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Show 350 LIBERTY AND SLAVERY. gcratc. I wish to keep withil1 bounds ; but I think no person can doubt that the condemnation affixed to all these tmn.sactions and to their authors must be the lot hereafter of the Fugitive Slave Bill, and of every one, according to the mcasw·e of his infinence, who gave it his support. Into the immortal catalogue of national crimes this has now passed, drawing with it, by an inexorable necessity, its authors also, and chiefly him who, as President of the United States, set his name to the bill, and breathed into it that final breath without which it would have no life. Other Presidents may be forgotten, but the name signed to the Fugitive Slave Bill can never be forgotten. There arc depths of infamy, as thoro are heights of f01mc. I regret to say what I must, but truth compels me. Better far for him had he never been bom; better for his memory, and for the name of his children, had he never been President!" If neither Mr. Fillmore nor George Washington swore to support the Constitution as Mr. Sumner understands it, we beg him to consider that his opinion was not /mown when they took the oath of office. Mr. Fillmore had, at that time, no better guide to go by than the decisions of the most enlightened judicial tribunals of his '£TIE >'UOITIVE SLAVE LAW. 351 country, with the Supreme Com-t of the U nitccl States at their head. lie was not so far raised above other men, nor possessed of so wonderful an insight into the Constitution, as Mr. Sumner; for he could understand it no better than its framers. lienee he was, no doubt, so conscious of his own fallibility that he could hardly look upon modesty as a crime, or upon a deference to the juuicial tribunals of his country as infamous. We trust, therefore, that his good name will survive, anu that his children will not blush to own it. It is ce1-tain that the American people will never believe, on the bare authority of Mr. Sumner, that, in his course regarding the Fugitive Slave Law, he planted his feet in the very "depths of infamy," when they ca11 so clearly sec that he merely trod in tho footsteps of George Washington. If what a man lacks in reason he coulu only make up in rage, then, after all, it would have to be concludcu that Mr. Sumner is a very respectable Senator; for, surely, the violence of his denunciations is almost as remarkable as the weakness of his logic. Fortunately, however, it can hurt no one except himself or those whom he represents. Certainly, the brightest names in the galaxy of An1cricu.n statesmen aro |