design of the Constitution was to preserve the fruits of the Revolution,
to respect State sovereignty, and yet secure a powerful and efficient
Union; to have a central government, and yet not infringe upon the local
rights of the States. It will, therefore, be seen that while the subject
of slavery was earnestly discussed, and presented at the outset a great
obstacle to the union of the States, yet it was thought, upon the whole,
best to leave to the slave States the business of doing away with this
great evil in such a manner as in their judgment might best conduce to
their own security and the preservation of the Union.

But no truth of history is more evident than that the authors of the
Constitution regarded slavery as impossible to be sustained upon the
ground of the natural rights of mankind, and deserving of no
encouragement in the Territories, or States hereafter to come into the
Union. It was thought that the best interests of the slave States would
lead them to abolish slavery, and that before many years, the Republic
would cease to bear the disgrace of chattel bondage. It is certainly
proper that the acts and language of the authors of the Constitution,
and those who chiefly were instrumental in achieving our independence,
should be made to interpret that instrument which was the creation of
their own toils and love of country. Because the circumstances of the
present day have brought about a mighty change in the feelings and
opinions of the slave States, it does not follow that the Constitution
in its original intention and spirit should be accommodated to this new
aspect of things. It is easy to get up a theory of the natural right of
slavery, and then say that the Constitution meant that the slave States
should carry slave property just where the free States carry their
property; but when this ground is taken, the Constitution is made, to
all intents, a pro-slavery instrument. It ceases to be the charter of a
nation's freedom, and resolves itself into the most effective agent of