as to read "the State of Missouri." A short, sharp debate followed; the vote was a tie, and, by the vote of the Speaker, Cobb's motion was rejected. Parker, of Virginia, was quickly on his feet. As the House had refused to acknowledge Missouri to be a State, and as she must be a Territory if not a State, he moved to correct the journal by inserting the words "Territory of" before "Missouri." Taylor, the Speaker-author of the lately defeated restriction-remarked that the rules made it the Speaker's duty to examine and correct the journal before it was read. In the present instance he had thought it proper so to correct the journal that it should not be taken either to affirm or deny that Missouri was a State, this being a question on which the House was greatly divided. The question, said Parker, is not one of mere form. If Missouri was a Territory, and the House had voted she was not a State, why not call her a Territory? "I say she is a State, and were I a citizen of that State I would never, at your suggestion, strike out that clause in the constitution to which objection has been made. If I found it convenient to myself to do so, I would; but I would not do it on your recommendation, even for the important boon of being admitted into the Union. I would rather be trodden down by the armies of the North and East, and, if you could get them, from the South, than yield this point. * * * If ever on earth a people has been maltreated, it is this people." By a vote of one hundred and fifty to four, the House rejected Parker's motion to desig

Missouri Neither State nor Territory

nate Missouri as a Territory. In the face of these heavy majorities, that she was neither State nor Territory, the question was-What was she?

Eustis, on the 24th, attempted to surmount the obstacle in her path by proposing a resolution that she should be admitted on a certain day, provided the objectionable clause in her constitution be expunged,* but, as the same question would probably be brought up by a motion to amend the resolution in the Senate, Lowndes suggested that nothing would be gained by this course, and the Eustis resolution was rejected by a large majority. In the Senate, meanwhile, the Missouri question had been exhaustively discussed and a different decision reached. On the 29th of November the committee to whom the proposed constitution was referred reported a resolution declaring Missouri admitted, which passed to a second reading. Nearly all who spoke on the subject from this time declared that every member's mind was made up, and further debate useless. Eaton, of Tennessee, on the 6th of December, offered a proviso, that nothing in the act for admission should be construed as giving the assent of Congress to any provisions in the constitution of Missouri, if any there might be, which contravened the clause in the Constitution of the United States declaring the equality of right of citizens of each State to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States. This,

*Art. iii., Sec. 26, in re free negroes, etc.

at least, guarded Congress, and postponed the day of reckoning. Various provisos in the same direction were submitted during the discussion. On the 7th, Eaton's proviso was rejected by a majority of three,* and the discussion of the committee's resolution was resumed. Smith, of South Carolina, in a long speech, cited all the precedents to show that no condition had been imposed on any of the ten new States admitted. In the constitutions of all of them only free white males could be electors, yet Congress had never objected to the discrimination, if there was any. More than this, New Hampshire and Vermont excluded the negro from the militia, and Vermont empowered the select - men of the towns to exclude, at their discretion, not only negroes and mulattoes, but citizens of any description, male or female, of other States.† The naturalization laws of the United States extended to white persons only, and Massachusetts excluded all negroes not subject to the Emperor of Morocco, under penalty of being whipped. New York made provision for the exclusion of undesirable inhabitants, with penalty of fine, imprisonment, and whipping.§ Connecticut had a similar law,|| and its recent constitution denied citizenship to free negroes and mulattoes.

Was not this mass of evidence conclusive that

Missouri and the Privileges of Free Negroes

Missouri only followed precedent in excluding whom she did not want, and that the exclusion was no more a discrimination than the constitutions and laws of the older States? Holmes, who had recently taken his seat as a Senator from Maine, argued that the privileges and immunities of citizens were nowhere extended to free persons of color by the Constitution of the United States nor by the laws of Congress; that they were conferred by the States alone; that Missouri had not conferred them; and, therefore, that black citizens of other States would acquire no other privileges and immunities than her own black population. This part of the population being excluded, the black citizens of other States might be excluded also.

On the 11th Eaton again offered his rejected resolution. Morrill, of New Hampshire, cited cases in Vermont, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts where the privileges and immunities of citizenship had been exercised by free men of color, and reasoned that these alone, though few, should be sufficient to reject the admission of Missouri. This time Eaton's amendment was carried.*

The Senate resolution was taken up in the House seven weeks later. Clay at once declared for it. Lowndes, Randolph, Barbour, and others from slave-holding States, announced with equal promptness that they should vote against it. Foot, of Con

* Twenty-six to eighteen.

† January 29, 1821.

necticut, proposed Eustis's resolution to expunge. Six other propositions were submitted, but all, including Foot's, were rejected by large majorities.* The House would neither adopt the resolution of the Senate nor one of its own. All efforts at amendment had failed. Missouri was left-neither a State nor a Territory. At this point Clay, hoping to effect some compromise, moved to refer the Senate resolution to a special committee of thirteen; it was appointed,† with himself as chairman, and, on the 10th, made its report. It was nearly unanimous that no other conditions than those already specified in the enabling act should be imposed. The settlement of the question ought not to be disturbed. As to the clause in the Missouri constitution affecting free persons of color, the same diversity of opinion prevailed in the committee as had prevailed in the House. thought, therefore, that neither side abandoning its opinion, a compromise could be effected by amending the Senate resolution: Missouri should be admitted into the Union upon the fundamental condition that she should never pass a law preventing any description of persons from going to and settling in the State who were, or who might become, citizens of any State in the Union. When, by a solemn public act, the Legislature of Mis

* Mostly on February 1st.

It

+ The committee consisted of: Clay, Kentucky; Eustis, Massachusetts; Smith, Maryland; Sergeant, Pennsylvania; Lowndes, South Carolina; Ford, New York; Archer, Virginia; Hackley, New York; S. Moore, Pennsylvania; Cobb, Georgia; Tomlinson, Connecticut; Butler, New Hampshire; Campbell, Ohio.