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A
HISTORY OF THE TRIAL
OF
CASTNER HANWAY AND OTHERS,
FOR
TREASON,
AT
PHILADELPHIA IN NOVEMBER, 1851.
WITH AN INTRODUCTION UPON
THE HISTORY OF THE SLAVE QUESTION.
BY
A MEMBER OF THE PHILADELPHIA BAR.
PHILADELPHIA:
URIAH HUNT & SONS, No. 44 NORTH FOURTH STREETS.
1852.
MERRIHEW AND THOMPSON, PRINTERS.
PREFACE.
The following pages contain a short history of the late Christiana
Treason Trials. During their progress a phonographic report of all the
proceedings was taken and printed, by order of the Court, for the use
of the Judges and Counsel employed in the cause. For this a copy right
was secured, and proposals issued for publishing it in full. Though
more than six months have elapsed, this has not yet been done, and
the only account of the transactions to which the public have access,
is contained in the daily papers of New York and Philadelphia. This
pamphlet has been prepared to supply the deficiency.
The sources of information used in compiling it, have been the
phonographic report already referred to; a transcript of the docket
of Alderman Reigart of Lancaster; a transcript of the docket of E. D.
Ingraham, Esquire, Commissioner of the U. S., resident in Philadelphia;
the records of the Philadelphia County Prison; the records of the
Circuit and District Courts; and the files of the Evening Bulletin.
Where these have not furnished a connected story, the deficiency has
been supplied from the writer’s own recollection, or that of his
friends, who attended upon or participated in the trial.
Some of the most glaring absurdities and incongruities contained in Mr.
Brent’s pamphlet, which he calls “A Report to his Excellency Governor
Lowe in relation to the Christiana Treason Trials,” have been pointed
out. The very limited circulation of this work, confined, we believe,
to a few who received copies as a personal favor, would render any
notice of it unnecessary, had it not been published in a measure by
the authority of the State, whose imaginary wrongs its author has, by
these means, sought to vindicate. The almost scurrilous terms in which
it denounces the majority of the citizens of Philadelphia, the people
of Pennsylvania, the officers of the Court in which the trials were
held, the Judges who presided, and, in short, every one connected with
the case, except counsel and the witnesses for the prosecution, are
conclusive evidence of more anxiety to emit spleen and mortification,
than to subserve the purposes of truth and justice.
A popular, not a professional view of the subject has been attempted.
It is amongst the body of the people that false reports have been
spread, and to the people this statement is addressed, in hopes that it
may tend to correct the evil.
In accordance with the wish of the publishers, a brief introduction
has been prefixed, embracing a connected view of all the many attempts
which have been made, at various periods to settle, by Congressional
legislation, the embarrassing question of slavery. The main object is
to show the views entertained upon the subject by the great statesmen
who framed the Constitution, and watched over its first developments;
and accordingly much more space has been devoted to that early
legislation, than to measures which are still fresh in the recollection
of those whom we address. The essay is thought to be appropriate in
this connection, because the late great Compromise, of which these
trials are one of the earliest fruits, is the legitimate consequence of
long antecedent measures, and cannot be fully understood or appreciated
without bestowing much previous study upon our early political history.
The sources from which this introduction has been compiled are strictly
original, consisting, as far as possible, of official or semi-official
documents and reports.
SLAVERY AS A NATIONAL QUESTION.
