338 



CONGRESS, U. S. 



his more remarkable fame as a lawyer I mean 

 William Pinkney, and it is among the recol- 

 lections of my youth that I heard Chief Justice 

 Marshall call him the undoubted head of the 

 American bar in a speech before the Mary- 

 land House of Delegates, spoke as statesman 

 and lawyer when he said : 



Sir, by the eternal principles of natural justice no 

 master in the State has a right to hold his slaves in 

 bondage for a single hour. 



" And Henry Brougham spoke not only as 

 statesman and lawyer, but as orator also, when, 

 in the British Parliament, he uttered these 

 memorable words: 



Tell me not of rights talk not of the property of 

 the planter in his slaves. I deny the right I ac- 

 knowledge not the property. The principles, the feel- 

 ings of our common nature, rise in rebellion against 

 it. Be the appeal made to the understanding or to the 

 heart, the sentence is the same that rejects it. In vain 

 you tell me of laws that sanction such a claim. There 

 is a law above all the enactments of human codes the 

 same throughout the world, the same in all times : it is 

 the law written by the finger of God on the heart of 

 man ; and by that law, unchangeable and eternal, while 

 men despise fraud and loathe rapine and abhor blood 

 they will reject with indignation the wild and guilty 

 phantasy that man can hold property in man. 



" Slavery exists at the national capital abso- 

 lutely without support of any kind in the Con- 

 stitution ; and here again I answer the Senator 

 from Kentucky (Mr. Davis). Nor is this all. 

 Situated within the exclusive jurisdiction of the 

 Constitution, where State rights cannot pre- 

 vail, it exists in open defiance of most cherished 

 principles. Let the Constitution be rightly in- 

 terpreted by a just tribunal, and slavery must 

 cease here at once. The decision of a court 

 would be as potent as an act of Congress." 



Mr. Sumner then proceeded to consider " how 

 completely slavery had installed itself here (in 

 this District) in utter disregard of the Consti- 

 tution, and compelled Congress ignobly to do 

 its bidding." 



A historical statement was made of the pro- 

 ceedings which led to the location of the capi- 

 tal, in illustration of this position, and he con- 

 cluded this portion of his remarks by saying : 

 "Bringing the argument together, the con- 

 clusion may be briefly stated. The five-headed 

 barbarism of slavery, beginning in violence, can 

 have no legal or constitutional existence, unless 

 through positive words expressly authorizing 

 it. As no such positive words can be found 

 in the Constitution, all legislation by Congress 

 supporting slavery must be unconstitutional 

 and void, while it is made still further impos- 

 sible by positive words of prohibition guarding 

 the liberty of every person within the exclusive 

 jurisdiction of Congress." 



Advocating the appropriation of money for 

 compensation to the owners, he said, in con- 

 clusion : " Amidst all present solicitudes, the 

 future cannot be doubtful. At the national 

 capital slavery will give way to freedom ; but 

 the good work will not stop here. It must 

 proceed. What God and nature decree rebel- 

 lion cannot arrest. And as the whole, wide- 



spread tyranny begins to tumble, then, above 

 the din of battle, sounding from the sea and 

 echoing along the land, above even the exulta- 

 tions of victory on well-fought fields, will as- 

 cend voices of gladness and benediction, swell- 

 ing from generous hearts wherever civilization 

 bears sway, to commemorate a sacred triumph, 

 whose trophies, instead of tattered banners, 

 will be ransomed slaves." 



Mr. Davis, of Kentucky, followed and ex- 

 amined the entire constitutional question rela- 

 tive to the bill. As his remarks present the 

 views and principles upon which the Govern- 

 ment has been hitherto administered, they 

 afford a criterion by which every one may 

 judge of the extent of the great political 

 change which the country and government are 

 now undergoing. 



" Mr. President, I will say a few words upon 

 the subject of the power which Congress claims 

 to exercise over this question. It seems to me 

 that the reason why this power has been so 

 uniformly and so generally conceded is that the 

 question of power has never been carefully ex- 

 amined. I laid down a few days ago this prop- 

 osition and I defy the Senator from Maine 

 or the Senator from New Hampshire to refute 

 it that there is no positive written law which 

 establishes property in a slave or in land or in 

 a horse or in any other subject of property ; 

 that the law upon that subject arises from the 

 uniform custom and usage of the civilized 

 world. And I laid down this further propo- 

 osition ; that my legal right to my slave was 

 precisely of the same nature and character with 

 my legal right to my land ; and that if I were 

 a citizen of the District of Columbia, Congress 

 would have no more right to deprive me of the 

 one subject of property than of the other. 



"Both the gentlemen deny that property can 

 exist in a human being. That is their broad 

 proposition. Upon that point I am totally at 

 issue with them, and I am sustained by the 

 Constitution of the United States, and by the 

 judgment of the Supreme Court and of all the 

 circuit judges of the United States wherever 

 the question has been mooted and decided. 

 The Senator from New Hampshire now con- 

 cedes explicitly that Congress has no power 

 to take from the people of the District their 

 houses or their lands, or any other property 

 but their slaves, as I understand him. I ask 

 the gentleman for the law or the provision of 

 the Constitution which forms the interdict, and 

 he explicitly gives it to me. It is the provision 

 that no citizen's property shall be taken for 

 public use except by due process of law and 

 upon just compensation. I maintain that that 

 prohibition on the power of Congress applies 

 as legitimately and with as much truth and 

 logic to slaves as it does to real estate. 



"My proposition a few days ago was that 

 slavery was general, that the abolition of sla- 

 very was local ; and that proposition I sustained 

 by reading from the opinion of Chief Justice 

 Marshall in the case of the Antelope, and he 



