Page:The History of Slavery and the Slave Trade.djvu/483

, are none of them more indispensable ingredients in a republican form of government than the equality of privileges of all the population; yet these have not been denied to be reasonable, and warranted by the national constitution in the admission of new states. Nor need gentlemen apprehend that congress will set no reasonable limits to the conditions of admission. In the exercise of their constitutional discretion on this subject, they are, as in all other cases, responsible to the people. Their power to levy direct taxes is aot limited by the constitution. They may lay a tax of one million of dollars, or of a hundred millions, without violating the letter of the constitution; but if the latter enormous and unreasonable sum were levied, or even the former, without evident necessity, the people have the power in their own hands — a speedy corrective is found in the return of the elections. This remedy is so certain, that the representatives of the people can never lose sight of it; and, consequently, an abuse of their powers to any considerable extent can never be apprehended. The same reasoning applies to the exercise of all the powers entrusted to congress, and the admission of new states into the Union is in no respect an exception.

One gentleman, however, has contended against the amendment, because it abridges the rights of the slaveholding states to transport their slaves to the new states, for sale or otherwise. This argument is attempted to be enforced in various ways, and particularly by the clause in the constitution last cited. It admits, however, of a very clear answer by recurring to the 9th section of article 1st, which provides that "the migration or importation of such persons as any of the states then existing shall admit, shall not be prohibited by congress till 1808." This clearly implies that the migration and importation may be prohibited after that year. The importation has been prohibited, but the migration has not hitherto been restrained; congress, however, may restrain it when it may be judged expedient. It is, indeed, contended by some gentlemen, that migration is either synonymous with importation, or that it means something different from the transportation of slaves from one state to another. It certainly is not synonymous with importation, and would not have been used had it been so. It cannot mean exportation, which is also a definite and precise term. It cannot mean the reception of free blacks from foreign countries, as is alleged by some, because no possible reason existed for regulating their admission by the constitution; no free blacks ever came from Africa, or any other country to this; and to introduce the provision by the side of that for the importation of slaves, would have been absurd in the highest degree. What alternative remains but to apply the term "migration" to the transportation of slaves from those states where they are admitted to be held, to other states? Such a provision might have in view a very natural object. The price of slaves might be affected so far by a sudden prohibition to transport slaves from state to state, that it was as reasonable to guard against that inconvenience as against the sudden interdiction of the importation. Hitherto it has not been found necessary for congress to prohibit migration or transportation from state to state. But now it becomes the right and duty of