The following brief essay is not intended to be an argumentative
discussion of the subject upon which it treats. Discussions of that
sort have abounded so much of late years, that there would be much more
presumption than wisdom in any attempt to increase the number. But
perhaps it may be matter of interest, now that the conflict has been
going on for more than sixty years, to know something of its earlier
phases, of its varied successes, and of the deeds done and the words
spoken by those who fought the same battle long ago in the infancy of
the republic. The region of historical research which we are about to
explore, appears to be almost a _terra incognita_ to the majority of
the fiery debaters who now-a-days are prosecuting this wordy war; or if
they occasionally plunge into it for a moment, it is only to hurry back
in premature triumph, dragging captive some unhappy straggling passage
of Jefferson or Jay, to serve as a bone of contention for a whole
generation of self-constituted agitators in and out of Congress. Now if
the object is merely to perpetuate the agitation, the course pursued is
unquestionably a wise one; for, short as our national history is, the
stock of facts which it supplies us with upon the subject is assuredly
large enough, if used with but a tithe of the economy heretofore
exhibited, to last till the Union and Time itself shall be no more. But
there are some quiet spirits still left who get weary of this hopeless
strife, and who can scarcely afford to adopt the advice of the Scotch
clergyman--to wait for rest till they get to heaven; who cannot help
calling out, “Peace, peace,” however discordant the answer may be;
and who, if they needs must fight, would be glad to know what they’re
fighting about, fight in earnest and be done with it. To answer, then,
at least one of these questions, and suggest to this rapidly increasing
class precisely what the present phase of the battle is, and what hopes
there are of final peace, this brief historical sketch is attempted.
The purpose is not, we repeat it, to discuss the subject; the author
aims not at the dignity of a disputant; he is more than satisfied with
the humbler task of supplying materials for those who do,--in hopes
that if rage and anger have hitherto filled the place of armorers in
our battle-field, history may in future discharge the duty a little
more creditably. It is proposed, then, to trace the slavery question
at length, so far as it has been the source of national difficulties,
embarrassments and legislation, with especial reference to its earlier
history, and to the clause in the Constitution respecting fugitives,
which has lately been made the subject of Congressional action.
It will not be necessary to extend our inquiries to any period anterior
to the revolution, or in any way to examine the peculiar causes which
first established and have long perpetuated slavery amongst us. Prior
to that event, it was of course a question between Great Britain and
her colonies, and nice casuistry might perhaps be needed to determine
the relative amount of guilt chargeable on each of the two parties. The
moral value, too, of a solemn judicial decision, “that no slave could
breathe the air or stand on the free soil of England,” may be a little
questioned, when it is remembered that such property would of necessity
be almost worthless in her climate; and that at the very moment when a
reluctant Judge pronounced these boasted words, her capitalists were
rolling in wealth that grew out of the sweat on negro brows in her
American plantations. We have heard of high bred Southern families in
which a thousand out-door slaves are never suffered to pollute the
pure air of the saloons and chambers that their masters breathe, or
tread the rich carpets that their toil has paid for. The custom is
undoubtedly refined and agreeable, but we never heard that it boasted
to rest on higher grounds than ordinary mortals venture on.
At the time of the declaration of independence, when the colonies
escaped from their long pupilage, and, with new rights and new
responsibilities, set out to act an independent part among the nations
of the earth, the taint of slavery was upon every one of them; in
every one, the soil was tilled by negro bondmen. The laws regulating
the relations between master and slave, were, it is true, widely
different in the different States; in some, as in Connecticut, the
privileges annexed to the condition were so wide and the facility of
rising from it so great, that the constitutional euphemism which is
now-a-days so boldly metaphorical, might with every propriety style
them “persons held to service or labor;” in others, they were then, as
now, a hopelessly degraded class, whose happiness depended entirely
on the arbitrary will of their masters. Of course it is not intended
to represent that the various States were equally interested in the
institution. Varieties of soil, climate and social habits, had drawn
the great mass of this population to what are now known as the Southern
States. At the time of the Declaration, no authentic enumeration had
been made; but when the first census was taken in 1791, the total
number of slaves in what are now known as the Northern States, was
40,370; in the Southern, 653,910. At the earlier period of which we
are now speaking, the disproportion was probably less striking, but
sufficiently great to make the interests of the two sections totally
opposite. The difference, however, did not depend merely upon the
amount of capital invested. The feeling in the North, both moral and
political, was decidedly and in many cases bitterly hostile to slavery.
