Decided in strictness of technical language, it was known it could not
be. Hundreds, thousands, a vast variety of cases may arise, and
centuries elapse, and leave that Court, if our Union still exists,
deciding questions in relation to that character of property in the
Territories; but the great and fundamental idea was that, after thirty
years of angry controversy, dividing the people and paralyzing the arm
of the Federal Government, some umpire should be sought which would
compose the difficulty and set it upon a footing to leave us in future
to proceed in peace; and that umpire was selected which the Constitution
had provided to decide questions of law. I ask my friend to read some
extracts from the decision.
Mr. Chesnut read as follows, from the case of Dred Scott _vs._ Sandford,
pp. 55-57:
"The Territory being a part of the United States, the Government and the
citizen both enter it under the authority of the Constitution, with
their respective rights defined and marked out; and the Federal
Government can exercise no power over his person or property beyond what
that instrument confers, nor lawfully deny any right which it has
reserved....
"The powers over person and property, of which we speak, are not only
not granted to Congress, but are in express terms denied, and they are
forbidden to exercise them. And this prohibition is not confined to the
States, but the words are general, and extend to the whole territory
over which the Constitution gives it power to legislate, including those
portions of it remaining under territorial government, as well as that
covered by States.
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