Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, Va. [W. Va.]) 1852-1859, 1856-12-04

The Constitution, supreme as it is over all
the departments of the government, legislative,
executive and judicial, isopen to amendment
by its very terms; and Congress or the States
may, in their discretion, propose amendment to
il, solemn compact though il in truth is, be-
tween the sovereign States of the Union. nthe
present instance, a political enactment, which
had ceased to lave legal power or authority of
any kind, was repealed The position assu-
med that Congress had no moral right TO exact
such repeal, was strange enough, and singularly
so in view of the fact that the argument came
from those who openly refused obedience to ex-
isting laws of the land. having the same popular
designation and quality as, compromisc acts
nay, more, who suncguivocaliy disreearsied and
condemned the most positive and obligatory in
functions of the Constitution itself, and sought,
by every means within their reach, to deprive
portion of their fellow citizens of the equal en-
joymcnt of those rights and privileges guaran-
tied alike to all by the fundamental compact Of
our Union. ny
This argument against the repeal of the stat.
ute line IN question. was accompanied by an
other of congenial character and equally with
the former destitute of foundation in reason and
truth. lit was imputed that the measure origi-
mated in the conception OF extending the linz
its of slave labor beyond those previously as
signed to it, and that such was its natural as
well as intended effect; and these baseiess as
sumptions were made in the northern States,
the ground of unceasing assault upon constitu-
tional right. II stsss5 az n * q ,,fss,
The repeal in terms of a statute, which was
already obsolete, and also null for ;unconstitu-
tionality, could have no influence to DISTRICT or
to promote the propagation of conflicting
views of political or social institutions When
the act organizing the Territories of Kansas
and Nebraska was passed, the inherent effect
upon that portion of the public domain thus
opened to legal settlement was to admit set
tiers from all the States of the Union alike,
each with his convictions of public policy and
private interest, there to found in their discre-
ton. subject to such limitations as the Consti-
tuition and acts of Congress might prescribe
new States hereafter to be admitted into the
Union. 1t was free field, open alike to ALL
whether the statute line of assumed restriction
We're repealed or not That repeal did not omen
tofree competition of the diverse opinions and
domestic institutions; a field, which, without
such repeal, would have been closed against
them; it found that field of competition already
opened, in fact and in law. All the repeal did
was to relieve the statnte-book of an objection
able enactment, unconstitutional in effect, and
injurious in terms to large portion of the
States.
of the United States, if emigration be left free
to act in this respect for ITSELF without legal pro-
lhibitions on either side slavelabor will sponta-
neously go every where, inspreference to free
labor. lsit fact that the peculiar domestic in
situations of the southern States possess rela-
lively SO much of vigor, that, wheresoeyer an
avenue is freely open TO all the world, theywiil
penetrate to the exclusion of those of the north
ern States. Is it the fact, that the former en-
10y, compared with the latter, such irresistibly
superior vitality independent of climate, soil.
and all other accidental circumstances, as to be
able to produce the supposed result, in spite of
the assumed moral and natural obstacles to its
accomplishment, and of the more numerous pop
ulation of the northern States?
| The argument of those who advocate the en-
actment of new laws of restriction, and condemn
the repeal of old ones in effect AYERS that their
particular views of government have no selfcx-
tending or sef-sustaining power of their own,
and will go nowhere unless forced by act of Con-
gross. And if Congress do but pause for a mos
ment in the policy of stern coercion; if it ven
ture to try the experiment of leaving men Judge
for themselves, what institutions will best suit
them; it it be not strained up to perpetual leg
islative exertion on this point; if Congress pro-
coed thus to act in the very spirit of liberty it is
at once charged with aiming to extend slave la.
| Dor into all the new territories of the United
States.
| OF course these imputations on the intentions
! OF Congress in this respect conceived as they
were in prejudice, and disseminated in passion,
are utterly destitute of any justification in the.
nature of things, and contrary to all the funtia-
mental doctrines >and principles of civil liberty
and selEgovernment. gaSsli.s i
While therefore, in general, the people of tho
northern States have never, Mt any time arroga-
ted for the federal government the power to in
terfere directly with the domestic condition of
persons in the sothern States, but on the con-
trary have disavowed all such Intentions and
have shrunk from conspicuous utilization with
those few who pursue their. fanatica1 objects