The most shortsighted, therefore, could not fail to foresee the speedy
adoption of those measures which ultimately provided for general
emancipation. Even in Virginia and Maryland, not then considered as
Southern States, ardent advocates were found to plead the cause of
liberty, and organized action had more than once been attempted in
its behalf. Below the Virginia line, in the Carolinas and Georgia,
an abolitionist was as rare a phenomenon then as he would be now;
those States were yet but thinly settled, a great part of their lands
unreclaimed, and no prospect of improvement appeared, except in the
extensive employment of slave labor, adapted both to the climate and
the character of the already established settlers.
Such was, briefly, the position of the two parties at the opening
of our independent history; and such it was, also, when the Federal
Convention met at Philadelphia in 1787, to frame the present
Constitution. The question presented itself to this body in a threefold
aspect--_First_, as to the influence which an enslaved race was
entitled to exercise in the government; _secondly_, as to their further
increase by importation; _thirdly_, as to how far Congress and the
Constitution were bound to provide for the security of this sort of
property.
The first of these was rightly regarded at the time, as by far the
most important, not only because of the magnitude of the interests
directly involved in its decision, but still more so, because of
the principles which, though scarcely remembered at present, were
undoubtedly the basis of the Compromise, in which the deliberations
of the convention resulted. A moment’s reference to the slave census,
referred to above, will show how great was the contrariety of interests
involved, and give a tolerably correct idea of the influences by
which the various States were governed in discussing the subject. For
whatever pleasure it might give us to conceal the humiliating fact,
candor will compel us to acknowledge, that even in those heroic times
of our history, interest seldom gave way to any nobler feeling when a
question like this was to be determined. The original claim set up by
the South but abandoned upon the final vote--except by South Carolina,
Georgia, and Delaware--was that the black population should be as
largely represented in Congress, as the white. It is impossible to
give anything but a very brief outline of the arguments used upon both
sides. Without venturing to insist upon the obvious absurdity, that
an enslaved and helpless race were really entitled to representation
because of any rights _they_ themselves might have to defend or duties
which they might be bound to discharge, the Southern members took the
position, not regarded at that time as utterly heterodox, that a State
is entitled to be represented, not merely because of its containing
so many human beings, but because so many human beings are in reality
only the exponent of so much wealth or so much power contributed by
such State to the support of the general government. The federal value
of the State is in direct proportion to the amount of this power, and
what difference could it make whether it emanated as in the South from
a race called slaves, supported at the direct expense of their masters,
who supplied them liberally with all the necessaries of life; or as
in the North, from a population occupying precisely the same relative
position in the social scale, performing labor of the same description,
maintained, though in a somewhat different way by the same capitalist,
and called Freeman--if one were entitled to representation, why not
the other? The negro population was as essentially a producing power
and as original an element of wealth as any body of free laborers could
be, and therefore as fully entitled to have their interests consulted
in the proceedings of a Government instituted for the express purpose
of providing for the security of property. But in addition to this,
they were entitled to make this claim not only as producers, but also
as consumers of those foreign productions, the importation of which
would form one great element of wealth in the Eastern States.
The fallacy of this reasoning, specious as it might seem, was warmly
commented on and exposed by the opposite side. If the Southern slave
was to be regarded as any other human being, and as possessed of those
inalienable rights which the Declaration of Independence proudly
claimed for all humanity, why not at once call him a citizen and give
him the right to be represented, not by his master, but by himself?
