Continuing, he said,
"I understand a proposed amendment to the constitution—which
amendment, however, I have not seen—has passed Congress, to the
effect that the Federal Government shall never interfere with the
domestic institutions of the states, including that of persons held
to service. To avoid misconception of what I have said, I depart
from my purpose not to speak of particular amendments so far as to
say that, holding such a provision to now be implied Constitutional
Law, I have no objection to its being made expressed and
irrevocable."
Even after the conflict of arms had occurred, the position of the
Administration was reiterated in the most solemn form. On the 22nd of
April, 1861, Mr. Seward, as Secretary of State, in an official
communication to Mr. Dayton, Minister to France, wrote:
"The territories will remain in all respects the same, whether the
revolution shall succeed or shall fail. The condition of slavery in
the several states will remain just the same, whether it succeed or
fail.... The rights of the states and the condition of every being
in them will remain subject to exactly the same laws and forms of
administration, whether the revolution shall succeed or whether it
shall fail. In one case the states would be federally connected with
the new Confederacy; in the other, they would, as now, be members of
the United States; but their constitutions and laws, customs, habits
and institutions, in either case, will remain the same."[281]