not conflict with the Constitution of the United States; and that a law, either protecting or prohibiting slavery, was not repugnant to that instrument, as was evidenced by the fact, that one-half of the States of the Union tolerated, while the other half prohibited, the institution of slavery. On the other hand it was insisted that, by virtue of the Constitution of the United States, every citizen had a right to remove to any Territory of the Union, and carry his property with him under the protection of law, whether that property consisted in persons or things.

Such being the character of the controversy, in respect to the territory acquired from Mexico, a similar question has arisen in regard to the right to hold slaves in the proposed territory of Nebraska when the Indian laws shall be withdrawn, and the country thrown open to emigration and settlement. . .

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. . The decision of this question involves the constitutional power of Congress to pass laws prescribing and regulating the domestic institutions of the various territories of the Union. In the opinion of those eminent statesmen, who hold that Congress is invested with no rightful authority to legislate upon the subject of slavery in the territories, the 8th section of the act preparatory to the admission of Missouri is null and void; while the prevailing sentiment in large portions of the Union sustains the doctrine that the Constitution of the United States secures to every citizen an inalienable right to move into any of the territories with his property, of whatever kind and description, and to hold and enjoy the same under the sanction of law. Your committee do not feel themselves called upon to enter into the discussion of these controverted questions. They involve the same grave issues which produced the agitation, the sectional strife, and the fearful struggle of 1850. As Congress deemed it wise and prudent to refrain from deciding the matters in controversy then, either by affirming or repealing the Mexican laws, or by an act declaratory of the true intent of the Constitution and the extent of the protection afforded by it to slave property in the territories, so your committee are not prepared now to recommend a departure from

the course pursued on that memorable occasion, either by affirming or repealing the 8th section of the Missouri act, or by any act declaratory of the meaning of the Constitution in respect to the legal points in dispute.

Your committee deem it fortunate for the peace of the country, and the security of the Union, that the controversy then resulted in the adoption of the compromise measures, which the two great political parties, with singular unanimity, have affirmed as a cardinal article of their faith, and proclaimed to the world, as a final settlement of the controversy and an end of the agitation. A due respect, therefore, for the avowed opinions of Senators, as well as a proper sense of patriotic duty, enjoins upon your committee the propriety and necessity of a strict adherence to the principles, and even a literal adoption of the enactments of that adjustment in all their territorial bills, so far as the same are not locally inapplicable.

From these provisions it is apparent that the compromise measures of 1850 affirm and rest upon the following propositions First: That all questions pertaining to slavery in the territories, and in the new States to be formed therefrom, are to be left to the decision of the people residing therein, by their appropriate representatives, to be chosen by them for that purpose.

Second: That "all cases involving title to slaves," and "questions of personal freedom" are referred to the adjudication of the local tribunals, with the right of appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States.

Third: That the provisions of the Constitution of the United States, in respect to fugitives from service, is to be carried into faithful execution in all "the organized territories" the same as in the States. The substitute for the bill which your committee have prepared, and which is commended to the favorable action. of the Senate, proposes to carry these propositions and principles into practical operation, in the precise language of the compromise measures of 1850.

136. Senator Everett on the Principle of the Legislation of 1850.1

The Missouri restriction of 1820, it is said, is inconsistent with the principle of the legislation of 1850. If anything more is meant by "the principle" of the legislation of 1850, than the measures which were adopted at that time in reference to the Territories of New Mexico and Utah for I may assume that those are the legislative measures referred to― if anything more is meant than that a certain measure was adopted, and enacted in reference to those Territories, I take issue on that point. I do not know that it could be proved that, even in reference to those Territories, a principle was enacted at all. A certain measure, or, if you please, a course of measures, was enacted in reference to the Territories of New Mexico and Utah; but I do not know that you can call this enacting a principle. It is certainly not enacting a principle which is to carry with it a rule for other Territories lying in other parts of the country, and in a different legal position. As to the principle of nonintervention on the part of Congress in the question of slavery, I do not find that, either as principle or as measure, it was enacted in those territorial bills of 1850. I do not, unless I have greatly misread them, find that there is anything at all which comes up to that. Every legislative act of those territorial governments must come before Congress for allowance or disallowance, and under those bills, without repealing them, without departing from them in the slightest degree, it would be competent for Congress to-morrow to pass any law on that subject.

