Hitherto I
have refrained from comment on the effect which the institution of
slavery was coming to have upon American politics because the increasing
importance of slavery, and of the resulting anti-slavery agitation,
demand for the purpose of this book special consideration. Such a
consideration must now be undertaken. The bitter personal and partisan
controversies of the Whigs and the Democrats were terminated by the
appearance of a radical and a perilous issue; and in the settlement of
this question the principles of both of these parties, in the manner in
which they had been applied, were of no vital assistance.
The issue was created by the legal existence in the United States of an
essentially undemocratic institution. The United States was a democracy,
and however much or little this phrase means, it certainly excludes any
ownership of one man by another. Yet this was just what the Constitution
sanctioned. Its makers had been confronted by the legal existence of
slavery in nearly all of the constituent states; and a refusal to
recognize the institution would have resulted in the failure of the
whole scheme of Constitutional legislation.
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