Free Republic

A law passed in 1795 has nothing to do with what Benjamin Franklin wrote in 1772 about the Somersett Case.

In 1772 slavery was England's problem and Franklin boldly told them what they should do, up to a point. Franklin never addressed what to do with a milion freed slaves. It was not his problem. It was not a problem for the United States of America which did not then exist.

In 1787, when it was a problem for Franklin and the other Framers to deal with, Franklin and the other Framers voted to protect the African slave trade for twenty years. He voted for representation based on the slave population to be set at three-fifths of that population. FRanklin voted for every state in the union to faithfully observe the Fugitive Slave Clause. That is not what Franklin said; that is what Franklin did when he had to do something.

The Evil Empire was not there to make Franklin or the other Framers do anything.

The law passed in 1795 showed what Massachusetts did regarding the freed slaves. As was clearly stated, "By this law, it will be observed that all negroes, resident in Massachusetts, not citizens of some one of the States, were required to depart in two months, on penalty of being apprehended, whipped, and ordered to depart. The process and punishment could be renewed every two months." That was gradual emancipation in Massachusetts. Whip them and imprison them until they left the state. You are incapable of discussing that documented truth. Gradual emancipation was nothing more than ethnic cleansing.

Diatribe. Ok, look. Why is there such a mental disconnect with you three? All three of you are having a logic flaw in your reasoning.

Once again, here is the logical flaw in your reasoning.

Massachusetts Negro Criminal Law 1795

How by deed, not creative interpretation, the wonderful and beneficent abolitionists of Massachusetts showed their love for the black man, who they held equal to themselves in every way.

Notes on Slavery in the State of Massachusetts, by George H. Moore, of The New-York Historical Society And Corresponding Member of The Massachusetts Historical Society, New York, D. Appleton & Co. 443 & 445 Broadway, MDCCCLXVI

228

The Massachusetts Law, entitled "An act for suppressing and punishing of Rogues, Vagabonds, common Beggars, and other idle, disorderly, and lewd Persons," was presented in the Senate on the 6th of March, 1788. It went through the usual stages of legislation, with various amendments, and was finally passed on the 26th of March, 1788. It contains the following very remarkable provision:

"V. Be it further enabled by the authority aforesaid [the Senate and House of Representatives in General Court assembled], that no person being an African or Negro, other than a subject of the Emperor of Morocco, or a citizen of some one of the United States (to be evidenced by a certificate from the Secretary of the State of which he shall be a citizen), shall tarry within this Commonwealth, for a longer time than two months, and upon complaint made to any Justice of the Peace within this Commonwealth, that any such person has been within the same more than two months, the said Justice shall order the said person to depart out of this Commonwealth, and in case that 'the said African or Negro shall not depart as aforesaid, any Justice of the Peace within this Commonwealth, upon complaint and proof made that such person has continued within this Commonwealth ten days after notice given him or her to depart as afore-

- - - - -

229

said, shall commit the said person to any house of correction within the county, there to be kept to hard labour, agreeable to the rules and orders of the said house, until the Sessions of the Peace, next to be holden within and for the said county; and the matter of the said house of correction is hereby required and directed to transmit an attested copy of the warrant of commitment to the said Court on the first day of their said session, and if upon trial at the said Court, it shall be made to appear that the said person has thus continued within the Commonwealth, contrary to the tenor of this act, he or she shall be whipped not exceeding ten stripes, and ordered to depart out of this Commonwealth within ten days; and if he or she shall not so depart, the same process shall be had and punishment inflicted, and so toties quoties.

The edition from which we copy is the earliest classified edition of "The Perpetual Laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts," and is not to be found in Part I., among those relating to "The Publick and Private Rights of Persons," nor among the "Miscellaneous" Statutes, but in "Part IV.," concerning "Criminal Matters." We doubt if anything in human legislation can be found which comes nearer branding color as a crime!

By this law, it will be observed that all negroes,

- - - - -

230

resident in Massachusetts, not citizens of some one of the States, were required to depart in two months, on penalty of being apprehended, whipped, and ordered to depart. The process and punishment could be renewed every two months. The only contemporary explanation of the design of the law which we have met with is to the effect that it was intended to prevent fugitive slaves from resorting to that State, in hopes to obtain freedom, and then being thrown as a deadweight upon that community. Belknap 1795. A recent writer states that this " enactment was said to have been the work of her [Massachusetts] leading lawyers, who were sufficiently sagacious to foresee the dangerous consequences of that constitutional provision which, on restoring fugitives from labor, not only threatened to disturb the public peace, but the stability of the system." Amory's Life of Sullivan, I., 226, note. We give this illustration of legal sagacity in Massachusetts for what it is worth, although we are satisfied that the statute itself clearly illustrates the intention of those who framed it. Expositio contemporanea eft optima.

