The true Democrat., 1856-05-27

put upon the acts whereby Indiana, Illinois, Alabama, and Mississippi formed their constl- tutlons and became States of the United States. Congress thus regarded the act authorizing the Inhabitants of territory to "form a consttu- ton and state government" as compact obll- gatory upon itself co instanti, and executed as soon as the constitution and State govern- ment were formed' It is not rule of law, Justice, and common sense, that when legisla- tive body adopts form of words which has received certain construction, 1t means to give 1t in that particular case the same con- struction? Is not this still truer where the same form of words has been repeatedly used, and has always received the same construction? This Is only to say of sentences what is said sf words, that their use determines their meaning.
 But sir, another fact strengthens the argu- ment. The form of words which have recit. ed was used in all the acts authorizing the for nation of constitutions and State governments, except in the case of Louisiana. In her case, Congress doubted whether the large proportion of her inhabitants, born and bred up under an arbitrary government, would either understand or prefer our form of civil policy; therefore, in the act authorizing the inhabitants of that ter rltory to form constitution and State govern ment," they added, "and if the same should not be disapproved by Congress at their next session, the said State should be admitted into the Union upon the same footing with the orl- ginal states" Even in this case Congress held that, when the inhabitants of territory were authorized to "form constitution and State government it became one of the United States by the formation of the State govern. ment unless this construction was expressly excluded. Now Congress, in 1920, when they adopted the act authorizing the inhabitants of the Territory of Missouri to " form a constitu- ton and State government" had before them the cases of Ohio and Louisiana. They adopt ed the form of words whereby Ohio became one of the States of the United States upon the formation of her State constitution;" and, therefore, they meant that Missouri should be "one of the States of the United States" upon the "formation of her State constitution" Did the north keep her faith to Missouri? No, federal officers had been superseded by State appointments; territorial machinery had given way to State equipment and panoply; and Missouri, with your act in her hands, and her robes of sovereignty around her, knocked at your door for admission into the sisterhood of States and was rudely rejected. Where, then, was the plighted faith of the north?-where her reverence for a sacred compact?
 | But Missouri was re eected, you say, because her constitution was anti-republican. Where fore was it ant-repubhcan? Because her con stitution authorized her legislature to prevent the admission of free negroes within her limits. 1 If 1t be true that this clause ant-republl- can, 1t was simply null and void. Was a State, then, to be depoSed from her sovere gn- ty the rights of her citizens to be abdlcated, and her own status to be forfeited, because of pro- vision in her constitution which was null and void, ob initio? Was Congress, too, the proper tribunal to adudicate the conformity of this clause in the State constitution of Missouri to | the federal constitution? Had not your feder- al organism possessed the supreme court with this power? And if it decided the clause, to be inconsistent with the federal constitution, was not the clause, and only that clause simply null and void? Kings have been deposed. privileged orders have been abdicated, but an American Congress for the first time set the example that the sovereign rights of whole ! people may be forfeited by what they called an error of their representatives," And was | it an error? Was not the same clause in the constitution of States both north and south? 1 Did not the legislation of northern States dis franchise and degrade the African within their own limits?
 1 The constitution of Ohio declared that Gin all elections all aohite male inhabitants shall en | joy the right of an elector." In Indiana there was law that :" no negro, mulatto, or Indian shall be witness, except in pleas of he State against negroes, mulatoes, or Indians, or in civil cases where negroes, mulattoeS, or Indians shall be partes.'' New Hampshire had law that leach and every able bodied white cti- zen shall be enroled;" and Vermont had similar law. The right to have arms is the badge and the right of citizen in free country; and yet these State; dislranchised the negro from tkeir use Massachusetts, 18th June 1795, passed law for the orderly so- lemnlzaton of marriages. It declared that no person by this act authorized to marry shall join 1 in marriage any white person with an Indian negro, or mulatto, on penalty of the sum of fifty pounds and the said marriage shall be null and void." Massachusetts at Mat day was not ambitious Of testing the philosophical expert ment of amalgamation. That was left to these later days, and to other of her 5ons Whether the Ethiopian has ascended, or they have de- scended, 1 will let others and history decide Rhode Island, which did not even have State constitution, dislranchised and degraded the negro within her own limits, but was so tender of their rights in Missouri that she elected Mir. D. Wolf to the United States Senate to resist the admission of Missouri with this clause in her constitution, although he had made his whole fortune in the African slave trade.
 But the very Congress which rejected Mis- souri had published its doctrine of negro rights and negro equality In an act incorporating the city of Washington, which passed 18th May, 1920, there is this clause: "That no per son shall be eligible to a seat in the board of common council, unless he shall be more than twenty-five years of age, a free a0hate male citi- zen of the United States" etc. It also con tans clause giving to the corporation the power and authority |" to prescribe the terms and conditions upon which free negroes and mulattoes may reside in the city" The cor poration could thus, in effect, exclude them from the city. Missouri was re jected for giv-
 ing to her legislature, in substance, the same power. If negroes were not citizens, they could claim no right to enter State, ard their exclusion from it was no violation of the feder- al constitution. The northern States did not regard them as citizens. Congress did not so regard them. By an act of Congress passed on the 14th April, 1902, to establish uniform rule of naturalization they declared that any alien, being free a0hite person, may be admit ted to become a citizen of the United States, or any of them, on the following conditions" etc. The government of Hayti was then an inde- pendent empire. Why were its black inhabi- tants excluded? Iii truth, the negro was not reSWded eltHcr noflu UT souti, aS CltiZen, and in 1920, when the north imposed an odious restriction upon the south, and then broke her word, she only used negrophilsm to hide the lust of jealousy and domination. If the con- stitution of Missouri was anti-republcan, then the constitutions of all the States in the Union were anti-repubican also. 1 have shown what the Missouri compact was, and who violated its plighted engagements 1 have shown that the north stabbed it to the heart in the very hour of its birth, and that now, wrgglng through its corrupt carcass, its fanatical repre- sentatives came here reeking with its putrefac- tion. and cry out against the south, |" broken faith!''
 T Having relieved this issue of embarrassment, may dismiss the remaining role of the repub- licans with few words Let the North refuse admission to State because of slavery in her constitution, and the history of this Union is closed We have reared this government