of the
Supreme Court of the United States.

He assumed that position at Freeport on the 27th of August, 1858. He said
that the people of the Territories can exclude slavery, in so many words:
You ought, however, to bear in mind that he has never said it since. You
may hunt in every speech that he has since made, and he has never used
that expression once. He has never seemed to notice that he is stating his
views differently from what he did then; but by some sort of accident, he
has always really stated it differently. He has always since then declared
that "the Constitution does not carry slavery into the Territories of the
United States beyond the power of the people legally to control it, as
other property." Now, there is a difference in the language used upon
that former occasion and in this latter day. There may or may not be a
difference in the meaning, but it is worth while considering whether there
is not also a difference in meaning.

What is it to exclude? Why, it is to drive it out. It is in some way to
put it out of the Territory. It is to force it across the line, or change
its character so that, as property, it is out of existence. But what is
the controlling of it "as other property"? Is controlling it as other
property the same thing as destroying it, or driving it away? I should
think not. I should think the controlling of it as other property would be
just about what you in Kentucky should want. I understand the controlling
of property means the controlling of it for the benefit of the owner of
it. While I have no doubt the Supreme Court of the United States would
say "God speed" to any of the Territorial Legislatures that should thus
control slave property, they would sing quite a different tune if, by
the pretence of controlling it, they were to undertake to pass laws which
virtually excluded it,--and that upon a very well known principle to
all lawyers, that what a Legislature cannot directly do, it cannot do by
indirection; that as the Legislature has not the power to drive slaves
out, they have no power, by indirection, by tax, or by imposing burdens in
any way on that property, to effect the same end, and that any attempt to
do so would be held by the Dred Scott court unconstitutional.

Douglas is not willing to stand by his first proposition that they can
exclude it, because we have seen that that proposition amounts to nothing
more nor less than the naked absurdity that you may lawfully drive