The daily union. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1845-1857, 1857-03-20

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hng colonies which have since gone from this country to
the African coast and which entering into the barbar
Gus and heather interior of the continent there 10
broadcast the seeds OF religion civilization and liberty -
within two short all the hopes OF its noble protector
were crushed and this first attempt at African colonization
was rendered abortve But great events however for
tuions or inevitable their occurrence though sometimes
marked by disaster in their outset and overwhelmed by
miscarriage and calamity bear them something of
the reproductive spirit Of the tabled phoenix The colony
has been epenshed its welfare has been watched with be-
nevolent care and noushed into of life with the
most assduous and tender solcitude Onrishing and
intelligent colony renders worthy Of our thoughtful
notice that spot long memorable for supplying the first
shpoad OF Africans to an English SLAYER in the reign OF
Elizabeth and more recently the place where those men
suffered and died whose freedom the judicial monstrosity
of the great Mansfield had secured
The learned Chief Justice made twoold mistake of his
tocal fact and OF legal principle Is il historically true
that slavery was so repugnan to the English law
as never 10 have actually existed in England and is it
legally ha under the English system of jurispru
dence could be the subject property in that
kngdomf The degradation of pien tenure distinguish
ed as well by the baseness and servty the hered
tary and unalterabe quality of the services ii exacted
listed in England from the earliest times But what mean
the existence OF African slavery in British colonies the
slaves placed there by act Of Parliament the trade partci
pated in by The King and his greatest subjects and sustained
and continued by pecuniary argesses authorized by Eg
tdwY Ii servtude be abhorent TO the free spirit Of the Eng
fish common law what mean those acts of Parliament 10
regulate and perpetuae it in colonies peoped by English
subjects controlled by English charters and governed by
Eoglish funconaries2 Did not English subjects carry to
their sAtlantic home, in the New World the anda-
mental maxims and distinguishing principles of the English
common law2 II So and that common law rrecopei
liable with human bondage did they not act In accordance
with its spirit in demonstrating and enactng against its
increase And how, in the face of such preenson
the English government be defended and justified in abro
eating those colonial laws which looked to the extinction
OF the trafc2 In negaving the act of Pennsylvania of
lTl2 in rejecting that of South Carolina in l760 dis
missing the acts of Jamaica in l7742 The fact alleged
ID denied by the whole history of England abroad and the
settled policy of the British empire home. The
is exemped not in some Of her present Institutions
at least her former SYSTEM and her colonial plan from
its earliest period to the time when the thirteen colonies
were separated from her dominion.
| The popular mind of England fully prepared for
African servitude by the mmemorial existence of ven
and ervce 1t is true that the law by which prop
ery in the offspring of American slave transmitted
became different from the rule of succession which pre-
vailed under the common law Of the kingdom But the
Pdrtus se9auur veen of the civil law which prevails in
The southern States the rule which regulates the
right to descendants not the original law of this
try One of earliest colonial laws The subject of
slavery which that of Maryland in the year 1863
acted that "a children horn OF any negro other slave
shall be slaves their fathers This rule OF Inherit
that of the English law, the maxim being
partas sequitur parem.
The paterna rule of succession offspring abol-
ished 10 Mary land in the year 1899 1905 and in the
year IT'S the principle of the civil substituted
The ancient doctrine 1t is enough, however, that the
maxim OF the English common law originally governed
the right OF serve succession in this country that
argument of English writer's s taken away 1t Is appa-
rent therefore, that the whole of American slavery
was not merely Of English origin but that It's plan
being altered from motives of convenience arising from
the ocsenes of the marriage tie among the barbarous de-
scendants of Africa.
The law of Maryland of 1863 which followed in the
ak OF the English precept TO the paterna line of
cesson condemned the Offspring of free white
who intermarre1 with African slave the serve con-
dOn of the father This feature of the carly legislation
OF that colony reflects the weknOwn sentiments of Eng
land at that early day, and proves the antiquity of te
opinion well ascerained and universal among the
learned in this country TO the inequality of the two
races and the deg nerae results of union between them
The dogma of the ilusrous Mansfield in that famous
decision that the English law did not recognise as
the subject of property unworthy of his character and
fame In the year 1859, nearly century before, that
question: so far English law concerned, had been
the head OF this august array Of learning and ability was
the eminent Chief Justice Holt The question under
the Assiento treaty with Spain and was submitted to the
judges by order of the King in council
The certificate of their unanimous opinion couched in
language alike concise and direct ain pursuance of his
Majeys orders in council hereunto annexed" say the
judges 1--WE do humbly certify opinion that negroes
nierchandtse'S The document is signed by all the judges
beginning with Holt and by Treby and Somers as attor-
ney and solicitor general
But the faaey Of the idea has been showa and the ys
tenn Of reasoning by which the Somerset sought
be supported is ably reviewed and demolished by that
eminent iurst Lord Stowel in the year 1921
This acute and accomplished English civilian better
known Sir William Scott in referring directly OPP
poste opinion of Lord Hardwicke made in the court of
c5ancery twenty-five years before that is in l749 see
State Trials vel % PIP A. sl informs that the per-
sonal traffic in slaves resident in England had been pub
TIC and as authorized IN LONDON as in Of West In
dia islands. They sold the Exchange and other
places of public resort by PARTIES
LONDON and with little they would have been
in any of our West India possessions Such state of
things continued without impeachment from very early
period up to nearly the end Of the last century, Hag
CARDS Rep, p 1867 He advers to the different opn-
ions which had been pronounced from the earliest n-
PRODUCTION of slavery into the English colonies by |
judges of high authority and the greatest ability in
the kingdom and the suadenness OF the conversion of
Mansfield to different doctrine. He is reminded Of
on the Of the defeat Of Ponpty, "popu-
lus Romanus pent facus est aiushe Romans suddenly
besame quite another people What event in the history of
England called up the classical "reminiscences of the learned
judge which is deicately and plainly limited at is more
Than subject OF conjecture. In subsequent page he
goes assert that for the space of fly gears not in
had the attention of English justice been call
ed these alleged violations of law bringing slaves
within the Jurisdiction of England and allowing them to
depart Black seamen" he says have navgated West
India ships this island but have heard other
Somersets nor has the public been much graied with
complaints Of their desc ton, though it ia probable that
may have taken, and not unfairly, the advantage
that was held out to them by the aw.r-p. III.
But IT, indeed the air Of England be pure and the soil
free to kill the demon of slavery he in
bales the one his profane foot reaches the other how
happened that down TO the very period of the emancpa
ton act for the British West India colonies the Chancellor
of England made DEGREES for sales in London of plantations
in Jamaica, together wih the slapes BY rhch they tere
worked? The Lord Chancellor ordered by decree the sale
of two sugar plantations at Nevis, and hundred and
fvo negroes thereon to take place the 10th january
1885, in Southampton Buildings Chancery Lane Londoni
The curious may in pamphlet the opinion OF the
French lawyers in the Maurtus dated in 1892 aud
at the end by the translator the notable particulars of this