Chapter XXII: Front Matter (22)

FINALLY.--As the Mosaic system was a great compound type, rife with meaning in doctrine and duty; the practical power of the whole, depended upon the exact observance of those distinctions and relations which constituted its significancy. Hence, the care to preserve inviolate the distinction between a _descendant of Abraham_ and a _Stranger_, even when the Stranger was a proselyte, had gone through the initiatory ordinances, entered the congregation, and become incorporated with the Israelites by family alliance. The regulation laid down in Ex. xxi. 2-6, is an illustration. In this case, the Israelitish servant, whose term expired in six years, married one of his master's _permanent female domestics_; but her marriage did not release her master from _his_ part of the contract for her whole term of service, nor from his legal obligation to support and educate her children. Neither did it do away that distinction, which marked her national descent by a specific _grade_ and _term_ of service, nor impair her obligation to fulfil _her_ part of the contract. Her relations as a permanent domestic grew out of a distinction guarded with great care throughout the Mosaic system. To render it void, would have been to divide the system against itself. This God would not tolerate. Nor, on the other hand, would he permit the master to throw off the responsibility of instructing her children, nor the care and expense of their helpless infancy and rearing. He was bound to support and educate them, and all her children born afterwards during her term of service. The whole arrangement beautifully illustrates that wise and tender regard for the interests of all the parties concerned, which arrays the Mosaic system in robes of glory, and causes it to shine as the sun in the kingdom of our Father.[B] By this law, the children had secured to them a mother's tender care. If the husband loved his wife and children, he could compel his master to keep him, whether he had any occasion for his services or not. If he did not love them, to be rid of him was a blessing; and in that case, the regulation would prove an act for the relief of an afflicted family. It is not by any means to be inferred, that the release of the servant in the seventh year, either absolved him from the obligations of marriage, or shut him out from the society of his family. He could doubtless procure a service at no great distance from them, and might often do it, to get higher wages, or a kind of employment better suited to his taste and skill. The great number of days on which the law released servants from regular labor, would enable him to spend much more time with his family, than can be spent by most of the agents of our benevolent societies with _their_ families, or by many merchants, editors, artists, &c., whose daily business is in New York, while their families reside from ten to one hundred miles in the country.

[Footnote B: Whoever profoundly studies the Mosaic Institutes with a teachable and reverential spirit, will feel the truth and power of that solemn appeal and interrogatory of God to his people Israel, when he had made an end of setting before them all his statutes and ordinances. "What nation is there so great, that hath statutes and judgments SO RIGHTEOUS, as _all_ this law which I set before you this day." Deut. iv. 8.]

