more persons (except in cases in which it has heretofore been otherwise used and practised), the parties have a right to a trial by jury; and this method of procedure shall be held sacred, unless in cases arising on the high seas, and such as relate to mariners' wages, the legislature shall hereafter find it necessary to alter it.

16. The liberty of the press is essential to the security of freedom in a state; it ought not, therefore, to be restrained in this commonwealth.

17. The people have a right to keep and bear arms for their common defence. And as in time of peace armies are dangerous to liberty, they ought not to be maintained without consent of the legislature; and the military power shall always be held in exact subordination to the civil authority, and be governed by it.

18. A frequent recurrence to the fundamental principles of the constitution, and a constant adherence to those of piety, justice, moderation, temperance, industry and frugality, are absolutely necessary to preserve the advantages of liberty, and to maintain a free government. The people ought, consequently, to have a particular attention to all those principles in the choice of their officers and representatives; and they have a right to require of their lawgivers and magistrates an exact and constant observance of them in the formation and execution of all laws necessary for the good administration of the commonwealth. 19. The people have a right in an orderly and peaceable manner to assemble to consult on the common good, give instructions to their representatives, and to request of the legislative body, by the way of addresses, petitions or remonstrances, redress of the wrongs done them and of the grievances they suffer.

20. The power of suspending the laws, or the execution of the laws, ought never to be exercised but by the legislature, or by authority derived from it, to be exercised in such particular cases only as the legislature shall expressly provide for.

21. The freedom of deliberation, speech and debate in either house of the legislature is so essential to the rights of the people that it cannot be the foundation of any accusation or prosecution, action or complaint in any other court or place whatever.

22. The legislature ought frequently to assemble for the redress of grievances, for correcting, strengthening and confirming the laws, and for making new laws, as the common good may require.

23. No subsidy, charge, tax, impost or duties ought to be established, fixed, laid or levied under any pretext whatever, without the consent of the people or their representatives in the legislature.

24. Laws made to punish for actions done before the existence of such laws, and which have not been declared crimes by preceding laws, are unjust, oppres sive and inconsistent with the fundamental principles of a free government.

25. No person ought in any case or in any time to be declared guilty of treason or felony by the legislature.

26. No magistrate or court of law shall demand excessive bail or sureties, impose excessive fines, or inflict cruel or unusual punishments.

27. In time of peace no soldier ought to be quartered in any house without the consent of the owner; and in time of war such quarters ought not to be made but by the civil magistrate in manner ordained by the legislature.

28. No person can in any case be subjected to law martial, or to any penalties or pains of that law (except those employed in the army or navy, and except the militia in actual service), but by the authority of the legislature.

29. It is essential to the preservation of the rights of every individual, his life, liberty, property and character, that there be an impartial interpretation of the laws and administration of justice. It is the right of every citizen to be tried by judges as free, impartial and independent as the lot of humanity

will admit. It is therefore, not only the best policy, but for the security of the rights of the people and of every citizen, that the judges of the supreme judicial courts should hold their offices as long as they behave themselves well, and that they should have honorable salaries, ascertained and established by standing laws.

30. In the government of this commonwealth the legislative department shall never exercise the executive and judicial powers, or either of them; the executive shall never exercise the legislative and judicial powers, or either of them; the judicial shall never exercise the legislative and executive powers, or either of them; to the end that it may be a government of laws, and not of men.

PART II.

FRAME OF GOVERNMENT.

The people inhabiting the territory formerly called the province of Massachusetts Bay do hereby solemnly and mutually agree with each other to form themselves into a free, sovereign and independent body politic or state, by the name of The Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

[Here follows the constitution of the government.]

THE TENTH AMENDMENT.

There was much clamor against the federal constitution when it was under discussion, because it did not contain a bill of rights. It was replied that all rights and powers remained in the people, except those actually expressed in the constitution; and that a bill of rights was therefore an absurdity; and besides, that it was dangerous, in implying that all rights not expressed as kept out, might in future be assumed to be in the constitution.

But the clamor went on, and in the Massachusetts convention, to escape defeat, the friends proposed to recommend an amendment declaring what every advocate said was the case anyhow, viz. that ALL POWERS NOT DELEGATED ARE RESERVED. When Gov. Hancock made this "conciliatory proposition," Samuel Adams turned to be an advocate, saying it was "equivalent to a summary of a bill of rights," and meant precisely what the second article of the first federal constitution did, viz., that "each state retained her sovereignty, and every power and right not expressly delegated to the united states in congress assembled." And he wrote to Gerry and Lee in congress, to urge the adoption of the said amendment, so that the people should see clearly "the distinction between the powers delegated to congress, and the sovereign authority of the several states, which is the palladium of the rights of the people."

The different forms in which the states proposed the prospective tenth amendment are here given, because the perverters say it means that the nation reserved to the states such powers as it chose, reserving all others to the state governments or to itself-the people.

This idea will be found ridiculous when the different forms as proposed by the states are presented, showing what they meant and thought they were proposing.

The form used by MASSACHUSETTS was as follows: "All powers not expressly delegated by the aforesaid constitution are reserved by the several states, to be by them exercised." [II. Ell. Deb. 197.]

SOUTH CAROLINA's version: "The states retain every power not expressly relinquished by them, and vested in the general government of the union. [I. Ell. Deb. 325.]

