Quill
  1. Overview: The Road to Civil War
  2. Full Record: The Road to Civil War
  3. Committee:The House of Representatives
  4. Session: 1861-01-28 12:00:00
  5. Event type: CREATE

The Road to Civil War

The House of Representatives

The Committee Secretary's View The Committee Secretary's View

To see the full record of a committee, click on the corresponding committee on the map below.

Document introduced in:

Session 14062: 1861-01-28 12:00:00

Various members submit compromise propositions to be considered by the House. The House considers the report of the Committee of Thirty-Three. By resolution, the Special Committee of Five is granted leave to sit during sessions and report when necessary. The House recieves a message from the President on the condition of the country, containing resolutions from Virginia on a Peace Conference.

Document View:

H. Res. 67

There are 0 proposed amendments related to this document on which decisions have not been taken.

Joint resolution proposing certain amendments to the Constitution of the United States.

Whereas serious and alarming dissensions have arisen between the northern and southern States concerning the rights and security of the rights of the slaveholding States, and especially their rights in the common territory of the United States; and whereas it is eminently desirable and proper that those dissensions, which. Now threaten the very existence of this Union, should be permanently quieted and settled by constitutional provisions, which shall do equal justice to all sections, and thereby restore to the people that peace and good will which ought to prevail between all the citizens of the United States:

Therefore,

Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, (two thirds of both Houses concurring,) That the following articles be, and are hereby, proposed and submitted as amendments to the Constitution of the United States. Which shall be valid to all intents and purposes as part of said Constitution, when ratified by conventions of three fourths of the several States:

ARTICLE 1. Persons held to service or labor for life in any state under the laws thereof may be taken into a Territory of the United States south of latitude 36’ 30’, and the right to such service or labor shall not be impaired thereby. And any Territorial Legislature shall have the exclusive right to make all needful rules and regulations for the protection of such right, and of such persons and their descendants, in their domestic relations. But Congress or any Territorial Legislature shall not have power to impair or abolish such right of service in the said Territory, nor in any other place within the jurisdiction of the United States, without the consent of all the States which maintain such service.

ART. 2. When any Territory of the United States shall have a population equal to the ratio of representation for one member of Congress, and the people shall have formed a constitution for a republican form of government, it shall be admitted as a sovereign State into the Union, on an equal footing with the other States, by the proclamation of the President of the United States; and the people may, in the constitution for such State, either prohibit or regulate the right to labor or service, and alter or amend the constitution at their will. And if the President refuses to admit such Territory as a State, this article shall not deprive Congress of the power to admit such State.

ART. 3. The Present right of representation, in the section two, article one of the Constitution of the United States, shall never be altered without the consent of all the States maintaining the right to service or labor for life. And the regulation of the right to labor or service in any of the States is hereby recognized to be exclusively the right of each State within its own limits; and this constitution shall never be altered or amended to impair this right of each State without its consent; Provided, That this article shall not e construed to absolve the United States Government from rendering assistance to suppress insurrection or domestic violence, as provided in the section four, article four of this Constitution.

ART 4. The exclusive power to regulate or abolish the right to labor or service for life in the District of Columbia is hereby ceded to the State of Maryland, to be exercised in common with such right in that State, subject, nevertheless, to the judicial jurisdiction of the District of Columbia.

ART. 5. No State shall pass any law in any way interfering with or obstructing the recovery of fugitives from justice, or from labor or service, or any law of Congress made under article four, section two of this Constitution; and all laws in violation of this article may be declared void by the Supreme Court of the United States at the suit of any state.

ART. 6. As a right of comity between the citizens of the several States, the right of transit with person held to labor or service for life, or for years, from one State to another, shall not be interfered with, without the consent of all the States maintaining such service.

ART. 7. Whenever any State shall grant by law to citizens of other States the right to sojourn for a limited period with persons held to service or labor, if such persons escape they shall be subject to recovery as fugitives, under the provisions of this Constitution, and shall be returned to the State from which they were brought.

ART. 8. The traffic in slaves with Africa is hereby forever prohibited. And the descendants of Africans shall not be made citizens.

ART. 9. All acts of any inhabitant of the United States tending to incite persons held to service or labor, to insurrection or acts of domestic violence, or to abscond, shall be considered and prohibited as contrary to law, and penal offense.

ART. 10. The County of any State, wherein a person owing service or labor is rescued from the custody of the owner, agent, or officer, shall be bound to pay the full value of such person, for the use of the owner, at the suit of the United States.

ART. 11. Persons held to service or labor for life, under the laws of any State or Territory, shall not be taken into any Territory of the United States while in a territorial condition, north of latitude 36° 30°.

ART. 12. Alleged fugitives from labor or service, on request, shall have a trial by jury at the place to which they may be returned.

ART. 13. All alleged fugitives charged with crime committed in violation of the laws of the State from which they fled shall, on demand, be returned to such State, and shall have the right of trial by jury, and, if such person claims to be a citizen of another State, shall have a right of appeal, or of writ of error, to the Supreme Court of the United States.

ART. 14. Citizens of any State sojourning in another State shall not be subject violence or punishment, nor injured in their persons or property, without trial by jury and due process of law.

ART. 15. No State, or the people thereof, shall retire from this Union without the consent of three fourths of all the States.

ART. 16. The Reserved power of the people in three fourths of the States to call and form a national convention to alter, amend, or abolish this Constitution, according to its provisions, shall never be questioned, notwithstanding the directions in article five of the Constitution.

ART. 17. The articles eight, nine, and ten of these amendments shall not be altered without the consent of all the States maintaining service or labor for life.

Decisions yet to be taken

None

Document Timeline

Other Actions

View text build components