The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus
Chapter 230 : Mr. PINCKNEY moved to amend Mr. RANDOLPH'S motion, so as to make "blacks equ

Mr. PINCKNEY moved to amend Mr. RANDOLPH'S motion, so as to make "blacks equal to the whites in the ratio of representation." This, he urged was nothing more than justice. The blacks are the laborers, the peasants, of the Southern States. They are as productive of pecuniary resources as those of the Northern States. They add equally to the wealth, and, considering money as the sinew of war, to the strength, of the nation. It will also be politic with regard to the Northern States, as taxation is to keep pace with representation.

On Mr. PINCKNEY'S (of S. Carolina) motion, for rating blacks as equal to whites, instead of as three-fifths,--South Carolina, Georgia, aye--2; Ma.s.sachusetts, Connecticut (Doctor JOHNSON, aye), New Jersey, Pennsylvania (three against two), Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, no--8.

Mr. RANDOLPH'S (of Virginia) proposition, as varied by Mr. WILSON (of Pennsylvania) being read for taking the question on the whole,--

Mr. GERRY (of Ma.s.sachusetts) urged that the principle of it could not be carried into execution, as the States were not to be taxed as States. With regard to taxes on imposts, he conceived they would be more productive where there were no slaves, than where there were; the consumption being greater.

Mr. ELLSWORTH (of Connecticut). In the case of a poll-tax there would be no difficulty. But there would probably be none. The sum allotted to a State may be levied without difficulty, according to the plan used by the State in raising its own supplies.

On the question on the whole proposition, as proportioning representation to direct taxation, and both to the white and three-fifths of the black inhabitants, and requiring a census within six years, and within every ten years afterwards,--Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, aye--6; New Jersey, Delaware, no--2; Ma.s.sachusetts, South Carolina, divided.--pp. 1079 to 1087.

Friday, July 13, 1787. Mr. MADISON said, that having always conceived that the difference of interest in the United States lay not between the large and small, but the Northern and Southern States.-p. 1088.

On the motion of Mr. RANDOLPH (of Virginia) the vote of Monday last, authorizing the Legislature to adjust, from time to time, the representation upon the principles of _wealth_ and numbers of inhabitants, was reconsidered by common consent, in order to strike out _wealth_ and adjust the resolution to that requiring periodical revisions according to the number of whites and three-fifths of the blacks.

Mr. GOUVERNEUR MORRIS (of Pennsylvania) opposed the alteration, as leaving still an incoherence. If negroes were to be viewed as inhabitants, and the revision was to proceed on the principle of numbers of inhabitants, they ought to be added in their entire number, and not in the proportion of three-fifths. If as property, the word wealth was right; and striking it out would produce the very inconsistency which it was meant to get rid of. The train of business, and the late turn which it had taken, had led him, he said, into deep meditation on it, and he would candidly state the result. A distinction had been set up, and urged, between the Northern and Southern States. He had hitherto considered this doctrine as heretical. He still thought the distinction groundless. He sees, however, that it is persisted in; and the Southern gentlemen will not be satisfied unless they see the way open to their gaining a majority in the public councils. The consequence of such a transfer of power from the maritime to the interior and landed interest, will, he foresees, be such an oppression to commerce, that he shall be obliged to vote for the vicious principle of equality in the second branch, in order to provide some defence for the Northern States against it. But to come more to the point, either this distinction is fict.i.tious or real; if fict.i.tious, let it be dismissed, and let us proceed with due confidence. If it be real, instead of attempting to blend incompatible things, let us at once take a friendly leave of each other. There can be no end of demands for security, if every particular interest is to be ent.i.tled to it. The Eastern States may claim it for their fishery, and for other objects, as the Southern States claim it for their peculiar objects. In this struggle between the two ends of the Union, what part ought the Middle States, in point of policy, to take? To join their Eastern brethren, according to his ideas. If the Southern States get the power into their hands, and be joined, as they will be, with the interior country, they will inevitably bring on a war with Spain for the Mississippi. This language is already held. The interior country, having no property nor interest exposed on the sea, will be little affected by such a war. He wished to know what security the Northern and Middle States will have against this danger. It has been said that North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia only, will in a little time have a majority of the people of America. They must in that case include the great interior country, and every thing was to be apprehended from their getting the power into their hands.

Mr. BUTLER (of South Carolina). The security the Southern States want is, that their negroes may not be taken from them, which some gentlemen within or without doors have a very good mind to do. It was not supposed that North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, would have more people than all the other States, but many more relatively to the other States, than they now have. The people and strength of America are evidently bearing southwardly, and southwestwardly.

