A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Part 51

The motion of Mr. CROWNINs.h.i.+ELD was rejected by the following vote:

AYES.--Ma.s.sachusetts, Virginia, and Tennessee--3.

NOES.--Maine, New Hamps.h.i.+re, Vermont, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, North Carolina, Kentucky, Missouri, Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, and Kansas--18.

The PRESIDENT:--The Conference will now proceed to the consideration of the sixth section.

No amendment being offered thereto, the Conference proceeded to the seventh section.

Mr. TURNER:--I move to strike out the whole of the seventh section, and insert in lieu thereof the following:

"Congress shall provide by law for securing to the citizens of each State the privileges and immunities of citizens of the several States."

The seventh section, as it now stands, will encounter more serious objection at the North than all the remaining portion of the article.

It is objectionable for many reasons: it looks to the actual exercise of violence and intimidation by mobs and unlawful a.s.semblies at the North. Although such may have occurred in one or two sections only, generally the provisions of the fugitive slave law have been observed and carried out. The whole subject is very distasteful to the North. I think if we keep it out of the article, and in its place secure that respect for the privileges of citizens in the various States, to which, indeed, under the Const.i.tution, they are ent.i.tled, we shall do much better.

Mr. LOGAN:--There are various reasons peculiar to some of the free States why this provision should not be adopted. The laws of several of the Western States do not recognize negroes as citizens. I move to amend the amendment proposed by my colleague, by inserting the words "free white" before the word "citizens."

The amendment offered by Mr. LOGAN was adopted by the following vote:

AYES.--New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, Indiana, and Illinois--10.

NOES.--Maine, New Hamps.h.i.+re, Vermont, Ma.s.sachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, and Iowa--8.

Mr. ORTH, of Indiana, dissented from the vote of his State.

Mr. TURNER:--I suppose the purpose of my colleague has been attained.

If there is a delegation willing to make such a distinction in the Const.i.tution, they will, of course, support the amendment as it is now amended.

The vote was then taken upon the amendment, as amended, with the following result:

AYES.--None.

NOES.--Maine, New Hamps.h.i.+re, Vermont, Ma.s.sachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, Missouri, Ohio, and Indiana--18.

Mr. WILMOT:--If the seventh section is adopted, I think the North should have some compensation therefor. I think citizens of the North have as much occasion for complaint on account of the action of mobs and riotous a.s.semblies in the slave States, as the slave States have of the occurrence of those mobs and a.s.semblies in the North. I therefore move the following as an addition to the seventh section:

"And Congress shall farther provide by law, that the United States shall make full compensation to a citizen of any State, who, in any other State, shall suffer by reason of violence or intimidation from mobs and riotous a.s.semblies, in his person or property, or in the deprivation, by violence, of his rights secured by this Const.i.tution."

Mr. GUTHRIE:--I am opposed to this amendment upon the general principles I have so often stated. I oppose it for another reason. I am not in favor of an amendment which encourages mobs and riots at the North, and I will not consent to one which, like this, encourages seditious speeches at the South.

Mr. WILMOT:--Such is not the effect of my amendment. It does not protect a man in making seditious speeches in the slave States. It only secures to the citizen his rights without regard to the State to which he belongs. We have a provision of the Const.i.tution on that subject now, but it is not effective.

Mr. COALTER:--I am in favor of the amendment. There is great necessity for it.

Mr. SEDDON:--I think gentlemen entirely misconstrue the intent and purpose of the present provision of the Const.i.tution on that subject.

It grows out of and rests upon that provision which requires the return of fugitive slaves. It imposes an obligation upon Congress to secure to the owner, when he pursues his slave into a free State, the right which he enjoys as a citizen of his own State. In all other respects it is unnecessary. If a man is injured in his person or his property, he has his redress in the State courts; or if he is a foreigner or a citizen of another State, he may go into the Federal courts and get his redress there. In this respect the citizens of both sections are amply protected.

Mr. STEPHENS:--I earnestly hope this amendment may be rejected. We have come here to arrange old difficulties, not to make new ones.