Vermont waged a successful revolution beginning in 1777 and established itself as a free, sovereign and independent state. Vermont was neither a state nor a territory of the United States from 1777 to 1791 when it joined the American constitutional union.

Massachusetts voided slavery by some political jugglery and then ordered blacks to leave the state or be whipped and imprisoned and have a like order issued upon release from prison.

Ilinois declared the end of slavery in the state and instituted 99-year indentured servitude.

Rhode Island was the headquarters of the slave ships.

Ohio statehood was declared by an act of August 7, 1953. They discovered a century and a half late that they had never completed the process for statehood.

63 Stat. 407, P.L. 204, August 7, 1953, JOINT RESOLUTION For Admitting the State of Ohio into the Union, excerpt:

Resolved by the Senate and the House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the State of Ohio, shall be one, and is hereby declared to be one, of the United States of America, and is admitted into the Union on an equal footing with the original States, in all respects whatever.

Sec. 2. This joint resolution shall take effect as of March 1, 1803.
Approved August 7, 1953.

It is also worth pointing out that Trump has had 19 straight wins at the Supreme Court which is a strong indication that the stays should never have been issued in the first place.

That is misinformed crap that I have seen elsewhere. The court granting a stay is not a win. Name 19 cases he has won on the merits.

In an investigative report that rocked the legal community, NBC News landed interviews with a dozen federal judges about the Supreme Court’s record of pausing lower court rulings against Donald Trump without explanation on an emergency basis.

The administration repeatedly has sought emergency relief on the Scotus "shadow docket." Scotus has frequently stayed action pending its ruling on the merits. Stays pending a ruling on the merits are not unusual. What is highly unusual is having so many cases referred to the "shadow docket." The number of stays increases with the number of emergency cases being docketed.

https://govfacts.org/roundup/supreme-court-shadow-docket-rulings-signal-turbulent-2025-2026-term-ahead/

Supreme Court Shadow Docket Rulings Signal Turbulent 2025-2026 Term Ahead

By GovFacts
September 6, 2025

[excerpt]

Shadow Docket Reveals Deep Court Divisions

While the courtroom was dark, the Court issued rulings through the increasingly powerful and controversial “shadow docket.” This week provided a stark example of how this process works and the divisions it reveals.

What Is the Shadow Docket?

The “shadow docket,” also known as the emergency or non-merits docket, allows the Supreme Court to make decisions outside its regular, transparent process.

Unlike cases on the “merits docket,” which involve extensive briefing, public oral arguments, and lengthy signed opinions, shadow docket matters are handled urgently with far less public visibility.

These cases typically involve emergency requests asking the Court to intervene immediately. Legal tools used are often a stay, which temporarily pauses a lower court’s ruling, or an injunction, which commands a party to do or stop doing something.

Decisions are made quickly, often within days, based on limited written arguments and without public hearings. Resulting orders are typically brief, unsigned, and offer little legal reasoning for the outcome.

Historically, the shadow docket handled routine, procedural matters. Since 2017, its use for making consequential rulings on major policy issues has surged, drawing criticism for lack of transparency and accountability.

NIH Ruling Shows Fractured Court

On Tuesday, September 2, 2025, the Court issued a complex and confusing order from its shadow docket in National Institutes of Health v. American Public Health Association. The case involved a challenge to the Trump administration’s cancellation of nearly $800 million in scientific research grants based on executive orders.

The ruling revealed a deeply fractured Court. In an opaque order with five separate written opinions, the Justices delivered a split decision:

By a 5-4 vote, the Court granted the administration’s request for a stay, halting a lower court’s order that would have required grant payments.

Simultaneously, by a different 5-4 vote, the Court denied a stay of the portion striking down underlying agency guidelines that implemented the executive orders.

The voting alignment was extraordinarily complex. Justice Amy Coney Barrett was the only justice in the majority for both parts. No single opinion commanded a majority, and Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito provided no written explanation for their votes.

This ruling illustrates how the shadow docket can produce outcomes that appear politically driven while obscuring legal logic. The case concerned a highly politicized executive branch action, and the Court’s response was not clear legal directive but a confusing, splintered order offering little guidance to lower courts or the public.

More Emergency Applications Arrive

The week saw further emergency docket activity. On Thursday, September 4, the Trump administration filed another urgent application asking the Justices to block a federal appeals court ruling requiring reinstatement of a fired Federal Trade Commission commissioner.

This filing continues a pattern of the administration frequently turning to the Supreme Court for emergency relief from unfavorable lower court decisions.