If he was nothing but property, why not speak out openly and attempt
to make property the basis of representation, and the Government a
tool in the hands of a moneyed aristocracy? It was conceded that the
slaveholding States were at that time by far the wealthiest part of
the confederacy, but this wealth of slavery was not and could not be
an element of power, but rather of weakness and confusion. If it was
argued that slaves filled, in the South, the same relative position
as free laborers in the North, and their employment necessarily
excluded to a great extent the introduction of a population which would
otherwise be entitled to representation, then in the same way free and
active _mind_, the only thing that deserves to be represented, was
likewise excluded. But on a similar principle, the horses, cattle, and
even the machinery of the North, which was nothing but a substitute
for so much manual labor, were equally entitled to be heard on the
floor of Congress. Why should property in one form go to Congress,
and be shut out when it takes another and more human one? “The houses
in Philadelphia alone,” said Gouverneur Morris, “are worth all the
wretched slaves that cover the rice swamps of South Carolina.” He
ridiculed the idea of treating the Southern slave as a consumer--“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 which covers his
nakedness.”
As a last resort, however, the Carolinas had an argument ready which
defied all ingenuity, learning, or statesmanship to answer, and
which has so often proved potential in after discussions. “North
Carolina would never confederate on any terms that did not rate the
black population at least at three-fifths.” Connecticut generosity
immediately interposed to prevent so disastrous a result, and after
another fruitless effort to obtain an equality of representation,
as some of the members rather metaphorically termed it, for the
luckless slaves, the clause as it now stands was adopted by an almost
unanimous vote. Thus was established the second great compromise of
the Constitution. It is in vain to support it now upon the grounds
which its friends originally occupied. Truer views of the real origin
and real ends of Government, have forever exploded amongst us the
notion, that property can in any way with justice be made an element of
representation; and that article in the Constitution stands now solely
upon any merit which it may have acquired as a necessary concession to
reconcile clashing interests; and it will probably hold its place as
long as slavery exists, upon the simple ground so tersely laid down
at the close of the discussion--that North Carolina would never have
confederated without it.
The course of the debate had, however, clearly shown that the slavery
question was at best nothing but the stalking horse behind which
deeper influences moved; that though the battle cry on one side might
be the rights of man, and on the other the rights of the master, yet
the battle cry in this, as in many other cases, hinted but remotely at
the real grounds of the war. The slaveholding States were at that time
the richest part of the Union, but their wealth arose exclusively from
agriculture, and their interests of course centered in this, and in the
exportation of their products. The Eastern and Middle States, though
then comparatively poor, were clearly destined to be the commercial
power of the Union, though the extent of that commerce and the enormous
wealth of which it has been the source, was then little dreamed of. The
great West was as yet a power unknown, and scarcely foreseen even by
the most sagacious statesmen. The object of the South, therefore, was
to increase their productive power, to give it as great an influence as
possible in the affairs of the country, to leave commerce unfettered,
and especially to exempt exports from the payment of duties. That of
the North, on the other hand, was to give Congress such large powers
in the regulation of commerce, as might be employed in the protection
of their infant marine against foreign competition; and to diminish
the duties on imports. In short it was merely a question as to which
should be the predominating interest--whether the South should be a
huge plantation to be drained of its wealth by the merchant princes
of the North, or whether the northern cities should be nothing but
the trading depots of Southern nabobs. The representation of slaves,
the chief productive element of Southern wealth, was selected as the
test question, and the powers of both parties were developed to the
utter-most in debating it. In the end, the North gained the commercial
privileges upon which it had insisted, the South three-fifths of
the anomalous representation which they demanded, together with the
exemption of exports from taxation. The overwhelming power and wealth
which the North have since acquired, and which must certainly be in
some measure attributed to this early policy, sufficiently proves that
they made an excellent “bargain” as one of their members termed it;
the _morality_ of the arrangement we do not propose to discuss, but
certainly while that compromise, be it good or bad, remains in the
Constitution, the interested work of both parties, it would require the
nicest casuistry to determine which of them is entitled to indulge in
any special self-glorification in the premises.
The second question above stated, acquired great additional importance
from the mode in which the first had been determined; though minor
and more local interests prevailed to alter the arrangement of the
contending forces. The whole of the middle and Eastern States were of
course, both from principle and policy, opposed to the perpetuation of
the slave trade. They had everything to lose and nothing to gain by it.
