The voice of freedom. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1839-1848, 1839-04-27
From the Hampshire Gazette.
MIR. CIay's Speech.

| was glad to see in your paper Mr.. Clay'S
speech on the slavery question. The Orator Of
the west, himself slave holder and President Of
the Colonization Society, must be supposed capable
of giving the strong arguments if any there are
against abolishing slavery and the slave trade by
action of Congress, in those cases in which Con-
gress is asked to do it. beg leave to very briefly
examine his leading positions.
The Constitution gives Congress power to leg
isate IN all cases whatsoever, for the District of
Columbia. Still Mr.. Clay thinks it cannot legis-
late OH the subject of slavery, because he thinks,
Maryland and Virginia did not expect it would,
when the district was coded. Legislation would
be breach of faith. AT best the faith is merely
implied. And the doctrine of southern politicians
is, the Constitution must not be construed. Obey it,
say they, to the letter. What says Mr.. Clay to
the act of the Congress of 1916 who, appealing to
Heaven declared aH men born free and equal and
entitled to Hberty? Was this no pledge that the
poor black man should taste the liberty he was
entitled to? And how did Mr.. Clay redeem that
pledge, when, in 1920, he, then speaker in Con-
gress, carried by management bill establishing
slavery in Missouri?
The Constitution gives Congress power to reg
ulate commerce between the States. Mr.. Clay
says Congress has no power from the Constitution
to abolish the commerce in SlareS between the
States. Surely the wise and learned trainers Of
the Constitution made strange use of the Kings
English, if Henry Clay is to be their interpreter.
MIR. Clay next speaks of the cruelty of one
State blaming the Institutions of another, especial
y of holding them up to the scorn contempt,
and detestation of the whole civilized world" and
says it has no more right to do it than one nation
to do it to another. Does he remember that in
1924, he besought Congress to take part with the
oppressed and ensaved Greeks against their op-
pressors the Turks, and that he then spoke in no
measured terms of the meanness and cruelty of
Turkish slavery? What if the now enfranchised
children of Leonidas should send over to our west
ern world their. sympathy for race grooming
under far worse than Turkish slavery?
The speaker then calculates the value of the
slaves in dollars, and makes them at the lowest
estimate, worth 1,200,O00,000 He knows he
says, There is a visionary Dogma which holds
that slaves are not the subject of property. But
they are. That is property which the law declares
to be property If Mr.. Clay should journey some
summer to the White Mountains of the Granite
State, and the good people of New Hampshire
should so amend their constitution as to tolerate
slavery, and the Legislature of the state should by
law declare Henry Clay to be the property of Isaac
Hill, he would become such by his own showing,
especially if Isaac should buy him and pay 400I
for him to some one, who sohould seize him forI
that money, full as much as he would be worth for
slave. He might sigh to go back to his wife and
children he left at Ashland, but he would have no
right to go, Stay he must, and his master would
have perfect right to task him severely and wear
him out in year or two, or task him more lightly
and let him hold out the longer for he is his
ERTY declared so by law, And who would rob
man of his property