No. 107. Act abolishing the Slave Trade in the District of Columbia

September 20, 1850

An Act to suppress the Slave Trade in the District of Columbia.

Be it enacted

That from and after

[January 1, 1851], it shall not be lawful to bring into the District of Columbia any slave whatever, for the purpose of being sold, or for the purpose of being placed in depot, to be subsequently transferred to any other State or place to be sold as merchandize. And any slave shall be brought into the said District by its owner, or by the authority or consent of its owner, contrary to the provisions of this act, such slave shall thereupon become liberated and free.

if

SEC..2. And be it further enacted, That it shall and may be lawful for each of the corporations of the cities of Washington and Georgetown, from time to time, and as often as may be necessary, to abate, break up, and abolish any depot or place of confinement of slaves brought into the said District as merchandize, contrary to the provisions of this act, by such appropriate means as may appear to either of the said corporations expedient and proper. And the same power is hereby vested in the Levy Court of Washington county, if any attempt shall be made, within its jurisdictional limits, to establish a depot or place of confinement for slaves brought into the said District as merchandize for sale contrary to this act.

[U. S. Stat. at Large, IX., 467, 468.]

No. 108. Treaty with Mexico

December 30, 1853

THE interest of the United States in a transportation route across the isthmus of Tehuantepec occasioned extended diplomatic correspondence between the United States and Mexico. In addition, the running of the boundary line under the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo had been attended with difficulties. Both questions were dealt with in the treaty of Dec. 30, 1853. usvally

known as the Gadsden treaty. The ratifications were exchanged at Washington June 30, 1854. The area acquired from Mexico was 45,535 square miles. REFERENCES. Text in U. S. Stat. at Large, X., 1031-1037. The diplomatic correspondence is in Senate Doc. 97, 32d Cong., 1st Sess. On the question of boundary, see Senate Doc. 34, 31st Cong., 1st Sess.; Senate Doc. 119, 120, 121, 131, 32d Cong., 1st Sess.; Senate Rep. 345, 32d Cong., Ist Sess.; Senate Doc. 55, 33d Cong., 2d Sess.; Senate Doc. 57, 34th Cong., 1st Sess.

The Mexican Republic agrees to designate the following as her true limits with the United States for the future: retaining the same dividing line between the two Californias as already defined and established, according to the 5th article of the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, the limits between the two republics shall be as follows: Beginning in the Gulf of Mexico, three leagues from land, opposite the mouth of the Rio Grande, as provided in the 5th article of the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo; thence, as defined in the said article, up the middle of that river to the point where the parallel of 31° 47′ north latitude crosses the same; thence due west one hundred miles; thence south to the parallel of 31° 20′ north latitude; thence along the said parallel of 31° 20' to the 11th meridian of longitude west of Greenwich; thence in a straight line to a point on the Colorado River twenty English miles below the junction of the Gila and Colorado Rivers; thence up the middle of the said river Colorado until it intersects the present line between the United States and Mexico.

...

In consideration of the foregoing stipulations, the Government of the United States agrees to pay to the government of Mexico, in the city of New York, the sum of ten millions of dollars . . .1

ARTICLE IV.

The provisions of the 6th and 7th articles of the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo having been rendered nugatory, for the most part,

1 The appropriation was made by act of June 29, 1854: U. S. Stat. at Large, X., 301.

ED.

by the cession of territory granted in the first article of this treaty, the said articles are hereby abrogated and annulled, and the provisions as herein expressed substituted therefor. The vessels, and citizens of the United States shall, in all time, have free and uninterrupted passage through the Gulf of California, to and from their possessions situated north of the boundary line of the two countries. It being understood that this passage is to be by navigating the Gulf of California and the river Colorado, and not by land, without the express consent of the Mexican government; and precisely the same provisions, stipulations, and restrictions, in all respects, are hereby agreed upon and adopted, and shall be scrupulously observed and enforced by the two contracting governments in reference to the Rio Colorado, so far and for such distance as the middle of that river is made their common boundary line by the first article of this treaty.

The several provisions, stipulations, and restrictions contained in the 7th article of the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo shall remain in force only so far as regards the Rio Bravo del Norte, below the initial of the said boundary provided in the first article of this treaty; that is to say, below the intersection of the 31° 47′ 30′′ parallel of latitude, with the boundary line established by the late treaty dividing said river from its mouth upwards, according to the fifth article of the treaty of Guadalupe.

The Mexican Government having on the 5th of February, 1853, authorized the early construction of a plank and railroad across the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, and, to secure the stable benefits of said transit way to the persons and merchandise of the citizens of Mexico and the United States, it is stipulated that neither government will interpose any obstacle to the transit of persons and merchandise of both nations; and at no time shall higher charges be made on the transit of persons and property of citizens of the United States, than may be made on the persons and property of other foreign nations, nor shall any interest in said transit way, nor in the proceeds thereof, be transferred to any foreign government.

