fact sufficiently established by the evidence.  What right he has acquired under the laws forbidding such importation is the only question which we have to examine.  Formerly, while the act dividing Louisiana into two territories was in force in this country, slaves introduced here in contravention to it, were freed by operation of law; but that act was merged in the legislative provisions which were subsequently enacted on the subject of importation of slaves into the United States generally.  Under the now existing laws, the individuals thus imported acquire no personal right, they are mere passive beings, who are disposed of according to the will of the different state legislatures.  In this country they are to remain slaves, and TO BE SOLD FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE STATE.  The plaintiff, therefore, has nothing to claim as a freeman; and as to a mere change of master, should such be his wish, he cannot be listened to in a court of justice.”

Extract from a speech of Mr. Thomson of Penn. in Congress, March 1, 1826, on the prisons in the District of Columbia.

“I visited the prisons twice that I might myself ascertain the truth. * * In one of these cells (but eight feet square,) were confined at that time, seven persons, three women and four children.  The children were confined under a strange system of law in this District, by which a colored person who alleges HE IS FREE, and appeals to the tribunals of the country, to have the matter tried, is COMMITTED TO PRISON, till the decision takes place.  They were almost naked—­one of them was sick, lying on the damp brick floor, without bed, pillow, or covering.  In this abominable cell, seven human beings were confined day by day, and night after night, without a bed, chair, or stool, or any other of the most common necessaries of life.”—­Gales’ Congressional Debates, v.2, p. 1480.

The following facts serve to show, that the present generation of slaveholders do but follow in the footsteps of their fathers, in their zeal for LIBERTY.

Extract from a document submitted by the Committee of the yearly meeting of Friends in Philadelphia, to the Committee of Congress, to whom was referred the memorial of the people called Quakers, in 1797.

“In the latter part of the year 1776, several of the people called Quakers, residing in the counties of Perquimans and Pasquotank, in the state of North Carolina, liberated their negroes, as it was then clear there was no existing law to prevent their so doing; for the law of 1741 could not at that time be carried into effect; and they were suffered to remain free, until a law passed, in the spring of 1777, under which they were taken up and sold, contrary to the Bill of Rights, recognized in the constitution of that state, as a part thereof, and to which it was annexed.