But perhaps we shall be told, that the “implied faith” in the acts of cession of Maryland and Virginia was not that Congress should never abolish slavery in the District, but that it should not do it until they had done it within their bounds!  Verily this “faith” comes little short of the faith of miracles!  “A good rule that works both ways.”  First, Maryland and Virginia have “good faith” that Congress will not abolish until they do; and then just as “good faith” that Congress will abolish when they do!  Excellently accommodated!  Did those States suppose that Congress would legislate over the national domain, the common jurisdiction of all, for Maryland and Virginia alone?  And who, did they suppose, would be judges in the matter?—­themselves merely? or the whole Union?

This “good faith implied in the cession” is no longer of doubtful interpretation.  The principle at the bottom of it, when fairly stated, is this:—­That the Government of the United States are bound in “good faith” to do in the District of Columbia, without demurring, just what and when, Maryland and Virginia do in their own States.  In short, that the general government is eased of all the burdens of legislation within its exclusive jurisdiction, save that of hiring a scrivener to copy off the acts of the Maryland and Virginia legislatures as fast as they are passed, and engross them, under the title of “Laws of the United States, for the District of Columbia!” A slight additional expense would also be incurred in keeping up an express between the capitols of those States and Washington city, bringing Congress from time to time its “instructions” from head quarters—­instructions not to be disregarded without a violation of that, “good faith implied in the cession,” &c.

This sets in strong light the advantages of “our glorious Union,” if the doctrine of Mr. Clay and the thirty-six Senators be orthodox.  The people of the United States have been permitted to set up at their own expense, and on their own territory, two great sounding boards called “Senate Chamber” and “Representatives’ Hall,” for the purpose of sending abroad “by authority” national echoes of state legislation!—­permitted also to keep in their pay a corps of pliant national musicians, with peremptory instructions to sound on any line of the staff according as Virginia and Maryland may give the sovereign key note!

Though this may have the seeming of mere raillery, yet an analysis of the resolution and of the discussions upon it, will convince every fair mind that it is but the legitimate carrying out of the principle pervading both.  They proceed virtually upon the hypothesis that the will and pleasure of Virginia and Maryland are paramount to those of the Union.  If the main design of setting apart a federal district had been originally the accommodation of Maryland, Virginia, and the south, with the United