of the people
or citizens of the State, nor supposed to possess any political rights
which the dominant race might not withhold or grant at their
pleasure. And as long ago as 1822, the Court of Appeals of Kentucky
decided that free negroes and mulattoes were not citizens within the
meaning of the Constitution of the United States; and the correctness
of this decision is recognised, and the same doctrine affirmed, in 1
Meigs's Tenn. Reports, 331.

And if we turn to the legislation of the States where slavery had worn
out, or measures taken for its speedy abolition, we shall find the
same opinions and principles equally fixed and equally acted upon.

Thus, Massachusetts, in 1786, passed a law similar to the colonial one
of which we have spoken. The law of 1786, like the law of 1705,
forbids the marriage of any white person with any negro, Indian, or
mulatto, and inflicts a penalty of fifty pounds upon any one who shall
join them in marriage; and declares all such marriages absolutely null
and void, and degrades thus the unhappy issue of the marriage by
fixing upon it the stain of bastardy. And this mark of degradation was
renewed, and again impressed upon the race, in the careful and
deliberate preparation of their revised code published in 1836. This
code forbids any person from joining in marriage any white person with
any Indian, negro, or mulatto, and subjects the party who shall offend
in this respect, to imprisonment, not exceeding six months, in the
common jail, or to hard labor, and to a fine of not less than fifty
nor more than two hundred dollars; and, like the law of 1786, it
declares the marriage to be absolutely null and void. It will be seen
that the punishment is increased by the code upon the person who shall
marry them, by adding imprisonment to a pecuniary penalty.

So, too, in Connecticut. We refer more particularly to the legislation
of this State, because it was not only among the first to put an end
to slavery within its own territory, but was the first to fix a mark
of reprobation upon the African slave trade. The law last mentioned
was passed in October, 1788, about nine months after the State had
ratified and adopted the present Constitution of the United States;
and by that law it prohibited its own citizens, under severe
penalties, from engaging in the trade, and declared all policies of
insurance on the vessel or cargo made in the State to be null and
void. But, up to the time of the adopti