News reports indicated the administration was preparing another major case concerning presidential authority to impose tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, which could also arrive on the emergency docket.

These events underscore how the shadow docket increasingly becomes a primary venue for high-stakes political and constitutional battles.

Yup, just like it states in the 2nd amendment. Right next to the part about needing a permit.

The right to keep and bear arms is not defined in the 2nd Amendment. It was a pre-existing common law right that was and is protected by the 2nd Amendment. It was not a right granted by the 2nd Amendment, but a right that existed in the colonies, was brought forth into the states upon independence, and recognized and protected by the Constitution.

U.S. Supreme Court, Ex Parte Grossman, 267 U.S. 86, 108-09 (1925)

The language of the Constitution cannot be interpreted safely except by reference to the common law and to British institutions as they were when the instrument was framed and adopted. The statesmen and lawyers of the Convention who submitted it to the ratification of the Conventions of the thirteen States, were born and brought up in the atmosphere of the common law, and thought and spoke in its vocabulary. They were familiar with other forms of government, recent and ancient, and indicated in their discussions earnest study and consideration of many of them, but when they came to put their conclusions into the form of fundamental law in a compact draft, they expressed them in terms of the common law, confident that they could be shortly and easily understood.

http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/blackstone_bk1ch1.asp

Blackstone's Commentaries on the Laws of England

Book the First - Chapter the First: Of the Absolute Rights of Individuals (1765)

5. THE fifth and last auxiliary right of the subject, that I shall at present mention, is that of having arms for their defence, suitable to their condition and degree, and such as are allowed by law. Which is also declared by the same statute 1 W. & M. ft. 2. c. 2. and is indeed a public allowance, under due restrictions, of the natural right of resistance and self-preservation, when the sanctions of society and laws are found insufficient to restrain the violence of oppression.

It has never meant a right to carry any and all weapons for any purpose. It does not mean that today.

District of Columbia v Heller, S. Ct. 554 US 570 (2008)

Heller at 620:

We described the right protected by the Second Amendment as “ ‘bearing arms for a lawful purpose’ ”

Heller at 626:

Like most rights, the right secured by the Second Amendment is not unlimited. From Blackstone through the 19th-century cases, commentators and courts routinely explained that the right was not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose. See, e.g., Sheldon, in 5 Blume 346; Rawle 123; Pomeroy 152–153; Abbott 333. For example, the majority of the 19th-century courts to consider the question held that prohibitions on carrying concealed weapons were lawful under the Second Amendment or state analogues. See, e.g., State v. Chandler, 5 La. Ann., at 489–490; Nunn v. State, 1 Ga., at 251; see generally 2 Kent *340, n. 2; The American Students’ Blackstone 84, n. 11 (G. Chase ed. 1884).

There is a right to keep and bear lawful arms, in a lawful manner, for a lawful purpose, under due restrictions. That is the right that shall not be infringed, not even a little bit.

To: woodpusher; jeffersondem; DiogenesLamp; BroJoeK; x; Ditto

"Instead, by choice, you said nothing."

You quoted my exact words in your post 356. Is this woodpusher just a bot account?

"That was a proposed amendment"

An echo has developed in here. Its good we are agreeing on the dates though.

443 posted on 9/12/2025, 9:59:11 AM by ProgressingAmerica (We cannot vote our way out of these problems. The only way out is to activist our way out.)

[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 439 | View Replies | Report Abuse]

Regarding your exact words, with full context:

---

To: DiogenesLamp; BroJoeK; Ditto; x; woodpusher; jeffersondem

I just realized an error. I did not link to Benjamin Franklin’s excoriation of the Somersett Case as I thought I had done.

https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Franklin/01-19-02-0128

Franklin was correct to point out the Empire’s absurd hypocrisy and hoarding.

348 posted on 9/9/2025, 12:03:32 PM by ProgressingAmerica (We cannot vote our way out of these problems. The only way out is to activist our way out.)

Franklin's diatribe was from 1772 and there was no United States of America at that time. It has absolutely nothing to do with the Evil Empire forcing slavery or anything else on the United States of America.

A footnote at the link you provided but from which you quoted nothing:

Lord Mansfield’s decision to free him was widely interpreted, at the time and later, to mean that any slave arriving in England became free; and this was the purport of the judgment: above, XVII, 38 n. Technically, however, the Lord Chief Justice decided the case on narrower ground, that a slave might not be taken out of the country against his will; if he was resident in England, or willing to leave in bondage, he was not affected.

Mansfield, in Somerset did not free anybody, not even Somerset, as I documented in my #356.

