In May, 1838, the Legislature of Connecticut passed a resolution asserting the power of Congress to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia.

In January, 1836, the Legislature of South Carolina “Resolved, That we should consider the abolition of Slavery in the District of Columbia as a violation of the rights of the citizens of that District derived from the implied conditions on which that territory was ceded to the General Government.”  Instead of denying the constitutional power, they virtually admit its existence, by striving to smother it under an implication.  In February, 1836, the Legislature of North Carolina “Resolved, That, although by the Constitution all legislative power over the District of Columbia is vested in the Congress of the United States, yet we would deprecate any legislative action on the part of that body towards liberating the slaves of that District, as a breach of faith towards those States by whom the territory was originally ceded.  Here is a full concession of the power.  February 2, 1836, the Virginia Legislature passed unanimously the following resolution:  “Resolved, by the General Assembly of Virginia, that the following article be proposed to the several states of this Union, and to Congress, as an amendment of the Constitution of the United States:”  “The powers of Congress shall not be so construed as to authorize the passage of any law for the emancipation of slaves in the District of Columbia, without the consent of the individual proprietors thereof, unless by the sanction of the Legislatures of Virginia and Maryland, and under such conditions as they shall by law prescribe.”

Fifty years after the formation of the United States’ constitution the states are solemnly called upon by the Virginia Legislature, to amend that instrument by a clause asserting that, in the grant to Congress of “exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever” over the District, the “case” of slavery is not included!!  What could have dictated such a resolution but the conviction that the power to abolish slavery is an irresistible inference from the constitution as it is? The fact that the same legislature, passed afterward a resolution, though by no means unanimously, that Congress does not possess the power, abates not a title of the testimony in the first resolution.  March 23d, 1824, “Mr. Brown presented the resolutions of the General Assembly of Ohio, recommending to Congress the consideration of a system for the gradual emancipation of persons of color held in servitude in the United States.”  On the same day, “Mr. Noble, of Indiana, communicated a resolution from the legislature of that state, respecting the gradual emancipation of slaves within the United States.”  Journal of the United States’ Senate, for 1824-5, p.231.

The Ohio and Indiana resolutions, by taking for granted the general power of Congress over the subject of slavery, do virtually assert its special power within its exclusive jurisdiction.