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CONSTITUTION

OF THE

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

INTRODUCTION.

THE PURPOSE FOR WHICH IT WAS FOUNDED.

THE Constitution of the United States, as declared in the preamble, was ordained and established by the people, "in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to themselves and their posterity."

HOW IT HAS BEEN VIOLATED.

A handful of slave-masters have broken up that Union, have overthrown justice, and have destroyed domestic tranquillity. Instead of contributing to the common defence and public welfare, or securing the blessings of liberty to themselves and their posterity, they have waged war upon their country, and have attempted to establish, over the ruins of the Republic, an aristocratic government founded upon Slavery.

"THE INSTITUTION" vs. THE CONSTITUTION.

It is the conviction of many thoughtful persons, that slavery has now become practically irreconcilable with republican institutions, and that it constitutes, at the present time, the chief obstacle to the restoration of the Union. They know that slavery can triumph only by overthrowing the republic; they believe that the republic can triumph only by overthrowing slavery.

"THE PRIVILEGED CLASS."

Slaveholding communities constitute the only "privileged class" of persons who have been admitted into the Union. They alone have the right to vote for their property as well as for themselves. In the free States citizens vote only for themselves. The former are allowed to count, as part of their representative numbers, three fifths of all slaves.. If this privilege, which was accorded only to the original States, had not been extended (contrary, as many jurists contend, to the true intent and meaning of the constitution) so as to include other States subsequently formed, the stability of government would not have been seriously endangered by the temporary toleration of this " institution," although it was inconsistent with the principles which that instrument embodied, and revolting to the senti ments cherished by a people who had issued to the world the Declaration of Independence, and had fought through the revolutionary war to vindicate and maintain the rights of man.

UNEXPECTED GROWTH OF SLAVERY.

The system of involuntary servitude, which had received, as it merited, the general condemnation of

the leading southern and northern statesmen of the country, of those who were most familiar with its evils, and of all fair-minded persons throughout the world, seemed, at the time when our government was founded, about to vanish and disappear from this continent, when the spinning jenny of Crompton, the loom of Wyatt, the cotton gin of Whitney, and the manufacturing capital of England, combined to create a new and unlimited demand for that which is now the chief product of southern agriculture. Suddenly, as if by magic, the smouldering embers of slavery were rekindled, and its flames, like autumnal fires upon the prairies, have rapidly swept over and desolated the southern states; and, as that local, domestic institution, which seemed so likely to pass into an ignominious and unlamented grave, has risen to claim an unbounded empire, hence the present generation is called upon to solve questions and encounter dangers not foreseen by our forefathers.

SLAVERY ABOLISHED BY EUROPEAN GOVERNMENTS.

In other countries the scene has been reversed. France, with unselfish patriotism, abolished slavery in 1794; and though Napoleon afterwards reestablished servitude in most of the colonies, it was finally abolished in 1848. England has merited and received her highest tribute of honor from the enlightened nations of the world for that great act of Parliament in 1833, whereby she proclaimed universal emancipation.

In 1844, King Oscar informed the Swedish states of his desire to do away with involuntary servitude in his dominions; in 1846 the legislature provided the pecu

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