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Vi.

Slavery, I now repeat, is not mentioned in the Constitution. The name Slave does not pollute this Charter of our Liberties. No ‘positive’ language gives to Congress any power to make a Slave or to hunt a Slave. To find even any seeming sanction for either, we must travel, with doubtful footsteps, beyond its express letter, into the region of interpretation. But here are rules which cannot be disobeyed. With electric might for Freedom, they send a pervasive influence through every provision, clause, and word of the Constitution. Each and all make Slavery impossible as a national institution. They efface from the Constitution every fountain out of which it can be derived.

First and foremost, is the Preamble. This discloses the prevailing objects and principles of the Constitution. This is the vestibule through which all must pass, who would enter the sacred temple. Here are the inscriptions by which they are earliest impressed. Here they first catch the genius of the place. Here the proclamation of Liberty is soonest heard. ‘We the People of the United States,’ says the Preamble, ‘in order to form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.’ Thus, according to undeniable words, the Constitution was ordained, not to establish, secure, or sanction Slavery—not to promote the special interests of slaveholders—not to make Slavery national, in any way, form, or manner; but to ‘establish justice,’ [122] ‘promote the general welfare,’ and ‘secure the blessings of Liberty.’ Here, surely, Liberty is national.

Secondly. Next in importance to the Preamble are the explicit contemporaneous declarations in the Convention which framed the Constitution, and elsewhere, expressed in different forms of language, but all tending to the same conclusion. By the Preamble, the Constitution speaks for Freedom. By these declarations, the Fathers speak as the Constitution speaks. Early in the Convention, Gouverneur Morris, of Pennsylvania, broke forth in the language of an Abolitionist: ‘He never would concur in upholding domestic slavery. It was a nefarious institution. It was the curse of Heaven on the State where it prevailed.’ Oliver Ellsworth, of Connecticut, said: ‘The morality or wisdom of Slavery are considerations belonging to the States themselves.’ According to him, Slavery was sectional.

At a later day, a discussion ensued on the clause touching the African slave trade, which reveals the definitive purposes of the Convention. From the report of Mr. Madison we learn what was said. Elbridge Gerry, of Massachusetts, ‘thought we had nothing to do with the conduct of the States as to Slavery, but we ought to be careful not to give any sanction to it.’ According to these words, he regarded Slavery as sectional, and would not make it national. Roger Sherman, of Connecticut, “was opposed to any tax on slaves imported, as making the matter worse, because it implied they were property.” He would not have Slavery national. After debate, the subject was committed to a Committee of eleven, who subsequently reported a substitute, authorizing ‘a tax on such migration or importation, at a rate not exceeding the average of duties laid on imports.’ This language, classifying persons with merchandise, seemed to imply a recognition that they were property. Mr. Sherman at once declared himself ‘against this part, as acknowledging men to be property, by taxing them as such under the character of slaves.’ Mr. Gorham ‘thought Mr. Sherman should consider the duty not as implying that slaves are property, but as a discouragement to the importation of them.’ Mr. Madison, in mild juridical phrase, ‘thought it wrong to admit in the Constitution the idea that there could be property in man.’ After discussion it was finally agreed to make the clause read:

‘But a tax or duty may be imposed on such inportation, not exceeding ten dollars for each person.’

The difficulty seemed then to be removed, and the whole clause was adopted. This record demonstrates that the word ‘persons’ was employed [123] in order to show that slaves, everywhere under the Constitution, were always to be regarded as persons, and not as property, and thus to exclude from the Constitution all idea that there can be property in man. Remember well, that Mr. Sherman was opposed to the clause in its original form, ‘as acknowledging men to be property;’ that Mr. Madison was also opposed to it, because he ‘thought it wrong to admit in the Constitution the idea that there could be property in man;’ and that, after these objections, the clause was so amended as to exclude the idea. But Slavery cannot be national, unless this idea is distinctly and unequivocally admitted into the Constitution.

But the evidence still accumulates. At a still later day in the proceedings of the Convention, as if to set the seal upon the solemn determination to have no sanction of Slavery in the Constitution, the word ‘servitude,’ which appeared in the clause on the apportionment of representation, was struck out, and the word ‘service’ inserted. This was done on the motion of Mr. Randolph, of Virginia, and the reason assigned for this substitution, according to Mr. Madison, in his authentic report of the debate, was that ‘the former was thought to express the condition of slaves, and the latter the obligations of free persons.’ With such care was Slavery excluded from the Constitution.

