Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1860-03-09

menus IN ldUOI ououlu luONt slaves uo iNf
resented as capital or as persons, taxed as
capital or as persons, or should they not DC
represented or taxed at all , The fathers DIS
agreed, debated long, and compromised at
last. Each State. they determined, shall have
two Senators In Congress. Three ifths of
the slaves shall be elsewhere represented and
be taxed as persons. What should be done
if the slave should escape into labor State
Should that State confess him to be chattcl
and restore him as such, OF might it regard
him as a person, and harbor and protect him
as man They compromised again, and
decided that no person held TO labor or SER
vice in ono State by the laws thereof, escaping
into another, shall by any law or regulation
Of that State, be discharged from such labor
or service, but shall be delivered up on claim
to the person TO whom such labor or service
shall be due.
Free aborers would immigrate, and slaves
might be imported into the States. The fa-
theirs agreed that Congress may establish uni
form laws Of naturalization, and 1t might pro-
hibit importation Of persons after 1908. Com
munitcs in the Southwest, detached from the
Southern States, were growing up in the prac-
tice Of slavery, to be capital States. New
States would soon grow up in the Northwest
while as yet capital stood alool, and labor had
not lifted the axe to begin there its endless
but bcnehcent task The fathers authorized
Congress to make all needhl rules and rcgu-
lations concerning the arrangement and dispo-
sition Of the public lands, and TO admit new
States. SO the Constitution, while it does
not disturb or affect tho system Of capital IN
slaves, existing in any State under its own
laws, does, at the same time, recognize every
human being when within any exclusive
sphere of Federal jurisdiction, not as capital
but a person.
WHAT THEY DID IN CONGRESS.
What was the action Of the fathers in Con
gress; They admitted the new States Of the
Southwest as capital States. because 1t was
practically impossible to do otherwise, and by
the ordinance Of 1881, confirmed in 1859,
they provided for the organization and admis-
sion of only labor States in the Northwest
They directed fugitives from service to be re-
stored not as chattels, but as persons. They
awarded naturalization to immigrant free la
borers, and they prohibited the trade in Airi-
can labor The disposition Of the whole sub
ject was in harmony with the condition Of So
ciety, and in the main, with the spirit Of the
age. The seven Northern States contentedly
became labor States by their own acts. The
six Southern States with equal tranquility
and by their own determination remained cap
ital States.
WHAT THEY DID NOT FOREsEE.
The circumstances which the fathers did
not clearly foresee were two. namely: the re-
inauguration Of slavery consequent on the in
creased consumption of cotton, and the ex-
tension Of the national domain across the Mis-
/ sissippi, and these occurred before $50. The
State of Louisiana, formed on a slaveholding
Z French settlement. within the newly acquired
Louisianian Territory, had then already been
T admitted into the Union There yet remain
ed, however. vast region which included Ar
/ kansas and Missouri, together with the then
unoccupied and even unnamed Kansas and
q Nebraska. Arkansas, a slaveholding com
munity, was nearly ready to apply, and Mis-
souri, another such Territory, was actually
, applying for admission into the Federal I'M
ion. The existing capital States seconded
these applications. and claimed that the whole
: Louisianian Territory was rightfully open to
slavery, and to the organization of future slave
! States. The labor States maintained that
Congress had supreme legislative power with
A in the domain and could and ought to ex-
! clude slavery there The question thus open
ed was one which related not at all to slavery
$ in the existing capital States 1t was purely
B. and simply a national question whether the
- common interest of the whole Republic re-
e quired that Arkansas, Missouri, Kansas and
$ Nebraska, should become capital States, with
e all the evils and dangers Of slavery, OF be la
e Dor States, with all the security benefits aud
- blessings Of freedom. On the decision was
p suspended the question, as was thought, whe-
= ther ultimately the Interior Of this new con
tinent should be an asylum for the oppressed
IL 10.
p after age, voluntarily from every other civil
2, lied land, as well as for the children Of mis-
= fortune in our own, or whether, through the
! renewal of the African slave trade, those mag
r nifcent and luxuriant regions should be sur
| rendered to the control Of capital, wringing
out the fruit of the earth through the impov-
orishing toll of negro slaves. That question
of 1920 was identicaly the question of 1860,
r so far principle, and even the field of its
application was concerned Every element OF
the controversy now present entered it then
the rightfulness or the wrongfulness of slave
ry; its effect, present and future; the consti-
tutonal authority of Congress the claims OF
/ the States, and of their citizens; the nature
Of the Federal Union, whether it is a compact
i between the States, or an independent gov
/ ernment; the springs Of its powers, and the
ligatures upon their exercise. All these were
! discussed with zeal and ability which have
never been surpassed. History tells us,
know not how truly, that the Union reeled
i under the vehemonce of that great debate
Patriotism took counsel from prudence, and
: enforced a settlement which has proved to be
, not final one and which, as is now seen,
practically left open all the great political is
sues which were involved, Missouri and Ar
kansas were admitted capital States, while
+ labor obtained, as reservation, the abridged
but yet comprehensive field Of Kansas and
Nebraska.
! Now, when the present conditions of the
various parts of the Louisianian Territory arc
! observed, and we see that capital retains un-
disputed possession of what it then obtained
' while labor is convulsing the country with sc
hard and prolonged struggle to regain
the lost equivalent which was then guaranteed
to it under circumstances of so great solemni-
. ty, we may we'll desire not to be undeceiyed
If the Missouri compromise was indeed un
necessarily accepted by the free States, inhu-
enced by exaggerations of the dangers of dis
t. union. The Missouri debate disclosed TRUTH
c of great moment for ulteior use:
A WHAT TRUTHS THE MISSOURI DEBATE DIS
= CLOSED.