I like the common law. I have made it my study. I like the use of this term here. It was a good system when not as perfect as it is now. The common law of England even tolerated slavery until it was abolished. The colliers of the North of England were once, to all intents and purposes, as much slaves as any negro on the Southern plantations, except in the matter of separation of families. I can refer you to a precedent on this subject, which you will find in a book of no very high authority. I mean the novel, _Red Gauntlet_. The general principle applicable here is this: Whenever you establish the right--no matter how, if you _establish_ it--the common law asserts the remedy. There is no crushing out about it. The simple proposition is this: Slavery exists already in that little worthless territory we own below the proposed line. Will we agree that it shall remain there just as it is now, so long as the territorial condition continues? That is all. There is no mystery or question of construction about it. Mr. FIELD:--The questions now before the Conference I suppose arise upon the report presented by the majority of the committee, and upon the motion to substitute for that report the propositions of the minority of the same committee. I propose to add to this report the three following propositions; and I will read them for the information of the Conference. I. "Each State has the sole and exclusive right, according to its own judgment, to order and direct its domestic institutions, and to determine for itself what shall be the relation to each other of all persons residing or being within its limits. II. "Congress shall provide by law for securing to the citizens of each State the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States. III. "The union of the States under the Constitution is indissoluble; and no State can secede from the Union, or nullify an act of Congress, or absolve its citizens from their paramount obligations of obedience to the Constitution and laws of the United States." These additions would render the majority report much more acceptable to the northern people than it is in its present shape, though even then, I am bound to declare, I could not support it. I prefer the substitute. In what I have now to say, I shall not confine myself to a discussion of these propositions, but availing myself of the latitude of debate hitherto allowed to gentlemen who have addressed the Conference in favor of the report of the majority of the committee, I shall endeavor to bring to the notice of this body, more fully than I have yet done, my views upon the general question presented for our consideration.