No, in fact, the Constitution authorizes Congress to control, or abolish, the international slave trade, and Founders themselves also outlawed slavery in what were then called "western territories".
So any suggestion that Congress had no authority over slavery is just bogus.
As for Northern anti-slavery laws, there was no suggestion in our Founders' time -- none, nada -- that states had no right to abolish slavery.
So the Supreme Court's 1857 Dred Scott decision to the contrary was new law, and therefore unconstitutional.
That makes your argument here totally bogus to the max.
DiogenesLamp: "A correct reading of the law during that time period offers NO SUPPORT for free states to ban slavery. None."
Except that nobody in 1787 or anytime later, asserted what you now ludicrously proclaim.
Your logic is based solely on the Supreme Court's 1857 Dred Scott decision, not on Founders' original intentions.
DiogenesLamp: "The bottom line is this. Washington maintained slaves in Pennsylvania after Pennsylvania had banned slavery."
But only within the limits allowed by Pennsylvania law.
You do the bait and switch. Nobody said anything about Congress. What I said was STATES had to respect the constitutional requirement to return slaves to their masters. I said that the wording in that clause of the constitution makes it virtually impossible to ban slavery.
So if you have a constitutional LAW that says "free states" must return slaves to their masters, how "free" can a state be? It can't, unless those states defy the constitution.
Your logic is based solely on the Supreme Court's 1857 Dred Scott decision, not on Founders' original intentions.
My logic is based on the fact that they put those words in the US Constitution, and I can see no way a free state can get around them without violating that requirement.
I say the Dred Scott decision was correct as a matter of law, because that's the consequence I see of states abiding by that requirement. You can't get rid of slavery in your state if your state is required to return fugitive slaves to their masters.
So long as the slave is held by the laws of another state, no free state can legally free him.
But only within the limits allowed by Pennsylvania law.
A courtesy on his part. I think had it gone to a Federal court, the court would have ruled he could do whatever he wanted because the State of Pennsylvania could not lawfully deprive him of his property.