General C. C. Pinckney said: "It is admitted by all that the rights not expressed were reserved by the several states." [IV. Ibid. 286.]

MARYLAND'S version is, that "congress shall exercise no power but what is expressly delegated by this constitution." [II. Ibid. 550.]

NORTH CAROLINA expressed it thus: "That each state in the union shall respectively retain every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this constitution delegated to the congress of the united states, or to the departments of the general government. Nor shall the said congress, nor any department of the said government, exercise any act of authority over any individual in any of the said states, but such as can be justified under some power particularly given in this constitution; but the said constitution shall be considered at all times a solemn instrument defining the extent of their authority, and defining the limits which they cannot rightfully in any instance exceed." [IV. Ibid. 249; Va. Gaz. Sept. 4, 1788.]

NEW HAMPSHIRE'S expression reads thus: "All powers not expressly and particularly delegated by the aforesaid constitution, are reserved by the several states to be by them exercised." [I. Ell. Deb. 326.]

NEW YORK'S version was put thus: "That every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by the said constitution clearly delegated to the congress of the united states, remains to the people of the several states, or to their respective state governments, to whom they may have granted the same." [I. Ibid. 327.]

RHODE ISLAND wanted the following amendment: "The united states shall guarantee to each state its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this constitution expressly delegated to the united states.'

APPENDIX F.

WEBSTER'S REAL CONSTITUTIONAL VIEWS.

SEVEN years after Webster had been elected to Congress from New Hampshire, and when he was in the full maturity of years and intellect, he, as a statesman, was called upon by one of the most enlightened communities of America, for his best considered counsel on that momentous subject then agitating the whole country - the admission of Missouri into the union of states, with or without conditions. The following document contains his most deliberate views:

The italics are in the text except what contains the following points of Webster's doctrine:

1. That "the only parties to the constitution" ‹ 'contemplated originally' were "the 13 confederated states."

2. That its provisions "rest on compact and plighted faith."

3. That all new states must come in by compact.

4. That our union is "the American confederacy."

A MEMORIAL

TO THE

CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES,

ON THE

Subject of Restraining the Increase of Slavery in New States,

TO BE ADMITTED INTO THE UNION.

Prepared in pursuance of a vote of the inhabitants of Boston and its vicinity, assembled at the State House, on the third day of December, A. D., 1819.

BOSTON:

SEWELL PHELPS, PRINTER, No. 5 COURT STREET.

1819.

The Committee appointed by a vote of the meeting holden in the State House, on the 3d instant, to prepare a memorial to Congress, on the subject of the prohibition of Slavery in the New States, submit the following:

BOSTON, December 15, 1819.

DANIEL WEBSTER,

GEORGE BLAKE,

JOSIAH QUINCY.

JAMES T. AUSTIN.
JOHN GALLISON.

MEMORIAL.

To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States, in Congress assembled:

THE undersigned, inhabitants of Boston and its vicinity, beg leave most respectfully and humbly to represent; That the question of the introduction of Slavery into the New States, to be formed on the west side of the Mississippi River, appears to them to be a question of the last importance to the future welfare of the United States. If the progress of this great evil is ever to be arrested, it seems to the undersigned that this is the time to arrest it. A false step taken now cannot be retraced; and it appears to us that the happiness of unborn millions rests on the measures, which Congress may, on this occasion, adopt. Considering this as no local question, nor a question to be decided by a temporary expediency, but as involving great interests of the whole of the United States, and affecting deeply and essentially those objects of common defence, general welfare, and the perpetuation of the blessings of liberty, for which the Constitution itself was formed, we have presumed in this way, to offer our sentiments and express our wishes to the National Legislature. And as various reasons have been suggested, against prohibiting Slavery in the New States, it may perhaps be permitted to us to state our reasons, both for believing that Congress possesses the Constitutional power to make such prohibition a condition, on the admission of a New State into the Union, and that it is just and proper that they should exercise that power.

And, in the first place, as to the Constitutional authority of Congress. The Constitution of the United States has declared, that "the Congress shall have power to dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations respecting the Territory, or other property belonging to the United States; and nothing in this Constitution shall be so construed as to prejudice the claims of the United States, or of any particular State.". It is very well known that the saving in this clause of the claims of any particular State was designed to apply to claims by the then existing States of territory, which was also claimed by the United States as their own property.

It has, therefore, no bearing on the present question. The power, then, of Congress over its own territories is, by the very terms of the Constitution unlimited. It may make all "needful rules and regulations; " which of course include all such regulations as its own views of policy or expediency shall from time to time dictate. If, therefore, in its judgment, it be needful for the benefit of a Territory to enact a prohibition of slavery, it would seem to be as much within its power of legislation, as any other ordinary act of local policy. Its sovereignty being complete and universal, as to the Territory, it may exercise over it the most ample jurisdiction in every respect. It possesses in this view all the authority which any State Legislature possesses over its own Territory and if a State Legislature may, in its discretion, abolish or prohibit Slavery within its own limits, in virtue of its general legislative authority, for the same reason Congress also may exercise the like authority over its own Territories. And that a State Legislature, unless restrained by some constitional provision, may so do, is unquestionable, and has been established by general practice.

If then, Congress possess unlimited powers of government over its Territories, it may certainly from time to time vary, control and modify its legislation