The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1858-02-11


i that +" free inhabitants can mean other than
4 free white inhabitants This sequit1r reminds
me of the boys syrogism: ~ gave my knife
for ride to Boston; my knife cost ifty cents
n it is therefore Fifty miles to Boston, If any
one doubts the conclusion, it can>oe at once
nailed by some authoritative pronu, cianiento,
4 that none other can for mome pt be sup
Il posed" What fools composed the delegations
!. that sought to insert white az restrictive of
s general citizenship, and with others actually
procured its insertion as restrictive o. their obi
4 cations to raise troops They sbyuld have
known that it was always UNDERSTOOD.
i 3. They were universally recognized as citi-
zeps. The elective franchise, till very recently
granted to none but citizens, was conferred upon
them in nearly all the original States; was with
in my own recollection enjoyed in North Caro-
lima, Tennessee, and Pennsylvania, and still is
in New York and nearly all the New England
States. Their citizenship itself was scarcely, if
at all, disputed. South Carolina and Delaware
4 alone refused them the rights of eleetors,* but
cannot learn that even there the general law
upon the subject was doubted or scsght to be
changed.
The new.fangled idea of this cour. was clear.
i ly unknown in 1900. In that year, Mr.. VAIN
i presented to the House an Anti Slav<ry petition
d from the free men of color of Philadelphia. The
petitioners expressly spoke of Themselves as cit
! liens of the United States and although the
petition caused two whole days of angry discus
I sion, none disputed the fact of citizenship, or
though it came from whites.
i / can only allude 10 the compl,s:nt of Mr..
Jefferson against the ottack of Beijish ship of
war upon the Chesapeake, and kill g and seiz-
/ ing American citizens ci sgens being
negroes; to the proclk of G., s. jackson
at New Orleans, calling upon the zee colored
people, as citizens, to rally in defes ce of their
country the final resolution of G .ngress ad-
hitting Missouri into the Union, ov, ruling one
i clause of her Constitution against Zee men of
! color from other States, because it Ontravened
hat clause of the Constitution Rasrantying
!, general citizenship or to the former practice
Of granting foreign passports to freq colored as
.reli as white citizens and csnnet allude at
all to the thousand other similar instances that
4 challenge attention. They all render absurd
the assumption that these persons /" were not
regarded in any of the States as members of
the community" &c.
/ have no time to go into further jetail but
I inasmuch as the Chief Justice has asserted that
| .'it cannot be believed that the larger slave.
| holding States regarded them as incipded in the
. word citizens" will briefly refer, to the acts
of Virginia on the subject which believe was
a tolerably large slaveholding State,
| The first action of Virginia upon citizenship
] find in 10 Henning, p. l29, 1870, 10 the act of
May 8, 1879, declaring who shall he deemed
| it was provided !" that alh white PERSONS
&c, and the free white inhabitants of every
one of the States" should be deemaS citizens,
AID should enjoy all the rights" &C., of citizens
OF Virginia. This restriction to "~hite per-
sons" within the State was so cont ,ry to the
general law, and to the spirit of th, day, and
the restriction to the white inhar 4tsnts of
the other States was so contrary to 10 Articles
of Confederation, that, at the OctolSr session,
1888, I'll Henning, 1913, 324,) the e,t was ex-
pressly repealed, and it was then Cd tcted that
all free persons born within the s,rritory of
this Commonwealth - shHl be deem.
ed citizens of this Commonwealth
This last act continued in force come forty
years, till a race arose that knew It Joseph,"
till after the commencement of tha.< grand de-
lection which has culminsted in the bred Scott
decision. 4" 1t cannot be believed" indeed If
this court would give more attent IN to facts,
and less to despotic interest and xstncts, it
might be led to believe many thing yet hidden
from its sight.
There is another fact in the L. -islation of
Virginia, that may throw little Lip It upon the
inquiry, as to whom this large ,Aveholding
State regarded as included in the prd citizen
In 9 Henning, 267, 26s, l End " an T for regu-
latiDg and disciplining the militia" ..assed May
8, l777, and in force, 30 far as md, at the
begins as follows: q
"For forming the citizens of thi; Common
wealth into militia, and disciplini., = the same
for defence thereof, be 1t enacted by he General
assembly, that all free male persona hired SER
wants, and apprentices, between i ages of
fifteen and fifty years, Except tho Governor,
&c., shall, by the commanding Of, ,er of the
county in which they reside, be e. :olled and
formed into companies of not less IAN thirty
two nor more than si1ty.eight rag. and file,
and these companies shall again BE- formed in
ito battalions," &c.
Here we have it on the record, plf n and I'M
equivocal, in the first Year of our inc pendence.
Gall free male persons" are exprs ,sly recog-
missed ss included in the words ctr ems of this
Commonwealth" "Bat this scan, ,t be be-
lieved,'" our court would say. &c The large
slaveholding States could not 30 re ard them
aud as we have decided that free habitants
means free white inhabitants, so free male
persons must mean free white max persons"
But, as if anticipating modern Jude j acumen,
the same act goes on to say "the zee mulat-
toes in said companies or battalit. 3 shall be
employed as drummers ifers, or piS&eers." So
it must "be believed" that " fret. Smale per-
tons means free male persons. -
Further, on page 2sO, find it p,syided that
the recruiting officers shall not :. enlist any
negro or mulatto into the service of this or
either of the United States, until<sJch negro
or mulatto shall produce certificate from
some justice of the peace of the cs.snty where
IN he resides, that he is free ma :"
| And in view of the fact that al The States
enlisted in the armies of the Rev,I fulton their
free colored az we'll as white citizer and upon
| the same terms that they hock d to their
country's standard with the same ~alacrity as
the whites that they fought and b. d on every
battle 6eld-the first blood shed in the contest
being that of a negro that ever Snce, they
have been pensioned under the sa se laws as
white soders-how intensely mes1 the bald
| assumption that they were not ssrt of the
people of the United States Or. 1t are the
necessities of despotism and hum jating the
shifts to which it drives its votaries
If those who fought through the Y 4r to estab.
| lish our liberties, who were electo, = in nearly
every State, and voted for the de5sgates that
Iadopted the Constitution, who wei, embraced
under the general law of citizenship, and no.
where excluded-if they formed NJ, part of the
| people or citizens of the country, s1Should like
to know on what rest .he claims VI any man,
| when the necessities of despotism demand hia
lexclusion? y
| have, l believe, succeeded in 1 owing that
United States citizenship in respec Ito natives.
IS matter exclusively of State re,s 1lation: so
that the citizens of eich State ar citizens of
the United s-atesi AID have ais negatived
the assumption that colored natis were no.
where treated aud Considered as a ,art of the
people, or citizens of the several ,tes. at the
adoption of the Federal Constitute So that.
| tha pdi to1 i