Page:The History of Slavery and the Slave Trade.djvu/443

 of the United States, shall, to all intents and purposes, be not only free persons, but free citizens. And that congress has such power is clearly proved by the very bill read this morning on the subject of naturalization, in which it is provided that the applicant shall be a "free white person," plainly implying that, but for that restriction, the slave black man, as well as the free white man, might avail himself of that law by fulfilling: its conditions.

"Moreover, congress have power to define and punish piracies and felonies on the high seas. Under this head, congress may, when they please, declare by law that an American going to the coast of Africa, and there receiving on board of auy vessel any person in chains or fetters, or in any manner under confinement, or carrying such person, whether sold as a slave or not, to any part of the world, without his own free will and consent, to be certified as congress may direct, shall be guilty of piracy and felony on the high seas, and, on conviction thereof, shall suffer death without benefit of clergy; and congress may, perhaps, go equally far with respect to foreigners who land slaves within the territory of the United States, in contravention of any regulation they nay please to make.

"So much as to the powers of congress. I desire that the world should know, I desire that those people in the gallery, about whom so much has been said, should know, that there is at least one member on this floor who believes that congress have ample powers to do all they have asked respecting the African slave-trade. Nor do I doubt that congress will, whenever necessity or policy dictate the measure, exercise those powers. I believe that the importation of one cargo of slaves would go far toward inducing such action; but I believe, also, that this necessity is not likely to happen. The states, I think, will severally do what is right in the premises.

"If the question were, what will congress do? not a member from the south is more ready than I to say, nothing. I think that as yet there is no necessity for acting. But the question being as to the powers of congress, those powers, if expressed at all, should be fully expressed."

Jackson, who rose in reply to Scott, after laboring to establish the divine origin of slavery by quotations from Moses, and its moral and political rectitude by the example of the Greeks and Romans, [sic]addresed himself then to the constitutional question. "The gentleman trusted there was no trafficking in the convention. What he called trafficking I believe was necessary. In order that the constitution might be made agreeable to all parties, interests were to be mutually given up. In suffering a bare majority of congress to decide on laws relative to navigation, the south admitted what was injurious to them, in order to obtain security for their slave property; and without it I believe the union would never have been completed. Break this tie, and you now dissolve it. Suppose congress were to forbid the eastern fishery, or to put restrictions upon it; would the eastern states submit? Affect the southern property, and gentlemen may assure themselves of the same tendency. The gentleman is willing to let this business rest till it appears what the states will do. His alternative is, if you will not abolish slavery, we will. He hoped