We conclude this inquiry by touching upon an objection, which, though not formally stated, has been already set aside by the tenor of the foregoing argument. It is this,--"The slavery of the Canaanites by the Israelites, was appointed by God as a commutation of the punishment of death denounced against them for their sins."[A] If the absurdity of a sentence consigning persons to death, and at the same time to perpetual slavery, did not sufficiently laugh at itself; it would be small self-denial, in a case so tempting, to make up the deficiency by a general contribution. Only _one_ statute was ever given respecting the disposition to be made of the inhabitants of Canaan. If the sentence of death was pronounced against them, and afterwards _commuted_, when? where? by whom? and in what terms was the commutation, and where is it recorded? Grant, for argument's sake, that all the Canaanites were sentenced to unconditional extermination; how can a right to _enslave_ them, be drawn from such premises? The punishment of death is one of the highest recognitions of man's moral nature possible. It proclaims him rational, accountable, guilty, deserving death for having done his utmost to cheapen human life, when the proof of its priceless worth lived in his own nature. But to make him a _slave_, cheapens to nothing _universal human nature_, and instead of healing a wound, gives a death-stab. What! repair an injury to rational being in the robbery of one of its rights, not only by robbing it of all, but by annihilating their _foundation_, the everlasting distinction between persons and things? To make a man a chattel, is not the _punishment_, but the _annihilation_ of a _human_ being, and, so far as it goes, of _all_ human beings. This commutation of the punishment of death, into perpetual slavery, what a fortunate discovery! Alas! for the honor of Deity, if commentators had not manned the forlorn hope, and by a timely movement rescued the Divine character, at the very crisis of its fate, from the perilous position in which inspiration had carelessly left it! Here a question arises of sufficient importance for a separate dissertation; but must for the present be disposed of in a few paragraphs. WERE THE CANAANITES SENTENCED BY GOD TO INDIVIDUAL AND UNCONDITIONAL EXTERMINATION? As the limits of this inquiry forbid our giving all the grounds of dissent from commonly received opinions, the suggestions made, will be thrown out merely as QUERIES, rather than laid down as _doctrines_. The directions as to the disposal of the Canaanites, are mainly in the following passages, Ex. xxiii. 23-33; xxxiv. 11; Deut. vii. 16-24; ix. 3; xxxi. 3-5. In these verses, the Israelites are commanded to "destroy the Canaanites," to "drive out," "consume," "utterly overthrow," "put out," "dispossess them," &c. Did these commands enjoin the unconditional and universal destruction of the _individuals_, or merely of the _body politic_? The word _haram_, to destroy, signifies _national_, as well as individual destruction; the destruction of _political_ existence, equally with _personal_; of governmental organization, equally with the lives of the subjects. Besides, if we interpret the words destroy, consume, overthrow, &c., to mean _personal_ destruction, what meaning shall we give to the expressions, "drive out before thee," "cast out before thee," "expel," "put out," "dispossess," &c., which are used in the same and in parallel passages? In addition to those quoted above, see Josh. iii. 10; xvii. 18; xxiii. 5; xxiv. 18; Judg. i. 20, 29-35; vi. 9. "I will _destroy_ all the people to whom thou shalt come, and I will make all thine enemies _turn their backs unto thee_." Ex. xxiii. 27. Here "_all their enemies_" were to _turn their backs_, and "_all the people_" to be "_destroyed_." Does this mean that God would let all their _enemies_ escape, but kill their _friends_, or that he would _first_ kill "all the people" and THEN make them "turn their backs," an army of runaway corpses? In Josh. xxiv. 8, God says, speaking of the Amorites, "I _destroyed_ them from before you." In the 18th verse of the same chapter, it is said, "The Lord _drave out_ from before us all the people, even the Amorites which dwelt in the land." In Num. xxxii. 39, we are told that "the children of Machir the son of Manasseh, went to Gilead, and took it, and _dispossessed_ the Amorite which was in it." If these commands required the destruction of all the _individuals,_ the Mosaic law was at war with itself, for directions as to the treatment of native residents form a large part of it. See Lev. xix. 34; xxv. 35, 36; xxiv. 22.; Ex. xxiii. 9; xxii. 21; Deut. i. 16, 17; x. 17, 19; xxvii. 19. We find, also, that provision was made for them in the cities of refuge, Num. xxxv. 15,--the gleanings of the harvest and vintage were theirs, Lev. xix. 9, 10; xxiii. 22;--the blessings of the Sabbath, Ex. xx. 10;--the privilege of offering sacrifices secured, Lev. xxii. 18; and stated religious instruction provided for them. Deut. xxxi. 9, 12. Now does this same law require the _individual extermination_ of those whose lives and interests it thus protects? These laws were given to the Israelites, long _before_ they entered Canaan; and they must have inferred from them, that a multitude of the inhabitants of the land were to _continue in it_, under their government. Again Joshua was selected as the leader of Israel to execute God's threatenings upon Canaan. He had no discretionary power. God's commands were his official instructions. Going beyond them would have been usurpation; refusing to carry them out, rebellion and treason. Saul was rejected from being king for disobeying God's commands in a single instance. Now if God commanded the individual destruction of all the Canaanites Joshua disobeyed him in every instance. For at his death, the Israelites still "_dwelt among them_," and each nation is mentioned by name. Judg. i. 27-36, and yet we are told that Joshua "left nothing undone of all that the Lord commanded Moses;" and that he "took all that land." Josh. xi. 15-22. Also, that "there _stood not a man_ of _all_ their enemies before them." Josh. xxi. 44. How can this be if the command to destroy, destroy utterly, &c., enjoined _individual_ extermination, and the command to drive out, unconditional expulsion from the country, rather than their expulsion from the _possession_ or _ownership_ of it, as the lords of the soil? That the latter is the true sense to be attached to those terms, we argue, further from the fact that the same terms are employed by God to describe the punishment which he would inflict upon the Israelites if they served other Gods. "Ye shall utterly perish," "be utterly destroyed," "consumed," &c., are some of them.--See Deut. iv. 20; viii. 19, 20.[B] Josh. xxiii. 12, 13-16; 1. Sam. xii. 25. The Israelites _did_ serve other Gods, and Jehovah _did_ execute upon them his threatenings--and thus himself _interpreted_ these threatenings. He subverted their _government_, dispossessed them of their land, divested them of national power, and made them _tributaries_, but did not _exterminate_ them. He "destroyed them utterly" as an independent body politic, but not as individuals. Multitudes of the Canaanites were slain, but not a case can be found in which one was either killed or expelled who _acquiesced_ in the transfer of the territory, and its sovereignty, from the inhabitants of the land to the Israelites. Witness the case of Rahab and her kindred, and that of the Gibeonites.[C] The Canaanites knew of the miracles wrought for the Israelites; and that their land had been transferred to them as a judgment for their sins. Josh. ii. 9-11; ix. 9, 10, 24. Many of them were awed by these wonders, and made no resistance. Others defied God and came out to battle. These last occupied the fortified cities, were the most inveterate heathen--the aristocracy of idolatry, the kings, the nobility and gentry, the priests, with their crowds of satellites, and retainers that aided in idolatrous rites, and the military forces, with the chief profligates of both sexes. Many facts corroborate the general position. Witness that command (Deut. xxiii. 15, 16,) which, not only prohibited the surrender of the fugitive servant to his master, but required the Israelites to receive him with kindness, permit him to dwell where he pleased, and to protect and cherish him. Whenever any servant, even a Canaanite, fled from his master to the Israelites, Jehovah, so far from commanding them to _kill_ him, straitly charged them, "He shall dwell with thee, even among you, in that place which _he_ shall choose--in one of thy gates where it liketh _him_ best--thou shalt not oppress him." Deut. xxiii. 