On the question to strike out _wealth_, and to make the change as moved by Mr. RANDOLPH (of Virginia) it pa.s.sed in the affirmative,--Ma.s.sachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, aye--9; Delaware, divided.--_pp_. 1090-1-2-3-4.

SAt.u.r.dAY, July 14, 1787.

Mr. MADISON. It seemed now to be pretty well understood, that the real difference of interests lay, not between the large and small, but between the Northern and Southern, States. THE INSt.i.tUTION OF SLAVERY, AND IT'S CONSEQUENCES, FORMED THE LINE OF DISCRIMINATION.--_p_. 1104.

TUESDAY, July 17, 1787.

Mr. WILLIAMSON. The largest State will be sure to succeed. This will not be Virginia, however. Her slaves will have no suffrage.--_p_.

1123.

THURSDAY, July 19, 1787.

Mr. MADISON. The right of suffrage was much more diffusive in the Northern than the Southern States; and the latter could have no influence in the election, on the score of the negroes.--p. 1148.

MONDAY, July 23, 1787.

General PINCKNEY reminded the Convention, that if the Committee should fail to insert some security to the Southern States against an emanc.i.p.ation of slaves, and taxes on exports, he should be bound by duty to his State to vote against their report.--_p_. 1187.

TUESDAY, July 24, 1787.

Mr. WILLIAMSON. As the Executive is to have a kind of veto on the laws, and there is an essential difference of interests between the Northern and Southern States, particularly in the carrying trade, the power will be dangerous, if the Executive is to be taken from part of the Union, to the part from which he is not taken.--_p_. 1189.

Mr. GOUVERNEUR MORRIS hoped the Committee would strike out the whole of the clause proportioning direct taxation to representation. He had only meant it as a bridge[3] to a.s.sist us over a certain gulf; having pa.s.sed the gulf, the bridge may be removed. He thought the principle laid down with so much strictness liable to strong objections.--_p_.

1197.

[Footnote 3: The object was to lessen the eagerness, on one side, for, and the opposition, on the other, to the share of representation claimed by the Southern States on account of the negroes.]

WEDNESDAY, July 25, 1787.

Mr. MADISON. Refer the appointment of the National Executive to the State Legislatures, and * * *

The remaining mode was an election by the people, or rather by the qualified part of them at large. * * *

The second difficulty arose from the disproportion of qualified voters in the Northern and Southern States, and the disadvantages which this mode would throw on the latter. The answer to this objection was--in the first place, that this disproportion would be continually decreasing under the influence of the republican laws introduced in the Southern States, and the more rapid increase of their population; in the second place, that local considerations must give way to the general interest. As an individual from the Southern States, he was willing to make the sacrifice.--pp. 1200-1.

THURSDAY, July 26, 1787.

Mr. Gouverneur Morris. Revenue will be drawn, it is foreseen, as much as possible from trade.--p. 1217.

MONDAY, August 6, 1787.

Mr. Rutledge delivered in the Report of the Committee of Detail.

ARTICLE VII.

SECT. 3. The proportions of direct taxation shall be regulated by the whole number of white and other free citizens and inhabitants of every age, s.e.x and condition, including those bound to servitude for a term of years, and three-fifths of all other persons not comprehended in the foregoing description, (except Indians not paying taxes); which number shall, within six years after the first meeting of the Legislature, and within the term of every ten years afterwards, be taken in such a manner as the said Legislature shall direct.

SECT. 4. No tax or duty shall be laid by the Legislature on articles exported from any State; nor on the migration or importation of such persons as the several States shall think proper to admit; nor shall such migration or importation be prohibited.

SECT. 5. No capitation tax shall be laid, unless in proportion to the census herein before directed to be taken.

SECT. 6. No navigation act shall be pa.s.sed without the a.s.sent of two-thirds of the members present in each house.--pp. 1226-33-34.

WEDNESDAY, August 8, 1787.

Mr. King wished to know what influence the vote just pa.s.sed was meant to have on the succeeding part of the Report, concerning the admission of slaves into the rule of representation. He could not reconcile his mind to the Article, if it was to prevent objections to the latter part. The admission of slaves was a most grating circ.u.mstance to his mind, and he believed would be so to a great part of the people of America. He had not made a strenuous opposition to it heretofore, because he had hoped that this concession would have produced a readiness, which had not been manifested, to strengthen the General Government, and to mark a full confidence in it. The Report under consideration had, by the tenor of it, put an end to all those hopes.

In two great points the hands of the Legislature were absolutely tied.

