Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from Speech of Hon. James H. Hammond, of South Carolina, on the Admission of Kansas, Under the Lecompton Constitution: Delivered in the Senate of the United States, March 4, 1856
Ple, bonafide, being the only way in which all the people can assemble and act together. I do not doubt that there might be some cases Of such gress and palpable frauds committed, in the formation of a convention, as might authorize Congress to investigate them, but I can scarcely conceive Of any; and and I do not think that Congress has any other power when a State knocks at the door for admission, but to inquire if her constitution is republican. That it embodies the will Of her people must necessarily be taken for granted, if it is their lawful act. I am assuming, Of course, that her boundaries are settled, and her population sufiicient.
If what I have said be correct, then the will of the people Of Kansas is to be found in the action Of her constitutional convention. It is immaterial whether it is the will Of a majority Of the people Of Kansas now, or not. The convem tion was, or might have been, elected by a majority 'of' the people Of Kansas. A convention, elected in April, may well frame a constitution that would not be agreeable to a major ity Of the people Of a new State, rapidly filling up, in the succeeding January and if'legislatures are to be allowed to put to vote the acts of a convention, and have them an nulled by a subsequent in?ux Of immigrants, there is no final ity. If you were to send back the Lecompton constitution, and another was to be framed, in the slow way in whichtwe de public business in this country, before it would reach Con gress and be passed, perhaps the majority would be turned the other way. Whenever you outside Of the regular forms Of law and constitutions to see for the will Of the people' you are wandering in a wilderness - a wilderness Of thorns.
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