Adopt this, and you lay the foundation stone of disunion. It is an encouragement to seditious speeches and purposes. The clause is well enough as it is. We do not wish to encourage men to come among us and excite discontent among our slaves. We will not permit them to do it.

Our safety requires that we should not. Our own citizens do not connive at the escape of slaves. None do it who have any business in our States. We are here for peace. When half a dozen States are out, whose return we wish to secure, shall we put such a clause as this into the Const.i.tution? Do it, and a half dozen others will follow. I am not at all sure that the report of the majority, if adopted, will satisfy my State. It certainly will not if it is mangled and frittered away. I have not occupied time in making speeches here. I say to you gentlemen, beware! If I thought the spirit of the North was truly represented in this Conference, I would go home and advise my State to secede; and if she did not, I would abandon her forever.

Mr. RUFFIN:--I am opposed to the amendment because I think it unnecessary, and because it opens a new and very serious controversy.

The rights of Northern men are fully protected now. There is not a court in the South in which a Northern citizen cannot find a lawyer to advocate his cause. If he is poor, he may even sue _in forma pauperis_, and incur no liability even for costs.

Mr. WILMOT:--I am claiming no more than I have a right to claim under the decision of the Supreme Court. That court, in the case of Prigg _vs._ The State of Pennsylvania, decided that the Const.i.tution imposes the duty upon Congress of carrying this provision into effect. I insist upon making it plain. Rights upon both sides are sought to be protected by this article. They are correlative.

Mr. LOGAN favored and Mr. EWING opposed the amendment, in a few brief remarks.

Mr. ORTH:--I do not think we shall accomplish much by protracting our present session longer. I move that the Conference adjourn, and ask a vote by States.

The Conference refused to adjourn, by the following vote:

AYES.--Maine, Connecticut, New York, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, and Kansas--7.

NOES.--New Hamps.h.i.+re, Vermont, Ma.s.sachusetts, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, Missouri, and Ohio--14.

The PRESIDENT:--The question recurs upon the amendment of the gentleman from Pennsylvania.

The vote upon the question of agreeing to the motion of Mr. WILMOT, resulted as follows:

AYES.--Maine, New York, Indiana, Vermont, Ma.s.sachusetts, Pennsylvania, Illinois, and Iowa--8.

NOES.--Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, Missouri, and Ohio--11.

And the motion was rejected.

Mr. BARRINGER:--I now move to amend the seventh section, by adding thereto the following words:

"And in all cases in which the United States shall pay for such fugitive, Congress shall also provide for the collection by the United States of the amount so paid, with interest, from the county, city, or town in which such arrest shall have been prevented, or rescue made."

I am certain that no objection can be made to the equity of this amendment. If a munic.i.p.al corporation shall permit the rights of a slave owner to be disregarded by the rescue of a slave, it not only fails to perform its duty under the Const.i.tution, but becomes an active partic.i.p.ant in the crime. Shall the consequences of its own fault be visited upon the people of the whole country? Those who acknowledge and carry out their obligations under the Const.i.tution, as well as those who do not? This would inflict a punishment upon the innocent for the crime of the guilty. It is not right to leave it in that way. It would present an inducement to these violations of law which the provision is intended to prevent. We ought to make the guilty party pay the penalty.

Mr. HACKLEMAN:--If such a proposition were to come from a free State, the mover would be charged with attempting to destroy all hope that the committee's report could be adopted by the people. However, if the friends of the report are willing to adopt it, I do not know that I ought to object. It places the Government in a position where it is bound under the Const.i.tution to prosecute a munic.i.p.al corporation for the acts of its individual members. It is certainly novel, and introduces a new system into the jurisprudence of the country. Is the mover serious in his proposition?

Mr. BARRINGER:--I am certainly serious. I would like to hear some substantial argument against my motion.

The question being taken on the amendment of Mr. BARRINGER, resulted as follows:

AYES.--Virginia, North Carolina, and Kansas--3.

NOES.--Maine, New Hamps.h.i.+re, Vermont, Ma.s.sachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa--17.

And the amendment was rejected.

Mr. DENT:--I wish to enter my dissent from the vote of Maryland. I consider the amendment as eminently just and proper.

Mr. CLAY:--I dissent from the vote of Kentucky.