the time when this inimical action towards
slavery was commenced in Maryland. Was
it not then worth forty millions, and have
not the slaveholders in the injuries result-
ing to them from the loss of labor and loss
of crops by reason of the employment or
abstraction of their negroes by the Federal
Government, and which are to be computed
in fixing the damages, suffered a further
loss of nearly twenty millions of dollars?
My demand, therefore, is a moderate one.
If I estimate it according to the rules which
would govern in giving legal advice to a
client, or in asking instructions from the
Court, or in argument before a jury, I
should fix it at not less than sixty millions.
Aye, sir, in a like case, in which one man's
rights were involved in a controversy with
another, I should claim that the injured
party was entitled to exemplary and conse-
quential damages.
Give us, Mr. President, the twenty mil-
lions and I should regard it as a mere com-
promise. If the slaveholders accepted it
they would do it as a mere compromise.
They would not be bribed thereby, nor
would they be sudden converts, men who
have changed the ideas of a lifetime. No,
sir I hope they will never change their
views or principles, and thereby dishonor
their name, their parentage, their fame, and
their native State. But seeing the Govern-
ment is determined by its policy to take
away all the negroes, they might contract,
they might accept, they might sell out their
rights of property upon the same principle
which actuates men who, having a legal
controversy, can agree upon terms of final
settlement without a waiver or sacrifice of
their principles.
There are two other points connected
with this subject, Mr. President, which I
must briefly allude to before concluding, as
they have been heralded over the State
through the press and on the hustings as
conclusive against this claim of the slaveholders.
When the slaveholder claims compensa-
tion, somewhat approximating a low value
of his property, some wiseacre replies,
" Look at your assessment books. You
have been either cheating the State for
years, or you are attempting to drive a hard
bargain as we Yankees have the credit of
doing whenever we can," I accept neither
horn of the dilemma. Slaves were as-
sessed in 1852, shortly after the set-
tlement of the national troubles of 1860,
and before the price of this property recov- |
ered from the depreciation which had taken
place in it. The votes on the passage of
the bill in the General Assembly show that
the representatives from different sections of
the State regarded the valuation to be a fair
assessment. There was no proposition to
amend the valuation—in tact, the valuation
approximated more nearly their market
value than other kinds of property. Where
do you find real estate assessed at its full
value? In my own county land worth $80
per acre, pays taxes at the rate of $40 per
acre. Some real estate in Baltimore city, or
in the county, will be found assessed at not
one-fifth of its present market price. And
pray, sir, who goes to the assessment books
to ascertain the value of property, or intro-
duces them as evidence of title? The slave-
owner is not the only one, therefore, who,
tried by this standard, is cheating the State,
or if his property is about to be taken, in
claiming damages, will drive a hard
bargain, if he demands more than its as-
sessed value.
Another politician of this school, which
thinks it all right to take away the proper-
ty of the citizen and not pay for it, thus.
screens the injustice of the act. The mem-
ber who represents the 3d Congressional
District will tell you, " it is too late to de-
mand compensation—the State has already
rejected the. proposition." Mr. President,
I deny it. I demand the time, place and oc-
casion. Who are the parties too the contract ?
The United States Government and the
people of the State assembled in Conven-
tion. They are the contracting parties.
When before this have the people of the
State been assembled in Convention? No
other power in the State could act on the
subject. Does Mr. Crisfield's action—his
motion to lay an imperfect bill upon the
table of the House of Representatives con-
clude the State? This is the first time I
ever heard that Mr. Crisfield constituted the
State of Maryland, Did he represent the
State and speak for her as a State? Was he
not a member of Congress for the 1st Con-
gressional District of Maryland, and as such
did he not partly represent the United State?
Government as one of the contracting par-
ties and not the State.
The National Intelligencer of May 14th,
1864, in an editorial entitled the "truth of
recent history vindicated," powerfully com-
bats the doctrine that the BORDER=0 States
have ever declined the proposition of eman-
cipation with compensation, and says, " we
hold it is not just to say that the BORDER=0 |