If this population must needs be represented on the floor of Congress,
certainly their next object was to reduce it to the smallest numbers
possible. But in addition to these very obvious interests, Virginia
and Maryland had other and private reasons for wishing to abolish a
trade which, as their lands were already overloaded by this unhappy
race, could be of no possible service to them, while to some extent it
must deprive them of the ever-extending southern market, into which
their surplus, “annually arising and renewing,” might be profitably
disgorged. Virginia philanthropy was therefore earnest to put an
end to so nefarious a traffic, and its ruinously debilitating and
demoralizing effects were vividly depicted by her talented delegates.
South Carolina and Georgia, whose original swamps were yet unredeemed
from their primeval worthlessness and desolation, and all whose hopes
of future greatness, both political and agricultural, depended on the
increase of this very available population, were sadly dismayed at the
dismal prospect thus suddenly and unfeelingly opened before them by the
desertion of their late allies. In vain they sought to discover, and no
wonder the problem puzzled them, why it should be a damning crime to
buy prisoners of war on the banks of the Niger, but a very laudable and
eminently patriotic course to buy black children and mulattoes bred for
the purpose on the banks of the Potomac.
We would not, however, represent that this question was debated by all
the Northern members with such exclusively interested views as marked
their treatment of the preceding one. Many of them were really alive to
the horrors of a trade which the whole civilized world was beginning to
look upon with detestation, and they protested vehemently against its
toleration under a new and republican government. But South Carolina
was by this time thoroughly versed in that omnipotent logic which
has tied up so many Gordian knots from that time to this. “Religion
and humanity,” said Rutledge, “have nothing to do with the question.
Interest alone is the governing principle with nations. The true
question at present is, whether the Southern States shall or shall not
be parties to the Union.” “South Carolina,” said Cotesworth Pinckney,
“can never receive the plan if it prohibits the slave trade;” and
“Georgia,” echoed Baldwin, “will never become a member of the Union,
if forbidden to import slaves.” Ellsworth, from Connecticut, forthwith
took the alarm--“was afraid of losing two States, while such others as
might be disposed to stand aloof, would fly into a variety of shapes
and directions, and most probably into several confederacies, not
without bloodshed.” This singular imaginary spectacle of States _flying
into a variety of shapes_, which has rambled through the brains of
successive generations, till the genius of the last great compromiser
exalted it into the sublime metaphor of erratic planets rushing madly
from their spheres, of course settled the question at once, and the
slave trade was tolerated till 1808, under the harmless euphemism
of the migration and importation of such persons as any of the then
existing States might think proper to admit.
Whether the controversial resources of the Convention were by this time
exhausted, or whether revolutionary sagacity failed to discover any new
danger to the Union in a clause that in more modern times has proved
a mine of most combustible perils; or whether, as is most likely, the
members saw that the political interests of the two great sections were
in no way staked upon the decision; certain it is, that when, late in
the summer, Mr. Butler suggested the restoration of fugitives from
labor as an amendment to the article providing for the delivering up of
criminals, the only objection offered was that the two clauses seemed
somewhat incongruous. The proposal was withdrawn for the moment and
submitted a few days afterwards by the same gentleman and C. Pinckney.
It was at once agreed to without debate. It is somewhat singular
that so many complaints should have been made of the inadequacy of a
provision thus expressly fashioned by the party it was intended to
benefit, and which is in reality more stringent than the one which,
had it not been for the Northern members, would originally have been
adopted.
The Convention adjourned about the middle of September, and the members
betook themselves to their respective homes--most of them to defend
in their State conventions the great work which they had completed.
It would be a tedious, and is happily an unnecessary task, to trace
the Constitution through the many ordeals it had to pass, ere a final
ratification was obtained. The arguments used both by the friends and
opponents of the compromises, were the same as those already sketched.