16. The Canaanitish servant by thus fleeing to the Israelites, submitted himself as a dutiful subject to their national government, and pledged his allegiance. Suppose _all_ the Canaanites had thus submitted themselves to the Jewish theocracy, and conformed to the requirements of the Mosaic institutes, would not _all_ have been spared upon the same principle that _one_ was? Again, look at the multitude of _tributaries_ in the midst of Israel, and that too, after they had "waxed strong," and the uttermost nations quaked at the terror of their name--the Canaanites, Philistines and others, who became proselytes--as the Nethenims, Uriah the Hittite--Rahab, who married one of the princes of Judah--Jether, an Ishmaelite, who married Abigail the sister of David and was the father of Amasa, the captain of the host of Israel. Comp. 1 Chron. ii. 17, with 2 Sam. xvii. 25.--Ittai--the six hundred Gittites, David's body guard. 2. Sam xv. 18, 21. Obededom the Gittite, adopted into the tribe of Levi. Comp. 2 Sam. vi. 10, 11, with 1 Chron. xv. 18, and xxvi. 4, 5--Jaziz, and Obil. 1 Chron, xxvii. 30, 31. Jephunneh the Kenezite, Josh. xiv. 6, and father of Caleb a ruler of the tribe of Judah. Numb. xiii. 2, 6--the Kenites registered in the genealogies of the tribe of Judah, Judg. i. 16; 1 Chron. ii. 55, and the one hundred and fifty thousand Canaanites, employed by Solomon in the building of the Temple.[D] Besides, the greatest miracle on record, was wrought to save a portion of those very Canaanites, and for the destruction of those who would exterminate them. Josh. x. 12-14. Further--the terms employed in the directions regulating the disposal of the Canaanites, such as "drive out," "put out," "cast out," "expel," "dispossess," &c., seem used interchangeably with "consume," "destroy," "overthrow," &c., and thus indicate the sense in which the latter words are used. As an illustration of the meaning generally attached to these and similar terms, we refer to the history of the Amalekites. "I will utterly put out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven." Ex. xvii. 14. "Thou shalt blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven; thou shalt not forget it." Deut. xxv. 19. "Smite Amalek and _utterly destroy_ all that they have, and spare them not, but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep." 1 Sam. xv. 2, 3. "Saul smote the Amalekites, and he took Agag the king of the Amalekites, alive and UTTERLY DESTROYED ALL THE PEOPLE with the edge of the sword." Verses 7, 8. In verse 20, Saul says, "I have brought Agag, the king of Amalek, and have _utterly destroyed_ the Amalekites." In 1 Sam. xxx. 1, 2, we find the Amalekites marching an army into Israel, and sweeping everything before them--and this in about eighteen years after they had all been "UTTERLY DESTROYED!" In 1 Kings ii. 15-17, is another illustration. We are informed that Joab remained in Edom six months with all Israel, "until he had _cut off every male_" in Edom. In the next verse we learn that Hadad and "certain Edomites" were not slain. Deut. xx. 16, 17, will probably be quoted against the preceding view. We argue that the command in these verses, did not include all the individuals of the Canaanitish nations, but only the inhabitants of the _cities_, (and even those conditionally,) because, only the inhabitants of _cities_ are specified--"of the _cities_ of these people thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth." Cities then, as now, were pest-houses of vice, they reeked with abominations little practised in the country. On this account, their influence would be far more perilous to the Israelites than that of the country. Besides, they were the centres of idolatry--there were the temples and altars, and idols, and priests, without number. Even their buildings, streets, and public walks were so many visibilities of idolatry. The reason assigned in the 18th verse for exterminating them, strengthens the idea--"that they teach you not to do after all the abominations which they have done unto their gods." This would be a reason for exterminating all the nations and individuals _around_ them, as all were idolaters; but God commanded them, in certain cases, to spare the inhabitants. Contact with _any_ of them would be perilous--with the inhabitants of the _cities_ peculiarly, and of the _Canaanitish_ cities pre-eminently so. The 10th and 11th verses contain the general rule prescribing the method in which cities were to be summoned to surrender. They were first to receive the offer of peace--if it was accepted, the inhabitants became _tributaries_--but if they came out against Israel in battle, the _men_ were to be killed, and the woman and little ones saved alive. The 15th verse restricts this lenient treatment to the inhabitants of the cities _afar off_. The 16th directs as to the disposal of the inhabitants of the Canaanitish cities. They were to save alive "nothing that breathed." The common mistake has been, in supposing that the command in the 15th verse refers to the _whole system of directions preceding,_ commencing with the 10th, whereas it manifestly refers only to the _inflictions_ specified in the 12th, 13th, and, 14th, making a distinction between those _Canaanitish_ cities that _fought_, and the cities _afar off_ that fought--in one case destroying the males and females, and in the other, the _males_ only. The offer of peace, and the _conditional preservation_, were as really guarantied to _Canaanitish_ cities as to others. Their inhabitants were not to be exterminated unless they came out against Israel in battle. Whatever be the import of the commands respecting the disposition to be made of the Canaanites, all admit the fact that the Israelites did _not_ utterly exterminate them. Now, if entire and unconditional extermination was the command of God, it was _never_ obeyed by the Israelites, consequently the truth of God stood pledged to consign _them_ to the same doom which he had pronounced upon the Canaanites, but which they had refused to visit upon them. "If ye will not drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you, then it shall come to pass that * * _I shall do unto you as I thought to do unto them_." Num. xxxiii. 55, 56. As the Israelites were not exterminated, we infer that God did not pronounce _that_ doom upon them; and as he _did_ pronounce upon them the _same_ doom, whatever it was, which they should _refuse_ to visit upon the Canaanites, it follows that the doom of unconditional _extermination_ was _not_ pronounced against the Canaanites. But let us settle this question by the "law and the testimony." "There was not a city that made peace with the children of Israel save the Hivites, the inhabitants of Gibeon; all others they took in battle. For it was of the Lord to harden their hearts, that they should COME OUT AGAINST ISRAEL IN BATTLE, that he might destroy them utterly, and that they might have no favor, but that he might destroy them, as the Lord commanded Moses." Josh. xi. 19. 20. That is, if they had _not_ come out against Israel in battle, they would have had "favor" shown them, and would not have been "_destroyed utterly_." The great design was to _transfer the territory_ of the Canaanites to the Israelites, and along with it, _absolute sovereignty in every respect_; to annihilate their political organizations, civil polity, and jurisprudence, and their system of religion, with all its rights and appendages; and to substitute therefor, a pure theocracy, administered by Jehovah, with the Israelites as His representatives and agents. In a word the people were to be _denationalized,_ their political existence annihilated, their idol temples, altars, groves, images, pictures, and heathen rites destroyed, and themselves put under tribute. Those who resisted the execution of Jehovah's purpose were to be killed, while those who quietly submitted to it were to be spared. All had the choice of these alternatives, either free egress out of the land;[E] or acquiescence in the decree, with life and residence as tributaries, under the protection of the government; or resistance to the execution of the decree, with death. "_And it shall come to pass, if they will diligently learn the ways of my people, to swear by my name, the Lord liveth, as they taught my people to swear by Baal;_ THEN SHALL THEY BE BUILT IN THE MIDST OF MY PEOPLE."

