The new
constitution has accordingly, with great propriety, made provision
against them, and all others proceeding from the defect of the
confederation on this head, by authorizing the general government to
establish an uniform rule of naturalization throughout the United
States."

Throughout this whole quotation Mr. Madison obviously takes it for
granted that the word "free" is used in the articles of confederation,
as the correlative of aliens.--And in this respect he no doubt correctly
represents the meaning then given to the word by the people of the
United States. And in the closing sentence of the quotation, he
virtually asserts that such is the meaning of the word "free" in "the
new constitution."

CHAPTER VIII.

THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES.

We come now to the period commencing with the adoption of the
constitution of the United States.

We have already seen that slavery had not been authorized or established
by any of the fundamental constitutions or charters that had existed
previous to this time; that it had always been a mere abuse sustained by
the common consent of the strongest party, in defiance of the avowed
constitutional principles of their governments. And the question now is,
whether it was constitutionally established, authorized or sanctioned by
the constitution of the United States?

It is perfectly clear, in the first place, that the constitution of the
United States did not, _of itself, create or establish_ slavery as a
_new_ institution; or even give any authority to the state governments
to establish it as a new institution.--The greatest sticklers for
slavery do not claim this. The most they claim is, that it recognized it
as an institution already legally existing, under the authority of the
state governments; and that it virtually guarantied to the states the
right of continuing it in existence during their pleasure. And this is
really the only question arising out of the constitution of the United
States on this subject, viz: whether it _did_ thus recognize and
sanction slavery as an _existing_ institution?

This question is, in reality, answered in the negative by what has
already been shown; for if slavery had no constitutional existence,
under the state constitutions, prior to the adoption of the constitution
of the United States, then it is absolutely certain that the
constitution of the United States did _not_ recognize it as a
constitutional