The members of the Liberty Party
also, who had cast votes for Birney in 1844, were ready for
the new movement. But the Free Soil Party derived its chief
strength, both of numbers and influence, from the Whigs. The
Anti-Slavery Whigs clung to Webster almost to the last. He
had disappointed them by opposing the resolution they offered
at the Whig State Convention, pledging the party to support
no candidate not known by his acts or declared opinions to
be opposed to the extension of slavery. But he had coupled
his opposition with a declaration of his own unalterable opposition
to that extension, and had said, speaking of those who were
in favor of the declaration: "It is not their thunder."
He declared in the Senate, as late as 1848: "My opposition
to the increase of slavery in the country, or to the increase
of slave representation in Congress, is general and universal.
It has no reference to lines of latitude or points of the
compass. I shall oppose all such extension, and all such
increase, at all times, under all circumstances, even against
all inducements, against all combinations, against all compromises.
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