[Footnote A: In the prophecy, Gen. ix. 25, the subjection of the Canaanites as a conquered people rendering tribute to other nations, is foretold by inspiration. The fulfilment of this prediction, seems to have commenced in the subjection of the Canaanites to the Israelites as tributaries. If the Israelites had exterminated them, as the objector asserts they were commanded to do; the prediction would have been _falsified_.]

[Footnote B: These two verses are so explicit we quote them entire--"And it shall be if thou do at all forget the Lord they God and walk after other Gods and serve them, and worship them, I testify against you this day that ye shall surely _perish_, as the nations which the Lord destroyed before your face, _so_ shall ye perish." The following passages are, if possible still more explicit--"The Lord shall send upon thee cursing, vexation and rebuke in all that thou settest thine hand unto for to do, until thou be _destroyed_, and until thou perish quickly." "The Lord shall make the pestilence cleave unto thee until he have _consumed_ thee." "They (the 'sword,' 'blasting,' &c.) shall pursue thee until thou _perish_." "From heaven shall it come down upon thee until thou be _destroyed_." "All these curses shall come upon thee till thou be _destroyed_." "He shall put a yoke of iron upon thy neck until he have _destroyed_ thee." "The Lord shall bring a nation against thee, a nation of fierce countenance, which shall not regard the person of the old, nor show favor to the young, * * until he have _destroyed_ thee." All these, with other similar threatenings of _destruction_, are contained in the twenty-eighth chapter of Deut. See verses 20-25, 45, 48, 51. In the _same_ chapter God declares that as a punishment for the same transgressions, the Israelites shall "be _removed_ into all the kingdoms of the earth," thus showing that the terms employed in the other verses, "destroy," "perish," "perish quickly," "consume," &c., instead of signifying utter, personal destruction doubtless meant their destruction as an independent nation. In Josh. xxiv. 8, 18, "destroyed" and "drave out," are used synonymously.]

[Footnote C: Perhaps it will be objected, that the preservation of the Gibeonites, and of Rahab and her kindred, was a violation of the command of God. We answer, if it had been, we might expect some such intimation. If God had straitly commanded them to _exterminate all the Canaanites_, their pledge to save them alive, was neither a repeal of the statute, nor absolution for the breach of it. If _unconditional destruction_ was the import of the command, would God have permitted such an act to pass without rebuke? Would he have established such a precedent when Israel had hardly passed the threshold of Canaan, and was then striking the first blow of a half century war? What if they _had_ passed their word to Rahab and the Gibeonites? Was that more binding than God's command? So Saul seems to have passed _his_ word to Agag; yet Samuel hewed him in pieces, because in saving his life, Saul had violated God's command. When Saul sought to slay the Gibeonites in "his zeal for the children of Israel and Judah," God sent upon Israel a three years' famine for it. When David inquired of them what atonement he should make, they say, "The man that devised against us, that we should be destroyed from _remaining in any of the coast of Israel_, let seven of his sons be delivered," &c. 2 Sam. xxi. 1-6.]

[Footnote D: If the Canaanites were devoted by God to unconditional extermination, to have employed them in the erection of the temple,--what was it but the climax of impiety? As well might they pollute its altars with swine's flesh or make their sons pass through the fire to Moloch.]

[Footnote E: Suppose all the Canaanitish nations had abandoned their territory at the tidings of Israel's approach, did God's command require the Israelites to chase them to ends of the earth, and hunt them out, until every Canaanite was destroyed? It is too preposterous for belief, and yet it follows legitimately from that construction, which interprets the terms "consume," "destroy," "destroy utterly," &c. to mean unconditional, individual extermination.]

[The original design of the preceding Inquiry embraced a much wider range of topics. It was soon found, however, that to fill up the outline would be to make a volume. Much of the foregoing has therefore been thrown into a mere series of _indices_, to trains of thought and classes of proof, which, however limited or imperfect, may perhaps, afford some facilities to those who have little leisure for protracted investigation.]

NO. 5.

THE

ANTI-SLAVERY EXAMINER.

THE

POWER OF CONGRESS

OVER THE

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.

* * * * *

REPRINTED FROM THE NEW-YORK EVENING POST, WITH ADDITIONS BY THE AUTHOR.

* * * * *

NEW-YORK:

PUBLISHED BY THE AMERICAN ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY,

NO. 143 NASSAU-STREET.

1838.

* * * * *

This periodical contains 3 1/2 sheets.--Postage under 100 miles, 6 cts.; over 100, 10 cts.

POWER OF CONGRESS

OVER THE

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.

