There is but one subject that should now engage Northern freemen — all other political objects are trivial beside it — and that is the strides of the slave power toward supremacy. To oppose the extension of slavery is a principle that ought to bind free men into one great party.
Original passage & context
"There is but one subject that should now engage the attention of Northern freemen, -- all other issues and political objects are trivial in comparison to its importance -- and that is, the strides of the slave power towards supremacy. [...] To oppose the extent of the area of slavery is a principle that can bind and ought to bind American freemen together in one great party."
Five days after the House passed the bill, a Whig paper calls for a single Northern party organized on one question. This is the argument that produced the Republican party within the year, and it is the reason the 1854 event sits first in this feed: the coalition that fights every later crisis here is being proposed on this page.
Read it in the original — Furman Secession Era Editorials transcription ↗