Roger B. Taney

“ Every state has an undoubted right to determine the status, or domestic and social condition, of the persons domiciled within its territory; except in so far as the powers of the states in this respect are restrained, or duties and obligations imposed upon them, by the Constitution of the United States. There is nothing in the Constitution of the United States that can in any degree control the law of Kentucky upon this subject. ”

“ And did not the court of Kentucky in this case decide upon the effect of the Ordinance of 1787?
It is agreed that this case arises under the laws of Kentucky. But Kentucky could not pass laws inconsistent with the Ordinance. They cannot make a slave of one whom the Ordinance makes free. All that Kentucky has done has been to apply the penalty to the asportation of slaves. ”

“ Duncan, 3 Mo., 140, says,-'The object of the Ordinance of 1787 was to prohibit the introduction of slaves into the territory, of which the present state of Illinois constitutes a part, and the master who permits his slave to go there to hire himself offends against that law as much as one who takes his slave along with himself to reside there, as if we are at liberty to regard the moral effect of the act, it is much more to permit the slave to go there to hire himself to labor, than for the master to take him along with himself to reside,' &c. ”

“ This is illustrated by the acts of coterminous slave states. Maryland and Virginia were obliged to pass laws to prevent freedom free resulting from a temporary residence.
What is the difference between temporary and permanent residence? Animus morandi and animus revertendi.
The only true distinction is between domicile, on the one hand, and mere residence, whether for a short or for a long time, on the other. Various words have been applied to express the idea, such as sojourning, commorancy, residence, &c. Many persons pass their whole lives in a strange land. ”

“ There is no principle of comity which requires any sovereignty to surrender the interest of its citizens, or its established laws, or its settled policy, in deference to or respect for any foreign law. ”

“ The proposition is maintained, that if a master voluntarily hire his slave to a citizen of a non-slaveholding state, to perform service and labor in such non-slaveholding state, and if he in fact send the slave there for that purpose, the slave becomes free. ”

“ Provided always, that any person escaping into the same, from whom labor or service is lawfully claimed in any one of the original states, such fugitive may be lawfully reclaimed and conveyed to the person claiming his or her labor or service as aforesaid.' And this article is one of the six which the Ordinance declares shall be a compact between the original states and the people and states in the said territory, and for ever remain unalterable unless by common consent. ”

“ Under this permission, Williams, in the year 1837, made several excursions with his band, including the slaves Reuben and Henry, to Cincinnati, Ohio, and New Albany and Madison, Indiana, for the purpose of playing at balls or public entertainments; after which he returned to Louisville, his place of residence, said slaves returning with him; from which time to the time of their escape in 1841, they had remained within the state of Kentucky. ”

“ The plaintiffs obtained this writ of error to reverse a judgment of the Court of Appeals of Kentucky, which affirmed the judgment of the inferior court, in which Graham obtained a verdict and judgment against the defendants below for three thousand dollars, on the ground that three of the servants of the plaintiff had been conveyed from Louisville, Kentucky, to Cincinnati, in the steamboat of defendants, by which means they escaped, and the plaintiff lost their services. ”

“ The defendant in error is a citizen of the state of Kentucky, and three negro men whom he claimed and held as his slaves were received on board the steamboat Pike, at Louisville, without his knowledge or consent, and transported to Cincinnati ”