has counted out a succession of years, which now defile before us, like so many sentinels, to guard the sacred landmark of freedom.
A simple statement of facts, derived from the journals of Congress and contemporary records, will show the origin and nature of this compact, the influence by which it was established, and the obligations which it imposed.
As early as 1818, at the first session of the Fifteenth Congress, a bill was reported to the House of Representatives, authorizing the people of the Missouri Territory to form a Constitution and State Government, for the admission of such State into the Union; but, at that session, no final action was had thereon. At the next session, in February, 1819, the bill was again brought forward, when an eminent Representative of New York, whose life has been spared till this last summer, Mr. James Tallmadge, moved a clause prohibiting any further introduction of slaves into the proposed State, and securing freedom to the children born within the State after its admission into the Union, on attaining twenty-five years of age. This important proposition, which assumed a power not only to prohibit the ingress of slavery into the State itself, but also to abolish it there, was passed in the affirmative, after a vehement debate of three days. On a division of the question, the first part, prohibiting the further introduction of slaves, was adopted by 87 yeas to 76