A civilized community presupposes a government of law. If that government be a republic, its citizens are the sole _sources_, as well as the _subjects_ of its power. Its constitution is their bill of directions to their own agents--a grant authorizing the exercise of certain powers, and prohibiting that of others. In the Constitution of the United States, whatever else may be obscure, the clause granting power to Congress over the Federal District may well defy misconstruction. Art. 1, Sec. 6, Clause 18: "The Congress shall have power to exercise exclusive legislation, _in all cases whatsoever_, over such District." Congress may make laws for the District "in all _cases_," not of all _kinds_; not all _laws_ whatsoever, but laws "in all _cases_ whatsoever." The grant respects the _subjects_ of legislation, _not_ the moral nature of the laws. The law-making power every where is subject to _moral_ restrictions, whether limited by constitutions or not. No legislature can authorize murder, nor make honesty penal, nor virtue a crime, nor exact impossibilities. In these and similar respects, the power of Congress is held in check by principles, existing in the nature of things, not imposed by the Constitution, but presupposed and assumed by it. The power of Congress over the District is restricted only by those principles that limit ordinary legislation, and, in some respects, it has even wider scope.

In common with the legislatures of the States, Congress cannot constitutionally pass ex post facto laws in criminal cases, nor suspend the writ of habeas corpus, nor pass a bill of attainder, nor abridge the freedom of speech and of the press, nor invade the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, nor enact laws respecting an establishment of religion. These are general limitations. Congress cannot do these things _any where_. The exact import, therefore, of the clause "in all cases whatsoever," is, _on all subjects within the appropriate sphere of legislation_. Some legislatures are restrained by constitutions, from the exercise of powers strictly within the proper sphere of legislation. Congressional power over the District has no such restraint. It traverses the whole field of legitimate legislation. All the power which any legislature has within its own jurisdiction, Congress holds over the District of Columbia.

It has been objected that the clause in question respects merely police regulations, and that its sole design was to enable Congress to protect itself against popular tumults. But if the convention that framed the Constitution aimed to provide for a _single_ case only, why did they provide for "_all_ cases whatsoever?" Besides, this clause was opposed in many of the state conventions, because the grant of power was extended to "_all_ cases whatsoever," instead of being restricted to police regulations _alone_. In the Virginia Convention, George Mason, the father of the Virginia Constitution, Patrick Henry, Mr. Grayson, and others, assailed it on that ground. Mr. Mason said, "This clause gives an unlimited authority in every possible case within the District. He would willingly give them exclusive power as far as respected the police and good government of the place, but he would give them no more." Mr. Grayson exclaimed against so large a grant of power--said that control over the _police_ was all-sufficient, and "that the Continental Congress never had an idea of exclusive legislation in all cases." Patrick Henry said: "Shall we be told, when about to grant such illimitable authority, that it will never be exercised? Is it consistent with any principle of prudence or good policy, to grant _unlimited, unbounded authority_?" Mr. Madison said in reply: "I did conceive that the clause under consideration was one of those parts which would speak its own praise. I cannot comprehend that the power of legislation over a small District, will involve the dangers which he apprehends. When any power is given, it's delegation necessarily involves authority to make laws to execute it. * * * * The powers which are found necessary to be given, are therefore delegated _generally_, and particular and minute specification is left to the Legislature. * * * It is not within the limits of human capacity to delineate on paper all those particular cases and circumstances, in which legislation by the general legislature, would be necessary." Governor Randolph said: "Holland has no ten miles square, but she has the Hague where the deputies of the States assemble. But the influence which it has given the province of Holland, to have the seat of government within its territory, subject in some respects to its control, has been injurious to the other provinces. The wisdom of the convention is therefore manifest in granting to Congress exclusive jurisdiction over the place of their session." (_See debates in the Virginia Convention_, p. 320.) In the forty-third number of the "Federalist," Mr. Madison says: "The indispensable necessity of _complete_ authority at the seat of government, carries its own evidence with it."

Finally, that the grant in question is to be interpreted according to the obvious import of its _terms_, and not in such a way as to restrict it to _police_ regulations, is proved by the fact, that the State of Virginia proposed an amendment to the United States Constitution at the time of its adoption, providing that this clause "should be so construed as to give power only over the _police and good government_ of said District," _which amendment was rejected_. Fourteen other amendments, proposed at the same time by Virginia, were _adopted_.

The former part, of the clause under consideration, "Congress shall have power to exercise _exclusive_ legislation," gives sole jurisdiction, and the latter part, "in all cases whatsoever," defines the _extent_ of it. Since, then, Congress is the _sole_ legislature within the District, and since its power is limited only by the checks common to all legislatures, it follows that what the law-making power is intrinsically competent to do _any_ where, Congress is competent to do in the District of Columbia.

STATEMENT OF THE QUESTION AT ISSUE.

Having disposed of preliminaries, we proceed to argue the _real question_ at issue. Is the law-making power competent to abolish slavery when not restricted in that particular by constitutional provisions--or, _Is the abolition of slavery within the appropriate sphere of legislation?_

In every government, absolute sovereignty exists _somewhere_. In the United States it exists primarily with the _people_, and _ultimate_ sovereignty _always_ exists with them. In each of the States, the legislature possesses a _representative_ sovereignty, delegated by the people through the Constitution--the people thus committing to the legislature a portion of their sovereignty, and specifying in their constitutions the amount and the conditions of the grant. That the _people_ in any state where slavery exists, have the power to abolish it, none will deny. If the legislature have not the power, it is because _the people_ have reserved it to themselves. Had they lodged with the legislature "power to exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever," they would have parted with their sovereignty over the legislation of the State, and so far forth the legislature would have become _the people_, clothed with all their functions, and as such competent, _during the continuance of the grant_, to do whatever the people might have done before the surrender of their power: consequently, they would have the power to abolish slavery. The sovereignty of the District of Columbia exists _somewhere_--where is it lodged? The citizens of the District have no legislature of their own, no representation in Congress, and no political power whatever. Maryland and Virginia have surrendered to the United States their "full and absolute right and entire sovereignty," and the people of the United States have committed to Congress by the Constitution, the power to "exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever over such District."

