What Is the Constitution Worth Nowadays?
The New York Tribune reminds a candidate for governor in a certain State, that “the United States Constitution guarantees to every State a republican form of government.” The United States Constitution also guarantees that “neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime, . . . shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.” And yet slavery does exist, and is expected to continue to exist, in places subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, by positive arrangement of the national administration; and the nation pays to the chief slave owner ten thousand dollars a year for support. And the Tribune sanctions all this. What is the Constitution worth nowadays?