The importation of slaves could not be prohibited. Exports could not be taxed. Is this reasonable? What are the great objects of the general system? First, defence against foreign invasion; secondly, against internal sedition. Shall all the States, then, be bound to defend each, and shall each be at liberty to introduce a weakness which will render defence more difficult? Shall one part of the United States be bound to defend another part, and that other part be at liberty, not only to increase its own danger, but to withhold the compensation for the burden? If slaves are to be imported, shall not the exports produced by their labor supply a revenue the better to enable the General Government to defend their masters? There was so much inequality and unreasonableness in all this, that the people of the Northern States could never be reconciled to it. No candid man could undertake to justify it to them. He had hoped that some accommodation would have taken place on this subject; that at least a time would have been limited for the importation of slaves. He never could agree to let them be imported without limitation, and then be represented in the National Legislature. Indeed, he could so little persuade himself of the rect.i.tude of such a practice, that he was not sure be could a.s.sent to it under any circ.u.mstances. At all events, either slaves should not be represented, or exports should be taxable.

Mr. SHERMAN regarded the slave trade as iniquitous; but the point of representation having been settled after much difficulty and deliberation, he did not think himself bound to make opposition; especially as the present Article, as amended, did not preclude any arrangement whatever on that point, in another place of the report.

Mr. GOUVERNEUR MORRIS moved to insert "free" before the word "inhabitants." Much, he said, would depend on this point. He never would concur in upholding domestic slavery. It was a nefarious inst.i.tution. It was the curse of Heaven on the States where it prevailed. Compare the free regions of the Middle States, where a rich and n.o.ble cultivation marks the prosperity and happiness of the people, with the misery and poverty which overspread the barren wastes of Virginia, Maryland, and the other States having slaves. Travel through the whole continent, and you behold the prospect continually varying with the appearance and disappearance of slavery. The moment you leave the Eastern States, and enter New York, the effects of the inst.i.tution become visible. Pa.s.sing through the Jerseys and entering Pennsylvania, every criterion of superior improvement witnesses the change. Proceed southwardly, and every step you take, through the great regions of slaves, presents a desert increasing with the increasing proportion of these wretched beings. Upon what principle is it that the slaves shall be computed in the representation? Are they men? Then make them citizens, and let them vote. Are they property?

Why, then, is no other property included? The houses in this city (Philadelphia) are worth more than all the wretched slaves who cover the rice swamps of South Carolina. The admission of slaves into the representation, when fairly explained, comes to this, that the inhabitant of Georgia and South Carolina who goes to the coast of Africa, and, in defiance of the most sacred laws of humanity, tears away his fellow creatures from their dearest connections, and d.a.m.ns them to the most cruel bondage, shall have more votes in a government inst.i.tuted for protection of the rights of mankind, than the citizen of Pennsylvania or New Jersey, who views with a laudable horror so nefarious a practice. He would add, that domestic slavery is the most prominent feature in the aristocratic countenance of the proposed Const.i.tution. The va.s.salage of the poor has ever been the favorite offspring of aristocracy. And what is the proposed compensation to the Northern States, for a sacrifice of every principle of right, of every impulse of humanity? They are to bind themselves to march their militia for the defence of the Southern States, for their defence against those very slaves of whom they complain. They must supply vessels and seamen, in case of foreign attack. The Legislature will have indefinite power to tax them by excises, and duties on imports; both of which will fall heavier on them than on the Southern inhabitants; for the bohea tea used by a Northern freeman will pay more tax than the whole consumption of the miserable slave, which consists of nothing more than his physical subsistence and the rag that covers his nakedness. On the other side, the Southern States are not to be restrained from importing fresh supplies of wretched Africans, at once to increase the danger of attack, and the difficulty of defence; nay, they are to be encouraged to it, by an a.s.surance of having their votes in the National Government increased in proportion; and are, at the same time, to have their exports and their slaves exempt from all contributions for the public service. Let it not be said, that direct taxation is to be proportioned to representation. It is idle to suppose that the General Government can stretch its hand directly into the pockets of the people, scattered over so vast a country. They can only do it through the medium of exports, imports and excises. For what, then, are all the sacrifices to be made? He would sooner submit himself to a tax for paying for all the negroes in the United States, than saddle posterity with such a Const.i.tution.

Mr. DAYTON seconded the motion. He did it, he said, that his sentiments on the subject might appear, whatever might be the fate of the amendment.

Mr. SHERMAN did not regard the admission of the negroes into the ratio of representation, as liable to such insuperable objections. It was the freemen of the Southern States who were, in fact, to be represented according to the taxes paid by them, and the negroes are only included in the estimate of the taxes. This was his idea of the matter.

Mr. PINCKNEY considered the fisheries, and the western frontier, as more burdensome to the United States than the slaves. He thought this could be demonstrated, if the occasion were a proper one.

Mr. WILSON thought the motion premature. An agreement to the clause would be no bar to the object of it.