Here are provisions determining the main features of the Government, the distribution of powers in the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial departments, and the manner in which they shall be respectively constituted,--securing to the President, with the consent of the Senate, the appointment of Governor, Secretary, and Judges, and to the people only the election of the Legislature,--and even ordaining the qualifications of voters, the salaries of the public officers, and the daily compensation of the members of the Legislature. Surely, if Congress may establish these provisions, without interference with the rights of territorial sovereignty, it is absurd to say that it may not also prohibit Slavery. In this very bill there is an express prohibition on the Territory, borrowed from the Ordinance of 1787, and repeated in every Act organizing a Territory, or even a new State, down to the present time, where it is expressly declared that "no tax shall be imposed upon the property of the United States." Now here is a clear and unquestionable restriction upon the Territories and States. The public lands of the United States, situated within an organized Territory or State, cannot be regarded as the _instruments_ and _means_ necessary and proper to execute the sovereign powers of the nation, like fortifications, arsenals, and navy-yards. They are strictly in the nature of _private property_ of the nation, and as such, unless exempted by the foregoing prohibition, would clearly be within the scope of local taxation, liable, like the lands of other proprietors, to all customary burdens and incidents. Mr. Justice Woodbury has declared, in a well-considered judgment, that, "where the United States own land situated within the limits of particular States, and over which they have no cession of jurisdiction, for objects either special or general, little doubt exists that the rights and remedies in relation to it are usually such as apply to other land-owners within the State."[59] I assume, then, that without this prohibition these lands would be liable to taxation. Does any one question this? Nobody. The conclusion, then, follows, that by this prohibition you propose to deprive the present Territory, as you have deprived other Territories,--ay, and States,--of an essential portion of its sovereignty. [59] United States _v._ Ames, 1 Woodbury & Minot, 80. And these, Sir, are not vain words. The Supreme Court of the United States has given great prominence to the sovereign right of taxation in the States. In the case of _Providence Bank_ v. _Billings and Pittman_, 4 Peters, 561, they declare,-- "That the taxing power is of vital importance; _that it is essential to the existence of Government_; that the relinquishment of such a power is never to be assumed." And again, in the case of _Dobbins_ v. _Commissioners of Erie County_, 16 Peters, 447, they say:--