The United States, by its agents, shall have the right to trans

port across the isthmus, in closed bags, the mails of the United States not intended for distribution along the line of communication; also the effects of the United States government and its citizens, which may be intended for transit, and not for distribution on the isthmus, free of custom-house or other charges by the Mexican government. Neither passports nor letters of security. will be required of persons crossing the isthmus and not remaining in the country.

When the construction of the railroad shall be completed, the Mexican government agrees to open a port of entry in addition to the port of Vera Cruz, at or near the terminus of said road on the Gulf of Mexico.

The two governments will enter into arrangements for the prompt transit of troops and munitions of the United States, which that government may have occasion to send from one part of its territory to another, lying on opposite sides of the continent.

The Mexican government having agreed to protect with its whole power the prosecution, preservation, and security of the work, the United States may extend its protection as it shall judge wise to it when it may feel sanctioned and warranted by the public or international law.

*

*1

Kansas-Nebraska Act

1854

THE first suggestion of a territorial organization for the region between the western boundary of Missouri and the Rocky Mountains, which had been left without organization upon the admission of Missouri in 1821, seems to have been made in 1844, when Wilkins, Secretary of War, proposed the formation of Nebraska Territory as preliminary to the extension of military posts in that direction. A bill to establish the Territory of Nebraska was introduced in the House Dec. 17, 1844, by Douglas of Illinois, but no action was taken. A bill with the same object, brought in March 15, 1848, by Douglas, now a member of the Senate, likewise came to nothing. A bill to attach Nebraska to the surveying district of Arkansas, introduced in the Senate July 28, 1848,

1 Signed: "James Gadsden, Manuel Diez de Bonilla, José Salazar Ylarreguil, J. Mariano Monterde." - Ed.

stopped with the Committee on Public Lands. A third bill to organize the Territory of Nebraska, also introduced by Douglas, was considered by the Senate Dec. 20, 1848, and recommitted.

December 13, 1852, Hall of Missouri introduced in the House a bill to organize the Territory of Platte. The bill went to the Committee on Territories, and as such was not reported. February 2, 1853, however, Richardson of Illinois reported from the committee a bill to organize the Territory of Nebraska, which passed the House Feb. 10, by a vote of 98 to 43. The Senate Committee on Territories reported the bill on the 17th, without amendments; March 4, by a vote of 23 to 17, consideration was refused. This bill did not propose to legislate slavery into the new territory. "The opposition to it came from Southern members who were preparing, but were not yet ready to announce, their next advanced claim, that the compromise of 1850 had superseded and voided that of 1820, abolished the prohibition of slavery in the territory north of the Missouri compromise line, and opened it to the operation of squatter sovereignty" (Johnston).

The thirty-third Congress met Dec. 5, 1853. December 14 Senator Dodge of Iowa introduced a bill to organize the Territory of Nebraska. The bill, which appears to have been identical with Richardson's bill of the previous session, provided for the organization of the whole region between the parallels of 36° 30′ and 43° 30′ on the south and north, Missouri and Iowa on the east, and the Rocky Mountains on the west. A substitute for this bill, with the same provision as to slavery as that which had been inserted in the Utah and New Mexico bills, was reported by Douglas, from the Committee on Territories, Jan. 4, 1854. The declaration regarding slavery was satisfactory to neither party, and on the 16th Dixon of Kentucky gave notice of an amendment explicitly exempting the proposed territory from the operation of the Missouri compromise, to which Sumner of Massachusetts responded with an amendment extending the Missouri compromise to the new territory. On the 23d Douglas reported that the committee had prepared several new amendments to the bill, changing the southern boundary from 36° 30′ to 37°, providing for two territories instead of one, and declaring the Missouri compromise inoperative in the new territories, on the ground that it had been superseded by the compromise measures of 1850. The bill as thus amended Douglas proposed to substitute for the bill previously reported. Debate in Committee of the Whole began Jan. 30. February 6 Douglas offered an amendment by which the Missouri compromise was to be declared “inconsistent" with the legislation of 1850, following this the next day with another amendment in the words of sec. 14 of the act as finally passed. This last amendment was agreed to on the 15th, by a vote of 35 to 10. March the bill passed the Senate, after an all-night session, by a vote of 37 to 14.

In the meantime Representative Miller of Missouri had introduced in the House, Dec. 22, a bill to organize the Territory of Nebraska. The bill went to the Committee on Territories, from which Richardson reported, Jan. 31, a bill to organize the Territories of Nebraska and Kansas. A minority report, advocating the application of squatter sovereignty to the two territories, was submitted by English of Indiana. The House bill did not regularly come up for consideration until May 8, but from Feb. 14 to April 28 either the House