But was he a seer and a statesman? He was. Let us pass to the proof. The
nullification conflict of the early ‘thirties had its root in slavery. The
owners of chattels objected to paying a tariff for the benefit of New England.
They took forceful steps in South Carolina, and would have gone far in
resisting Congress, had not Andrew Jackson decreed that the “union of the
states must and shall be preserved.”
Now, although he had set up a people apart from others, in spite of all temptations,
Joseph remained an American, an autocrat at home, a Democrat in his beliefs.
December 25, 1832, he uttered this prophecy, which was to become all too true:
[Seitz then quotes D&C 87 in full]
Smith perceived more plainly that the abolitionists the evil of slavery.
He saw, too, that it was an economic question for the South and a moral one for
the North, with no ground for adjustment. Slavery must either expand or make
war. At first he preferred the former course, but not in any territory belonging
to the United States. He proposed to Van Buren in 1837 that he would raise one
hundred thousand men, conquer a useless Mexico and let slavery migrate thereto,
as a means of saving the nation. No attention was paid to this, yet ten years
later we had conquered Mexico at the behest of the slave power and by the absorption
of Texas gave it room for a vast expansion. This did not solve the problem,
though postponing its acuteness. Smith saw this and knew the crisis would arise
anew. He proposed that the new lands of the Louisiana Purchase be sold
gradually, and the money used to recompense the owners of the serfs.
“Pray Congress,” he wrote, when proclaiming his candidacy for president
in 1844, provoked thereto by the attitude of Van Buren and Clay toward his
people, “to pay every man a reasonable price for his slaves out of the surplus
revenue arising from the sale of public lands, and from the deduction of pay of
members of Congress.
“Petition also, ye godly inhabitants of the slave States, your
legislates to abolish slavery by the year 1850, or now, and save the abolitionists
from reproach and ruin or shame.
“break off the shackles of the poor black men and hire him to labor like
human beings; for an hour of virtuous liberty on earth is worth a whole
eternity of bondage.”
He wrote further on the point:
“The Southern people are noble and hospitable. They will help to rid a
free country of every vestige of slavery, whenever they are assured of an
equivalent of their property.”
What other voice in all the madness was no sane? But he advocated higher
things not for the slaves alone. “Abolish the practice in the Army and Navy,”
he continued, “of trying men by courtmartial for desertion. If a soldier or
marine runs away, send him his wages with this instruction: That his country
will never trust him again; he has forfeited his honor.
“Make honor the standard with all men. Be sure that good is rendered for
evil in all cases; and this whole nation, like a kingdom of kings and priests,
will rise up in righteousness and be respected as wise and witty on earth, and
just as holy for Heaven by Jehovah, the authority of perfection.” (Don C. Seitz,
Uncommon Americans: Pencil Portraits of Men and Women Who Have Broken the
Rules [Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, 1925], 10-13)