Franklin griped about the slave trade and argued for emancipation. What should be done with a million or so emancipated black people, he did not say. That was then the Crown's problem. When the problem of the Evil Empire had become a problem for the Founders and Framers to solve, what did Ben Franklin do then? Did Ben Franklin, at the Constitutional Convention, vote in favor of the proposed Constitution, including the Fugitive Slave Clause?

Of course Massachusetts had a solution for the burden imposed by free blacks, as I documented in my #440 to you to which your response has been ***crickets***. Pass a state law (March 26, 1788) that ordered "Africans or Negro" persons to get out of the state, or be whipped and imprisoned, and upon release from prison, renew the same offer.

https://freerepublic.com/focus/chat/4336363/posts?page=440#440

To: ProgressingAmerica

Massachusetts Negro Criminal Law 1795

How by deed, not creative interpretation, the wonderful and beneficient abolitionists of Massachusetts showed their love for the black man, who they held equal to themselves in every way.

Notes on Slavery in the State of Massachusetts, by George H. Moore, of The New-York Historical Society And Corresponding Member of The Massachusetts Historical Society, New York, D. Appleton & Co. 443 & 445 Broadway, MDCCCLXVI

228

The Massachusetts Law, entitled "An act for suppressing and punishing of Rogues, Vagabonds, common Beggars, and other idle, disorderly, and lewd Persons," was presented in the Senate on the 6th of March, 1788. It went through the usual stages of legislation, with various amendments, and was finally passed on the 26th of March, 1788. It contains the following very remarkable provision:

"V. Be it further enabled by the authority aforesaid [the Senate and House of Representatives in General Court assembled], that no person being an African or Negro, other than a subjct of the Emperor of Morocco, or a citizen of some one of the United States (to be evidenced by a certificate from the Secretary of the State of which he shall be a citizen), shall tarry within this Commonwealth, for a longer time than two months, and upon complaint made to any Justice of the Peace within this Commonwealth, that any such person has been within the same more than two months, the said Justice shall order the said person to depart out of this Commonwealth, and in case that 'the said African or Negro shall not depart as aforesaid, any Justice of the Peace within this Commonwealth, upon complaint and proof made that such person has continued within this Commonwealth ten days after notice given him or her to depart as afore-

- - - - -

229

said, shall commit the said person to any house of correction within the county, there to be kept to hard labour, agreeable to the rules and orders of the said house, until the Sessions of the Peace, next to be holden within and for the said county; and the matter of the said house of correction is hereby required and directed to transmit an attested copy of the warrant of commitment to the said Court on the first day of their said session, and if upon trial at the said Court, it shall be made to appear that the said person has thus continued within the Commonwealth, contrary to the tenor of this act, he or she shall be whipped not exceeding ten stripes, and ordered to depart out of this Commonwealth within ten days; and if he or she shall not so depart, the fame process shall be had and punishment inflicted, and so toties quoties.

The edition from which we copy is the earliest classified edition of "The Perpetual Laws of the Commonwealth of Massachufetts," and is not to be found in Part I., among those relating to "The Publick and Private Rights of Persons," nor among the "Miscellaneous" Statutes, but in "Part IV.," concerning "Criminal Matters." We doubt if anything in human legislation can be found which comes nearer branding color as a crime!

By this law, it will be observed that all negroes,

- - - - -

230

resident in Massachusetts, not citizens of some one of the States, were required to depart in two months, on penalty of being apprehended, whipped, and ordered to depart. The process and punishment could be renewed every two months. The only contemporary explanation of the design of the law which we have met with is to the effect that it was intended to prevent fugitive slaves from resorting to that State, in hopes to obtain freedom, and then being thrown as a deadweight upon that community. Belknap 1795. A recent writer states that this " enactment was said to have been the work of her [Massachusetts] leading lawyers, who were sufficiently sagacious to foresee the dangerous confequences of that conftitutional provision which, on restoring fugitives from labor, not only threatened to disturb the public peace, but the stability of the system." Amory's Life of Sullivan, I., 226, note. We give this illustration of legal sagacity in Massachusetts for what it is worth, although we are satisfied that the statute itself clearly illustrates the intention of those who framed it. Expositio contemporanea eft optima.

440 posted on 9/12/2025, 12:27:59 AM by woodpusher

[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 415 | View Replies | Report Abuse]

[quoting BroJoeK] While forms of Indian slavery did exist in the Southwest — especially under Spanish and Mexican regimes — it was not equivalent to the chattel slavery of African Americans in the Deep South.

Indigenous labor was sometimes coerced or exploited, but the scale, legal structure, and racial ideology of Southern plantation slavery were not replicated in Arizona.

Cotton farming in Arizona did not flourish until the late 19th and early 20th centuries, long after the Civil War and abolition of slavery.

