the complaint; and Jas. T. Birney and John Jolliffe were for the defense. Mr. Ware started out by saying that his sympathy was with McQuerry, and that as to the abstract question of slavery he did not differ from the lawyers on the other side; but he should do his duty to his client fully, under the conviction that his claim was sustained by the Constitutional law of the land.

Birney and Jolliffe both

made speeches of the ad hominem kind. Poor Jolliffe allowed his reason and judgment to be overcome by his sympathy and his hatred of slavery. He took the position that the Fugitive Slave Act was unconstitutional, a thing that no reading man was pardonable in doing, and every other ingenious device was resorted to for bringing the Court to the side of mercy.

The case undoubtedly fretted Judge McLean, while the following semi-querulous language from his decision, perhaps, may not indicate his temptation to ignore his Constitutional obligations and the dignity of his office:

"I can not here be governed by sympathy; I have to look to the law and be governed by the law, and to guard myself with more than usual caution in such a case, when judgment might be warped by sympathy.

This is not a case for sympathy; the evidence certainly is complete, that the fugitive had a kind master; of this matter we on the north bank of the Ohio River have no concern. The law has been enacted by the highest power; that none is higher is acknowledged by all men. Sooner or later a disregard for the law would bring chaos, anarchy, and wide-spread ruin; the law must be enforced. Let

those who think differently go to the people who make the laws. I can not turn aside from the sacred duties of my office to regard aught but the law. By the force of all the testimony and the law I am bound to remand the fugitive to his master.”

An attempt was made to appeal the case to the Supreme Court, but McLean said an appeal could not be taken from the decision of a judge of that court given in chambers. Still, Miller was bound in the sum of two thousand dollars to return the slave to Ohio should the Supreme Court take notice of the case. Miller then offered to emancipate McQuerry for one thousand two hundred dollars and give fifty dollars towards it himself. Levi Coffin, the old "under-ground railroad" busybody, and others made an effort to raise the money but did not succeed, and so poor McQuerry had to leave his wife and children and go back into slavery, where he remained until death, or until the slaveholder's rebellion restored him to his family in Ohio.

In a special message to Congress, January 18, 1853, President Fillmore exhibited unusual concern about the few Seminole Indians who yet remained in Florida. He said they were still unwilling to comply with the conditions of the treaty of 1832, and intimated that force ought again to be tried. He admitted that they had not shown a hostile inclination since Mr. Tyler had happily closed the long war in 1842, and thought that while they numbered only about five hundred men, women, and children, past experiences taught that it would require no

inconsiderable army to subdue and capture them. The main reason for this warlike message the President expressed in these words: "It can not be denied that the withholding of so large a portion of her territory from settlement is a serious injury to the State of Florida." But this reason looks like an unsubstantial pretext to-day even, when, with all the hurrah and advertising schemes of Florida real estate and railroad speculators, most of this swampy, malarious region occupied by the handful of poor Seminoles remains uninhabited and uninhabitable.

CHAPTER XI.

FIRST ANNUAL MESSAGE-DESTINY OF THE RED MANTHE HAND OF PROVIDENCE.

A

FTER a short vacation Congress again assembled on the first Monday in December, with less disposition to quarrel, and a very decided tendency to friendly and active legislation. The following is President Fillmore's

FIRST ANNUAL MESSAGE.

December 2, 1851.

FELLOW-CITIZENS OF THE SENATE AND of the House of RepresENTA

TIVES:

Being suddenly called, in the midst of the last session of Congress, by a painful dispensation of Divine Providence to the responsible station which I now hold, I contented myself with such communications to the Legislature as the exigency of the moment seemed to require. The country was shrouded in mourning for the loss of its venerated Chief Magistrate, and all hearts were penetrated with grief. Neither the time nor the occasion appeared to require or to justify, on my part, any general expression of political opinions, or any announcement of the principles which would govern me in the discharge of the duties to the performance of which I had been so unexpectedly called. I trust, therefore, that it may not be deemed inappropriate if I avail myself of this opportunity of the reassembling of Congress to make known my sentiments in a general manner, in regard to the policy which ought to be pursued by the Government, both in its intercourse with

foreign nations and in its management and administration of internal affairs.

Nations, like individuals in a state of nature, are equal and independent, possessing certain rights and owing certain duties to each other, arising from their necessary and unavoidable relations; which rights and duties there is no common human authority to protect and enforce. Still they are rights and duties, binding in morals, in conscience, and in honor, although there is no tribunal to which an injured party can appeal but the disinterested judgment of mankind, and ultimately the arbitrament of the sword.

Among the acknowledged rights of nations is that which each possesses of establishing that form of government which it may deem most conducive to the happiness and prosperity of its own citizens; of changing that form as circumstances may require, and of managing its internal affairs according to its own will. The people of the United States claim this right for themselves, and they readily concede it to others. Hence, it becomes an imperative duty not to interfere in the government or internal policy of other nations; and, although we may sympathize with the unfortunate or the oppressed everywhere in their struggles for freedom, our principles forbid us from taking any part in such foreign contests. We make no wars to promote or to prevent successions to thrones, to maintain any theory of a balance of power, or to suppress the actual government which any country chooses to establish for itself. We instigate no revolutions, nor suffer any hostile military expeditions to be fitted out in the United States to invade the territory or provinces of a friendly nation. The great law of morality ought to have a national as well as a personal and individual application. We should act toward other nations as we wish them to act toward us; and justice and conscience should form the rule of conduct between governments instead of mere power, self-interest, or the desire of aggrandizement. To maintain a strict neutrality in foreign wars, to cultivate friendly relations, to reciprocate every noble and generous act, and to perform punctually and scrupulously every treaty obligation-these are the duties which we owe to other States, and by the performance of which we best entitle ourselves to like