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FEBRUARY, 1863 D O U G L A SS M O N T H L Y 797 [[horiz line across page]] [[column 1/3]] C. Nell presided. Addresses were made by Rev. Dr. Kirk, Dr. J. B. Smith, William Wells Brown, Rev. James Freeman Clarke, Frederick Douglass, Miss Annie E. Dickinson, and several others. In the evening when the Proclamation came to hand, Charles W. Slack read it to the audience, who received it with uprorious applause, shouting, tossing up their hats, rapping on the floor with their canes, and singing "Bow ye the trumpet, "blow" Rev. Mr. Waterston offered a prayer which touched all hearts. Then followed shouts of "Glory to God in the highest ;" and "Hallelujah !" After the meeting was dismissed, many of the audience went to the Twelfth street Baptist church which had been opened during the evening, where a large congregation had assembled to wait for the Proclamation. In Worcester, Washburn Hall threw open its doors to a rejoicing audience, and a spirited meeting was held ; addressed by Rev. Messrs. Smith, Richardson, Whitney, and Brown. At Chicago, as our Western correspondent 'PILGRIM' reports, the colored people celebrated the gladsome New Year's Day with appropriate public festivities——feeling sure of the coming of the Proclamation, before it was issued. At Washington, a great flock of contraband——men, women and children assembled at the headquarters of Superintendent Nichols, and engaged in a variety of congratulatory exercises. They sang the 'Negro Boatman's Song' with a volume of voice that could be heard miles off. An old man arose and said, "I'm free now the Lord Jesus has made me free !" Then followed the song, 'Let my people go"——sung with thrilling effect and another, 'There will be no more taskmasters" A colored preacher, familiarly called John the Baptist, and other speakers, occupied the afternoon with addresses, interspersed with hymans. At seven in the evening, a bell-man, rang a bell, calling the people together for the reading of the Proclamation. After the reassembling prayer was offered by an aged contraband in these words : 'We 'seech thee, O Lord ! to 'member the ' de Union army, support dem on de right and 'left to carry on dy work. Go before dem 'like a burning lamp. 'Member de President, 'de sea sailors and land' trabbelers ; 'member 'me, de meanest of dem all. Write us a 'ticket, and gib us free admission in heaben. 'Amen.' During the reading of the Proclamation, explanations were made showing the different portions of Virginia in which Freedom was declared when many of the contrabands recognizing their native counties, cried out. ' Dat's me' 'I'm free,' "Dat means dis chile,' ' Bress de Lord for dat." The remainder of the evening was spent in exhortations, prayers, hymns, joyful exclamations, and blessings on Massa Lincoln. It was a scene never to be forgotten by any who witnessed it. In South Carolina, at Beaufort, a celebration of the negroes was held in a live-oak grove. Gen. Saxton, Chaplain French, Col. Higginson, Mrs. Frances D. Gage, (The Independant's correspondent,) and others, in addition to the colored people, took part in the exercises. A set of colors, the gift of Dr. Cheever's church of New York, was presented to the negro brigade. A barbacue followed, consisting of twelve roasted oxen. The health of the President was drunk in molasses and water by the humble people whom he so greatly blest. One hundred guns were fired on Boston Common, in Albany, Pittsburg, and other cities throughout the North, and far to the West, in San Francisco——whither the joyful news was flashed over the wires, reaching an expectant people as soon as in those cities which stand as nearer neighbors to Washington. In addition to the above, many other demonstrations were made in various Northern cities, of which we have no room here to make chronicle ; nor have we space for mentioning any of the innumerable references to the Great Event which were made in the Churches on the first Sunday of the year. The only regret [[end column]] [[start column 2/3]] which mingles with the general joy is for the omissions which the President though prudent to make. But the conviction already prevails, that, if Provident shall now give victories to our arms, the entire system of American Slavery will be speedily extinct——cleansed like a stain from the face of the land ! God hasten the hour !——N.Y. Independent. [[horiz line]] CITIZENSHIP OF COLORED AMERICANS. [[horiz line]] OUR readers have probably seen the recent and remarkable paper of the Attorny-General affirming the citizenship of persons of African descent in our country. The question of the political status of such persons was brought up for decision by the fact the Treasury Department was compelled to pronounce upon it in the case of a colored master of a vessel, whose ship had been seized for engaging without authority in the coasting trade. The Department referred the question to the Attorney General, Mr. Bates, for his decision ; and that officer, in an opinion of elaborate and exhaustive reasoning, examines the whole subject and decides in favor of the citizenship of such persons. The opinion is a remarkable document on many grounds. Its complete and decisive character would at any time attract attention to it as an argument of uncommon ability. Its searching criticism of the reasonings upon which the U.S. Supreme Court grounded its extra-judicial decision in that far-famed case of Dred Scott, which become such an era in our national history, would lend it a peculiar interest were it but a private and unofficial document. But the chief circumstances of interest about it is that it is a formal decision by the legal authorities of the nation, in behalf of justice to the blacks ; and even this is enhanced by the fact, that the high official by whom it is drawn up is himself from a slave state, and must be familiar with the legal aspects of the subject in such communities. As a prominent lawyer of Missouri, he must be deemed able to appreciate the considerations on which it has been held that a negro