NO. 5.

THE

ANTI-SLAVERY EXAMINER.

THE

POWER OF CONGRESS

OVER THE

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.

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REPRINTED FROM THE NEW-YORK EVENING POST, WITH ADDITIONS BY THE AUTHOR.

* * * * *

NEW-YORK: 

PUBLISHED BY THE AMERICAN ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY,

NO. 143 NASSAU-STREET.

1838.

* * * * *

This periodical contains 3 1/2 sheets.—­Postage under 100 miles, 6 cts.; over 100, 10 cts.

POWER OF CONGRESS

OVER THE

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.

A civilized community presupposes a government of law.  If that government be a republic, its citizens are the sole sources, as well as the subjects of its power.  Its constitution is their bill of directions to their own agents—­a grant authorizing the exercise of certain powers, and prohibiting that of others.  In the Constitution of the United States, whatever else may be obscure, the clause granting power to Congress over the Federal District may well defy misconstruction.  Art. 1, Sec. 6, Clause 18:  “The Congress shall have power to exercise exclusive legislation, in all cases whatsoever, over such District.”  Congress may make laws for the District “in all cases,” not of all kinds; not all laws whatsoever, but laws “in all cases whatsoever.”  The grant respects the subjects of legislation, not the moral nature of the laws.  The law-making power every where is subject to moral restrictions, whether limited by constitutions or not.  No legislature can authorize murder, nor make honesty penal, nor virtue a crime, nor exact impossibilities.  In these and similar respects, the power of Congress is held in check by principles, existing in the nature of things, not imposed by the Constitution, but presupposed and assumed by it.  The power of Congress over the District is restricted only by those principles that limit ordinary legislation, and, in some respects, it has even wider scope.

In common with the legislatures of the States, Congress cannot constitutionally pass ex post facto laws in criminal cases, nor suspend the writ of habeas corpus, nor pass a bill of attainder, nor abridge the freedom of speech and of the press, nor invade the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, nor enact laws respecting an establishment of religion.  These are general limitations.  Congress cannot do these things any where.  The exact import, therefore, of the