not confined to the inhabitants of the new State, but reaches and protects the rights of the citizens of all the States. The habits of the people and the number of slaves by whom the labor of the territory of New Orleans was performed, were doubtless the reason for the omission of an article in the act of admission by which slavery should be excluded from the new State.

toms, and manners of the inhabitants, required | the wise exercise of which on this occasion, is the immediate and cautious attention of Congress, which, instead of extending, in the first instance, to these territories the ordinance of 1787, ordained special regulations for the government of the same. These regulations were from time to time revised and altered, as observation and experience showed to be expedient, and as was deemed most likely to encourage and promote those changes which would soonest qualify the inhabitants for self-government and admission into the Union. When the United States took possession of the province of Louisiana in 1804, it was estimated to contain 50,000 white inhabitants; 40,000 slaves, and 2,000 free persons of color.*

More than four-fifths of the whites, and all the slaves, except about thirteen hundred, inhabited New Orleans and the adjacent territory; the residue, consisting of less than ten thousand whites, and about thirteen hundred slaves, were dispersed throughout the country now included in the Arkansas and Missouri territories. The greater part of the thirteen hundred slaves were in the Missouri territory, some of them having been removed thither from the old French settlements on the East side of the Mississippi, after the passing of the ordinance of 1787, by which slavery in those settlements was abolished.

Having annexed these new and extraordinary conditions to the act for the admission of Louisiana into the Union, Congress may, if they shall deem it expedient, annex the like conditions to the act for the admission of Missouri; and moreover, as in the case of Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, provide by an article for that purpose, that slavery shall not exist within the same.

Admitting this construction of the constitution, it is alleged that the power by which Congress excluded slavery from the States northwest of the river Ohio, is suspended in respect to the States that may be formed in the province of Louisiana. The article of the treaty referred to declares: "That the inhabitants of the territory shall be incorporated in the Union of the United States, and admitted as soon as possible; according to the principles of the Federal Constitution, to the enjoyment of all rights, advantages, and immunities of citizens of the United States; and in the mean time, they shall be maintained and protected in the free enjoyment of their liberty, property, and the religion which they profess."

In 1812, the territory of New Orleans, to which the ordinance of 1787, with the exception of certain parts thereof, had been previously extended, was permitted by Congress to form a Constitution and State Government, and admitted as a new State into the Union, Although there is want of precision in the by the name of Louisiana. The acts of Congress article, its scope and meaning cannot be misfor these purposes, in addition to sundry im- understood. It constitutes a stipulation by portant provisions respecting rivers and public which the United States engage that the inlands, which are declared to be irrevocable un-habitants of Louisiana should be formed into a less by common consent, annex other terms and conditions, whereby it is established, not only that the Constitution of Louisiana should be republican, but that it should contain the fundamental principles of civil and religious liberty, that it should secure to the citizens the trial by jury in all criminal cases, and the privi-tected by Congress in the enjoyment of their lege of the writ of habeas corpus according to the Constitution of the United States; and after its admission into the Union, that the laws which Louisiana might pass, should be promulgated; its records of every description preserved; and its judicial and legislative proceedings conducted in the language in which the laws and judicial proceedings of the United States are published and conducted.

State or States, and as soon as the provisions of the constitution permit, that they should be admitted as new States into the Union on the footing of the other States; and before such admission, and during their territorial government, that they should be maintained and pro

liberty, property, and religion. The first clause of this stipulation will be executed by the admission of Missouri as a new State into the Union, as such admission will impart to the inhabitants of Missouri "all the rights, advantages, and immunities" which citizens of the United States derive from the constitution thereof; these rights may be denominated federal rights, are uniform throughout the Union, Guards so friendly to the rights of the citi- and are common to all its citizens: but the zens, and restraints on the State sovereignty so rights derived from the constitution and laws material to the gradual confirmation and secu- of the States, which may be denominated rity of their liberties, demonstrate the exten-State rights, in many particulars differ from sive and parental power of Congress; power

* This estimate was too high, as, by the census of 1810, the whole province was found to contain only 96,000 inhabitants, viz: 51,000 whites, 37,000 slaves, and 8,000 free per

sons of color.

each other. Thus, while the federal rights of the citizens of Massachusetts and Virginia are the same, their State rights are dissimilar and different, slavery being forbidden in one, and permitted in the other State. This difference arises out of the constitutions and laws of the

two States, in the same manner as the difference in the rights of the citizens of these States to vote for representatives in Congress arises out of the State laws and constitution. In Massachusetts, every person of lawful age, and possessing property of any sort, of the value of two hundred dollars, may vote for representatives to Congress. In Virginia, no person can vote for representatives to Congress, unless he be a freeholder. As the admission of a new State into the Union confers upon its citizens only the rights denominated federal, and as these are common to the citizens of all the States, as well of those in which slavery is prohibited, as of those in which it is allowed, it follows that the prohibition of slavery in Missouri will not impair the federal rights of its citizens, and that such prohibition is not sustained by the clause of the treaty which has been cited.