has no standing in our courts ; and it is gratifying to find with what precision of statement, what force of reasoning, and what command of controlling facts, the Attorney General sets forth the view which gives to one of this despised race the full position and the full rights, at home and abroad, on the land and on the sea, of an American Citizen. The argument of Mr. Bates is in full accord with an earlier argument of equal ability upon the same subject in the debates of the U. S. Senate. Twelve years ago, in the controversy between Massachusetts and South Carolina, which grew out of the imprisonment in the jails of Charleston of colored seamen visiting that city, and which culminated in the expulsion of Mr. Hoar from the latter state, Senator Roger S. Baldwin of Connecticut took up the subject, and brought to bear upon it all the force of a mind, the legal acumen and logical force of which have seldom been surpassed at the American bar. The question turned upon the rights of colored men of Massachusetts as citizens of the Union, in the state of South Carolina, under the clause of the Constitution which gives to citizens of one state coming into another all the rights of citizens of the latter state. The debate occurred in April, 1850, on a motion to refer some resolutions upon slavery in the territories, by Senator Foote of Mississippi, to a select committee. On the part of the South, it was maintained that at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, negroes were not citizens ; that they had never been recognized as such by any state ; and that the framers of the Constitution could not, therefore have designed to include them within the scope of this provision In opposition to this pretence, Senator Baldwin showed that when the Constitution was adopted, colored men were actually voters in a majority of the states ; and alluded to the fact now again asserted by Mr Bates, that long after that date colored men continued to vote both in North Carolina and in Tennessee. [[end column]] [[start column 3/3]] Among the facts then adduced were some of great significance in the history of Virginia. Senator Baldwin quoted from the statues of that state the following act, passed in 1782 : ' All free persons born with the territory ' of this commonwealth, all persons not being ' natives who have obtained a right to citizenship ' under former laws, and also all children, ' wheresoever born, whose parents are or were ' citizens at the time of the birth of such children, ' shall be deemed citizens of this commonwealth.' The history of this enactment is somewhat singular, and is honorable to the Virginia of those generous days. There was a provision in one of the articles of the old Confederation, to the effect that ' the free inhabitants of each of these states, ' paupers, vagabonds, and fugitives from justice ' excepted, shall be entitled to all privileges ' and immunities of free citizens in the ' several state.' While the Revolution was in progress, June 25, 1778, the delegation from South Carolina moved in Congress to amend this clause, by inserting in it, between the words 'free' and 'inhabitants,' the word 'white,' and thus to limit citizenship to the white inhabitants. The amendment was rejected by a vote of two to eight, and the clause stood in the words above quoted until the articles were superseded by our present Constitution. The letter of the provision is itself decisive, but the comment upon its meaning which is afforded by this abortive attempt to amend it, places its scope beyond controversy. It is somewhat surprising that the Attorney-General should have overlooked in his recent extended discussion this significant and unimpeachable consideration here brought to light by the Connecticut Senator Before these articles had been ratified by a sufficient number of the states to make them binding, the state of Virginia had passed an act which limited citizenship to white persons; but after the adoption of the Articles of Confederation, that state, our of deference to their authority, repeated the restriction, and adopted this law, of 1782, which confers citizenship upon 'all free persons born within the commonwealth.' This law of Virginia was in force at the adoption of the Federal Constitution, and gives or cource a construction to that instrument. If all free naves of the state were then citizens of Virginia, such natives were so a fortiori, in the freer and more democratic states of the North. If citizenship was conceded to the free inhabitants of each state under the old Confederacy, and the attempt to limit it to whites was made and rejected, what pretext can remain for denying that colored persons were citizens within the meaning and scope of the Constitution? We advert the more distinctly to the effort of Senator Baldwin because, through the adverse temper of the public mind at that day toward any assertions of the political rights of colored men, the speech fell upon very unwilling ears, and found slight appreciation. There was little in it to attract the mere rhetorical critic, but for a vigorous, logical effort, it deserves a high rank. In no similar effort within our recollection is there more of sustained power, of discrimination, of inference, and of statement. It is impossible to read this brief discussion without a conviction that the question is decided beyond all doubt. Negroes were formally and designedly recognized as citizens of Virginia at the time when the Constitution was adopted. No one of Senator Baldwin's colleagues ventured any answer upon the floor of the Senate to the substantial and exact argument of his speech on this point. They discreetly suffered it to pass without reply, and it attracted little notice, save from the few who cherished every grain of wheat amid the political chaff of that day. But it stands a memorial of its authors faithfulness to great principles of justice and freedom in dark and troubled hours, and of the signal ability with which he carried on his conflict with the powers of darkness which then ruled the ascendant. [[end column]]
