Page:Debates in the Several State Conventions, v3.djvu/614

598 near me (Mr. White) could have met with the treatment it has. The honorable gentleman says there are only three rights stipulated in it. I thought this error might have been accounted for at first; but after he read it, the continuance of the mistake has astonished me. He has wandered from the point. [Here he read Mr. White's proposition.] Where in this paper do you discover that the people of Virginia are tenacious of three rights only? It declares that all power comes from the people, and whatever is not granted by them, remains with them; that among other things remaining with them, are liberty of the press, right of conscience, and some other essential rights. Could you devise any express form of words, by which the rights contained in the bill of rights of Virginia could be better secured or more fully comprehended? What is the paper which he offers in the form of a bill of rights? Will that better secure our rights than a declaration like this? All rights are therein declared to be completely vested in the people, unless expressly given away. Can there be a more pointed or positive reservation?

That honorable gentleman, and some others, have insisted that the abolition of slavery will result from it, and at the same time have complained that it encourages its continuation. The inconsistency proves, in some degree, the futility of their arguments. But if it be not conclusive, to satisfy the committee that there is no danger of enfranchisement taking place, I beg leave to refer them to the paper itself. I hope that there is none here who, considering the subject in the calm light of philosophy, will advance an objection dishonorable to Virginia—that, at the moment they are securing the rights of their citizens, an objection is started that there is a spark of hope that those unfortunate men now held in bondage may, by the operation of the general government, be made free. But if any gentleman be terrified by this apprehension, let him read the system. I ask, and I w ill ask again and again, till I be answered, (not by declamation,) Where is the part that has a tendency to the abolition of slavery? Is it the clause which says that "the migration or importation of such persons as any of the states now existing shall think proper to admit shall not be prohibited by Congress prior to the year 1808"? This is an exception from the power of regulating commerce, and the restriction