or possessed by the new inhabitants of Missouri, has in each case been acquired under the laws of the United States, and not during and under the laws of the province of Louisiana. Should, therefore, the future introduction of slaves into Missouri, be forbidden, the feelings of the citizens would soon become reconciled to their exclusion, and the inconsiderable number of slaves owned by the inhabitants at the date of the cession of Louisiana, would be emancipated or sent for sale into States where slavery exists.

It is further objected, that the article of the act of admission into the Union, by which slavery should be excluded from Missouri, would be nugatory, as the new State in virtue of its sovereignty would be at liberty to revoke its consent, and annul the article by which slavery is excluded.

Such revocation would be contrary to the The remaining clause of the article is ex- obligations of good faith, which enjoins the pressly confined to the period of the territorial observance of our engagements; it would be government of Missouri, to the time between repugnant to the principles on which governthe first occupation of the country by the ment itself is founded: sovereignty in every United States, and its admission as a new State lawful government is a limited power, and can into the Union. Whatever may be its import, do only what it is lawful to do-sovereigns, it has no reference nor application to the terms like individuals, are bound by their engageof the admission, or to the condition of Mis-ments, and have no moral power to break them. souri, after it shall have been admitted into the Union. The clause is but the common formula of treaties, by which inhabited territories are passed from one sovereign to another; its object is to secure such inhabitants the permanent or temporary enjoyment of their former liberties, property, and religion; leaving to the new sovereign full power to make such regulations respecting the same, as may be thought expedient, provided these regulations be not incompatible with the stipulated security.

What were the liberties under the French government, the enjoyment of which, under ours, called for protection, we are unable to explain; as the United States have no power to prevent the free enjoyment of the Catholic religion, no stipulation against their interference to disturb it could be necessary; and the only part of the clause whose object can be readily understood, is that relative to "property."

As all nations do not permit slavery, the term property, in its common and universal meaning, does not include or describe slaves. In treaties, therefore, between nations, and especially in those of the United States, whenever stipulations respecting slaves were to be made, the word "negroes," or "slaves," have been employed, and the omission of these words in this clause, increases the uncertainty whether, by the term property, slaves were intended to be included. But admitting that such was the intention of the parties, the stipulation is not only temporary, but extends no further than to the property actually possessed by the inhabitants of Missouri, when it was first occupied by the United States. Property since acquired by them, and property acquired

Treaties between nations repose on this principle. If the new State can revoke and annul an article concluded between itself and the United States, by which slavery is excluded from it, it may revoke and annul any other article of the compact; it may, for example, annul the article respecting public lands, and in virtue of its sovereignty, assume the right to tax and to sell the lands of the United States. There is yet a more satisfactory answer to this objection. The judicial power of the United States is co-extensive with their legislative power, and every question arising under the Constitution or laws of the United States, is cognizable by the judiciary thereof. Should the new State rescind any of the articles of compact contained in the act of admission into the Union, that, for example, by which slavery is excluded, and should pass a law authorizing slavery, the judiciary of the United States, on proper application, would immediately deliver from bondage, any person detained as a slave in said State. And, in like manner, in all instances affecting individuals, the judiciary might be employed to defeat every attempt to violate the Constitution and laws of the United States.

If Congress possess the power to exclude slavery from Missouri, it still remains to be shown that they ought to do so. The examination of this branch of the subject, for obvious reasons, is attended with peculiar difficulty, and cannot be made without passing over arguments which, to some of us, might appear to be decisive, but the use of which, in this place, would call up feelings, the influence of which would disturb, if not defeat, the impartial consideration of the subject.

Slavery, unhappily, exists within the United

the want of a rule of apportionment, until the establishment of the constitution.

