minors whom your constitution makes free ;
and it will be so viewed by all who are inter-
ested in preserving the institution of slavery,
by all who regard the institution as proper
under our form of government to beplaced
upon the statute book of the State.
It is a very serious matter. The proposi-
tion to give a preference to their former mas-
ters is one that certainly looks humane; but
the refusal to have the assent of the parents
or next friends of those minors shows that
there something improper about if. If
they (???) the proper persons to have the cus-
tody and the service of these minors, surely
those most interested in their welfare ought
to be the suitable persona to decide upon
that, I have no doubt that in every case
where the master has been humane that the
attachment of the servant and his gratitude
would incline him to select that master for
the future master of his children during
their minority. But we have upon the stat-
ute book a provision of law for all cases that
can possibly arise here. Every necessity ap-
pears to be anticipated, and if there is a defi-
ciency anywhere it can be supplied by statute
better than by fundamental law.
Mr. CUSHING, By the operation of this
section as it is written here proposed by the
gentleman from Caroline, I think its adoption
would simply amount to postponing the
emancipation of all minors until they arrive at
the age of twenty-one years, I can hardly be-
lieve that to be the desire of this convention,
many of whom I know have come here espe-
cially pledged against the adoption of any sys-
tem of apprenticeship as a specific article the
constitution. The orphans' courts of the
State will have power to apprentice any
minors whose parents are unable lo support
them, and who are liable to be a burden to
the community in which they live. There
certainly can be no need of a provision to
force the orphans' court to apprentice these
minors when they are able to make their own
living or when their parents are able and
willing to support them. Many of the min-
ors who must be apprenticed under the opera-
tion of this section will be fully competent to
earn their own living. You apprentice men
twenty years of age, under this section, quite
capable of supporting themselves. You apprentice
those of eighteen, seventeen, six-
teen and fifteen, all of them fully capable of
supporting; themselves by their own labor.
And yon do this at a time when there is a de-
mand tor labor all over the State, when the
cry is that there is not labor sufficient fur the
agricultural and mechanical operations of
the .State. And certainly the younger child-
ren can most of them be supported by their
parents.
I regard this as a modified form of slavery,
as a postponement of the emancipation of
slaves in Maryland after the adoption of the
constitution. I have no idea of voting for |
the adoption of an article which puts back
into slavery all under twenty-one years of
age. By the operation of this section alt
'those between the ages of eighteen and
twenty-one will be prevented from being
taken into the army without compensation to
their masters for interfering with the con-
tract of their apprenticeship. I certainly
hope it is not the intention of the convention
to get rid of slavery, and then to put back
into a modified form of slavery all slaves un-
der twenty one years of age.
As to myself, the delegation of Baltimore
city are all instructed by our constituents
upon this subject, and are definitely pledged
not to vote for any law? for colored appren-
ticeship; and certainly this is a proposition
that none of us can entertain. And cer-
tainly in other parts of the State delegates
were sent here for the purpose of emancipat-
ing the shaves, and it. could not have been the
will of their constituents that after their
emancipation 'all persons under twenty-one
years of 'age should be remanded to slavery.
The orphans' court has at present the un-
doubted power to apprentice all such as cannot
support themselves, or whose parents cannot
support them. While there is not the slight-
est doubt that in such cases the minors should
be apprenticed that they may not become an
expense to the community, and while they
would always give their masters the prefer-
ence, I am sure you need not give the orphans'
court any more power than it now has under
the present regulations and laws of the State.
Certainly it will not at all aid in the adoption
of your constitution in the western part of
the State to put into it a section putting back
into slavery all those under twenty-one years
of age, who were previously emancipated by
your bill of rights. I shall therefore bo ob-
liged to vote against everything which in the
slightest degree looks to sanctioning in any-
way the proposition to put back into slavery
all emancipated slaves under the age of twen-
ty-one years.
Mr. CHAMBERS. I regret to see the sad spec-
tacle exhibited to us this morning. I had
really hoped that this extravagantly violent
animosity towards everything like the interest
of the slaveholder, would ere' this, by its own
violence, have dissipated itself. It has been
said that the most violent disease soonest ter-
minates, either by cure or fatally, it would
really seem that the expiration of time bat
adds fuel to the flame which has been so hotly
burning against everything like the interest of
the slave owner. We have had spectacles, 1
hope not of the sober feelings of the body
generally, of gentlemen who have already been
distinguished for the warmth of their opposi-
tion-to everything like these slaveholding in-
terests.. I trust and am willing to believe they
were not a fair specimen of life cool, calm,
deliberate judgment of the majority of the
house.
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