The San Carlos Irrigation Project, begun in the early 1900s, was a federal effort to restore water to Native communities and support agriculture — not to promote plantation-style slavery.

Arizona’s arid climate and water scarcity made large-scale cotton plantations technically possible but economically and socially distinct from Southern slavery-based models.

The claim conflates indigenous irrigation traditions with Southern slavery, and projects a plantation model onto a region and history where it doesn’t fit. While irrigation farming proved viable in Arizona, it did not validate or support the Southern plantation system — either economically, socially, or ethically.

Massachusetts Negro Criminal Law 1795

How by deed, not creative interpretation, the wonderful and beneficient abolitionists of Massachusetts showed their love for the black man, who they held equal to themselves in every way.

Notes on Slavery in the State of Massachusetts, by George H. Moore, of The New-York Historical Society And Corresponding Member of The Massachusetts Historical Society, New York, D. Appleton & Co. 443 & 445 Broadway, MDCCCLXVI

228

The Massachusetts Law, entitled "An act for suppressing and punishing of Rogues, Vagabonds, common Beggars, and other idle, disorderly, and lewd Persons," was presented in the Senate on the 6th of March, 1788. It went through the usual stages of legislation, with various amendments, and was finally passed on the 26th of March, 1788. It contains the following very remarkable provision:

"V. Be it further enabled by the authority aforesaid [the Senate and House of Representatives in General Court assembled], that no person being an African or Negro, other than a subjct of the Emperor of Morocco, or a citizen of some one of the United States (to be evidenced by a certificate from the Secretary of the State of which he shall be a citizen), shall tarry within this Commonwealth, for a longer time than two months, and upon complaint made to any Justice of the Peace within this Commonwealth, that any such person has been within the same more than two months, the said Justice shall order the said person to depart out of this Commonwealth, and in case that 'the said African or Negro shall not depart as aforesaid, any Justice of the Peace within this Commonwealth, upon complaint and proof made that such person has continued within this Commonwealth ten days after notice given him or her to depart as afore-

- - - - -

229

said, shall commit the said person to any house of correction within the county, there to be kept to hard labour, agreeable to the rules and orders of the said house, until the Sessions of the Peace, next to be holden within and for the said county; and the matter of the said house of correction is hereby required and directed to transmit an attested copy of the warrant of commitment to the said Court on the first day of their said session, and if upon trial at the said Court, it shall be made to appear that the said person has thus continued within the Commonwealth, contrary to the tenor of this act, he or she shall be whipped not exceeding ten stripes, and ordered to depart out of this Commonwealth within ten days; and if he or she shall not so depart, the fame process fliall be had and punishment inflicted, and so toties quoties.

The edition from which we copy is the earliest classified edition of "The Perpetual Laws of the Commonwealth of Massachufetts," and is not to be found in Part I., among those relating to "The Publick and Private Rights of Persons," nor among the "Mifcellaneous" Statutes, but in "Part IV.," concerning "Criminal Matters." We doubt if anything in human legislation can be found which comes nearer branding color as a crime!

By this law, it will be observed that all negroes,

- - - - -

230

resident in Massachufetts, not citizens of some one of the States, were required to depart in two months, on penalty of being apprehended, whipped, and ordered to depart. The process and punishment could be renewed every two months. The only contemporary explanation of the design of the law which we have met with is to the effect that it was intended to prevent fugitive slaves from resorting to that State, in hopes to obtain freedom, and then being thrown as a deadweight upon that community. Belknap 1795. A recent writer states that this " enactment was said to have been the work of her [Massachusetts] leading lawyers, who were sufficiently sagacious to foresee the dangerous confequences of that conftitutional provision which, on restoring fugitives from labor, not only threatened to disturb the public peace, but the stability of the system." Amory's Life of Sullivan, I., 226, note. We give this illustration of legal sagacity in Massachusetts for what it is worth, although we are satisfied that the statute itself clearly illustrates the intention of those who framed it. Expositio contemporanea eft optima.

You are free to present whatever you want regarding whatever Franklin said about R. v. Knowles, ex parte Somerset, (1772) Lofft 1, 98 E.R. 499, 20 S.T. 1. Instead, by choice, you said nothing.

I am sure by your logic, considering modern interpretations of the words of the Constitution, you may tell us that Franklin firmly supported gay marriage.

The Preamble is of no legal authority whatever. It was written by the Committee on style.

Learn some history beyond Wikipedia:

Massachusetts Negro Criminal Law 1795

How by deed, not creative interpretation, the wonderful and beneficient abolitionists of Massachusetts showed their love for the black man, who they held equal to themselves in every way.