Suffice it to say that while the toleration of the slave trade and
the apportionment of representatives, met with serious opposition in
all the Northern States; yet so far as there are any reports of the
debates, there does not appear to have been a word said either for or
against the clause relating to the restoration of fugitives, except
in Virginia and the two Carolinas, where it was enumerated among the
victories gained for the _South_, and spoken of in terms of high
approval. Generally, however, it was passed over without the slightest
comment.
Such, then, were, upon this subject, the materials of controversy
bequeathed to posterity by the framers of the Constitution--harmless
enough, it would seem, and not easily tortured out of their quiescent
state; but in the gradual change of times and parties, and magnified,
too, by sectional interests and passions, found amply sufficient
for the political wranglers of three generations, and gifted with a
vitality and obstinacy that survive unchanged the conflicts of sixty
years--neither broken by the blows nor mollified by the compromising
caresses of whole hosts of eloquent statesmen.
The jubilee that hailed the birth of the new government was scarcely
over, ere its friends, in their eagerness to push the advantages
already gained, and its enemies, in the hope of retrieving their
defeat, found means to rouse into new life the scarce quieted troubles
of the Convention. The relative importance, however, of the slavery
questions, was already beginning to change. The provision apportioning
representatives and direct taxes, was so carefully worded and had been
so anxiously debated both in the Federal and State Conventions, that no
flaw could be found to hang a doubtful construction on, and little hope
could be entertained of overturning that which had been so deliberately
and so recently agreed upon as in some measure the corner-stone of the
structure upon which all the nation’s hopes depended. It was rather
the toleration of the slave trade which at this early period stung the
consciences or clashed with the interests of a portion of the members.
In the first session of the first Congress, when the tariff bill was
under discussion, Parker, a delegate from _Virginia_, first rekindled
the wordy war, by moving to insert a clause imposing a duty of ten
dollars a head, which was allowed by the Constitution, upon every slave
imported. The question seems to have been debated, like its countless
progeny, with abundant warmth. Mr. Smith, of South Carolina, informed
the House that “no topic had yet been introduced so important to
South Carolina and the welfare of the Union.” Jackson, from Georgia,
one of the most indefatigable debaters of his day, and a man of very
considerable abilities, attacked Virginia with especial bitterness for
her interested and hypocritical philanthropy. But perhaps the most
remarkable, as it certainly was the most able speech delivered on the
subject, was that of Madison in support of the measure. As his opinions
are known to have coincided with those of Washington, Jefferson,
and Patrick Henry, they may be fairly taken as expounding the sense
of Revolutionary Virginia on the great interests of slavery. “By
expressing,” said he, “a national disapprobation of that trade, it is
to be hoped we may destroy it, and so save ourselves from reproaches,
_and our posterity from the imbecility ever attendant upon a country
filled with slaves_. This is as much the interest of South Carolina
and Georgia as of any other States. Every addition they receive to the
number of their slaves tends to weakness, and renders them incapable
of self-defence. In case of hostilities with foreign nations, their
slave population will be the means, not of repelling invasion, but of
inviting attack. It is the duty of the general government to protect
every part of the Union against danger as well internal as external.
Everything, therefore, which tends to increase this danger, is a
proper subject for the consideration of those charged with the general
administration of the government.” Parker finally withdrew his motion,
intending, however, to make it the subject of a separate bill. The
chief reason assigned for this course was, the unwillingness of many
of the members to vote for a clause by which they might seem, however
indirectly, to sanction the idea that human beings were to be treated
like goods and chattels, and to be classed with and legislated upon as
such.
No member, however, was found disposed to moot the question so late in
the session, and it slept quietly till March of the following year,
when it presented itself in a new and much more troublesome form.
