Page:The History of Slavery and the Slave Trade.djvu/500

 alter, modify, amend, and change their state constitutions, having regard alone to a republican form? And was there any existing law, or any clause in the federal constitution, that prohibited a total change from a slaveholding to a non-slaveholding state, or from a non-slaveholding to a slaveholding state? Mr. Scott thought that if this provision was proper, or within the powers of congress, they also had the correlative right to say that the people of Missouri should not be admitted as a state, unless they provided, in the formation of their state constitution, that slavery should be tolerated. Would not those conscientious gentlemen startle at this, and exclaim, what! impose on those people slaves, when they do not want them? This would be said to be a direct attack on the state independence. Was it in the power of congress to annex the present condition, Mr. Scott deemed it equally within the scope of their authority to say what color the inhabitants of the proposed state should be, what description of property, other than slaves, those people should or should not possess, and the quantity of property each man should retain, going upon the agrarian principle. He would even go further, and say that congress had an equal power to enact to what religion the people should subscribe; that none other should be professed, and to provide for the excommunication of all those who did not submit.

The people of Missouri were, if admitted into the Union, to come in on an equal footing with the original states. That the people of the other states had the right to regulate their own internal police, to prescribe the rules of their own conduct, and, in the formation of their constitution, to say whether slavery was or was not admissible, he believed was a point conceded by all. How, then, were the citizens of Missouri placed on an equal footing with the other members of the Union? Equal in some respects — a shameful discrimination in others. A discrimination not warranted by the constitution, nor justified by the treaty of cession, but founded on mistaken zeal, or erroneous policy. They were to be bound down by onerous conditions, limitations, and restrictions to which he knew they would not submit. That people were brave and independent, and willing to risk their own happiness and future prosperity on the legitimate exercise of their own judgment and free will. Mr. Scott protested against such a guardianship as was contemplated now to be assumed over his constituents. The spirit of freedom burned in the bosom of the freemen of Missouri, and if admitted into the national family, they would be equal, or not come in at all. With what an anxious eye have they looked to the east, since the commencement of this session of congress, for the good tidings, that on them you had conferred the glorious privilege of self-government and independence. What seeds of discord will you sow, when they read this suspicious, shameful, unconstitutional inhibition in their charter? Will they not compare it with the terms of the treaty of cession, that bill of their rights, emphatically their magna charta? And will not the result of that comparison be a stigma on the faith of this government? It had been admitted by some gentlemen, in debate, that, were the people of Missouri to form a constitution conforming to this provision, so soon as they were adopted into