IN THE ONE,

FROM THE CONSTITUTION.

"No person held to service or labor in one State under the laws thereof, escaping in another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due."

IN THE OTHER,

FROM THE STATE LAW.

"No Court of Record in this State, nor any Judge thereof, no Justice of the Peace, nor other Magistrate acting under the authority of this State, shall hereafter take cognizance of, or grant any certificate, warrant, or other process to any person claiming any other person as a fugitive slave in this State."

We wonder how it was that the other States did not, by solemn act and proclamation, strike Vermont and Massachusetts both out of the Union, and erase their names from its records. The enacting such laws was more than enough to deserve it.

BOST.-This, however, may regard the States who first formed the Union, not those that have been admitted into it afterward, or may be admitted in future. Much less can it regard the Territories belonging to the Confederation. It is only from these we do now intend to exclude Slavery, permitting it to remain where it is in the States.

WASH.-There can be no difference in this respect between the old and new States, save that some have entered the Union at its first forming, others afterward at different times, which is no difference at all. The same disposition equally applies to every one of them, and their rights for all intents and purposes must be the same in all; because there is in all the same reason, all having the same end in entering the Union: which is to partake of its common benefits. You cannot but have observed that in the petitions or bills presented to Congress for the admission of any

new State, there is a clause expressed in these words, or others of similar import, "upon the same footing with the original States in all respects whatever."

Hence it is plain that the New as well as the Old are and remain sovereign States. The petition or bill for admission is an implied declaration on their part of the surrender or delegation into the Federal Government of so much of their independent sovereignty, to be used by her in their name and for their benefit, as is necessary for forming part of the Union; as is equal to that surrendered and delegated to her at its forming by the Original States for the same purpose.

By necessary consequence, the citizens of the new States are as much citizens of the United States as the citizens of the old ones; with the inherent right, among others, to go into any part of the Territory belonging to the United States, there settle and freely use their property in the same manner and with equal security, as they may in their native States. You can no more exclude Slavery from the Common Territory than you can from the Slaveholding States.

BOST.-But Congress may, the Constitution expressly ordaining," Congress shall have the power to dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations respecting the Territory and other property belonging to the United States."

WASH.-From which you infer that Congress are empowered to exclude Slavery from the Territories, or plant it there, if they so please! But this inference does not descend from the words of the clause which you have recited to give them such meaning is, on the contrary, a great and evident abuse of interpretation, contrary alike to sound reasoning and to what we have clearly expressed both there and elsewhere.

Our language, in that clause, is as manifest in its import, as it is dictated by necessity. We could not have spoken otherwise. The Territory belonging, not to any particular State, but to all the States, we could not have con

ferred on any one, or ones, of them the power of disposing, or making regulations about it, but must have given it to all the States united; namely, to Congress, which represents them. As a private master has the power of regulating, and disposing of, his individual property, so must the same power about common property belong to the common master: such, in the present instance, we recognized to be the United States, considered together; with the difference that the private master may do as he lists in disposing of his individual property, having nobody to care for, or consult about it, but his own will; in him the whole operation begins and ends: whereas the common master, or rather the representative of the several masters of the common property, must, in disposing of it, necessarily consult the right, will, and interests, not of one portion, but of every one of the several masters it represents in common.

Its regulations, therefore, must respect inviolate the rights of each of them. As they are on common ground, so must they be made for the common benefit of all, and equally affect all without distinction. Otherwise it were not to dispose of, or regulate, but to usurp the common property. The greater number of the co-masters, however large, cannot attempt to disregard, or deny the rights of the few. If such could ever be the case, the surest way to lose one's property would be to put it in common with others, to be disposed of as the greater number of the co-masters think fit.

Therefore this power, vested in Congress, can never be understood as enabling them to destroy, or abridge, the rights which belong to any State, or citizen, on the common property; yet this would be the necessary conclusion to be arrived at from that clause, if Congress had the power to legislate for or against Slavery in the Territory. To speak only of the latter case, it is manifest that Congress would put at naught the rights of the Slaveholding States and their citizens in that part of the

Slavery should be excluded.

common Territory, whence Now, that Congress are en

abled in any of their measures and enactments to subvert the right of any State or citizen, by virtue and in consequence of the use of that power which we vested in them by that, or any other, clause, we never said nor meant; it being equally far from our words and our intention.

Not to say that in that clause we consider the common Territory in no other light but that of property; as the subject itself required, and appears, from the unbroken, not to be broken, connection of the words "respecting the Territory and other property belonging to the United States." These words are uttered, as it were, in one and the same breath, for the same meaning and purpose; and no interpretation, which is not evidently unjust, can possibly disconnect them, or induce any distinction or limitation between them. All which manifestly restricts the power of Congress to legislating respecting the Territory only as property; and this forbids them to legislate respecting the persons who may settle in it. Wherefore they cannot legislate for or against Slavery in any settlement in the Territory, because persons, whether bond or free, are not the property belonging to the United States.

They might refuse to sell part of the Territory to foreign slaveholders, and not permit them to settle there with their slaves; but they cannot hinder from going thither a slaveholder who is a citizen of the United States, a member of the community which they represent, and by whose authority they act.

But, that Congress have no such power, is made evident by the very nature and destination of the Territory. As this is unquestionably a part of the Public Lands, so it is unquestionable that the Public Lands are "to be considered a common fund for the use and benefit of the United States, and shall be faithfully disposed of for that purpose, and for no other use or purpose whatever." With this express declaration and condition have those lands been ceded and conveyed to the General Government by the several States to whom they respectively belonged.

Nay, the very resolution of Congress, dated October 10th, 1780, which is anterior to these cessions, and in consequence of which these cessions were made by the several States afterward, does openly declare " That the unappropriated lands that may be ceded or relinquished to the United States by any particular State, shall be disposed of for the common benefit of the United States."

The same thing must be said of any other portion of the public lands which the Federal Government has acquired by treaty or otherwise; for they were bought with the public money.

And Henry Clay, from the Committee on Manufactures, in his report on the public lands, presented to the Senate in 1832, says upon these words of cession: "Thus by the clear and positive terms of the cession, was a great, public, national trust created and assumed by the General Government. It became solemnly bound to hold and administer the lands ceded as a common fund for the use and benefit of all the States, and for no other use and purpose whatever. To waste or misapply this fund, or to divert it from the common benefit for which it was conveyed, would be a violation of the trust." You are not ignorant that Henry Clay was what you call a Republican, that is, of your party; although both the name and the idea conveyed by it has undergone some alterations afterward.

However this is, you may now prepare yourself to answer the question: Whether that part of the public lands, whence Congress should exclude Slavery, would be disposed of for the use and benefit of all the States?" How can it be, if the citizens of the Slaveholding States are refused entrance and settlement in it? There is no need to advert that it is the citizens who form and represent the State, and consequently that a place in which any citizens are not permitted to enter and settle, cannot be said to be disposed of for the use and benefit of the State to which they belong. The territory, in such a case, would manifestly be appropriated for the use and benefit, not of all the United