Report of the special committee appointed to investigate the troubles in Kansas,: with the views of the minority of said committee.

KANSAS AFFAIRS.
Spring convention the arguments of Dr. G. A. Cutler, C. W. Steward,
A. Larzelere, B. Harding, and others, were to urge the necessity of a
secret society, something on the order of the Know-nothings, by which
they could unite their force and labor more effectually against the pro slavery party. This idea was received with acclamation by all of them
except myself. I being an Irishman myself by birth, was opposed to
the measure, as it was too much like Know-nothingism, and told them
if they pressed it they would find me their most inveterate enemy.
They said they had better do without it; that they were too feeble to
have any disturbance in their ranks. We had several speeches from
those I have nanmed, together with S. Collins, John Free, and B. G.
Cady. They told us we must do all we could to keep slavery out of
Kansas, and sooner than permit slavery in Kansas, or even submit to
the repeal of the MIissouri compromise, they ought to go for a disunion,
and to take up arms against the authorities, and, in order to effect
this purpose, they would shed the last drop of their blood, as they
ought to do. Those speeches were received with applause. When
3Ir. Brown showed me the rifles at Lawrence he told me that they
would continue to send arms, men, and means to make Kansas a free
State by force, if necessary. He told me that these arms and muni tions of war were sent as dry goods to the agents of the Emigrant Aid
Society, who received them and gave them out to the people, and gave
as a reason why they were thus secretly sent was that they might not
be detected by the United States officers. He told me that the agent
(I am now confident that he said Robinson, who was recognized at
that time as the agent of the Emigrant Aid Society) had been on after
arms, and had to remain two weeks over his time, in order to avoid
being detected in getting them here. Brown furthermore told me that
going on after those arms was very delicate business; that it would
not do to send everybody. Robinson being a very shrewd man, had
all he could do to keep from being caught. Brown's instructions to
me was, that when we got thirty men in each regiment we must send
a delegate to Boston, but that he must first go to Lawrence, where he
would get letters of introduction to the people in Boston, who would
furnish him with as many arms as we had men in the neighborhood
to bear them, and that we would get them gratis. When in Lawrence I was invited by a friend to go up into a private room to see the
kind of goods they received from the east. I saw a box which they
were opening, and a part of the cover torn off had "C. Robinson"
on it. I saw in the box blue jackets and white pants, a drum and
drumsticks. I inferred they were military uniforms, but no one told
me so. They nailed the box up again with the goods as they came.
I saw a large house building; it had port-holes in the top of it. I
was told by G. W. Brown, Lowrie, Hutchinson, and Emery that the
buiNXing was for the purposes of fortification. Brown told me it was
built by the Emigrant Aid Society. They expected they would be
attacked in their town, as they were freemen, and would exercise the
rights of freemen in the llberty of speech and the liberty of the press,
and that many of their speeches and publications were in violation of
he laws of the Territory, and they thereby expected to come in collision with the authorities of the Territory. When I was first intro
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