Notes on Slavery in the State of Massachusetts, by George H. Moore, of The New-York Historical Society And Corresponding Member of The Massachusetts Historical Society, New York, D. Appleton & Co. 443 & 445 Broadway, MDCCCLXVI

228

The Massachusetts Law, entitled "An act for suppressing and punishing of Rogues, Vagabonds, common Beggars, and other idle, disorderly, and lewd Persons," was presented in the Senate on the 6th of March, 1788. It went through the usual stages of legislation, with various amendments, and was finally passed on the 26th of March, 1788. It contains the following very remarkable provision:

"V. Be it further enabled by the authority aforesaid [the Senate and House of Representatives in General Court assembled], that no person being an African or Negro, other than a subjct of the Emperor of Morocco, or a citizen of some one of the United States (to be evidenced by a certificate from the Secretary of the State of which he shall be a citizen), shall tarry within this Commonwealth, for a longer time than two months, and upon complaint made to any Justice of the Peace within this Commonwealth, that any such person has been within the same more than two months, the said Justice shall order the said person to depart out of this Commonwealth, and in case that 'the said African or Negro shall not depart as aforesaid, any Justice of the Peace within this Commonwealth, upon complaint and proof made that such person has continued within this Commonwealth ten days after notice given him or her to depart as afore-

- - - - -

229

said, shall commit the said person to any house of correction within the county, there to be kept to hard labour, agreeable to the rules and orders of the said house, until the Sessions of the Peace, next to be holden within and for the said county; and the matter of the said house of correction is hereby required and directed to transmit an attested copy of the warrant of commitment to the said Court on the first day of their said session, and if upon trial at the said Court, it shall be made to appear that the said person has thus continued within the Commonwealth, contrary to the tenor of this act, he or she shall be whipped not exceeding ten stripes, and ordered to depart out of this Commonwealth within ten days; and if he or she shall not so depart, the fame process fliall be had and punishment inflicted, and so toties quoties.

The edition from which we copy is the earliest classified edition of "The Perpetual Laws of the Commonwealth of Massachufetts," and is not to be found in Part I., among those relating to "The Publick and Private Rights of Persons," nor among the "Mifcellaneous" Statutes, but in "Part IV.," concerning "Criminal Matters." We doubt if anything in human legislation can be found which comes nearer branding color as a crime!

By this law, it will be observed that all negroes,

- - - - -

230

resident in Massachufetts, not citizens of some one of the States, were required to depart in two months, on penalty of being apprehended, whipped, and ordered to depart. The process and punishment could be renewed every two months. The only contemporary explanation of the design of the law which we have met with is to the effect that it was intended to prevent fugitive slaves from resorting to that State, in hopes to obtain freedom, and then being thrown as a deadweight upon that community. Belknap 1795. A recent writer states that this " enactment was said to have been the work of her [Massachusetts] leading lawyers, who were sufficiently sagacious to foresee the dangerous confequences of that conftitutional provision which, on restoring fugitives from labor, not only threatened to disturb the public peace, but the stability of the system." Amory's Life of Sullivan, I., 226, note. We give this illustration of legal sagacity in Massachusetts for what it is worth, although we are satisfied that the statute itself clearly illustrates the intention of those who framed it. Expositio contemporanea eft optima.

Sure. It was actually an amendment, the date is April 18, 1783.

That was a proposed amendment. All proposed amendments required unanimous consent and all failed. New York refused to ratify the three-fifths tax proposal. There are no amendments to the AoC.

Article 4

The Parties will consult together whenever, in the opinion of any of them, the territorial integrity, political independence or security of any of the Parties is threatened.

Article 4 provides that when one party feels insecure, the collective parties will gather and hold a circle jerk.

The article contains several misstatements that merit correction.

First, the author quotes Justice Kavanaugh: “Reasonable suspicion is a lesser requirement than probable cause and ‘considerably short’ of the preponderance of the evidence standard.” While this accurately reflects United States v. Knights, 534 U.S. 112 (2001), the context is misrepresented. Justice Kavanaugh’s statement pertains to brief investigatory stops, not arrests. Under Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968), such stops require reasonable suspicion, defined as specific and articulable facts suggesting criminal activity. These encounters do not rise to the level of arrest and do not trigger the full protections afforded under the Fourth Amendment.

Second, the claim that “The United States Supreme Court allows ethnicity to be a factor for arresting people, but not in admitting them to college” is legally inaccurate. The Supreme Court has held that ethnicity may be considered as one factor among many in forming reasonable suspicion, but it cannot be the sole basis for a stop or arrest. In United States v. Brignoni-Ponce, 422 U.S. 873 (1975), the Court ruled that while Border Patrol agents may consider apparent Mexican ancestry as one factor, it must be accompanied by other specific facts to justify a stop. Arrests require probable cause, which must be based on objective facts—not racial or ethnic generalizations.

