It may be supposed that here the word "free" is used as the correlative of slavery; that it presumes the "whites" to be "free;" and that it therefore implies that other persons than "white" may be slaves. Not so. No other parts of the constitution authorize such an inference; and the implication from the words themselves clearly is, that _some_ "white" persons might not be "free." The distinction implied is between those "white" persons that were "free," and those that were not "free." If this were not the distinction intended, and if _all_ "white" persons were "free," it would have been sufficient to have designated the electors simply as "white" persons, instead of designating them as both "free" and "white." If therefore it were admitted that the word "free," in this instance, were used as the correlative of slaves, the implication would be that _some_ "white" persons were, or might be slaves. There is therefore no alternative but to give to the word "free," in this instance, the same meaning that it has in the constitutions of Georgia, North Carolina and Pennsylvania. In 1704 South Carolina passed an act entitled, "_An act for making aliens FREE of this part of the Province._"--This statute remained in force until 1784, when it was repealed by an act entitled "_An act to confer the right of citizenship on aliens_"[17] One more example of this use of the word "_freeman_." The constitution of Connecticut, adopted as late as 1818, has this provision: "Art. 6. Sec. 1. All persons who have been, or _shall hereafter_, previous to the ratification of this constitution, _be admitted freemen_, according to the existing laws of this State, shall be electors." Surely no other proof can be necessary of the meaning of the words "free" and "freeman," as used in the constitutions existing in 1789; or that the use of those words furnish no implication in support of either the 'existence', or the constitutionality of slavery, prior to the adoption of the constitution of the United States in that year. I have found, in _none_ of the State constitutions before mentioned, (existing in 1789,) any other evidence or intimation of the existence of slavery, than that already commented upon and refuted. And if there be no other, then it is clear that slavery had no legal existence under them. And there was consequently no _constitutional_ slavery in the country up to the adoption of the constitution of the United States. [Footnote 14: The State Constitutions of 1789 were adopted as follows: Georgia, 1777; South Carolina, 1778; North Carolina, 1776; Virginia, 1776; Maryland, 1776; Delaware, 1776; Pennsylvania, 1776; New Jersey, 1776; New York, 1777; Massachusetts, 1780; New Hampshire, 1783. These early Constitutions ought to be collected and published with appropriate notes.]