Maryland, New-York, New-Jersey, South Carolina, and perhaps one or two others had provisions of this character. _North Carolina had none, Georgia none, Virginia none_. The slave laws of these three latter states, then, necessarily fell to the ground on this change of government. Maryland, New-York, New-Jersey and South-Carolina had acts upon their statute books, _assuming_ the existence of slavery, and pretending to legislate in regard to it; and it may perhaps be argued that those laws were continued in force under the provision referred to. But those acts do not come within the above description of "laws in force"--and for this reason, viz. the acts were originally unconstitutional and void, as being against the charters, under which they were passed; and therefore never had been _legally_ "in force," however they might have been actually carried into execution as a matter of might, or of pretended law, by the white race. This objection applies to the slave acts of all the colonies. None of them could be continued under this provision.--None of them, legally speaking, were "laws in force." But in particular states there were still other reasons against the colonial slave acts being valid under the new constitutions. For instance, South Carolina had no statute (as has before been mentioned,) that designated her slaves with such particularity as to distinguish them from free persons; and for that reason none of her slave statutes were _legally_ "in force." New-Jersey also was in the same situation. She had slave statutes; but none designating the slaves so as to distinguish them from the rest of her population. She had also one or more specific provisions in her constitution incompatible with slavery, to wit: "That the common law of England* * * * _shall remain in force_, until altered by a future law of the legislature; such parts only as are repugnant to the rights and privileges contained in this charter." (Sec. 22.) Maryland had also, in her new constitution, a specific provision incompatible with the acts on her colonial statute book in regard to slavery, to wit: "Sec. 3. That the _inhabitants_"--mark the word, for it includes _all_ the inhabitants--"that the _inhabitants_ of Maryland are entitled to the common law of England, and the trial by jury, according to the course of that law," &c. This guaranty, of "the common law of England" to _all_ "the inhabitants of Maryland," without discrimination, is incompatible with any slave acts that existed on the statute book; and the latter would therefore have become void under the constitution, even if they had not been previously void under the colonial charter. 4. Several of these state constitutions have used the words "free" and "freemen."