n the District: President Van Buren in his
letter of March 6, 1836, to a committee of gentlemen in North Carolina,
says, "I would not, from the light now before me, feel myself safe in
pronouncing that Congress does not possess the power of abolishing
slavery in the District of Columbia." This declaration of the President
is consistent with his avowed sentiments touching the Missouri question,
on which he coincided with such men as Daniel D. Tompkins, De Witt
Clinton, and others, whose names are a host.[A] It is consistent, also,
with his recommendation in his late message, in which, speaking of the
District, he strongly urges upon Congress "a thorough and careful
revision of its local government," speaks of the "entire dependence" of
the people of the District "upon Congress," 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 residence of officers
entrusted 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 an
territory not comprised as aforesaid, without making _the prohibition of
slavery_ therein an indispensable 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 stat