Furthermore, the comparison to college admissions misrepresents the constitutional frameworks involved. In Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, 600 U.S. ___ (2023), the Court addressed race-conscious admissions under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. This is a distinct legal context from immigration enforcement, which implicates the Fourth Amendment’s protections against unreasonable searches and seizures.

Finally, immigration enforcement actions by ICE are governed by statutory authority under 8 U.S.C. §§ 1226 and 1357. While ICE may arrest individuals pursuant to administrative warrants, these warrants are not issued by neutral magistrates and are valid only for named individuals. Courts have held that the “reason to believe” standard for warrantless arrests under §1357(a)(2) must meet the probable cause threshold required by the Fourth Amendment (see Immigration Arrests in the Interior of the United States: A Primer, Congressional Research Service LSB10362, June 13, 2025).

In sum:

Reasonable suspicion governs brief stops (Terry).

Probable cause is required for arrests (Carroll v. United States, 267 U.S. 132 (1925)).

Ethnicity alone cannot justify a stop or arrest (Brignoni-Ponce).

Administrative warrants do not confer the same authority as judicial warrants.

Constitutional protections apply to all persons within the U.S., regardless of immigration status.

The article’s framing oversimplifies and misrepresents these legal standards. Enforcement practices must be grounded in law—not in generalizations or expediency.

BroJoeK, your post reads like a hymn to moral intentions untethered from reality. “Almost without exception”? That’s a generous euphemism for a generation of men who, while penning lofty ideals about liberty, were simultaneously calculating the market value of human beings. If hypocrisy were a founding principle, the Framers would’ve nailed it.

Yes, some Founders “opposed slavery in principle.” And some people oppose gluttony while eating their third slice of cake. The principle is easy. The practice is what matters.

Washington owned slaves until his death. Jefferson wrote stirring prose about equality while maintaining a forced labor camp at Monticello. Madison wrung his hands over slavery’s moral stain but never freed a soul. These men didn’t “gradually abolish” slavery—they gradually died, leaving the institution intact.

As for the “black problem,” it wasn’t that they were enslaved—it was that white America couldn’t imagine them as equals. Lincoln, ever the pragmatist, floated colonization as a solution. In his 1862 Annual Message to Congress, he proposed gradual emancipation paired with deportation, suggesting that freedmen could work for wages until they were shipped off to “congenial climes” among “people of their own blood and race”. That’s not abolitionism—it’s logistical segregation.

So no, I don’t buy the narrative that lifelong slaveholders were closet abolitionists. That’s like calling a pyromaniac a firefighter because he occasionally poured water on the flames he lit. The Founders made a choice. They chose unity over justice, profit over principle, and silence over emancipation.

And I, too, am gradually moving in the direction of believing nonsense—just as Washington was gradually moving toward freeing his slaves. That is to say, not at all.

Let’s begin with your historical mash-up of Founders and Framers. They were two distinct groups, largely of different generations, pursuing different objectives. But if you prefer to mash apples and lemons into one fruit and consume them interchangeably, that’s your prerogative. Just don’t expect anyone serious to swallow it.

At the time of the Founding, James Monroe was 18. Aaron Burr was 20. Hamilton was 21. Madison was 25. These were young revolutionaries—not the seasoned architects of 1787. Conflating the Founding with the Framing is like confusing the Declaration with the Constitution. One lit the fire, the other built the furnace.

Now, onto your constitutional mythology.

Jacobson v. Massachusetts 197 U.S. 11 (1905) did not use the Preamble to justify broad police powers. The Court stated plainly:

“It has never been regarded as the source of any substantive power conferred on the Government of the United States.”

The ruling upheld a state vaccination law under state police powers, not federal authority. The Preamble was mentioned only to be dismissed. If you’re invoking Jacobson as a federal endorsement of Preamble-based power, you’re not reading the case—you’re projecting onto it.

United States v. Kahriger, 345 U.S. 22 (1953) likewise did not lean on the Preamble. The Court upheld a federal wagering tax under Congress’s taxing power, and reaffirmed that the Preamble is not a source of legal authority. Any “nod” to general welfare was rhetorical fluff, not doctrinal substance. Stretching that into constitutional justification is fan fiction.

NFIB v. Sebelius 567 U.S. 519 (2012)—the Obamacare case—didn’t cite the Preamble at all. The ruling was grounded in the Taxing Clause, the Spending Clause, and a rejection of the Commerce Clause. If you’re hearing echoes of “general welfare,” it’s because you’re shouting into a canyon of your own construction.

