not been protected by law, and by all your
courts from the very commencement of it
introduction to the present time? Was it
not brought into Maryland when we were a
colony of Great Britain, when we were under
the jurisdiction of Great Britain? Was it
not brought here by the express authority of
the Parliament of Great Britain? Was it
not brought here by parties engaged in the
African slave trade, in which the good Queen
Anne was a partner, and of the profits of
which she received a fourth part? Was not
the institution brought here and established,
and slaves introduced as an article of com-
merce? Were they not recognized by the
British government as property? Was it
not so held in the constitution? Has it not
been so held down to the present time? Was
not the institution considered so sacredly
guarded and protected that when the Con-
vention met here in 1850, they solemnly
adopted a provision which went to the extent
of saying that the legislature should have no
power of passing any law to interfere with
the relation of master and slave?
These are the guarantees under which this
property is held by the people of Maryland
What is the condition in which it is held?
Is it not well known, especially to the gen-
tlemen who represent the counties where the
number of slaves is considerable, that for a
great number of years past, it has been very
general, in the distribution of estates, if a
main owned land and negroes, to give his
lands to his sons, and his negroes to his
daughters? Is it not known that a great
portion of the property of the females, of the
infants, in these counties, consists of slaves?
that the only property on earth that they
have, in many instances, is the slaves whose
hire affords them a support?
I conversed with a gentleman at the last
session of the legislature, from Dorchester
county, who remarked to me that in the di-
vision of his father's estate, the lands were
given to his sons, and his sisters had twelve
or fifteen slaves apiece—one or two sisters—
and it was the sole property they had. I
know instances in my own county in which
under the will of their father, there are help-
less and unprotected females whose sole sup-
port is the hire of the negroes left them by
their father. I know instances in which
helpless infants will be stripped of the only
income they have, the hire perhaps of a ne-
gro man or woman. I know such instances
within my personal knowledge, where this
will operate to strip individuals of every dol-
lar of property they have under the consti-
tution and laws, and every dollar of support,
and they will be left penniless upon the cole
charities of the world.
It is the proposition not only that they shall
not now, when food and clothing are so high,
have one dollar of compensation, so far as
you can prevent it, but that they shall not |
hereafter. They shall have no hope. They
shall have nothing to encourage anybody to
afford them shelter, and food, and clothing,
in the hope that the returning justice of the
legislature will make compensation whereby
they may be remunerated for their support.
You close the door to hope entirely. You
not only turn them out penniless, without a
home, but you shut the door in their face,
and say to them, the legislature shall never
hereafter—whatever may be the state of our
finances, although our works of internal im-
provement may put millions into the treas-
ury of the State, although we may be out of
debt, and have enough for our school sys-
tem—have the power to make a dollar's
compensation to you for this property taken
from you, although you had as much right
to the protection of that property as of any
other.
When this question was under considera-
tion before, I read an authority, in my place
here, from Judge Story, based upon Vattel
and other writers upon the fundamental prin-
ciples of law and constitutions governing all
civilized societies, to the effect that this prin-
ciple of compensation tor property taken for
public purposes, not only extended to legisla-
tures, but that it was the fundamental prin-
ciple upon which society was based: that the
sovereign power, in no state of government,
had the right to take private property for
public use without compensation; that it was
in violation of the original foundation of jus-
tice and of right.
We are sent here by the people of Mary-
land to amend their constitution, to organize
their civil government upon the principle's of
a government of freedom, and of justice,
which have obtained and been recognized as
belonging to all governments that claim to
represent the wishes of a free people and a
civilized community. Here is a proposition
so plain, so consistent, with the principles of
justice, that it commends itself, as to all other
property, to the consideration, and the con-
fidence, and the adoption of this Convention.
I say if you intended to exclude this species
of property, you ought to have incorporated
in the forty-third section of this article—
which corresponds with the constitution of
the United States, and lays down the funda-
mental principles of government, that you
shall not take private property to be used
without compensation—an exception. Instead
of that broad and unequivocal assertion, yon
should have said, "unless it be slave pro-
perty." You should go back and reconsider
that now, and make it read, ''No property
unless it be slave property, shall be taken for
public use without compensation," in order
to make it consistent.
I am the more surprised at the determina-
tion which seems to be manifested to carry
this proposition through without debate, be-
cause I have observed the extreme anxiety |
