[Footnote 15: Since that time the words "free" and "freemen" have been gradually falling into disuse, and the word citizen been substituted--doubtless for the reason that it is not pleasant to our pride or our humanity to use words, one of whose significations serves to suggest a contrast between ourselves and slaves.] [Footnote 16: Dallas's edition of the Laws of Pennsylvania, vol. 1, Appendix, page 25.] [Footnote 17: Cooper's edition of the Laws of South Carolina, vols. 2 and 4. "Aliens,"] CHAPTER VII. THE ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION. The Articles of Confederation, (formed in 1778,) contained no recognition of slavery. The only words in them, that could be claimed by any body as recognizing slavery, are the following, in Art. 4, Sec. 1. "The better to secure and perpetuate mutual friendship and intercourse among the people of the different States in this Union, _the free inhabitants_ of each of these States, paupers, vagabonds and fugitives from justice excepted, shall be entitled to all the privileges and immunities of _free citizens_ in the several States; and _the people_ of each State shall have free ingress and regress to and from any other State, and shall enjoy therein all the privileges of trade and commerce, subject to the same duties, impositions and restrictions, as the inhabitants thereof respectively." There are several reasons why this provision contains no legal recognition of slavery. 1. The true meaning of the word "free," as used in the English law, in the colonial charters, and in the State constitutions up to this time, when applied to persons, was to describe citizens, or persons possessed of franchises, as distinguished from aliens or persons not possessed of the same franchises. Usage, then, would give this meaning to the word "free" in this section. 2. The rules of law require that an innocent meaning should be given to all words that will bear an innocent meaning. 3. The Confederation was a league between states in their corporate capacity; and not, like the constitution, a government established by the people in their individual character. The confederation, then, being a league between states or corporations, as such, of course recognized nothing in the character of the state governments except what their corporate charters or state constitutions authorized. And as none of the state constitutions of the day recognized slavery, the confederation of the state governments could not of course recognize it. Certainly none of its language can, consistently with legal rules, have such a meaning given to it, when it is susceptible of another that perfectly accords with the sense in which it is used in the constitutions of the states, that were parties to the league.