Congressional Law For The District Of Columbia

Some considerable time since, we were e ir.formed of the case of a clergyman in ' Hampden County, who had given greal '- ofience to some politician in hischurch, by preaching a. bold c faithful sermón on - "Slavery, and the duty of American citi zens in regird to its Abolition." The ? worst paroxysm of indignntion Wan oc casioned, as we understand, by his stnteï mont that there was still a law e.xisiing in the District of Columbio, nnd owing ! iis force only to the authority and net of Congress, by which a slave, arrested : for murder, is subject to be cut in qnarters, and the qjarters to be exposed in . the most public places of the countv. - A torrent of indignant denials nlmost i overwhe-ned the good man, without giving him a chance to produce his authority or prove lm position. His appeal to Judge Jay hardly availed to procure even a suspension of judgment. - Under these circumstances, we volunleered to write to n memberof Congress, to procure an exact and certified copy of the law and a statement of Is present validity. We rëceivèd in reply, the following copy and certifícate, which we propose, will be fully satisfactory to all reasonable people. ! Be it cnacted &c "That when any i negro or other slave shall be convicted , by confession or verdict of a jury, of any petit treasmi or murder, or wilfully burn ing of dwelling-houses, it shall and may be law ful for the justices before whom ' such conviciion shall be to give judgment against such negro or other slave, to have the righl hnnd cut off, to be hauged in the usual manner, the head severed from the body, the body divided into fourquarters, and the head and quarters set up in the most pubüc places in the county where sudi acts werecommitted." The above is copied verbatim from the fourth chapter of the Laws of Ma ryland of 1729, being the whole of the 2d section of said chapter, as contained I in tle first vol of the Laws of Mnryland, "revised and collected by William Kelly. Atl'y." The act was in force in 1801 when it was constituled within the district of Columbia by act of Congress npproved on the 27th of July of that year, entitled " An net concerning the district of Columbio" nnd is now in force within that part of said district which lies North of the Polomac, being all that portion which was élded by Maryland to the United States.