Nor is this all. In the Massachusetts Convention, to which the Constitution, when completed, was submitted for ratification, a veteran of the Revolution, General Heath, openly declared that, according to his view, Slavery was sectional, and not national. His language was pointed. ‘I apprehend,’ he says, ‘that it is not in our power to do anything for or against those who are in Slavery in the Southern States. No gentleman within these walls detests every idea of Slavery more than I do; it is generally detested by people of this Commonwealth; and I ardently hope the time will soon come, when our brethren in the Southern States will view it as we do, and put a stop to it; but to this we have no right to compel them. Two questions naturally arise: If we ratify the Constitution, shall we do anything by our acts to hold the blacks in slavery—or shall we become partakers in other men's sins? I think neither of them.’

Afterwards, in the first Congress under the Constitution, on a motion which was much debated, to introduce into the Impost Bill a duty on the importation of Slaves, the same Roger Sherman, who in the National Convention had opposed the idea of property in man, authoritatively exposed the true relations of the Constitution to Slavery. His language [124] was, that ‘The Constitution does not consider these persons as property; it speaks of them as persons.’

Thus distinctly and constantly, from the very lips of the framers of the Constitution, we learn the falsehood of the recent assumptions in favor of Slavery and in derogation of Freedom.

Thirdly. According to a familiar rule of interpretation, all laws concerning the same matter, in pari materia, are to be construed together. By the same reason, the grand political acts of the Nation are to be construed together, giving and receiving light from each other. Earlier than the Constitution was the Declaration of Independence, embodying, in immortal words, those primal truths to which our country pledged itself with its baptismal vows as a Nation. ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident,’ says the Nation, ‘that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among them are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.’ But this does not stand alone. There is another national act of similar import. On the successful close of the Revolution, the Continental Congress, in an address to the people, repeated the same lofty truth. ‘Let it be remembered,’ said the Nation again, ‘that it has ever been the pride and the boast of America, that the rights for which she has contended were the rights of human nature. By the blessing of the Author of these rights, they have prevailed over all opposition, and form the basis of thirteen independent States.’ Such were the acts of the Nation in its united capacity. Whatever may be the privileges of States in their individual capacities, within their several local jurisdictions, no power can be attributed to the Nation, in the absence of positive, unequivocal grant, inconsistent with these two national declarations. Here, sir, is the national heart, the national soul, the national will, the national voice, which must inspire our interpretation of the Constitution, and enter into and diffuse itself through all the national legislation. Thus again is Freedom national.

Fourthly. Beyond these is a principle of the common law, clear and indisputable, a supreme rule of interpretation from which in this case there can be no appeal. In any question under the Constitution every word is to be construed in favor of liberty. This rule, which commends itself to the natural reason, is sustained by time-honored maxims of our early jurisprudence. Blackstone aptly expresses it, when he says, that ‘The law is always ready to catch at anything in favor of [125] liberty.’ The rule is repeated in various forms. Favores ampliandi sunt; odia restringenda. Favors are to be amplified; hateful things to be restrained. Lex Angliae est lex misericordiae. The law of England is a law of mercy. Angliae jura in omni casu libertati dant favorem. The laws of England in every case show favor to liberty. And this sentiment breaks forth in natural, though intense, force, in the maxim: Impius et crudelis judicandus est qui libertati non favet. He is to be adjudged impious and cruel who does not favor liberty. Reading the Constitution in the admonition of these rules, again I say Freedom is national.

Fifthly. From a learned judge of the Supreme Court of the United States, in an opinion of the court, we derive the same lesson. In considering the question, whether a State can prohibit the importation of slaves as merchandise, and whether Congress, in the exercise of its power to regulate commerce among the States, can interfere with the slave-trade between the States, a principle has been enunciated, which, while protecting the trade from any intervention of Congress, declares openly that the Constitution acts upon no man as property. Mr. Justice McLean says: “If slaves are considered in some of the States as merchandise, that cannot divest them of the leading and controlling quality of persons by which they are designated in the Constitution. The character of property is given them by the local law. This law is respected, and all rights under it are protected by the Federal authorities; but the Constitution acts upon slaves as persons and not as property.” * * * ‘The power over Slavery belongs to the States respectively. It is local in its character, and in its effects.’ Here again Slavery is sectional, while Freedom is national.

Sir, such, briefly, are the rules of interpretation which, as applied to the Constitution, fill it with the breath of Freedom,

Driving far off each thing of sin and guilt.

To the history and prevailing sentiments of the times we may turn for further assurance. In the spirit of Freedom the Constitution was formed. In this spirit our Fathers always spoke and acted. In this spirit the National Government was first organized under Washington. And here I recall a scene, in itself a touchstone of the period, and an example for us, upon which we may look with pure national pride, while we learn anew the relations of the National Government to Slavery.

The Revolution had been accomplished. The feeble Government [126] of the Confederation had passed away. The Constitution, slowly matured in a National Convention, discussed before the people, defended by masterly pens, had been already adopted. The thirteen States stood forth a nation, wherein was unity without consolidation, and diversity without discord. The hopes of all were anxiously hanging upon the new order of things and the mighty procession of events.

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