Thus, the sovereignty of the District of Columbia, is shown to reside solely in the Congress of the United States; and since the power of the people of a state to abolish slavery within their own limits, results from their entire sovereignty within the state, so the power of Congress to abolish slavery in the District, results from its entire _sovereignty_ within the District. If it be objected that Congress can have no more power over the District, than was held by the legislatures of Maryland and Virginia, we ask what clause in the constitution graduates the power of Congress by the standard of a state legislature? Was the United States constitution worked into its present shape under the measuring line and square of Virginia and Maryland? and is its power to be bevelled down till it can run in the grooves of state legislation? There is a deal of prating about constitutional power over the District, as though Congress were indebted for it to Maryland and Virginia. The powers of those states, whether few or many, prodigies or nullities, have nothing to do with the question. As well thrust in the powers of the Grand Lama to join issue upon, or twist papal bulls into constitutional tether, with which to curb congressional action. The Constitution of the United States gives power to Congress, and takes it away, and _it alone_. Maryland and Virginia adopted the Constitution _before_ they ceded to the united States the territory of the District. By their acts of cession, they abdicated their own sovereignty over the District, and thus made room for that provided by the United States constitution, which sovereignty was to commence as soon as a cession of territory by states, and its acceptance by Congress furnished a sphere for its exercise.

That the abolition of slavery is within the sphere of legislation, I argue, _secondly_, from the fact, that _slavery as a legal system, is the creature of legislation_. The law by _creating_ slavery, not only affirmed its _existence_ to be within the sphere and under the control of legislation, but equally, the _conditions_ and _terms_ of its existence, and the _question_ whether or not it _should_ exist. Of course legislation would not travel _out_ of its sphere, in abolishing what is _within_ it, and what was recognised to be within it, by its own act. Cannot legislatures repeal their own laws? If law can take from a man his rights, it can give them back again. If it can say, "your body belongs to your neighbor," it can say, "it belongs to _yourself_, and I will sustain your right." If it can annul a man's right to himself, held by express grant from his Maker, and can create for another an artificial title to him, can it not annul the artificial title, and leave the original owner to hold himself by his original title?

3. _The abolition of slavery has always been considered within the appropriate sphere of legislation_. Almost every civilized nation has abolished slavery by law. The history of legislation since the revival of letters, is a record crowded with testimony to the universally admitted competency of the law-making power to abolish slavery. It is so manifestly an attribute not merely of absolute sovereignty, but even of ordinary legislation, that the competency of a legislature to exercise it, may well nigh be reckoned among the legal axioms of the civilized world. Even the night of the dark ages was not dark enough to make this invisible.

The Abolition decree of the great council of England was passed in 1102. The memorable Irish decree, "that all the English slaves in the whole of Ireland, be immediately emancipated and restored to their former liberty," was issued in 1171. Slavery in England was abolished by a general charter of emancipation in 1381. Passing over many instances of the abolition of slavery by law, both during the middle ages and since the reformation, we find them multiplying as we approach our own times. In 1776 slavery was abolished in Prussia by special edict. In St. Domingo, Cayenne, Guadaloupe and Martinique, in 1794, where more than 600,000 slaves were emancipated by the French government. In Java, 1811; in Ceylon, 1815; in Buenos Ayres, 1816; in St. Helena, 1819; in Colombia, 1821; by the Congress of Chili in 1821; in Cape Colony, 1823; in Malacca, 1825; in the southern provinces of Birmah, in 1826; in Bolivia, 1826; in Peru, Guatemala, and Monte Video, 1828, in Jamaica, Barbadoes, Bermudas, Bahamas, the Mauritius, St. Christopher's, Nevis, the Virgin Islands, Antigua, Montserrat, Dominica, St. Vincents, Grenada, Berbice, Tobago, St. Lucia, Trinidad, Honduras, Demarara, and the Cape of Good Hope, on the 1st of August, 1834. But waving details, suffice it to say, that England, France, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, Denmark, Austria, Prussia, and Germany, have all and often given their testimony to the competency of the law to abolish slavery. In our own country, the Legislature of Pennsylvania passed an act of abolition in 1780, Connecticut, in 1784; Rhode Island, 1784; New-York, 1799; New-Jersey, in 1804; Vermont, by Constitution, in 1777; Massachusetts, in 1780; and New Hampshire, in 1784.

When the competency of the law-making power to abolish slavery, has thus been recognised every where and for ages, when it has been embodied in the highest precedents, and celebrated in the thousand jubilees of regenerated liberty, is it forsooth an achievement of modern discovery, that such a power is a nullity?--that all these acts of abolition are void, and that the millions disenthralled by them, are, either themselves or their posterity, still legally in bondage?

4. _Legislative power has abolished slavery in its parts_. The law of South Carolina prohibits the working of slaves more than fifteen hours in the twenty-four. [_See__Brevard's Digest_, 253.] In other words, it takes from the slaveholder his power over nine hours of the slave's time daily; and if it can take nine hours it may take twenty-four--if two-fifths, then five-fifths. The laws of Georgia prohibit the working of slaves on the first day of the week; and if they can do it for the first, they can for the six following. Laws embodying the same principle have existed for ages in nearly all governments that have tolerated slavery.

The law of North Carolina prohibits the "immoderate" correction of slaves. If it has power to prohibit _immoderate_ correction, it can prohibit _moderate_ correction--_all_ correction, which would be virtual emancipation; for, take from the master the power to inflict pain, and he is master no longer. Cease to ply the slave with the stimulus of fear, and he is free. Laws similar to this exist in slaveholding governments generally.