The Preamble is not a legal wand you can wave to conjure federal authority. It’s a mission statement—not a rulebook.

And if we’re going to invoke the Founding Generation’s ideals, let’s do so with intellectual honesty. For example, according to DiogenesLamp, the Declaration’s whole spiel about “all men are created equal” was just “colorful language,” signifying nothing.

Clearly, as Thomas Jefferson penned lofty ideals about equality while being attended by his enslaved valet Jupiter, he must have had a moment of reflection—perhaps even imagining himself and Jupiter as equals. But the thought was fleeting. When the ink dried, Jupiter remained in bondage, and Jefferson resumed his role as slaveholder. And let’s not pretend Jefferson’s relationship with slavery was purely economic. After his wife’s death, he took a particular interest in her half-sister Sally Hemings—his property by law, and by all credible accounts, his mistress by practice.

So much for “created equal.” For Jefferson, some were created to serve, and some to be served—even as he drafted the rhetoric that would inspire generations.

Finally, on “We the People”: In 1788, the great ratifying debates centered on that phrase—a deliberate rejection of the old Confederation’s limp “We the States.” Patrick Henry saw it as a threat to state sovereignty. He was right to be alarmed. The Constitution wasn’t a patch job—it was a revolution in legitimacy.

“We the People” isn’t ornamental. It affirms that the Constitution draws its authority directly from the people—not from the states, not from the government, and certainly not from the dusty remnants of the Articles. It remains the clearest rebuke to any theory that places institutions above individuals.

If you’re going to invoke the Constitution, do it with precision. Otherwise, you’re just dressing ideology in historical cosplay.

They got to 3/5ths because it was a known number back in the Articles of Confederation.

It was anti-slavery people who pushed for that lower number of 3/5ths. Try all you want jeffersondem no matter how you cut the cake the 3/5ths compromise is not pro-slavery.

Could you kindly identify the provision of the Articles of Confederation which relates to three fifths of anything?

"Of the 13 original slave states, 13 of them voted to enshrine slavery into the United States Constitution in 1787. This includes Pennsylvania and Massachusetts."

No. Rhode Island was not even present(represented) at the 1787 Convention being the troublemaker it had always been at that time, but even excluding this technicality that there were only 12 still no.

They voted to enshrine non-slavery into the United States Constitution in 1787.

All thirteen of the original states ratified the Constitution, just not in 1787. All states ratified the whole Constitution, including the Fugitive Slave clause. They did so as free, sovereign and independent states, of their own free will.

The establishment of the Constitution was between the states so ratifying the same. All thirteen became members of the new union upon ratification of the Constitution.

Neither did 12 consider slavery at the Constitutional Convention. Early on, when it was known that the Convention was to exceed its authorization to propose amendments to the Articles of Confederation; from the New York delegation, all but Alexander Hamilton walked out, leaving Hamilton unable to represent the state and vote on anything. Hamilton signed the draft Constitution "of New York," not "for New York."

Complain all you want. You can't unmake it. It's no wonder your whole crew are so rejecting of notions of Originalism. You only want what the clause came to be, not what it started out as.

The Fugitive Slave Clause says the same thing in 2025 as it did in 1788.

No person held to service or labor in one state, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due.

It is still there, but there are no longer any persons held to service or labor.

The error is yours; John Newton had the privilege of the British Empire's hypocrisy of greedily hoarding slavery abolitionism all for itself on the Isles and not sharing the blessings of slavery abolitionism across the board specifically with the 1772 Somersett (sic - Somerset) Case - this very thing is actually, in plain text, the very complaint that Benjamin Franklin makes.

Somerset, more properly R. v. Knowles, ex parte Somerset, (1772) Lofft 1, 98 E.R. 499, 20 S.T. 1, did not abolish slavery in England. It gave a cause of action while in England, but only suspended the status of a slave while in England.

The Slave, Grace, 2 Hagg. Admir. (G.B.) 94, (1827)

In The Slave, Grace (1827), the English High Court of Admiralty modified the Somerset rule. Grace, a West Indian slave, had been taken to England but then returned to Antigua with her master. She sued for her freedom only after returning to Antigua. Lord Stowell, speaking for the English court, held that Grace was still a slave. Stow­ell found that residence in England only suspended the status of a slave. Without positive law, the master could not control a slave in England and could not force a slave to leave the realm. But if a slave did return to a slave jurisdiction, as Grace had, then the law of Eng­land would no longer be in force and the person's status would once again be determined by the laws of the slave jurisdiction.

SOURCE: Dred Scott v. Sandford, A brief History with Documents, Paul Finkelman, (1997), p. 21.