His argument, on lines that the debates
had made familiar, was stated with such eloquence, force, and
graphic power that it produced the effect of a new presentation.
Waiving the question whether Congress might refuse admission to a
state, he held that, if it were admitted, it was admitted into a
union of equals, and hence could not be subjected to any special
restriction. [Footnote: Annals of Cong., 16 Cong., 1 Sess., I., 389
et seq.] Without denying the danger of the extension of slavery, he
argued that it was not for Congress to stay the course of this dark
torrent. "If you have power," said he, "to restrict the new states
on admission, you may squeeze a new-born sovereign state to the size
of a pigmy." There would be nothing to hinder Congress "from
plundering power after power at the expense of the new states,"
until they should be left empty shadows of domestic sovereignty, in
a union between giants and dwarfs, between power and feebleness. In
vivid oratory he conjured up this vision of an unequal union, into
which the new state would enter, "shorn of its beams," a mere
servant of the majority.
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