at the South, too, than Mr. Davis, on this question. I may be wrong, but I assure you I never regarded him as a Secessionist, properly speaking; that is, I always regarded him as a strong Union man in sentiment, so long as the Union was maintained on the principles upon which it was founded. He was, without doubt, a thorough State Rights, State Sovereignty man. He believed in the right of Secession; but what I mean to say is, that in my opinion, he was an ardent supporter of the Union on the principles, as he understood them, upon which, and for which, the Union was formed. There were, as I have said, many public men amongst us who after these Resolutions passed the Senate, and after the Presidential canvass was opened upon them, and the various issues presented in the Party platforms of the day, as we shall see, who were openly for Secession in case Mr. Lincoln should be elected upon the principles on which he was nominated. But Mr. Davis, as far as I know or believe, did not belong even to this class. If he was in favor of Secession barely upon the grounds of Mr. Lincoln's election, I am not aware of it. He certainly made no speech or wrote any letter for the public during that canvass that indicated such views or purposes. I never saw a word from him recommending Secession as the proper remedy against threatening dangers until he joined in the general letter of the Southern Senators and Representatives in Congress to their States, advising them to take that course.

This was in December, 1860, and not until after it was ascertained in the Committee of the Senate, on Mr. Crittenden's proposition for quieting the apprehensions and alarm of the Southern States from the accession of Mr. Lincoln to power, that the Republicans, his supporters, would not agree to that measure. It is well known that

he and Mr. Toombs both declared their willingness to accept the adoption of Mr. Crittenden's measure as a final settlement of the controversy between the States and sectious, if the party coming into power would agree to it in the same spirit and with the same assurance. It was after it was known that this party would not enter into any such settlement, or give any assurance for the future, that Mr. Davis joined other Southern Senators and Representatives advising the Southern States to secede, as the proper remedy for what he and they considered impending dangers to their rights, security, and future welfare. There is nothing in Mr. Davis's life, or public conduct, that I am aware of, that affords just grounds for believing that he ever desired a separation of the States, if the principles of the Union, under the Constitution, had been faithfully adhered to by all the Parties to it. These were the sentiments of all his speeches, in Congress and out of it, as far as I have ever seen, even down to his last most touching leave-taking address to the Senate!

But all this is digressing from the matter before us. We shall have enough of these questions hereafter. The point we are now considering is not the object or motive of Mr. Davis in offering these Resolutions. It is the exposition actually made by the Senate of the United States, nineteen States to ten States, of the real nature and character of the Government. Mr. Davis was but the instrument, the draftsman, through whom this overwhelming majority of the States announced for themselves the nature of the bonds of their Union! This exposition was as late as 1860, and substantially the same that had been given by the same August Body of ambassadors representing their Sovereignty in 1838,

twenty-two years before! That exposition was that the Constitution is a Compact between Sovereign States.

So, after this very long talk, wandering the while far from the point, we finally return to the same place at which we had arrived before taking up Mr. Webster's speech. We now stand just where we did then. We have gone through with his great argument and Mr. Calhoun's reply, to which no rejoinder was ever made. We have seen that the Senate, by a nearly three fourths vote of the States, in 1838, and by a vote of nearly two to one, in 1860, sustained that construction of the Constitution which was set forth in the first of Mr. Calhoun's Resolutions in 1833, and which I maintain. The decisions of the Supreme Court referred to, sustain the same view also. We have seen further, that Mr. Webster himself, in his riper years, held that the Union was "a Union of States." That it was founded That it was founded upon "Compact," and that "a bargain cannot be broken on one side and still bind the other side."

Does it not, therefore, clearly appear from these high authorities, and even upon the authority of Mr. Webster himself, that the Government of the United States is a Federal Government, or as Washington styled it, a Confederated Republic? What further, if any thing, have you to say against this as an indisputably established conclusion?

COLLOQUY X.

NULLIFICATION-GENERAL JACKSON ON THE UNION-JEFFERSON ON THE UNION-KENTUCKY RESOLUTIONS OF 1798-SETTLEMENT OF THE NULLIFICATION ISSUE-THE DEBATES IN THE SENATE-WILKINS, CALHOUN, GRUNDY, BIBB AND CLAY-THE COMPROMISE ON THE PROTECTIVE POLICY OF 1833-THE WORKINGS OF THE FEDERAL SYSTEM UNDER THE PRINCIPLES ON WHICH THAT COMPROMSIE WAS MADE-THE GREAT PROSPERITY THAT FOLLOWED-NO PRESIDENT FROM JEFFERSON TO LINCOLN ELECTED, WHO DID NOT HOLD THE GOVERNMENT TO BE A COMPACT BETWEEN SOVEREIGN STATES-MADISON, MONROE, JOHN QUINCY ADAMS, JACKSON, VAN BUREN, HARRISON, POLK, TAYLOR, PIERCE, AND BUCHANAN, ALL SO HELD IT TO BE-THE SUPREME COURT NOT THE UMPIRE BETWEEN THE STATES AND THE GENERAL GOVERNMENT-MADISON, BIBB, MARSHALL, AND LIVINGSTON ON THIS SUBJECT-GENERAL JACKSON'S EXPLANATION OF THE DOCTRINES OF THE PROCLAMATION-HE HELD THE CONSTITUTION TO BE A COMPACT BETWEEN SOVEREIGN STATES-HIS FAREWELL ADDRESS.

MAJOR HEISTER. I have listened with interest to this discussion as it has progressed thus far. Several new views, I candidly confess, have been presented by you. But I am not prepared to assent to your conclusion as a truth indisputably established. I was never a disciple of the school of either Story, Webster, or Calhoun. I was born, bred, and brought up a Jeffersonian Democrat. MR. STEPHENS. So was I.

MAJOR HEISTER. Well, then, Andrew Jackson was the embodiment of the principles in which I was reared. I am, therefore, a disciple of the School of the Hero of New Orleans as well as of the Sage of Monticello! I have never devoted much time to the study of the questions and principles you have been discussing, and do not profess any very accurate acquaintance with or in

formation upon them; but I have always understood very well, that General Jackson held, that the Union. must be preserved. That he put down Nullification, and the whole theory of the Government attempted to be established by Mr. Calhoun. Now, I am a Union man upon the principles of General Jackson. His proclamation against Nullification is my political text-book. Have you got that Proclamation?

MR. STEPHENS. Yes, here it is, in the Statesman's Manual, vol. 2, page 794.

MAJOR HEISTER. Well, did not General Jackson, in it, denounce the proceedings in South Carolina as treasonable, and did he not, by his Roman firmness and decision, at the time, promptly quell the Rebellion in its incipiency, then brewing in that State, and thus save the Union and maintain the Constitution?

What Story and Motley and Webster said about the Constitution has but little weight with me. If Webster did not answer Calhoun, General Jackson, at least, silenced him, and put an end to Nullification and all other attempts to overthrow the Government, for more than a quarter of a century. Here is the Proclamation, which is, as I have said, my text-book on this subject. It is too long for me to read the whole of it, nor is it necessary. I call your attention to only certain portions of it.

MR. STEPHENS. Before looking into the Proclamation I must set you right on some matters of fact.

MAJOR HEISTER. How so? What matters of fact? MR. STEPHENS. The statement by you that General Jackson put down Nullification and silenced Mr. Calhoun.

MAJOR HEISTER. Are not these statements correct? Do you join issue on them?