutions."

On this resolution, every Democrat in the House voted "No." Only three northern Know Nothings voted against it-eighty-eight of them, with all the Black Republicans, voting for it, or absent.

On the bill to admit Kansas into the Union on

the revolutionary Topeka constitution, got up by the Free-Soil party in that Territory, the vote was about the same. All the Black Republicans, and all the northern Know Nothings, except seven, voting for its admission; and all the Democrats, except one, voting against it.

It was known to well-informed persons at the South, at the time these individuals were elected to Congress, that they were Free-Soilers, and that on Free-Soil principles they had defeated sound national Democrats. But the elections were pending in the South; and the fact was boldly and unblushingly denied by the Know Nothings, in the full trust that the rottenness of their associates could not be exposed until it was too late to affect our elections. I happen to have before me the North Carolina Star, the newspaper organ of "the order" in my State, for March 17, 1855, in which I find the following

editorial:

"NEW HAMPSHIRE ELECTION.-An election was held in

New Hampshire, on the 13th, for Governor, members of the
Legislature, Congress, &c., and, from the returns already
received, there is no doubt of the entire success of the
American party.

"Of the members of the Legislature, the Know Nothings twenty-nine, and the Whigs three, so far as heard from.

have elected one hundred and twenty three, the Democrats

All the Know Nothing members of Congress are said to be elected. Remember this is Mr. Pierce's State, and may, therefore, be regarded as an abandonment of the firm of Pierce, Forney, Seward, & Co. This American victory occurred on the same day the Virginia American candidate was nominated. The former may be taken as a precursor

of the result of the latter."

The members of this House whose election

was thus greeted in a southern State, are among the most unwavering of the Free-Soil majority; and the next thing we heard of that glorious Know Nothing Legislature was, that it had elected JOHN P. HALE, and another like him, to the United States Senate.

Such were the means resorted to to blind the people of the South to the appalling dangers into which Know Nothingism was precipitating the country, and the South in particular. Is not the charge, made last summer, that the triumph of

tionist.

"The order" having proved so potent a lever at the North for raising into power the brokendown politicians of a defeated party, it was seized on at the South as a means of performing the same office for a large number of aspirants, who, under every other name, had been rejected by the people of that section. It came silently and secretly; and until long after its establishment, and its lodges had been organized in every county, and in almost every neighborhood, we were ignorant of its existence among us. I, myself, at the moment it was achieving, and until long after it had achieved the exploits at the North which filled this House with Abolitionists, entertained no more suspicion of its existence in our midst than I have at this moment that Massachusetts

emigrant aid societies are established in the city
of my residence. It not only came secretly, but
it came under the guise of an association, no way
interfering in politics, except to prevent a repeti-
tion of the discreditable scenes to which I have
alluded, as having occurred in 1852. Its friends
professed to eschew all offices and promotion for
themselves; denounced "the wild hunt after of-
fice, which characterizes the age," and bewailed
"the purer days of the Republic, when office
sought the man, and not man the office." Such
professions of moderation and disinterestedness
disarmed suspicion. Thousands joined it who
withdrew on ascertaining that, whilst the pretext
was to keep foreigners and Roman Catholics out
of office, the real
object was to keep out Demo-
crats; and that whilst ostensibly declining all of-
fices for themselves, their main fundamental prin-
ciple-the one which could never be violated by

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brother" with impunity-was a preference of themselves and one another, not only for every office, but for every employment in the country.

The elections at the North had been carried on extreme Free-Soil principles, as I have shown. They had taken place in the fall of 1854. The elections at the South were to come on in the summer of 1855. The northern Know Nothings had had a "good time of it" in 1854, running on an extreme Free-Soil platform; and the southern Know Nothings claimed, and had accorded to them, a platform that it was thought would give

must be got rid of. He was willing to accept a compromise, but the section must be got rid of. He was willing to accept the Washington platform, for, if there was any thing in it, it was so covered up with verbiage that a President would be elected before the people would find out Thus ended, as predicted it would end, the atwhat it was all about. [Tumultuous laughter.] Three tempt to form a national Know Nothing party. southern States had been carried on the twelfth section. The Democratic party is the only party in the Repeal it, and we will give you the entire North. [Ap-country standing upon the Constitution, and plause."]