The consistency which he labored so hard to prove in his speech was hopelessly shattered, and no ingenuity, either then or since, can restore it.
[Footnote 1: _Congressional Globe_, 31st Congress, 1st Session, p.

203.] [Footnote 2: Ibid., Appendix, p.

510.] A dispassionate examination of Mr.Webster's previous course on slavery, and a careful comparison of it with the ground taken in the 7th of March speech, shows that he softened his utterances in regard to slavery as a system, and that he changed radically on the policy of compromise and on the question of extending the area of slavery.

There is a confused story that in the winter of 1847-48 he had given the anti-slavery leaders to understand that he proposed to come out on their ground in regard to Mexico, and to sustain Corwin in his attack on the Democratic policy, but that he failed to do so.

The evidence on this point is entirely insufficient to make it of importance, but there can be no doubt that in the winter of 1850 Mr.Webster talked with Mr.Giddings, and led him, and the other Free-Soil leaders, to believe that he was meditating a strong anti-slavery speech.