(Brown, John). Parker, Richard (1810-1893). SPEECH OF HON. RICHARD PARKER, OF VIRGINIA, ON THE PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE IN RELATION TO CALIFORNIA. Delivered In The House of Representatives, Thursday, February 28, 1850. Washington: Printed at the Congressional Globe Office, 1850. Octavo, 9-5/8 inches high by 6-1/2 inches wide. Softcover, laid into printed self-wrappers. The edges of the front cover page are darkened. The covers are splitting along the top and bottom. 8 pages, including the covers. There is damp staining to the top edges and bottom front corners of the pages, with a couple of short tears & chips. Good.
RARE First edition.
Richard Parker's speech as part of the heated debate regarding California's admission to the Union as a free, non-slavery state. He gives a fierce defense of the right of Southern states to own slaves. "It is well known that the Articles of Confederation contained no provision for the restoration of such of our slaves as might flee from one State to another. And prior to the adoption of our Constitution, the want of such a provision subjected those States most interested in slavery to great inconvenience, annoyance, and loss. We also know that this entire subject was carefully considered in the convention which framed the Constitution; and we further know that the Constitution would never have been adopted, had it not contained that full and complete provision for the protection of our slave property which we find in it. That provision is that 'no person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up, on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due.' The object of this provision of the Constitution is too plain to be misunderstood....And now, can the North, which has derived so much benefit, and has grown so great under this Federal Constitution, feel surprised that we call upon her, by the faith she pledged to us in that sacred instrument, and by the obligation she thereby assumed, to stand by this provision made for our benefit? Or can she be surprised that her neglect of the high obligations under which she brought herself by accepting this Constitution has given rise to disappointment and to much angry feeling on our part? Is she to receive all the advantages of union, and yet not be held bound by this most solemn stipulation - a stipulation so distinct, that no pretext can cover its evasion?...should aggression be accumulated upon aggression, and wrong upon wrong - it is not for me to predict what line of conduct Virginia will pursue."
Himself a slave owner, Richard Parker (1810-1893) was a lawyer and judge from Virginia. He served as a Democrat in the US House of Representatives from 1849 to 1851. He is best remembered as the judge of the 13th judicial circuit of Virginia who presided over the trials of John Brown and his associates in 1859, sentencing them to death for the raid on Harpers Ferry.
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