44. Slavery, says Sterne, however disguised, _is still a bitter draught_; but it is rendered tenfold more bitter and intolerable, when the members of families are dragged asunder, never to behold each other, or their native _wonted_ country again.--And it is the _uncontrolled slave trade_, between the middle and southerly states, which gives facility to the extensive and increasing practice of kidnapping (slaves as well as freemen,) and secures it from the possibility of detection, except casually. Under the existing laws, if a free coloured man travels without passports certifying his right to his liberty, he is generally apprehended; and frequently plunged into slavery, by the operation of the laws. But after being seized and manacled by the kidnapper, the slave merchant drives him through several states, without interruption, and sells him where he seldom regains his liberty. If the wisdom of the state or general governments should not recommend the complete abolition of the internal as well as external slave trade, it believed, at least, that an acquaintance with its abuses will convince them of the necessity of so regulating it, as to confine the traffic _totally_ to legal _slaves_. This could, perhaps, be effectually accomplished by compelling every travelling slave-trader to report his slaves to a proper magistrate, in every township or county through which he passes; and to produce certificates, from some magistrate residing near the place in which they were purchased, of their being legal slaves and legally sold;--and also by compelling every purchaser of imported slaves, (by _land_ or _sea_,) to register them, and file similar certificates, in the offices of the respective county clerks. 45. The act of depriving a free man of his liberty, being a violation of the constitution of the United States, and an _overt attack_ upon the public liberty, ought to be declared treason of some sort or other, and punished by a reciprocity, in some degree, of the fate, to which the conspirator attempts to involve his victim;--imprisonment in a penitentiary, or some other secure place of industry, and moral education;--for, I do not believe there ever lived a kidnapper, who had read the whole of the New Testament, or any part of Seneca's Morals, or Paley's Principles of Moral Philosophy, or any similar books.