“No person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property,
     without due process of law.”

Under this great aegis the liberty of every person within the national jurisdiction is unequivocally placed.  I say every person.  Of this there can be no question.  The word “person” in the Constitution embraces every human being within its sphere, whether Caucasian, Indian, or African, from the president to the slave.  Show me a person within the national jurisdiction, and I confidently claim for him this protection, no matter what his condition or race or color.  The natural meaning of the clause is clear, but a single fact of its history places it in the broad light of noon.  As originally recommended by Virginia, North Carolina, and Rhode Island, it was restricted to the freeman.  Its language was, “No freeman ought to be deprived of his life, liberty, or property, but by the law of the land.”  In rejecting this limitation, the authors of the amendment revealed their purpose, that no person, under the National Government, of whatever character, should be deprived of liberty without due process of law,—­that is, without due presentment, indictment, or other judicial proceeding.  But this amendment is nothing less than an express guaranty of Personal Liberty, and an express prohibition of its invasion anywhere, at least within the national jurisdiction.

Sir, apply these principles, and Slavery will again be as when Washington took his first oath as President.  The Union Flag of the Republic will become once more the flag of Freedom, and at all points within the national jurisdiction will refuse to cover a slave.  Beneath its beneficent folds, wherever it is carried, on land or sea, slavery will disappear, like darkness under the arrows of the ascending sun,—­like the Spirit of Evil before the Angel of the Lord.

In all national territories Slavery will be impossible.

On the high seas, under the national flag, Slavery will be impossible.

In the District of Columbia Slavery will instantly cease.

Inspired by these principles, Congress can give no sanction to Slavery by the admission of new slave States.

Nowhere under the Constitution can the Nation, by legislation or otherwise, support Slavery, hunt slaves, or hold property in man.

Such, sir, are my sincere convictions.  According to the Constitution, as I understand it, in the light of the past and of its true principles, there is no other conclusion which is rational or tenable, which does not defy authoritative rules of interpretation, does not falsify indisputable facts of history, does not affront the public opinion in which it had its birth, and does not dishonor the memory of the fathers.  And yet politicians of the hour undertake to place these convictions under formal ban.  The generous sentiments which filled the early patriots, and impressed upon the government they founded, as upon the coin