How then can it be said that the principle of non-intervention on the part of Congress in the subject of slavery was enacted and established by the compromise measures of 1850? But, whether that be so or not, how can you find, in a simple measure applying in terms to these individual Territories, and to them alone, a rule which is to govern all other Territories with a retrospective and with a prospective action? Is it not a

1 February 8, 1854. Congressional Globe, 33 Cong., 1 Sess., App., 160–62 passim.

mere begging of the question to say that those compromise measures, adopted in this specific case, amount to such a general rule?

But, let us try it in a parallel case. In the earlier land legislation of the United States, it was customary, without exception, when a territory became a State, to require that there should be a stipulation in their State constitution that the public lands sold within their borders should be exempted from taxation for five years after the sale. This, I believe, continued to be the uniform practice down to the year 1820, when the State of Missouri was admitted. She was admitted under this stipulation. If I mistake not, the next State which was admitted into the Union - but it is not important whether it was the next or not - came in without that stipulation, and they were left free to tax the public lands the moment when they were sold. Here was a principle; as much a principle as it is contended was established in the Utah and New Mexico territorial bill; but did any one suppose that it acted upon the other Territories? I believe the whole system is now abolished under the operation of general laws, and the influence of that example may have led to the change. But, until it was made by legislation, the mere fact that public lands sold in Arkansas, were immediately subject to taxation, could not alter the law in regard to the public lands sold in Missouri, or in any other State where they were exempt.

There is a case equally analogous to the very matter we are now considering the prohibition or permission of slavery. The ordinance of 1787 prohibited slavery in the territory northwest of the Ohio. In 1790 Congress passed an act accepting the cession which the State of North Carolina had made of the western part of her territory, with the proviso, that in reference to the territory thus ceded Congress should pass no laws "tending to the emancipation of slaves." Here was a precisely parallel case. Here was territory in which, in 1787, slavery was prohibited. Here was territory ceded by North Carolina, which became the territory of the United States south of the Ohio, in reference to which it was stipulated with North Carolina, that

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Congress should pass no laws tending to the emancipation of slaves. But I believe it never occurred to any one that the legislation of 1790 acted back upon the ordinance of 1787, or furnished a rule by which any effect could be produced upon the state of things existing under that ordinance, in the territory to which it applied. . . .

Look at the words of the acts themselves. They are specific. They give you boundaries. The lines are run. The Territories are geographically marked out. They fill a particular place on the map of the continent; and it is provided that within those specific geographical limits a certain state of things, with reference to slavery shall exist. That is all. There is not a word which states on what principle that is done. There is not a word to tell you that that state of things carries with it a rule which is to operate elsewhere- retrospectively upon territory acquired in 1803, and prospectively on territory that shall be acquired to the end of time. There is not a word to carry the operation of those measures over the geographical boundary which is laid down in the bills themselves.

It would be singular if, under any circumstances the measures adopted should have this extended effect, without any words to indicate it. It would be singular, if there was nothing that stood in the way; but when you consider that there is a positive enactment in the way — the eighth section of the Missouri law, which you now propose to repeal because it does stand in the way-how can you think that these enactments of 1850 in reference to Utah and New Mexico were intended to overleap these boundaries in the face of positive law to the contrary, and to fall upon and decide the organization of Territories in a region purchased from France nearly fifty years before, and subject to a distinct specific legislative provision.

Sir, it is to me a most singular thing that words of extension in 1854 should be thought necessary in this bill to give the effect supposed to have been intended to the provisions of the acts of 1850, and that it should not be thought necessary in 1850 to put these words of extension into the original bills themselves.