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," recommends that a "uniform system of local government" be adopted, and adds, that "although it was selected as the seat of the General Government, the site of its public edifices, the depository of its archives, and the residences of officers intrusted with large amounts of public property, and the management of public business, yet it never has been subjected to, or received, that _special_ and _comprehensive_ legislation which these circumstances peculiarly demanded." [Footnote A: Mr. Van Buren, when a member of the Senate of New-York, voted for the following preamble and resolutions, which passed unanimously:--Jan. 28th, 1820. "Whereas the inhibiting the further extension of slavery in the United States, is a subject of deep concern to the people of this state: and whereas, we consider slavery as an evil much to be deplored, and that _every constitutional barrier should be interposed to prevent its further extension_: and that the constitution of the United States _clearly gives Congress the right_ to require new states, not comprised within the original boundary of the United States, to _make the prohibition of slavery_ a condition of their admission into the Union: Therefore, Resolved, That our Senators be instructed, and our members of Congress be requested, to oppose the admission as a state into the Union, of any territory not comprised as aforesaid, without making _the prohibition of slavery_ therein an indispensible condition of admission." ] The tenor of Mr. Tallmadge's speech on the right of petition, and of Mr. Webster's on the reception of abolition memorials, may be taken as universal exponents of the sentiments of northern statesmen as to the power of Congress to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia. An explicit declaration, that an "_overwhelming majority_" of the _present_ Congress concede the power to abolish slavery in the District has just been made by Robert Barnwell Rhett, a member of Congress from South Carolina, in a letter published in the Charleston Mercury of Dec. 27, 1837. The following is an extract: "The time has arrived when we must have new guaranties under the constitution, or the Union must be dissolved. _Our views of the constitution are not those of the majority_. AN OVERWHELMING MAJORITY _think that by the constitution, Congress may abolish slavery in the District of Columbia--may abolish the slave trade between the States; that is, it may p
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