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

ZenS are expressly maue Scnotoi SisiNono'
know not what deductions of reason may be
clear to ewes filed with slave plantations-tG
eyes blinded by passion and interest but |!
any schoolboy, on any other theme, should &C
! boggle in logic, he would be at once promoted
/ from the forum to the dunce-block.
! But, suppose State change this intention,
if it ever existed its general power over citizen
ship is clearly reserved, and, under the Eberali
zing influence of Democracy and Christianity
it may abandon design it was always ashamed
to put on the record. What is to hinder Blu,
it has no power, Gays the Chief Justice, and
for the reason that it has delegated to Congress,
the power to make rules of naturalization
Well, then, we must look to Congress to natu:
ralize these persons. But Congress can only
provide for the naturalizatio of aliens; an1
these persons are native born. And thus WI
have description of person" that can nevei
be made citizens and for the reason, thai
Congress may naturalize another description o.
personsi
And is this the new phase of the doctrine OF
State Rights2 have looked with anxious
attention for the protests of those who annually
endorse the resolutions of 1898 against this last
and boldest in this courts long series of at
tacks upon the sovereignty of the States. The
power of the States over citizenship, as clearly
power can be, and the rights of those CITIZEN
to general citizenship, guaranteed as plainly az
language can do it, are impudently denied
and by reasoning that would disgrace fresh.
man. And yet these guardians of State sover
eigniy-men boisterous in defence of STATED
right to oppress--clamorousy echo the denial
The people of some of the States are believ
ed wish there were no doubt of the fact
be as earnestly devoted to justice, to the dot
trines of the Declaration, and the spirit of thu
Constitution, as others are supposed to be tt
their opposite. To render fruitless that devo
ton, State sovereignty, and with it the Consti
tuition, must be overthrow. Well may thi
colored American view with vengeful Joy th.
madness of his insane tormentors, as he seee
them, in their eagerness to destroy every refuge
from their hate, pull down upon their OWL
heads the fair fabric of their own constitutions
freedom!
But the doctrinal heresy of this opinion doe
not exceed It's gross perversions of history
do not now propose to wade through the mag
OF those perversions; to trace the garbled fact
and false innuendoes; the appeals to low pref,
dice and despotic fears; the ISLANDERS of the gre,
dead and the miserable reasoning (2) that pc
wade it. With sorrowful emotions have bee
through them all. And have sometimes in :
agined the shades of Jay and of Marshall-me:
with whose national doctrines / have little
sympathy. yet men who loved law and revereG
justice-to be sadly looking DER with me the
dirty page, wondering tina: they ever shoult
have looked to irresponsible bodies as check
upon popular I'M ustice. (.
The main historical claim alone have time
to notice: "When the Constitution was adopt
ed, says the syllabus, "they free negroesf
were not regarded in any Of the States az
members of the community which constituted.
the State, and were not numbered among it,
people or citizens.'" :
If this claim be true, it must be susceptible
of the most unequivccal proof Upon so ims
portant a question, it will never do to admit a.
doubt. And the rule excluding these persons
must have been clear and explicit; yet such
explicit exclusion is not pretended. But the
fact is sought to be established by series of
strained inferences and mere guesses. Resors
is not had to the law and the testimony Stat
utes, constitutions, records, are passed by as
unworthy of attention; and the assumption of
the exclusion is founded upon the fact alone
that the ancestors of its subjects had been
enslsved, and they themselves we're sometimes
unjustly trested-as though Governments had
done anything else, in this world of ours, than
Cypress, directly or Indirectly, one class or an
other of their citizens or subjects.
This, then, is the proposition: "that no per-
son whose ancestors had been oppressed, and
who was himself illtreated by the colonists,
could have been numbered among the people
or citizens" / would advise caution to those
who propose to accept this proposition, close
examination of the genealogical tree, lest the
conclusion might apply where least expected.
But the great birth act of the Republic is in
the way of the court, and the audacious sacri-
eye with which that act is treated, confess,
surprises me. The great principles of justice
and natural law upon which it was founded
those principles that alone redeemed our IA
theirs from the charge of criminal rebellion
are limited to race, to a mere fraction of the
human family; and failing in argument to
prove this limitation, the court magisterially
pronounces it I" too clear for dispute" The
idea, so sublime yet so simple, that the COM
mon Father of mankind has endowed His chill
dren with rights which cannot be taken from
them-the right to life and the right to liber-
ty-this divine idea the harmonic chain of hu.
man society, before which our fathers bowed in
humble contrition for their own inconsistency,
yet in fervent hope for its full realization, be-
cause of this inconsistency, is shorn of its holt
ness, ID made but the precept of tyranny. That
Sentence, that has commanded the homsge of
mankind this court would thus sneeringly rem.
der: " We hold these truths to be selfevident:
that the superior races, if born of free mothers
are created equal that they are endowed by
their Creator with certain iualensble rights !;
that among them are life, liberty, and the pur-
suit of happiness; that to secure these rights
Governments are instituted, deriving their Just
powers from the consent of such races, if free
and white, among the governed"
But our fathers deserve not this taunt. That
fha- holl =
aud what human institutions realize the ideal of
those who are leading US onward and upward p
but none were more keenly sensible than they
of this inconsistency; none could be more anx
lous to be redeemed from Its charge; and not
by apostacy to their sublime faith, but by
works meet for repentance" We according
" lind the great and good among them anx-
iously laboring TO carry out the doctrines Of the
Declaration, and as understood by them, not
| by this court. Franklin, Jay, Hamilton, aud
others, became officers of societies for the abo.
| lition OF Slavery and protection of the free.
And to illustrate our own apossacy from these
ituthe, IN contrast with their former apprecia.
Ion, ask attention to the fact that a recen.
| othcer OF the same society of which Franklin
was President, Tor pursuing itslegitimate work
a work that woys the brightest flowers in the
| chapet On the brow Of the philos 1pher-was
illegally thrown into prison by a Federal Judge,
chile his own State refused him protection, aud
| oils own city applauded the outrage! So Wash
! ington and Jefferson, and all others whose
| names pOstarity holds in reverence, united in
| coDdemning Slavery, and especially as a glsr:
| ing Inconsistency with the principles of the
| Declaration.
But, to be more specific: This court was
forced to admit, and thereby admitted away its
whole case, that all who were citizens in the
several States ct the time of the adoption of the
Constitution, bec&I,e citizens of the Untea
States. page 400 So we have only to in
| auire whether free blacks Wera then citizens IL