p. 208 | Freedom in New Territories

Pacific Press Publishing Company · New York · Mar 29, 1900

FromThe American Sentinel, Vol. 15, No. 13.

Freedom in New Territories

It is being seriously argued to-day even by prominent journals that because the Constitution did not (in the days before the war) of its own force extend slavery into the new territories of the United States, therefore the Constitution does not now of its own force extend freedom to the new territory taken from Spain. Such an argument is altogether fallacious. Slavery did not represent the Constitution or the Government; it was a blot upon the Government. Freedom, on the other hand, is the very essence of the governmental system which the Constitution embodies; and when the Government is extended, freedom, by the force of the Constitution, necessarily goes with it. When men fix their gaze too intently on technicalities, they generally lose sight of the principles which lie at the foundation of the whole subject.