it by an amendment. We do not put any
such interpretation upon it.
Mr. MILLER. Suppose the other construc
tion to be put upon it. The gentleman from
Howard (Mr. Sands) argued yesterday that
under this provision the entire State—if it is
a State—of West Virginia might be ceded to
the State of Maryland, and incorporated with
it. There is a practical difficulty about that
matter. If the Sate of West Virginia should
under this provision, be incorporated with
the State of Maryland, and a new State
framed, then I ask gentlemen what becomes of
the provision which we have just enacted
with regard lo slavery? Under the Constitu-
tion of West Virginia slavery is not extin-
guished in that State. It is extinguished
only as to slaves born in the State of Virginia
after the date of the adoption of their Con-
stitution. Slaves already born are not to be
manumitted until several years afterwards ;
those ten years of age not until they attain
the age of thirty years, and those subse-
quently born not until a long period after
that.
Mr. CUSHING. That is provided for in this
section.
Mr. MILLER. I suppose the gentleman re-
fers to the last clause of the section: "And
the General Assembly shall enact such laws
as may be required to extend the Constitu-
tion and laws of this State over such terri-
tory, and may create courts conformably to
the Constitution fur such territory, and may,
for that purpose, increase the number of
Judges of the Court of Appeals." But if the
State comes in as an entire State and is incor-
porated with the State of Maryland, then I
would ask the gentleman whether that can
be done except under the provisions of the
Constitution of the United States; and whether
one State, when the two are incorporated to-
gether, has any mure right than the other, to
say that its Constitution and its laws shall
prevail over both ?
I say there will be a practical difficulty in
this matter. The Constitution of the United
States declares:
"New States may be admitted by Congress
into this Union; but no new State shall be
formed or erected within the jurisdiction of
any other State, nor any State be formed by
the junction of two or more States, or parts
of States, without the consent of the Legis-
latures of the States concerned, as well as of
Congress,"
There would therefore have to be a new
State formed, composed of the States of West
Virginia and Maryland; and it would have
to be admitted under the Constitution into
the Union as at new State, with an entire new
Constitution adopted by the two Status.
Anything that West. Virginia might say or
that Maryland might say with regard to the
law to prevail with reference to slavery, would
be settled by the people of the two States to- |
gether forming the new State which is to
come in under the Constitution.
But the particular question before the Con-
vention now is the amendment of the gentle-
man from Prince George's (Mr. Belt.) It is
conceded by the gentleman from Baltimore
city (Mr. Stirling) that this cannot be done
except by the consent of the Legislature of
Virginia—Old Virginia, and not West Vir-
ginia.
Mr. STIRLING. I do not say any such thing.
It may be done with the consent of West Vir-
ginia, without that of East Virginia.
Mr. MILLER. I am speaking of Loudoun
county.
Mr. STIRLING. Loudoun county does not
belong to West Virginia; and of course the
consent of East Virginia would be neces-
sary.
Mr. MILLER. If any contiguous territory
is likely to be incorporated, I know of no
county so desirable to the State as the coun-
ty of Loudoun, if the thing could be accom-
plished, or some portion, perhaps, of the
Eastern Shore of Virginia. Now, it is con-
ceded that that cannot be done except by the
consent of the Legislature of Virginia—the
State proper. I ask gentlemen of this con-
vention whether this is the proper time to go
to the State of Virginia to ask her consent for
such a cession of her territory? The legisla-
ture which meets at Alexandria has control
and jurisdiction only so far as the armies of
the United States extend into the territory of
Virginia itself. It does seem to me eminently
wise and just, if the State of Maryland is to
obtain an accession of territory from Virginia
in this way, and it being conceded that it can
be done only by consent of the legislature of
Virginia, that we should wait until we can
get that assent fully and fairly expressed by
the people of Virginia represented in their
legislature. If it so happens that the Union
armies entirely occupy the State of Virginia,
and if then, upon full consideration of all the
people of old Virginia, after it is brought
back into the Union through the triumph of
the Union armies, they should be willing to
part with the county of Loudoun and add it
to the State of Maryland, then let it be done
in a fair, manly, and open manner. Who
knows whether, after this war shell have pro-
gressed to that extent, whether the people of
Virginia would then be willing that any part
of their territory should be ceded to the State
of Maryland?
The amendment which has been offered by
the gentleman from Prince George s (Mr.
Belt) fixes a time, and says that this cession
shall not take place until the termination of
the present civil war. I say that that amend-
ment is eminently just and proper. We do
not wish as Maryland men to get from the
State of Virginia any of her territory, unless
we get it with the full and free consent of the
legislature of Virginia and the people of |
