"
It maintained that no compensation should be given to planters
emancipating slaves, because that would be a surrender of fundamental
principles; "slavery is a crime, and is, therefore, not an article to be
sold;" because slave-holders are not just proprietors of what they claim;
because emancipation would destroy only nominal, not real property; and
because compensation, if given at all, should be given to the slaves.
It declared any "scheme of expatriation" to be "delusive, cruel, and
dangerous." It fully recognized the right of each state to legislate
exclusively on the subject of slavery within its limits, and conceded
that Congress, under the present national compact, had no right to
interfere; though still contending that it had the power, and should
exercise it, "to suppress the domestic slave-trade between the several
states," and "to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia, and in
those portions of our territory which the Constitution has placed under
its exclusive jurisdiction."
After clearly and emphatically avowing the principles underlying the
enterprise, and guarding with scrupulous care the rights of persons and
states under the Constitution, in prosecuting it, the declaration closed
with these eloquent words:--
We also maintain that there are, at the present time, the highest
obligations resting upon the people of the free states to remove slavery
by moral and political action, as prescribed in the Constitution of the
United States.
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