ccurate language:

[Sidenote] 19 Howard, pp. 537-8.

I prefer the lights of Madison, Hamilton, and Jay, as a means of
construing the Constitution in all its bearings, rather than to
look behind that period into a traffic which is now declared to be
piracy, and punished with death by Christian nations. I do not
like to draw the sources of our domestic relations from so dark a
ground. Our independence was a great epoch in the history of
freedom; and while I admit the Government was not made especially
for the colored race, yet many of them were citizens of the New
England States, and exercised the rights of suffrage when the
Constitution was adopted, and it was not doubted by any
intelligent person that its tendencies would greatly ameliorate
their condition.

Many of the States on the adoption of the Constitution, or shortly
afterwards, took measures to abolish slavery within their
respective jurisdictions; and it is a well-known fact that a
belief was cherished by the leading men, South as well as North,
that the institution of slavery would gradually decline until it
would become extinct. The increased value of slave labor, in the
culture of cotton and sugar, prevented the realization of this
expectation. Like all other communities and States, the South were
influenced by what they considered to be their own interests. But
if we are to turn our attention to the dark ages of the world, why
confine our view to colored slavery? On the same principles white
men were made slaves. All slavery has its origin in power and is
against right.

To the constitutional theory advanced by the Chief-Justice, that
Congress cannot exercise sovereign powers over Federal Territories,
and hence cannot exclude slave property from them, Justices McLean and
Curtis also opposed a vigorous and exhaustive argument, which the most
eminent lawyers and statesmen of that day deemed conclusive. The
historical precedents alone ought to have determined the issue. "The
judicial mind of this country, State and Federal," said McLean, "has
agreed on no subject within its legitimate action with equal unanimity
as on the power of Congress to establish Territorial governments. No
court, State or Federal, no judge or statesman, is known to have had
any doubts on this question for nearly sixty years after the power was
exercised."

[Sidenote] 19 Howard,