Besides this general ground, the power of Congress to abolish slavery in the District may be based upon another equally tenable.  We argue it from the fact, that slavery exists there now by an act of Congress.  In the act of 16th July, 1790, Congress accepted portions of territory offered by the states of Maryland and Virginia, and enacted that the laws, as they then were, should continue in force, “until Congress shall otherwise by law provide;” thus making the slave codes of Maryland and Virginia its own.  Under these laws, adopted by Congress, and in effect re-enacted and made laws of the District, the slaves there are now held.

Is Congress so impotent in its own “exclusive jurisdiction” that it cannot “otherwise by law provide?” If it can say, what shall be considered property, it can say what shall not be considered property.  Suppose a legislature enacts, that marriage contracts shall be mere bills of sale, making a husband the proprietor of his wife, as his bona fide property; and suppose husbands should herd their wives in droves for the market as beasts of burden, or for the brothel as victims of lust, and then prate about their inviolable legal property, and deny the power of the legislature, which stamped them property, to undo its own wrong, and secure to wives by law the rights of human beings.  Would such cant about “legal rights” be heeded where reason and justice held sway, and where law, based upon fundamental morality, received homage?  If a frantic legislature pronounces woman a chattel, has it no power, with returning reason, to take back the blasphemy?  Is the impious edict irrepealable?  Be it, that with legal forms it has stamped wives “wares.”  Can no legislation blot out the brand?  Must the handwriting of Deity on human nature be expunged for ever?  Has law no power to stay the erasing pen, and tear off the scrawled label that covers up the IMAGE OF GOD?  We now proceed to show that

THE POWER OF CONGRESS TO ABOLISH SLAVERY IN THE DISTRICT HAS BEEN, TILL RECENTLY, UNIVERSALLY CONCEDED.

1.  It has been assumed by Congress itself.  The following record stands on the journals of the House of Representatives for 1804, p. 225:  “On motion made and seconded that the House do come to the following resolution:  ’Resolved, That from and after the 4th day of July, 1805, all blacks and people of color that shall be born within the District of Columbia, or whose mothers shall be the property of any person residing within said District, shall be free, the males at the age of ——­, and the females at the age of ——.  The main question being taken that the House do agree to said motion as originally proposed, it was negatived by a majority of 46.’” Though the motion was lost, it was on the ground of its alleged inexpediency alone, and not because Congress lacked the constitutional power.  In the debate which preceded the vote, the power of Congress was conceded.  In March, 1816, the House of Representatives passed the following resolution:—­“Resolved, That a committee be appointed to inquire into the existence of an inhuman and illegal traffic in slaves, carried on in and through the District of Columbia, and to report whether any and what measures are necessary for putting a stop to the same.”