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grant which created it; but to the States themselves belong all powers not expressly delegated, or which, by necessary implication, do not arise from some express grant. At the time of the adoption of the Constitution, negro slavery, I believe, existed in all the States but one, which then formed the Union; and no power was given to the general government to control, regulate, prohibit, or establish slavery. That power not being granted, was vested in the States themselves. The Constitution, however, recognized slavery as one of the institutions of the country, and made provision for the protection of slave property. There was no grant, therefore, of power of any kind on the subject of slavery made by the States to the general government; but there was a binding obligation entered into by the free States, or by such as might become free, that the general government should protect slave property. It seems to me, therefore, that as the States delegated to the general government no power of any kind over the question of slavery, Congress, which derives all its powers from the Constitution, possesses no authority either to establish or prohibit slavery in the States or territories. In regard to the territories, Mr. Chairman, the general government is but the trustee of the States; and it has no power to make any rule or regulation which will throw open the territories to settlement by the people of one section of the Union to the exclusion of the people of another. The beneficiary interest of the territories is in the people of all the States-slave States as well as free— and the general government, as the trustee, is bound to execute the trust for the common benefit of all. Any legislation by Congress, prohibiting slavery in the territories, would, therefore, be not only an assumption of power not delegated, but would be a violation of the trust which the Constitution vested in the general government.

But, sir, I further hold, that the general government has no power to prohibit, by any legislative act, the introduc

tion into the territories of any species of property which the Constitution of the United States has recognized as property. Property in slaves is not only recognized by the Constitution, but guarantees are given for its protection. The power, therefore, which is given to Congress by the third section of the fourth article, to make "all needful rules and regulations respecting the territory or other property belonging to the United States," is merely a right to regulate, but not a power to abolish that which the Constitution has recognized as property. An obligation to protect or regulate gives no power to prohibit or to destroy. And thus, while we have the constitutional power to pass laws for the protection and regulation of slave property in the territories, we have no power to make any legislative enactment for its prohibition, whether in the States or territories. In a word, sir, the Constitution of the United States is the Constitution of the territories, and as that Constitution recognizes the right of property in slaves, any prohibition by Congress of that right would be in violation of the Constitution, which is the supreme law of the land.

Extract from the Southern Address published in 1830, said to have been drawn by Mr. Calhoun :

We do not deem it necessary, looking to the object of this address, to examine the question so fully discussed at the last session, whether Congress has the right to exclude the citizens of the South from immigrating with their property into territories belonging to the confederated States of the Union. What we propose in this connection is, to make a few remarks on what the North alleges, erroneously, to be the issue between us and them.

So far from maintaining the doctrine, which the issue implies, we hold that the Federal Government has no right to extend or restrict slavery, no more than to establish or abolish it; nor has it any right whatever to distinguish be

tween the domestic institutions of one State, or section, and another, in order to favor the one and discourage the other. As the federal representatives of each and all the States, it is bound to deal out, within the sphere of its powers, equal and exact justice and favor to all. To act otherwise, to undertake to discriminate between the domestic institutions of one and another, would be to act in total subversion of the end for which it was established-to be the common protector and guardian of all. Entertaining these opinions, we ask not, as the North alleges we do, for the extension of slavery. That would make a discrimination in our favor, as unjust and unconstitutional as the discrimination they ask against us in their favor. It is not for them nor for the federal government to determine whether our domestic institution is good or bad, or whether it should be repressed or preserved. It belongs to us, and us only, to decide such questions. What, then, we do insist on is, not to extend slavery, but that we shall not be prohibited from immigrating with our property into the territories of the United States because we are slaveholders; or, in other words, that we shall not on that account be disfranchised of a privilege possessed by all others, citizens and foreigners, without discrimination as to character, profession, or color. All, whether savage, barbarian, or civilized, may freely enter and remain, we only being "excluded."

CHAPTER XIII.

THE DRED SCOTT CASE.

Extract from the opinion of the Court by Chief Justice Taney; also from the opinion of Judge Daniels; and from a Pennsylvania case declaring a negro not a

citizen.

TANEY, C. J. * * The question is simply this: Can a negro, whose ancestors were imported into this country, and sold as slaves, become a member of the political community formed and brought into existence by the Constitution of the United States, and as such, become entitled to all the rights, and privileges, and immunities, guaranteed by that instrument to the citizen? One of which rights is the privilege of suing in a court of the United States, in the cases specified in the Constitution.

It will be observed, that the plea applies to that class of persons only whose ancestors were negroes of the African race, and imported into this country, and sold and held as slaves. The only matter in issue before the court, therefore, is, whether the descendants of such slaves, when they shall be emancipated, or who are born of parents who had become free before their birth, are citizens of a State, in the sense in which the word citizen is used in the Constitution of the United States. And this being the only matter in dispute on the pleadings, the court must be understood as speaking, in this opinion, of that class only; that is, of

those persons who are the descendants of Africans who were imported into this country and sold as slaves.

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The words "people of the United States" and "citizens" are synonymous terms, and mean the same thing. They both describe the political body who, according to our republican institutions, form the sovereignty, and who hold the power and conduct the government through their representatives. They are what we familiarly call the "sovereign people," and every citizen is one of this people, and a constituent member of this sovereignty. The question before us is, Whether the class of persons described in the plea in abatement compose a portion of this people, and are constituent members of this sovereignty? We think they are not, and that they are not included, and were not intended to be included, under the word "citizens" in the Constitution, and can therefore claim none of the rights and privileges which that instrument provides for and secures to citizens of the United States. On the contrary, they were at that time considered as a subordinate and inferior class of beings, who had been subjugated by the dominant race, and, whether émancipated or not, yet remain subject to their authority, and had no rights or privileges but such as those who held the power and the government might choose to grant them.

It is not the province of the court to decide upon the justice or injustice, the policy or impolicy, of these laws. The decision of that question belonged to the political, or law-making power; to those who formed the sovereignty and framed the Constitution. The duty of the court is to interpret the instrument they have framed, with the best lights we can obtain on the subject, and to administer it as we find it, according to its true intent and meaning when it was adopted.

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