Mr. Clay's resolution, to _prohibit
emancipation_ within the District. There is no _stopping place_ for this
plighted "faith." Congress must not only refrain from laying violent
hands on slavery, _itself_, and see to it that the slaveholders
themselves do not, but it is bound to keep the system up to the Maryland
and Virginia standard of vigor!

Again, if the good faith of Congress to Virginia and Maryland requires
that slavery should exist in the District, while it exists in those
states, it requires that it should exist there _as_ it exists in those
states. If to abolish _every_ form of slavery in the District would
violate good faith, to abolish _the_ form existing in those states, and
to substitute a totally different one, would also violate it. The
Congressional "good faith" is to be kept not only with _slavery_, but
with the _Maryland and Virginia systems_ of slavery. The faith of those
states not being in the preservation of _a_ system, but of _their_
system; otherwise Congress, instead of _sustaining_, would counteract
their policy--principles would be brought into action there conflicting
with their system, and thus the true spirit of the "implied" pledge
would be violated. On this principle, so long as slaves are "chattels
personal" in Virginia and Maryland, Congress could not make them _real
estate_, inseparable from the soil, as in Louisiana; nor could it permit
slaves to read, nor to worship God according to conscience; nor could it
grant them trial by jury, nor legalize marriage; nor require the master
to give sufficient food and clothing; nor prohibit the violent sundering
of families--because such provisions would conflict with the existing
slave laws of Virginia and Maryland, and thus violate the "good faith
implied," &c. So the principle of the resolution binds Congress in all
these particulars: 1st. Not to abolish slavery in the District _until_
Virginia and Maryland abolish. 2d. Not to abolish any _part_ of it that
exists in those states. 3d. Not to abolish any _form_ or _appendage_ of
it still existing in those states. 4th. _To abolish_ when they do. 5th.
To increase or abate its rigors _when, how_, and _as_ the same are
modified by those states. In a word, Congressional action in the
District is to float passively in the wake of legislative action on the
subject in those states.

But here comes a dilemma. Suppose the legislation of those states should
steer different courses--then there would be _