Jeniffer electronic book

But negro slavery, just in so far as
it became an issue, tended to make the alliance precarious. The national
organization embodied in the Constitution authorized not only the
existence of negro slavery, but its indefinite expansion. American
democracy, on the other hand, as embodied in the Declaration of
Independence and in the spirit and letter of the Jeffersonian creed, was
hostile from certain points of view to the institution of negro slavery.
Loyalty to the Constitution meant disloyalty to democracy, and an active
interest in the triumph of democracy seemed to bring with it the
condemnation of the Constitution. What, then, was a good American to do
who was at once a convinced democrat and a loyal Unionist?
The ordinary answer to this question was, of course, expressed in the
behavior of public opinion during the Middle Period. The thing to do was
to shut your eyes to the inconsistency, denounce anybody who insisted on
it as unpatriotic, and then hold on tight to both horns of the dilemma.


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