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Show 226 DESPOTISI\r was left in Georgia, as in the other state~, to rest ?n such legal ba!-iis as it might have ha~ durwg coloma! times. The rottenness of that bas1s was not perceived by the state lcgi•latures nor .by the state courts. 'l'heir preconceived prejudices, thetr unw1ll~ngncss .to look into the matter at all, kept them blmd to It; but their blindness, their ignorance, their mistakes, could not alter the law, nor make that legal which jn fact was· not so. rrhere was, indeed, the best of reasons why none of the States-however several of them might be willing to leave to slavery such character of legality as it had acquired from colonial legislation-should have ventured upon any direct attempts, by virtue of their newly-assumed powers, to bestow upon it a new and original character of legality. For, however jurists and courts of law may have admitted a legal omnipo· tencc in governments, the people of the United States, in rising against the mother country, and establlshmg thcmsel vcs as a separate nation, had cxpressl y renounced any such claims. Not to mention particu~ lar State Bills of Ricrhts, their joint Declaration of Independence-that public and official exhibition of reasons for the steps they had taken in breaking up their union with Great Britain-proceeded on the very ground that men possess certain inherent and unalienable Rights, including life, liberty, and the pur· suit of happiness-rights which no government has authority to take away, unless, indeed, in the way of punishment for crimes-and any deliberate an.d contluuou:; attempt to invade which, justifies resistance even unto death. With what face could governments which had just made such a declaration of principles proceed to enact laws subjecting to per~etual and he· rcditary servitude one half or more of thm_r mh~bitants? How paltry, how trifling, side by stde w1th such a terrible assumption, must have appeared ~he parliamentary claim to tax the colonies, out of wluch the H.evolution grew! IN AMERICA. 227 . Nor was the !e.nun.ciation thus made without a more d1rcct and posthve mrluence in many of the states; for the Supreme Court of Massachusetts decided, in 178-l, that the natural fr~edom and political equality of aU men, pr<:claJmed m the Declaration of Indcpende~ ce,. and m the Bill of Rights prefixed to the Con•titutiOn adopted 111 that state in 1780, were totall~ mcons1stcnt Wlth the existence of involuntary seTVItude, and that slavery under that Bill of Rights could. no.t be legal. A similar clause in the second constitutiOn of New Hampshire was held to guarantee personal freedom to all persons born in that state after the ado~twn of that constitution. In Pennsylvania, ConnectiCut, and H.hode Island, personal liberty was secured by statute to all future natives of those states; and, to complete this scheme of abolition in these th.rec state~, as well as in New Hampshire, the further mtroduchon of persons claimed as slaves, or the exportation of such persons from those states was prohibited. ' In five of the eight remaining states, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, 1\iaryland, and Virginia, slavery w~s regarded, b;Y the more intelligent and enlightened cthzcns, mcludmg all those distinauishcd men who had take? a conspicuous part in th~ late Revolution, as an ev1l.and a wrong inconsistent with the principles on which that Revolution was founded. Its tertmnatwn was anxiously looked for, and confidently hoped. All those five states had taken the first step In that daectwn by prohibiting the further introduc- , ~on of persons claim~d as slaves; while Virginia and £ faryland, by repealing the old colonial acts which ~rbade manum1ssions, except by the allowance of t e. govcrn?r ~n.d council, had opened a door for the aehon of md1v1dual sentiment in favor of liberty WhiCh came soon into active exercise. Such was the state of things in the ten northern - · states when the Federal convention came together· and, pending the session of t hat convention the fa~ mous ordinance of 1787 was passed by the Congress |