1. Be it enacted by the people of the State of New
York, represented in Senate and Assembly, That the Governor
of the State be, and he is hereby authorized to raise, by
voluntary enlistment, two regiments of free men of color,
for the defence of the State for three years, unless sooner
discharged.

"SECT. 2. And be it further enacted, That each of the said
regiments shall consist of one thousand and eighty
able-bodied men; and the said regiments shall be formed into
a brigade, or be organized in such manner, and shall be
employed in such service, as the Governor of the State of
New York shall deem best adapted to defend the said State.

"SECT. 3. And be it further enacted, That all the
commissioned officers of the said regiments and brigade
shall be white men; and the Governor of the State of New
York shall be, and he is hereby, authorized to commission,
by brevet, all the officers of the said regiments and
brigade, who shall hold their respective commissions until
the council of appointment shall have appointed the officers
of the said regiments and brigade, in pursuance of the
Constitution and laws of the said State.

"SECT. 6. And be it further enacted, That it shall be lawful
for any able-bodied slave, with the written assent of his
master or mistress, to enlist into the said corps; and the
master or mistress of such slave shall be entitled to the
pay and bounty allowed him for his service: and, further,
that the said slave, at the time of receiving his discharge,
shall be deemed and adjudged to have been legally manumitted
from that time, and his said master or mistress shall not
thenceforward be liable for his maintenance.--_Laws of the
State of New York, passed at the Thirty-eighth Session of
the Legislature_, chap. xviii."

The organization of negro troops was now fairly begun; at the South
enlistment was confined to the free negroes as set forth in Gen.
Jackson's Proclamation. In New York, the slaves who should enlist with
the consent of their owners were to be free at the expiration of their
service, as provided in the Sixth section of the law quoted above.

Animated by that love of liberty and country which has ever prompted
them, notwithstanding the disabilities under which they labored, to
enter the ranks of their country's defenders whenever that