States' Constitution,
nor upon the ground of his United States citizenship, nor by having his
domicile within the United States jurisdiction. The constitution no
where recognizes the right to "slave property," _but merely the fact
that the states have jurisdiction each in its own limits, and that there
are certain "persons" within their jurisdictions "held to service" by
their own laws_.

Finally, in the clause under consideration, "private property" is not to
be taken "without _just_ compensation." "JUST!" If justice is to be
appealed to in determining the amount of compensation, let her determine
the _grounds_ also. If it be her province to say _how much_ compensation
is "just," it is hers to say whether _any_ is "just,"--whether the slave
is "just" property _at all_, rather than a "_person_." Then, if justice
adjudges the slave to be "private property," it adjudges him to be _his
own_ property, since the right to one's _self_ is the first right--the
source of all others--the original stock by which they are
accumulated--the principal, of which they are the interest. And since
the slave's "private property" has been "taken," and since
"compensation" is impossible--there being no _equivalent_ for one's
self--the least that can be done is to restore to him his original
private property.

Having shown that in abolishing slavery, "property" would not be "taken
for public use," it may be added that, in those states where slavery has
been abolished by law, no claim for compensation has been allowed.
Indeed the manifest absurdity of demanding it, seems to have quite
forestalled the _setting up_ of such a claim.

The abolition of slavery in the District, instead of being a legislative
anomaly, would proceed upon the principles of every day legislation. It
has been shown already, that the United States' Constitution does not
recognize slaves as "property." Yet ordinary legislation is full of
precedents, showing that even _absolute_ property is in many respects
wholly subject to legislation. The repeal of the law of entailments--all
those acts that control the alienation of property, its disposal by
will, its passing to heirs by descent, with the question, who shall be
heirs, and what shall be the rule of distribution among them, or whether
property shall be transmitted at all by descent, rather than escheat to
the state--these, with statutes of limitation, and various other classes
of legislative acts, serve to illustrate t