remind you that Jefferson proposed a clause in the Declaration of Independence charging that George the Third was determined to keep open market where men could be bought and sold, and had resisted every legislative attempt to prohibit or restrain this execrable traffic; that so strong, North and South, was the feeling averse to slavery in the convention which framed the Constitution, that the word "slave" was not permitted to have a place in the fundamental law of the republic; that not until the cotton-gin enhanced the profit of slave-labor did a radical change take place in the South; and that it has been judicially determined, that among the "we, the people," who declared their independence were colored freemen in various States.
The only prerequisite for the performance of the great work assigned him is, that the author should be unencumbered with biassing influences or pre-engendered preferences and desires, and that he should be impelled solely by that unswerving love of truth and sense of duty which will guide him to a correct judgment commensurate with the grave issues involved.
