The Middlebury register. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1850-1882, 1850-05-28

bound to assent TO the admission of any State
into the Union unless upon such conditions a.
shall be consistent with the general welfare.
The General Assembly do therefore resolve,
I that our Senators be instructed, and our Rep |
rescntatives in Congress he requested to use
| their influence to prohibit the introduction of
slavery into the territories of the United States
and to prevent lis being legalzed in any State
hereafter to Le admitted into the Union.
She put her reasons on the record that
slavery is wrong in ilself-that it tends TO
wcaken the national s,rength-that it cannot |
be tolerated on the plea of necessy-and |
that Congress has the constitutional power
10 prohibit it. These are her sentiments now.
The doctrine that controveris them is mod
crn doctrine affirming that men may 90 to
any territory of the United States, carrying
with them all that is held as property in their
several States. There is remarkable uni
iormiiy in the uttcrance of that doctrine.
Look through the long debates in both hous.
es Of Congress, and you see it always in the
same siereotyped form. We should suppose
that as a mere matter of taste, for the sake
of novelty, it would sometimes be varied !;
but it still holds the same imlnuable formula.
, The reason is plain--changc the expression,
and you kill the doctrine. Say that you have
Il a right to carry your local laws into the ter
riories, and you make an equivalent express
$ sion that every lawyer will drop like hot
: iron. 1t is not true as TO any State north or
l. South. There are fifty men in Vermont
i who own bank, with capital of an hun
= dred thousand dollars. They hold and man
% age their property by local laws Of the State
They now propose to take that bank and mi
D. crate to California, where the law prohibit.
h banking, or to territory where there arc
at no laws on the subject. They propose to
r hold and manage their property in their new
to residence just as they have done in their old
residence. There is not country jusiice.r
IL all the land so green that he would not laugl
IN in their faces,
IL Why was there constitutional and lcga
sc provision for the rccapture Of fugitive slaves
s. If they are properly ander the general Law
~ Of the land ; those provisions are needless
ne Their adoption and the prcscnt,lcmand for
TIA their execution, is q confession that slave
81 are held as property by local laws, and can
he not be carried beyond the Jurisdiction O
IS, that law. A slave escapes and makes hi
on way TO Canada in your stables is hors
OF that has been fed and sroomed by that ne
*, groi he snaps his tether and follows owe
le. the same road to the same place VI on can 3
th and take the one but must leave the othe
H. Why is this so? Because the one is, an
ar the other is not, held as property by the con
Gu mon law of the world. Take slave an
'es cross Mason and Dixons line. The momeI
you have passed that boundary, he ceases
're be property. You are still in the Unior
'es Why can you not still hold your property
AS Because the power of your local law is e'
We hausted. You have gone beyond its limit
nu As IA reasoning man tell me the dincrenc
II" between facing norhward and westwar,
'us when YOU cross the line OF demarkation Il
'"' local slAveholting law.
RS,
of The sentiment of Vermont is sustained /
oil southern authority. 1t is found in the cell
nd brated Mississippi case, Groves rs. Slaugl
me ter, tried in the Supreme Court of the Tn
,oo ted States January, 1871. That case ha
!, reference to the inter State slave trade.
,.s the argument of it, the Hon. r. j. Wake
,n assumed that Congress had no power to re!
;'o ulate the traffic in slaves, because they al
ri. not property, but persons. They arc NJ
Inc merchandise, subject to the general con
nj, mercial regulations, because they are NJ
ms recognized as property out ofthe State whci
MI they are held. " 1t was commerce in me
nal chandse, regarded as such by all the State
,n- and not commerce in persons, that was d.
cir signed to be regulated b. Congress. Con
mi merce in persons, if it may be so calle
,rg was not intended TO be regulated by Coz
en- gress, because it WIS peculiar and loca
,ut and not national"--4Ppendir 10 Peters
he Reports, rol. -, p. SO.
hat If that doc,rine he true il is because slav,
oil are property by local, and not by gener
ss' law That is the sentiment of Vermont.
he is not new. 1t is older than the thunder
z Winthrop, or Webster, or Wilmot The ol
nat battery, whence it originated, is sill SCUM
nc and sends forth its annual charges. | l.
''' eve it has been found easier to peryert tha
W. to answer il 1t was declared thirty yeal
~ since. In that Time, five new slave STATE
''' have been admitted. She has demonstrate
= against them all, and most earnestly again
" the last. But they have been admitted b
the constituted authority, and she has sui
niitted. A whole generation has come an
gone since that was proclaimed. 1t was III
" uuerance of honest sentiment, and had n
" reference to political effect the Senator's
snecrs of New Hampshire TO the conrar
Notwithstanding. Racen! events lead us t
-, suppose that her sister States do not aecus
Vermont of putting her light under busl
e, or smothering her sentiments in her Al
chives. She does not spring upon you wit
70 new principle, after the territories wer
L. acquired. You knew beforehand that if lha
De territory was acquired Vermont had le
mi upon it for freedom. You took it with lha
de mortgage. She is not prompted by the Hash.
a. and ilippani zeal Of a new political convert
n. but by long-setted and abiding principle