The national Republican., 1862-03-17

paid to anonymous communications
EMANCIPATION IN THE DIsTRlCT---
SUBMITTING 1T 10 THE PEOPLE.
The last effort Of the enemies OF the great
measure Of emancipation in this District is to
persuade Congress TO make II contingent upon
the ratification Of a popular vote. This would
give them delay, at any rate, and the possible
chance of defeating the measure altogether.
Drowning men catch at straws, and the parli'
sans Of q condemned institution will be thank
full for even reprieve Of execution.
While we do not doubt that an overwhelming
majority Of the citizens OF this District desire
the passage Of such a bill Of emancipation as
has been matured by the appropriate commit
tees of Congress, we are opposed to its submis
sion to any popular vote less than that Of the
whole body Of the citizens of the United States,
and that is sort of submission which nobody
proposes and which is wholly impracticable
We are opposed to It's submission 10 any such
restricted vote as that Of the people Of this little
District, never larger than ten miles square,
and now reduced by amputation to much
smaller dimensions.
In the first place, there is no more reason for
submitting this measure TO popular vote, than
there is for submitting to the same arbitramen'
hundred other measures affecting local inter
ests, as bank charters, city railroads, &c.
In the next place, the proposed submission il
violation Of that provision Of the Constitution
Of the United States, which vests exclusive leg
islstive power here in Congress That is moi .
power to be transferred to 0thers, or exercised
by deputation.
Deputing it to majority OF the legal voters
Of the District, II not as tyrannical, is az un.
constitutional, as any other conceivable depu
tation. 1t is supposuble that many persons
have remained here, or have removed here, on
the faith that they were to be governed legis.
latively by Congress, who would not have re.
mained here or removed here, to be subject 10
such law making power as is now suggested,
viz: a decision at the polls, by small popula-
ton, mostly city population, and with all the
hazards of fraud and deluson and all the GER
thihIitn VI SASitVucut iCCliuk dttuuiuS
that method of arbitrament We speak now Of
legislative government, and although the line
separ atipg what is municipal and may there,
fore be left to localities, from those general
rules affecting life and property which can only
emsnate from the sovereign legislative power
may not be exactly de6nable, yet nobody will
pretend that the establishment, or abrogaton
Of slavery, is a municipal affair. II that inst
tuition exists here, it is by the act Of Congress:
adopting and re-enacting certain laws Of Mary
land. 1t is Congress only which could estab
lish slavery here, and il IL Congress alone which
can abolish it.
In the third place, the proposed submission
vitlstes the whole measure, upon the basis upor
which it isput in the common discussions of it
and upon which the courts may put it. Ii it il
tobe sustained as case Of taking private prop
erty for public uses upon the payment Of com
pensation, (assumipg that the restrictions of The
Constitution upon that subject apply to thi,
District) there must be decision by ,he'legi,
lative power that the private property is need
ed for the public use. Congress- may SC
decide, but it cannot delegate the power 30 Il
decile to the voters o! this District
In the fourth place, there is no such body
polite as the District OF Columbia, and il the
theory of submission is sound one, II should
be made separately to the city OF Georgetown
TO the city Of Washington, and to the rural dis,
tricts outside Of those citieH Why should We
who live in the city OF Washington, be com
PEELED to remain incumbered with slavery
merely because we may be Outvoted, il such
should happen TO be the fact, by the people o.
Georgetown and Of the county OF Washington
We have no such relations with them, az cit
zens Of the same State have with each other
and which Is that of members Of the same polit
lcal community, acting according TO the will
of the majority of it as an aggregate. Vast
ington has the relation to Georgetown of geo
graphical contact, and such an identity ol
political condition as exists in the fact OF a
common subsection to the same supreme power
exterior 10 both Of them that of the nation
But there Is no relation between the two cities
which can render it tolerable that either shal
be controlled by the other, az to slavery, OF
any other matter whatever.
In the fifth place, the proposed submission i,
an adoption and endorsement Of that most pos
tilent violation Of popular sovereignty which
was strangely christened the doctrine of pop
ular sovereignty" and which, having rur
through its brief day Of existence, is now con
signed 10 the receptacle OF things forgotten, OF
remembered only with derision. The scope o
that doctrine, or az 1t was sometimes called
''principLe," Heaven save the mark, was 10 de
fraud the whole people Of the nation Of their
sovereignty over the Territories Of the nation
by transferring II to whatever indnitesimal mi.
nority OF thepeople might happen to inhabit a
particular Territory at particular time. 1t
has no plausibility, except what II derives from
confoundng municipal with legislative reg
ulations, and assuming that the latter should