The weekly pioneer and Democrat. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. Territory) 1855-1865, 1864-05-06
Senator Charles Summers IS Great
Ideaw.s,


Most of our readers must have seen the
7e" Esprit going the rounds of the papers
relative to Senator CHARLES SUMMERS
" great adeaD." We state, as an interes-
ting TACT OF news, that the idea has at last
transpired-is born-is out at last, at large
on the public. This idee, as Western peo-
pie pronounce the word, is embodied in
his report as chairman of select commit
tee of the Senate on "Slavery and the
treatment of Freedmen, &C.. containing
twenty-four closely printed octave pages.
He has discovered that the clause of
section 2 of article OF the constitution
of the United States, under which the tu-
gitive slave laws were enacted, does not
and was not intended by the fathers of the
constitution to apply to slaves at all! The
clause reads: "No person held to service
or labor in one State, under the laws
thereof, escaping into another, shall, in
consequence of any law or regulation
therein, be discharged from such service or
labor; but shall be delivered up on claim
of the party to whom such service or la
Dor may be DUE
This clause Mr.. SUMNER, who occupies
the seat where once sat DANIEL WEBSTER
and RUFUS CHoATE, says means, if gra-
matically construed, that 'no person shall
be deIiuered up," &c. But he says, by
'no person" is only meant apprentices
and that slavery not being mentioned 60
m00aine in the Constitution, was not by
any of its provisions either recognized or
tolerated.
If the discussion of such question at
such time as this were not merely
piece of the most abstract folly, the Sen
ator from Massachusetts, might be asked
what is meant by the third clause of Sec
ton Q, Of article 1, of the Constitution,
which, in regard to the respective repre-
sentatives of the several States in Con-
gress, declares it shall be according to
their respective numbers, which shall be
determined by adding to the whole num-
Der of free persons, including those bound
TO ser0ice for term Of gears, and exc
Guiding Indians not taxed, Mree:tifths Of
all other persons" What is meant by call
other persons ?" What is meant be 'sre-
spective numbers ~ which Mr.. SUMNER
might say, referred to the States instead
of the inhabitants, according to his mex
orable rules of grammatical construction.
How did the Constitution tolerate the
slave trade till 1903 if it did not recog-
nize slavery without naming it?"
Now, no well balanced, unprecedented
mind will deny that slavery is not sin
and curse wherever it exists, but SEN
sible people will ask themselves, do such
claptrap argumentations about the consti-
tuition tend to do away with the evil? Will
the ten thousand copies of Mr.. SUMMERS
report help to feed the poor negroes who
are starving on the banks of the lower
Mississippi? Could not the money appro-
priated by Congress to publish these re-
ports have been applied to better purpose
than the circulation of Mr.. SUMMERS great
i0eaw?
We think the best way to free the slaves
is to conquer a peace with the Southern
States, and that however desirable the OBJ
Jet of emancipation may be, that we owe
other duties to the human race and to pa
triotism, which should prevent US from
attempting the attainment of that object,
through the fundamentally of miscegena-
ton or the sophstical destruction Of the
constitution.