The Constitution of Mississippi gives the General Assembly power to make laws "to oblige the owners of slaves to _treat them with humanity_." The Constitution of Missouri has the same clause, and an additional one making it the DUTY of the legislature to pass such laws as may be necessary to secure the _humane_ treatment of the slaves. This grant of power to those legislatures empowers them to decide what _is_ and what is _not_ "humane treatment." Otherwise it gives no "power"--the clause is mere waste paper, and flouts in the face of a mocked and befooled legislature. A clause giving power to require "humane treatment" covers all the _particulars_ of such treatment--gives power to exact it in all _respects--requiring_ certain acts, and _prohibiting_ others--maiming, branding, chaining together, allowing each but a quart of corn a day,[A] and but "one shirt and one pair of pantaloons" in six months[B]--separating families, destroying marriages, floggings for learning the alphabet and reading the Bible--robbing them of their oath, of jury trial, and of the right to worship God according to conscience--the legislature has power to specify each of these acts--declare that it is not "_humane_ treatment," and PROHIBIT it.--The legislature may also believe that driving men and women into the field, and forcing them to work without pay as long as they live, is not "humane treatment," and being constitutionally bound "to _oblige_" masters to practise "humane treatment"--they have the _power_ to _prohibit such_ treatment, and are bound to do it.

[Footnote A: Law of North Carolina, Haywood's Manual, 524-5.]

[Footnote B: Law of Louisiana, Martin's Digest, 610.]

The law of Louisiana makes slaves real estate, prohibiting the holder, if he be also a _land_ holder, to separate them from the soil.[C] If it has power to prohibit the sale _without_ the soil, it can prohibit the sale _with_ it; and if it can prohibit the _sale_ as property, it can prohibit the _holding_ as property. Similar laws exist in the French, Spanish, and Portuguese colonies.

[Footnote C: Virginia made slaves real estate by a law passed in 1705. (_Beverly's Hist. of Va._, p. 98.) I do not find the precise time when this law was repealed, probably when Virginia became the chief slave breeder for the cotton-growing and sugar-planting country, and made young men and women "from fifteen to twenty-five" the main staple production of the State.]

The law of Louisiana requires the master to give his slaves a certain amount of food and clothing, (_Martin's Digest_, 610.) If it can oblige the master to give the slave _one_ thing, it can oblige him to give him another: if food and clothing, then wages, liberty, his own body. Such laws exist in most slaveholding governments.

By the slave laws of Connecticut, under which slaves are now held, (for even Connecticut is still a slave State,) slaves might receive and hold property, and prosecute suits in their own name as plaintiffs: [This last was also the law of Virginia in 1795. See Tucker's "Dissertation on Slavery," p. 73.] There were also laws making marriage contracts legal, in certain contingencies, and punishing infringements of them, ["_Reeve's Law of Baron and Femme_," p. 310-1.] Each of the laws enumerated above, does, _in principle_, abolish slavery; and all of them together abolish it _in fact_. True, not as a _whole_, and at a _stroke_, nor all in one place; but in its _parts_, by piecemeal, at divers times and places; thus showing that the abolition of slavery is within the boundary of _legislation_.

5._The competency of the law-making power to abolish slavery has been recognized by all the slaveholding States, either directly or by implication_. Some States recognize it in their _Constitutions_, by giving the legislature power to emancipate such slaves as may "have rendered the state some distinguished service," and others by express prohibitory restrictions. The Constitutions of Mississippi, Arkansas, and other States, restrict the power of the legislature in this respect. Why this express prohibition, if the law-making power cannot abolish slavery? A stately farce, indeed, formally to construct a special clause, and with appropriate rites induct it into the Constitution, for the express purpose of restricting a nonentity!--to take from the lawmaking power what it _never had_, and what _cannot_ pertain to it! The legislatures of those States have no power to abolish slavery, simply because their Constitutions have expressly _taken away_ that power. The people of Arkansas, Mississippi, &c., well knew the competency of the law-making power to abolish slavery, and hence their zeal to _restrict_ it. The fact that these and other States have inhibited their legislatures from the exercise of this power, shows that the abolition of slavery is acknowledged to be a proper subject of legislation, when Constitutions impose no restrictions.

The slaveholding States have recognised this power in their _laws_. The Virginia Legislature passed a law in 1786 to prevent the further importation of Slaves, of which the following is an extract: "And be it further enacted that every slave imported into this commonwealth contrary to the true intent and meaning of this act, shall upon such importation become _free_." By a law of Virginia, passed Dec. 17, 1792, a slave brought into the state and kept _there a year_, was _free_. The Maryland Court of Appeals at the December term 1813 (see case of Stewart _vs._ Oakes,) decided that a slave owned in Maryland, and sent by his master into Virginia to work at different periods, making one year in the whole, became _free_, being _emancipated_ by the law of Virginia quoted above. North Carolina and Georgia in their acts of cession, transferring to the United States the territory now constituting the States of Tennessee, Alabama and Mississippi, made it a condition of the grant, that the provisions of the ordinance of '87, should be secured to the inhabitants _with the exception of the sixth article which prohibits slavery_; thus conceding, both the competency of law to abolish slavery, and the power of Congress to do it, within its jurisdiction. Besides, these acts show the prevalent belief at that time, in the slaveholding States, that the general government had adopted a line of policy aiming at the exclusion of slavery from the entire territory of the United States, not included within the original States, and that this policy would be pursued unless prevented by specific and formal stipulation.

