the United States. I think I can lay it down as a correct principle, that the common law of England, as it was at the time of the Declaration of Independence, still continues to be the national law of this country, so far as it is applicable to our present state, and subject to the modifications it has received here in the course of nearly half a century." Chief Justice Taylor of North Carolina, in his decision in the case of the State vs. Reed, in 1823, Hawkes' N.C. Reps. 454, says, "a law of paramount, obligation to the statute, was violated by the offence--COMMON LAW, founded upon the law of nature, and confirmed by revelation." The legislation of the United States abounds in recognitions of the principles of the common law, asserting their paramount binding power. Sparing details, of which our national state papers are full, we illustrate by a single instance. It was made a condition of the admission of Louisiana into the Union, that the right of trial by jury should be secured to all her citizens,--the United States government thus employing its power to enlarge the jurisdiction of the common law in this its great representative.

Having shown that the abolition of slavery is within the competency of the law-making power, when unrestricted by constitutional provisions, and that the legislation of Congress over the District is thus unrestricted, its power to abolish slavery there is established. We argue it further, from the fact that,

10. SLAVERY NOW EXISTS IN THE DISTRICT BY AN ACT OF CONGRESS. In the act of 16th July, 1790, Congress accepted portions of territory offered by the states of Maryland and Virginia, and enacted that the laws, as they then were, should continue in force, "until Congress shall otherwise by law provide." Under these laws, adopted by Congress, and in effect re-enacted and made laws of the District, the slaves there are now held.

Is Congress so impotent in its own "exclusive jurisdiction" that it cannot "otherwise by law provide?" If it can say, what shall be considered property, it can say what shall not be considered property. Suppose a legislature should enact that marriage contracts should be mere bills of sale, making a husband the proprietor of his wife, as his bona fide property; and suppose husbands should herd their wives in droves for the market as beasts of burden, or for the brothel as victims of lust, and then prate about their inviolable legal property, and deny the power of the legislature, which stamped them "property," to undo its own wrong, and secure to wives by law the rights of human beings. Would such cant about "legal rights" be heeded where reason and justice held sway, and where law, based upon fundamental morality, received homage? If a frantic legislature pronounces woman a chattel, has it no power, with returning reason, to take back the blasphemy? Is the impious edict irrepealable? Be it, that with legal forms it has stamped wives "wares." Can no legislation blot out the brand? Must the handwriting of Deity on human nature be expunged for ever? Has LAW no power to stay the erasing pen, and tear off the scrawled label that covers up the IMAGE OF GOD?

II. THE POWER OF CONGRESS TO ABOLISH SLAVERY IN THE DISTRICT HAS BEEN, TILL RECENTLY, UNIVERSALLY CONCEDED.

1. It has been assumed by Congress itself. The following record stands on the journals of the House of Representatives for 1804, p. 225: "On motion made and seconded that the House do come to the following resolution: 'Resolved, That from and after the 4th day of July, 1805, all blacks and people of color that shall be born within the District of Columbia, or whose mothers shall be the property of any person residing within the said District, shall be free, the males at the age of ----, and the females at the age of ----. The main question being taken that the House do agree to said motions as originally proposed, it was negatived by a majority of 46.'" Though the motion was lost, it was on the ground of its alleged inexpediency alone. In the debate which preceded the vote, the power of Congress was conceded. In March, 1816, the House of Representatives passed the following resolution: "Resolved, That a committee be appointed to inquire into the existence of an inhuman and illegal traffic in slaves, carried on in and through the District of Columbia, and to report whether any and what measures are necessary for putting a stop to the same."

On the 9th of January, 1829, the House of Representatives passed the following resolution by a vote of 114 to 66: "Resolved, That the Committee on the District of Columbia, be instructed to inquire into the expediency of providing by law for the gradual abolition of slavery within the District, in such a manner that the interests of no individual shall be injured thereby." Among those who voted in the affirmative were Messrs. Barney of Md., Armstrong of Va., A.H. Shepperd of N.C., Blair of Tenn., Chilton and Lyon of Ky., Johns of Del., and others from slave states.

2. IT HAS BEEN CONCEDED BY COMMITTEES OF CONGRESS, ON THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.--In a report of the committee on the District, Jan. 11, 1837, by their chairman, Mr. Powell of Va., there is the following declaration: "The Congress of the United States, has by the constitution exclusive jurisdiction over the District, and has power upon this subject (slavery,) as upon all other subjects of legislation, to exercise unlimited discretion." Reports of Comms. 2d Sess. 19th Cong. v. iv. No. 43. In December, 1831, the committee on the District, Mr. Doddridge of Va., Chairman, reported, "That until the adjoining states act on the subject, (slavery) it would be (not unconstitutional but) unwise and impolitic, if not unjust, for Congress to interfere." In April, 1836, a special committee on abolition memorials reported the following resolutions by their Chairman, Mr. Pinckney of South Carolina: "Resolved, That Congress possesses no constitutional authority to interfere in any way with the institution of slavery in any of the states of this confederacy."

"Resolved, That Congress ought not to interfere in any way with slavery in the District of Columbia." "Ought not to interfere," carefully avoiding the phraseology of the first resolution, and thus in effect conceding the constitutional power. In a widely circulated "Address to the electors of the Charleston District," Mr. Pinkney is thus denounced by his own constituents: "He has proposed a resolution which is received by the plain common sense of the whole country as a concession that Congress has authority to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia."

3. IT HAS BEEN CONCEDED BY THE CITIZENS OF THE DISTRICT. A petition for the gradual abolition of slavery in the District, signed by nearly eleven hundred of its citizens, was presented to Congress, March 24, 1827. Among the signers to this petition, were Chief Justice Cranch, Judge Van Ness, Judge Morsel, Prof. J.M. Staughton, and a large number of the most influential inhabitants of the District. Mr. Dickson, of New York, asserted on the floor of Congress in 1835, that the signers to this petition owned more than half the property in the District. The accuracy of this statement has never been questioned.

THIS POWER HAS BEEN CONCEDED BY GRAND JURIES OF THE DISTRICT. The grand jury of the county of Alexandria, at the March term, 1802, presented the domestic slaves trade as a grievance, and said, "We consider these grievances demanding legislative redress." Jan. 19, 1829, Mr. Alexander, of Virginia, presented a representation of the grand jury in the city of Washington, remonstrating against "any measure for the abolition of slavery within said District, unless accompanied by measures for the removal of the emancipated from the same;" thus, not only conceding the power to emancipate slaves, but affirming an additional power, that of excluding them when free. Journal H. R. 1828-9, p. 174.

4. THIS POWER HAS BEEN CONCEDED BY STATE LEGISLATURES. In 1828 the