When the general convention that formed the constitution took this subject into their consideration, the whole question was once more examined; and while it was agreed that all contributions to the common treasury should be made according to the ability of the several States to furnish the same, the old difficulty recurred in agreeing upon a rule whereby such ability should be ascertained, there being no simple standard by which the ability of individuals to pay taxes can be ascertained. A diversity in the selection of taxes has been deemed requisite to their equalization. Between com

States. Enlightened men, in the States where it is permitted, and every where out of them, regret its existence among us, and seek for the means of limiting and of mitigating it. The first introduction of slaves is not imputable to the present generation, nor even to their ancestors. Before the year 1642, the trade and ports of the colonies were open to foreigners equally as those of the mother country; and as early as 1620, a few years only after the planting of the colony of Virginia, and the same year in which the first settlement was made in the old colony of Plymouth, a cargo of negroes was brought into, and sold as slaves in Virginia, by a foreign ship. From this beginning, the importation of slaves was continued for nearly two centu-munities this difficulty is less considerable, and ries. To her honor, Virginia, while a colony, opposed the importation of slaves, and was the first State to prohibit the same, by a law passed for this purpose in 1778, thirty years before the general prohibition enacted by Congress in 1808. The laws and custom of the States in which slavery has existed for so long a period, must have had their influence on the opinions and habits of the citizens, which ought not to be disregarded on the present occasion.

Omitting, therefore, the arguments which might be urged, and which by all of us might be deemed conclusive were this an original question, the reasons which shall be offered in favor of the interposition of the power of Congress to exclude slavery from Missouri shall be only such as respect the common defence, the general welfare, and that wise administration of the government, which, as far as possible, may produce the impartial distribution of benefits and burdens throughout the Union.

although the rule of relative numbers would not accurately measure the relative wealth of nations, in States in the circumstances of the United States, whose institutions, laws and employments are so much alike, the rule of numbers is probably as near equal as any other simple and practicable rule can be expected to be, (though between the old and new States its equity is defective,) these considerations, added to the approbation which had already been given to the rule, by a majority of the States, induced the convention to agree that direct taxes should be apportioned among the States, according to the whole number of free persons, and three-fifths of the slaves which they might respectively contain.

The rule for apportionment of taxes is not necessarily the most equitable rule for the apportionment of representatives among the States; property must not be disregarded in the composition of the first rule, but frequently is overlooked in the establishment of the second. A rule which might be approved in respect to taxes, would be disapproved in respect to representatives; one individual possessing twice as much property as another, might be required to pay double the taxes of such other; but no man has two votes to another's one; rich or poor, each has but a single vote in the choice of representatives.

By the articles of confederation the common treasury was to be supplied by the several States, according to the value of the lands, with the houses and improvements thereon, within the respective States. From the difficulty in making this valuation, the old Congress were unable to apportion the requisition for the supply of the general treasury, and obliged to propose to the States to propose an alteration of the articles of confederation, by which the In the dispute between England and the whole number of free persons, with three-fifths colonies, the latter denied the right of the of the slaves contained in the respective States, former to tax them, because they were not should become the rule of such apportionment represented in the English Parliament. They of the taxes. A majority of the States approved contended that, according to the law of the of this alteration, but some of them disagreed land, taxation and representation were insepato the same; and for want of a practicable rule rable. The rule of taxation being agreed upon of apportionment, the whole of the requisition by the convention, it is possible that the maxim of taxes made by Congress, during the revolu-with which we successfully opposed the claim tionary war and afterwards, up to the establishment of the Constitution of the United States, were merely provisional, and subject to revision and correction, as soon as such rules should be adopted. The several States were credited for their supplies, and charged for the advances made to them by Congress; but no settlement of their accounts could be made for

* Stith's History of Virginia.

of England, may have had an influence in procuring the adoption of the same rule for the apportionment of representatives; the true meaning, however, of this principle of the English constitution is, that a colony or district is not to be taxed which is not represented; not that its number of representatives shall be ascertained by its quota of taxes. If threefifths of the slaves are virtually represented, or their owners obtain a disproportionate power in legislation, and in the appointment of

The States in which slavery already exists are contiguous to each other; they are also the portion of the United States nearest to the European colonies in the West Indies; colonies whose future condition can hardly be regarded as problematical. If Missouri, and the other Great, however, as this concession was, it States that may be formed to the west of the was definite, and its full extent was compre-river Mississippi, are permitted to introduce

and establish slavery, the repose, if not the se- | citizens, whose rights it will not, and cannot curity, of the Union may be endangered; all the States south of the river Ohio, and west of Pennsylvania and Delaware, will be peopled with slaves, and the establishment of new States west of the river Mississippi, will serve to extend slavery instead of freedom over that boundless region.

On the other hand, if slavery be excluded from Missouri, and the other new States which may be formed in this quarter, not only will the slave markets be broken up, and the principles of freedom be extended and strengthened, but an exposed and important frontier will pre-ed States; that their health and comfort would sent a barrier which will check and keep back foreign assailants, who may be as brave, and, as we hope, will be as free as ourselves. Surrounded in this manner by connected bodies of freemen, the States where slavery is allowed will be made more secure against domestic insurrection, and less liable to be affected by what may take place in the neighboring colonies.