CONGRESS, F. S. 



211 



Union, should be permanently quieted and settled by 

 constitutional provisions which shall do equal justice 

 to all sections, and thereby restore to the people that 

 peace and good will which oiiijlit to prevail between 

 all the citizens of the United States : Therefore, 



' i-fj by the Senate and House of Representative* 

 of the United Stales of Amerita in Congress assembled, 

 (two-thirds of both flouses concurring,) That the fol- 

 lowing articles be, and are hereby, proposed and sub- 

 mitted as amendments to the Constitution of the United 

 States, which shall be valid to all intents and purposes 

 as part of said Constitution, when ratified by conven- 

 tions of three-fourths of the several States. 



ART. 1. In all the territory of the United States now 

 held or hereafter acquired, situate north of the south- 

 ern boundary of Kansas and the northern boundary 

 of New Mexico, slavery or involuntary servitude, ex- 

 cept as a punishment for crime, is prohibited, while 

 such territory shall remain under territorial govern- 

 ment. In all" the territory south of said line now held 

 or hereafter acquired, slavery of the African race is 

 hereby recognized as existing, and shall not be inter- 

 fered "with "bv Congress; but shall be protected as 

 property by all the departments of the territorial gov- 

 ernment during its continuance ; and when any terri- 

 tory, north or south of said line, within such boun- 

 daries as Congress may prescribe, shall contain the 

 population requisite for a member of Congress, accord- 

 ing to the then Federal ratio of representation of the 

 people of the United States, it shall, if its form of gov- 

 ernment be republican, be admitted into the Union on 

 an equal footing with the original States, with or with- 

 out slavery, aslhe constitution of such new State may 

 provide. 



ART. 2. Congress shall have no power to abolish 

 slavery in places under its exclusive jurisdiction, and 

 situate within the limits of States that permit the hold- 

 ing of slaves. 



AKT. 3. Congress shall have no power to abolish 

 slavery within the District of Columbia so long as it 

 exists in the adjoining States of Virginia and Mary- 

 land, or either, nor without the consent of the inhabi- 

 tants, nor without just compensation first made to such 

 owners of slaves as do not consent to such abolish- 

 ment Nor shall Congress at any time prohibit officers 

 of the Federal Government, or members of Congress, 

 whose duties require them to be in said district, from 

 bringing with them their slaves, and holding them as 

 such, during the time their duties may require them 

 to remain there, and afterwards taking them from the 

 district. 



ART. -L Congress shall have no power to prohibit, or 

 hinder the transportation of slaves from one State to 

 another, or to a territory in which slaves are by law 

 permitted to be held, whether that transportation be 

 by land, navigable rivers, or by the sea, 



ART. 5. That, in addition to the provisions of the 

 third paragraph of the second section of the fourth 

 article of the Constitution of the United States, Con- 

 gress shall have power to provide bv law, and it shall 

 Be its duty so to provide, that the United States shall 

 pay to the owner who shall apply for it, the full value 

 of his fugitive slave, in all casea/when the marshal, or 

 other officer, whose duty it was to arrest said fugitive, 

 was prevented from so doing by violence or intimi- 

 dation, or when, after arrest, said fugitive was rescued 

 by force, and the owner thereby prevented and ob- 

 structed in the pursuit of his remedy for the recovery 

 of his fugitive slave, under the said 'clause of the Con- 

 stitution and the laws made in pursuance thereof. 

 And in all cases, when the United States shall pay for 

 such fugitive, they shall have the power to reimburse 

 themselves by imposing and collecting a tax on the 

 county or city in which said violence, intimidation, or 

 rescue was committed, equal in amount to the sum 

 paid by them, with the addition of interest and the 

 costs of collection ; and the said county or city, after 

 it has paid said amount to the United S'tates, may, for 

 its indemnitv, sue and recover from the wrong-doers 

 er rescuers, by whom the owner was prevented from 



the recovery of his fugitive slave, in like manner as 

 the owner himself might have sued and recovered. 



ART. 6. No future amendment of the Constitution 

 shall affect the five preceding articles, nor the third 

 paragraph of the second section of the first article of 

 the Constitution, nor the third paragraph of the second 

 section of the fourth article of said Constitution ; and 

 no amendment shall be made to the Constitution which 

 will authorize or give to Congress any power to abol- 

 ish or interfere with slavery in any of the States by 

 whose laws it is or may be allowed or permitted. 



ART. 7. SEC. 1. The "elective franchise and the right 

 to hold office, whether Federal, State, territorial, or 

 municipal, shall not be exercised by persons who are, 

 in whole or in part, of the African race. 



SEC. 2. The United States shall have power to ac- 

 quire, from time to time, districts of country in Africa 

 and South America, for the colonization, at the expense 

 of the Federal Treasury, of such free negroes and mu- 

 lattoes as the several States may wish to nave removed 

 from their limits, and from the District of Columbia, 

 and such other places as may be under the jurisdiction 

 cf Congress. 



And whereas also, besides those causes of dissension 

 embraced in the foregoing amendments proposed to 

 the Constitution of the United States, there are others 

 which come within the jurisdiction of Congress, and 

 may be remedied by its legislative power ; and whereas 

 it is the desire of Congress, as far as its power frill 

 extend, to remove all just cause for the popular dis- 

 content and agitation which now disturb the peace of 

 the country and threaten the stability of its institutions : 

 Therefore," 



1. Besohed by the Senate and House of Represent- 

 atives of the United States of America in Congress as- 

 semble J, That the laws now in force for the recoverj 

 of fugitive slaves are in strict pursuance^ to the plan 

 and mandatory provisions of the Constitution, and 

 have been sanctioned as valid and constitutional by 

 the judgment of the Supreme Court of the United 

 States ; that the slaveholding States are entitled to 

 the faithful observance and execution of those lairs, 

 and that they ought not to be repealed, or so modified 

 or changed as to impair their efficiency ; and that laws 

 ought to be made for the punishment of those who at- 

 tempt, by rescue of the slave, or other illegal means, 

 to hinder or defeat the due execution of said laws. 



2. That all State laws which conflict with the fugi- 

 tive slave acts, or any other constitutional acts of Con- 

 gress, or which, in their operation, impede, hinder, or 

 delay the free course and due execution of any of said 

 acts." are null and void by the plain provisions of the 

 Constitution of the United States. Yet those State 

 laws, void as they are, have given color to practices, 

 and led to consequences which have obstructed the 

 due administration and execution of acts of Congress, 

 and especially the acts for the delivery of fugitive 

 slaves, and have thereby contributed much to the dis- 

 cord and commotion now prevailing. Congress, there- 

 fore, in the present perilous juncture, does not deem 

 it improper, respectfuUy and earnestly, to recommend 

 the repeal of those laws to the several States which 

 have enacted them, or such legislative corrections or 

 explanations of them as may prevent their being used 

 or perverted to such mischievous purposes. 



3. That the act of the 18th of September, 1850, com- 

 monly called the Fugitive Slave Law, ought to be so 

 amended as to make the fee of the commissioner, men- 

 tioned in the eighth section of the act, equal in amount, 

 in the cases decided by him, whether his decision be 

 in favor of, or against the claimant. And to avoid 

 misconstruction, the last clause of the fifth section of 

 said act, which authorizes the person homing a war- 

 rant for the arrest or detention of a fugitive slave, to 

 summon to his aid the posse comitatus, and which de- 

 clares it to be the duty of all good citizens to assist 

 him in its execution, ought to be so amended as to 

 expressly limit the authority and duty to cases in 

 which there shall be resistance, or danger of resistance 

 or rescue. 



