I ask that committee whether they are not proposing a change in the Constitution, which, if adopted, will operate as a direct and effectual protection of slavery in all the territories of the United States? This appears to me to be the true question for our consideration. I wish to know what meaning is attached by its friends to one part of the proposed article. It states that "the _status_ of persons owing service or labor as it now exists shall not be changed by law," &c.; and again, "that the rights arising out of said relations shall be subject to judicial cognizance in the Federal courts according to the _common law_." The _status_, then, shall not be changed. By that term I suppose condition is intended. I understand that perfectly. There shall be no law to change the condition, to _impair_ the rights of the slaveholder; but shall there be no law to _protect_ these rights? Now, what is intended by this? Why not make this provision plain, and not leave it open to any question of construction? The ghost of the old trouble rises here, and will not down at the bidding of any man. I believe under this article the institution of slavery is to be protected by a most ingenious contrivance. The _common law_, administered according to the pro-slavery view, is to be called in for its protection. Now I ask the chairman of the committee reporting these propositions what he means by the _common law_? The common law, as we understand it, is the law of freedom--not of slavery. But I do not here propose to discuss that question. I wish to know how the truth really is. How does the committee, how do the friends of this proposition understand it? By the _common law_ a slave is still a man: a person, and not a personal chattel. He may owe service, as a child to its parent, an apprentice to his master, but he is still a _person_ owing service. He is all the time recognized as a _man_. As such he may own and hold property, take it by inheritance and dispose of it at pleasure, by will or by contract. All these rights, all the principles on which they are founded, are in direct antagonism to slavery. The argument may be carried much farther, but this is far enough for my purpose. By the slave law, all this is reversed. The master owns the _body_ of the slave, may sell or otherwise dispose of him, may make him the subject of inheritance. The slave loses all the attributes of a person, and becomes property as much as the horse or the ox that feeds at his master's crib. These, in a condition of slavery are the rights of the master over the slave. These rights the common law, under this proposition, is to recognize, protect, and enforce. I believe I am not mistaken in this. What other construction can you give the article? It is a distinct proposal to engraft slavery upon the common law: to declare in the Constitution that slavery is recognized and protected by the common law.