"But...Muh States Rights!"

I'm going to come back to this, because I scanned just the comments by John Quincy Adams and knew I had to slow down and read it very carefully, and now (I mean in this moment, for me) is not the time for that.   

Well, here; you can see what I mean:

But if it so be so, as to the mere question of the right between master and slave, it is of tremendous concern to you that this little cluster of slave owners should possess, besides their own share in the representative hall of the nation the exclusive privilege of appointing two fifths of the whole number to the representatives of the people.  

This is now your condition, under the delusive ambiguity of language and of principles, which begins by declaring the representation of the popular branch of the legislature a representation of persons, and then provides that one class of persons shall have neither part nor lot in the choice of their representatives;  but their elective franchise shall be transferred to their masters,  and the oppressors shall represent the oppressed.  

The same perversions of the representative principle pollutes the composition of the colleges of electors of President and Vice President of the United States, and every department of the government of the Union is thus tainted at its source by the gangrene of slavery.

This is the "hidden wound" Wendell Berry writes of, in American history; our secret de Polichinelle.  And still we insist on hiding it from ourselves.  And are surprised when it bursts open again, and denounce attention to it as "woke," turning the word into an euphemism for our own racism and fear of a brown planet and of the "other" we have treated so brutally, fear mostly that what goes around comes around, and "justice" means we face the fate we dealt to them for so long.

And why Greg Abbott is making so much noise about an "invasion" and protecting his state from the brown people that white people took it away from (upon establishing the Republic, Texans quickly set about ejecting, eradicating, and removing all non-white person, except slaves, from the premises.  The beat goes on. Does Abbott really fear an "invasion"? No; but he knows a good political scare when he sees one.).

You can see why I need to read it carefully myself; the whole post, not just the quotes.