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There is not only no free state which would now establish it, but there is no slave state, which, if it had had the free alternative as we now have, would have founded slavery.

William H. Seward

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William H. Seward
Age: 71 †
Born: 1801
Born: May 16
Died: 1872
Died: October 10
Diplomat
Former Governor Of New York
Lawyer
Politician
Florida
New York
William Henry Seward
William Seward
Alternatives
Slavery
Slave
State
Free
States
Founded
Would
Establish
Alternative

More quotes by William H. Seward

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The United States are a political state, or organized society, whose end is government, for the security, welfare, and happiness of all who live under its protection.
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But there is a higher law than the Constitution, which regulates our authority over the domain, and devotes it to the same noble purposes.
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The whole hope of human progress is suspended on the ever-growing influence of the Bible.
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The right to have a slave implies the right in some one to make the slave that right must be equal and mutual, and this would resolve society into a state of perpetual war.
William H. Seward
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But I deny that the Constitution recognizes property in man.
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Sir, there is no Christian nation, thus free to choose as we are, which would establish slavery.
William H. Seward
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Therefore, states are equal in natural rights.
William H. Seward
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It is an irrepressible conflict between opposing and enduring forces.
William H. Seward
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The circumstances of the world are so variable that an irrevocable purpose or opinion is almost synonymous with a foolish one.
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We show our sympathy with slavery by emancipating slaves where we cannot reach them, and holding them in bondage where we can set them free.
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I know and all the world knows, that revolutions never go backwards.
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Idea is a noble one — an idea that fills and expands all generous souls the idea of equality — the equality of all men before human tribunals and human laws, as they all are equal before the Divine tribunal and Divine laws.
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Revolutions never go backward.
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There is a higher law than the Constitution.
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But you answer, that the Constitution recognizes property in slaves. It would be sufficient, then, to reply, that this constitutional recognition must be void, because it is repugnant to the law of nature and of nations.
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Whatever policy we adopt, there must be an energetic prosecution of it. For this purpose it must be somebody's business to pursue and direct it incessantly.
William H. Seward
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No man will ever be President of the United States who spells 'negro' with two gs.
William H. Seward
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The two systems slave and free-labor are incompatible. They have never permanently existed together in one country, and they never can.
William H. Seward
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It would be contrary to the spirit of the American Government to use force to subjugate the South.
William H. Seward
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I mean to say that Congress can hereafter decide whether any states, slave or free, can be framed out of Texas. If they should never be framed out of Texas, they never could be admitted.
William H. Seward