Union County star and Lewisburg chronicle. [volume] (Lewisburg, Pa.) 1859-1864, 1860-05-18

Of American society, that all men are ere.
ated equal, and have inaienable rights tc
life, liberty, aud the pursuit of happiness
Each State, however, reserved to oitself ex
elusive political power over the subject OF
slavery within its own borders. Neverthe.
less, it unavoidably presented itself in
their consultations on bond Of Federal
Union. The new Government was to be
representative one. Slaves were capital
in some States, in others capital had nO
investments in labor Should those slaves
be represented as capital or as persons, OF
should they not be represented or taxed at
all? The fathers disagreed, debated long,
and compromised at last. Each State,
they determined, shall have two Senators
in Congress. Three-ffths of the slaves
shall be elsewhere represented and be tax
ed as persons. What should be done if
the slave should escape into labor State
Should that State confess him to be a
chattel, aud restore him as such, or might
1t regard him As person, and harbor and
protect him as man! They compromised
again, and decided that no person held to
labor or service in one State by the laws
thereof, escaping into another, shall, BY
any law or regulation Of that State, be dis
charged from such labor or service, but
shall be delivered up on claim to the per-
son to whom such labor or service shall be
due
Free laborers would immigrate, and
slaves might be imported into the States
The fathers agreed that Congress may es-
tablish uniform laws of naturalization, aud
it might prohibit the importation of per-
sous after lSUS. Communities in the
Southwest, detached from the Southern
States, were growing up in the practice Of
slavery, to be capital States. New States
would soon grow up IN the Northwest,
while as yet capital stood aloof, and labor
had not lifted the axe to begin there its
endless but beneticeut task. The fathers
authorized Congress TO make all Deedful
rules and regulations concerning the man
agemout aud disposition Of the public
lands, and to admit new States. So the
Constitution, while it does no. disturb or
affect the system of capital in slaves, exis
ting in any State under its own laws, does,
at the same time, recognise every human
being, when within any exclusive sphere
of Federal jurisdis,ion, not as capital, but
as a person.
What was the action Of the fathers in
Congress? They admitted the new States
Of the Southwest as capital States, because
it was practically impossible to do other
wise, and by the ordnance of 1877, cou,
frmed in 1883, they provided for the Or
ganiz and admission Of only labor
States in the Northwest. They directed
fugi,ives from service to be restored, not
as chattels, but as persons. They award
ed naturalization to migrant free labOrers,
aud they prohibited the trade in African
labor. This disposition of the whole sub
jet was III harmony with the condition of
society, and in the main with the spirit OF
the age. The seven Northern States CON
teutedly became labor States by their own
acts. The six Southern States, with equal
tranquility and BY their OVID determination,
remalucd capital States.
The Circumstances which the fathers did
not clearly fOresee were two, namely: the
reinvigoration of slavery consequent on the
increased consumption of cotton, and the
extension Of the national domain across
the Mississippi; and these occurred before
1920. The State Of Louisiana, formed on
slavehOldiDg French settlement, within
the new y-acquirei Louisiana Territory,
had then already been admitted into the
Ubion. There yet remained, however, a
vast region which included Arkansas and
Missouri, together with the then unoccu-
pied and even unnamed Kansas aud Ne !
braska. Arkansas, a slaveholding commu-
nifty, was nearl ly ready to.apply, and Mis-
souri,, another such Territory, was actually
applying for admission into the Federal
Union, The existing capital States secon-
ded these applications, and claimed that the
whole Louisianian Territory was right
fully open to slavery, and to the organiza,
ton of future slave States. The labor
States maintained that Congress had su-
preme legislative power within the domain,
and could and ought to exclude slavery
there. The question thus opened was one
which related not at all to slavery in the
existing capital States. 1t was purely and
simply national question, whether the
interest of the whole Republic
required that Arkansas, Missouri, Kansas,
md Nebraska, should become capital
States, with all the evils and dangers of
avcry, or be labor States, with all the
ecurity, benefits, and blessings of freedom
IN the decision was suspended the qucs-
ion, as We thought, whether ultimately
he interior of this new continent should
'e an asylum for the oppressed and the
xilc, coming year after year aud age after
ge, voluntarily from every other civilized
and, as well as for the children of misfor- :
une in our own, or whether, through the
euewal of the African slave trade, those
magnificent and luxuriant regions should
e surrendered to the control of capital,
ringing out the fruits of the earth through :
he impoverishing toll of negro slaves.
That question of 1920 was ideniically t
be question of 1850, SO far as principle, t
nd even the field Of its application, was S
onccrned. Every element of the contro- c
ersy now present, entered it theu-the 4
ghifulness or the wrongfulness Of slavery; a
S effects, present and future the copsti- r
I'lOD a ant hOrity of rcp,.or.. a.. Ill: 7 6