Excerpt from Popular Sovereignity in the Territories: Judge Douglas in Reply to Judge Black
Well, Judge Black, for himself and as Attorney General for my confederated assailants, has replied to my Wooster speech in his appendix; and what has he said on this point? What reply has he made to my positive denial of the truth of his allegations, and my demand for the production of the proof? Does he repeat the charge and produce the evidence to sustain its truth; or does he retract the charge and apologize for the injustice he has done me? I had supposed that there was no alternative for a man of honor but to do the one or the other! Judge Black has done neither! Nor is his conduct less exceptionable in respect to his allegation that I advocate the confiscacation of private property by the territorial legislature, or that I have alternately affirmed and denied that the Territories are sovereign political communities or States, or that the Jeffersonian plan of government for the Territories, which I alleged to have been adopted, was in fact "rejected by Congress," or that I was attempting to establish a new school of politics by forcing new articles into the creed, and new tests of democratic faith, in violation of the Cincinnati platform.
It is to be regretted that all political discussions cannot be conducted upon those elevated principles of fairness and honor which require every gentleman to state his antagonists position fairly and truly, and correct any mistake he may have committed inadvertently the moment it is pointed out to him.
That I am or ever have been in favor of the confiscation of private property by the action of a territorial legislature, or by any other power on earth, is simply untrue and absurd. Nor is there any foundation or excuse for the allegation that I have ever assigned as a reason for such confiscation that the Territories were sovereign political communities.
The Territories, Without Being Sovereign Communities, Have Certain Attributes of Sovereignty.
I have never said or thought that our Territories were sovereign political communities, or even limited sovereignties like the States of the Union. Sovereign States have the right to make their own constitutions and establish their own governments, and alter and change the same at pleasure. I have never claimed these powers for the Territories, nor have I ever failed to resist such claim when set up by others, as was done by the friends of a State organization in New Mexico and Utah some years ago, and more recently by the supporters of the Topeka and Lecompton movements in Kansas, where they attempted to subvert the authority of the territorial governments established by Congress, without the consent of Congress.
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