The gentleman contends that the power to remove slaves from one State to another, for sale, is found in that part of the Constitution which gives Congress the power to regulate commerce within the States, &c.  This argument is non sequiter, unless the honorable Senator can first prove that slaves are proper articles for commerce.  We say that Congress have power over slaves only as persons.  The United States can protect persons, but cannot make them property, and they have full power in regulating commerce, and can, in such regulations, prohibit from its operations every thing but property; property made so by the laws of nature, and not by any municipal regulations.  The dominion of man over things, as property, was settled by his Creator when man was first placed upon the earth.  He was to subdue the earth, and have dominion over the fish of the sea, the fowls of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth; every herb bearing seed, and the fruit of a tree yielding seed, was given for his use.  This is the foundation of all right in property of every description.  It is for the use of man the grant is made, and of course man cannot be included in the grant.  Every municipal regulation, then, of any State, or any of its peculiar institutions, which makes man property, is a violation of this great law of nature, and is founded in usurpation and tyranny, and is accomplished by force, fraud, or an abuse of power.  It is a violation of the principles of truth and justice, in subjecting the weaker to the stronger man.  In a Christian nation such property can form no just ground for commercial regulations, but ought to be strictly prohibited.  I therefore believe it is the duty of Congress, by virtue of this power, to regulate commerce, to prohibit, at once, slaves being used as articles of trade.

The gentleman says, the Constitution left the subject of slavery entirely to the States.  To this position I assent; and, as the States cannot regulate their own commerce, but the same being the right of Congress, that body cannot make slaves an article of commerce, because slavery is left entirely to the States in which it exists; and slaves within those States, according to the gentleman, are excluded from the power of Congress.  Can Congress, in regulating commerce among the several States, authorize the transportation of articles from one State, and their sale in another, which they have not power so to authorize in any State?  I cannot believe in such doctrine; and I now solemnly protest against the power of Congress to authorize the transportation to, and the sale in, Ohio, of any negro slave whatever, or for any possible purpose under the sun.  Who is there in Ohio, or elsewhere, that will dare deny this position?  If Ohio contains such a recreant to her constitution and policy, I hope he may have the boldness to stand forth and avow it.  If the States in which slavery exists love it as a household god, let them keep it there, and not call upon us in the free States to offer incense to their idol.  We do not seek to touch it with unhallowed hands, but with pure hands, upraised in the cause of truth and suffering humanity.