Page:A legal review of the case of Dred Scott, as decided by the Supreme Court of the United States.djvu/23

 nor intended to be included in the general words used in that memorable instrument." p. 407.

Free negroes have also been admitted as citizens by every treaty, by which the United States have acquired a Territory from a foreign nation. Thus the treaty with France of 1803, by which that Territory was obtained, part of which now forms the State of Missouri, provides that "the inhabitants of the ceded Territory shall be incorporated in the Union of the United States, and admitted as soon as possible, according to the principles of the Federal Constitution, to the enjoyment of all the rights, advantages and immunities of citizens of the United States." The treaty with Spain for the purchase of Florida, contains the like words, under which the supreme court of Alabama have held that a free negro was entitled to the rights of a citizen of the United States. Tannis v. Doe, 21 Alab. 454. Perhaps the silence of Mr. Justice Campbell on this point may have been occasioned in part by the decision of the supreme court of his own State. The treaty with Mexico of 1848, contained a similar clause, using the words "citizens" instead of "inhabitants;" and the supreme court of the United States, within two years past, unanimously declared, in a case where the title of land depended upon the point, that "all the inhabitants, without distinction, whether Europeans, Africans, or Indians, were citizens" of Mexico. United States v. Ritchie, 17 Howard, 525.

The authorities therefore clearly show that free negroes, born in the United States, are to be presumed citizens in all those States in which no law to the contrary is proved. No statute or decision of the State of Missouri, as to the extent of the rights allowed to free negroes in that State, is referred to in the opinion of any of the judges. We have had no opportunity to make a thorough examination of the statutes of Missouri, but some of them in so many terms recognize the fact that there may be free negroes who are citizens of the United States. Revised Statutes of Missouri, c. 123, § 9.

The three judges, who now think that free negroes cannot be citizens, seem to have been much influenced by the consideration, that, if citizens, they might, under the clause giving to citizens of each State all privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States, claim rights which might be dangerous to the peace and safety of States where slavery is recognized. We are inclined to think that clause secures to citizens of one State in another, those privileges and immunities only which would there be allowed to citizens