Slaveholding states have asserted this power _in their judicial decisions._ In numerous cases their highest courts have decided that if the legal owner of slaves takes them into those States where slavery has been abolished either by law or by the constitution, such removal emancipates them, such law or constitution abolishing their slavery. This principle is asserted in the decision of the Supreme Court of Louisiana, in the case of Lunsford _vs._ Coquillon, 14 Martin's La. Reps. 401. Also by the Supreme Court of Virginia, in the case of Hunter _vs._ Fulcher, 1 Leigh's Reps. 172. The same doctrine was laid down by Judge Washington, of the United States Supreme Court, in the case of Butler _vs._ Hopper, Washington's Circuit Court Reps. 508. This principle was also decided by the Court of Appeals in Kentucky; case of Rankin _vs._ Lydia, 2 Marshall's Reps. 407; see also, Wilson _vs._ Isbell, 5 Call's Reps. 425, Spotts _vs._ Gillespie, 6 Randolph's Reps. 566. The State _vs._ Lasselle, 1 Blackford's Reps. 60, Marie Louise _vs._ Mariot, 8 La. Reps. 475. In this case, which was tried in 1836, the slave had been taken by her master to France and brought back; Judge Mathews, of the Supreme Court of Louisiana, decided that "residence for one moment" under the laws of France emancipated her.

6. _Eminent statesmen, themselves slaveholders, have conceded this power_. Washington, in a letter to Robert Morris, dated April 12, 1786, says: "There is not a man living, who wishes more sincerely than I do, to see a plan adopted for the abolition of slavery; but there is only one proper and effectual mode by which it can be accomplished, and that is by _legislative_ authority." In a letter to Lafayette, dated May 10, 1786, he says: "It (the abolition of slavery) certainly might, and assuredly ought to be effected, and that too by _legislative_ authority." In a letter to John Fenton Mercer, dated Sept. 9, 1786, he says: "It is among my first wishes to see some plan adopted by which slavery in this country may be abolished by _law_." In a letter to Sir John Sinclair, he says: "There are in Pennsylvania, _laws_ for the gradual abolition of slavery, which neither Maryland nor Virginia have at present, but which nothing is more certain that that they _must have_, and at a period not remote." Speaking of movements in the Virginia Legislature in 1777, for the passage of a law emancipating the slaves, Mr. Jefferson says: "The principles of the amendment were agreed on, that is to say, the freedom of all born after a certain day; but it was found that the public mind would not bear the proposition, yet the day is not far distant, when _it must bear and adopt it_."--Jefferson's Memoirs, v. 1, p. 35. It is well known that Jefferson, Pendleton, Mason, Wythe and Lee, while acting as a committee of the Virginia House of Delegates to revise the State Laws, prepared a plan for the gradual emancipation of the slaves by law. These men were the great lights of Virginia. Mason, the author of the Virginia Constitution; Pendleton, the President of the memorable Virginia Convention in 1787, and President of the Virginia Court of Appeals; Wythe was the Blackstone of the Virginia bench, for a quarter of a century Chancellor of the State, the professor of law in the University of William and Mary, and the preceptor of Jefferson, Madison, and Chief Justice Marshall. He was author of the celebrated remonstrance to the English House of Commons on the subject of the stamp act. As to Jefferson, his _name_ is his biography.

Every slaveholding member of Congress from the States of Maryland, Virginia, North and South Carolina, and Georgia, voted for the celebrated ordinance of 1787, which _abolished_ the slavery then existing in the Northwest Territory. Patrick Henry, in his well known letter to Robert Pleasants, of Virginia, January 18, 1773, says: "I believe a time will come when an opportunity will be offered to _abolish_ this lamentable evil." William Pinkney, of Maryland, advocated the abolition of slavery by law, in the legislature of that State, in 1789. Luther Martin urged the same measure both in the Federal Convention, and in his report to the Legislature of Maryland. In 1796, St. George Tucker, professor of law in the University of William and Mary, and Judge of the General Court, published an elaborate dissertation on slavery, addressed to the General Assembly of the State, and urging upon them the abolition of slavery by _law_.

John Jay, while New-York was yet a slave State, and himself in law a slaveholder, said in a letter from Spain, in 1786, "An excellent law might be made out of the Pennsylvania one, for the gradual abolition of slavery. Were I in your legislature, I would present a bill for the purpose, drawn up with great care, and I would never cease moving it till it became a law, or I ceased to be a member."

Daniel D. Tompkins, in a message to the Legislature of New-York, January 8, 1812, said: "To devise the means for the gradual and ultimate _extermination_ from amongst us of slavery, is work worthy the representatives of a polished and enlightened nation."

The Virginia Legislature asserted this power in 1832. At the close of a month's debate, the following proceedings were had. I extract from an editorial article of the Richmond Whig, of January 26, 1832.

"The report of the Select Committee, adverse to legislation on the subject of Abolition, was in these words: _Resolved_, as the opinion of this Committee, that it is INEXPEDIENT FOR THE PRESENT, to make any legislative enactments for the abolition of Slavery." This Report Mr. Preston moved to reverse, and thus to declare that it _was_ expedient, _now_ to make Legislative enactments for the abolition of slavery. This was meeting the question in its strongest form. It demanded action, and immediate action. On this proposition the vote was 58 to 73. Many of the most decided friends of abolition voted against the amendment; because they thought public opinion not sufficiently prepared for it, and that it might prejudice the cause to move too rapidly. The vote on Mr. Witcher's motion to postpone the whole subject indefinitely, indicates the true state of opinion in the House.--That was the test question, and was so intended and proclaimed by its mover. That motion was _negatived_, 71 to 60; showing a majority of 11, who by that vote, declared their belief that "at the proper time, and in the proper mode, Virginia ought to commence a system of gradual abolition."