The interests of humanity involved in the abolition of slavery, had
not been left altogether to the mercy of politicians and political
expediency. At a much earlier period, philanthropic and religious
organizations had been established with a view to expedite a result
so consonant with the aims of humanity and justice. Among these, the
Society of Friends had especially distinguished itself, and some of
its more active members now resolved to seize the fortunate occasion,
offered by the establishment of a new and vigorous government, to
direct, if possible, some of its wholesome energies to the attainment
of their great object. The Yearly Meetings of Pennsylvania and
Delaware, accordingly united in a petition, praying Congress to
abolish the slave trade. The phraseology of the petition was a little
ambiguous, making it doubtful whether it really prayed an immediate
abolition, or only that Congress should use whatever power they might
possess under the Constitution, to discourage the hateful traffic.
Viewed in the latter light, the prayer was undoubtedly a most proper
one; and even if the former be its true construction, the petitioners
only shared an error common to some of the first statesmen of the
day--that of over estimating the powers of a newly constituted and
untried government. But whatever was its true meaning, the petition
broke like a thunderbolt over the heads of the irritable congressmen.
The debate exceeded in violence anything that had yet been heard.
The Quakers who had ventured to appear in the gallery to countenance
their unlucky petition, were encountered with scoffing and personal
abuse. Jackson renewed his former threats; the hall rang with cries
of dissolution; falling columns, torn flags, blood-stained battle
fields, and all the dread imagery that seems to be stereotyped in
some imperishable material, was paraded with frightful significancy
before the startled audience. On the following day, however, to which
the debate had been adjourned, the Friends appeared with a formidable
auxiliary indeed. Next to Washington, no man was regarded in those days
with more general veneration, than the sage and statesman, Franklin. As
early as 1787, this great and good man had been chosen first President
of a “Society for promoting the abolition of slavery, for the relief
of free negroes unlawfully held in bondage, and for improving the
condition of the African race”--a society which deserves especial
mention here, as one of the latest acts of its useful and honorable
career, has been to support the defence in the Treason trials, to a
history of which this brief essay is intended as a preface. A petition
of the same nature, as that of the Yearly Meetings, was presented
from this Society and signed by Franklin--this being perhaps the last
official act of a strangely varied life, in the whole course of which
it would be difficult to point out a single step taken unadvisedly,
or a word uttered which the speaker would afterwards have wished to
retract. After a long recital, the memorial concluded, by praying
“that Congress would promote mercy and justice towards this distressed
race; and step to the very verge of the power vested in them, for
discouraging every species of traffic in the persons of our fellow men.”
It would be difficult for any but a congressman, looking at this paper
now, to find in it the materials for excited debate, or, at any rate,
for violent invectives against the impertinence of its framers. It
certainly does not arrogate the privilege of judging or even suggesting
the course which it behoved Congress to take. With mingled modesty
and confidence, it is left to more deliberate counsels to determine
what may be and what ought to be done, the petitioners only imploring,
for the sake of humanity, religion, and consistency, that all which
could be done, should be done. If such was the spirit that offered
it, that which received it was widely different. The debate of the
previous day was renewed with additional violence--policy, interest,
the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, history, antiquity,
justice, religion, and the Bible, were as usual confidently invoked
to the support of both sides. The house was divided much in the same
way as the Convention had been on the same subject. But the debate
is entitled to particular notice, as opening for the first time the
constitutional question which for many years agitated both houses, as
to how far Congress could be considered as true to its duty in refusing
to listen to and to commit any memorial whatever, not flatly absurd and
extravagant--no matter how certain might be the fate which in committee
it was doomed to meet. The negative was earnestly insisted upon by
Madison and Paige from Virginia, and the petition was finally committed
by a vote of forty-three to eleven. After a month’s deliberation the
committee produced an elaborate report, submitting that Congress had no
power to abolish the slave trade till 1808, though they might regulate
the manner in which it was conducted, and impose the tax of ten dollars
if they saw fit; that they had no power to emancipate the slaves
already held in the various States, nor to interfere with the domestic
legislation by which the several State legislatures might see fit to
govern or educate this species of property; but that they had the
power to prohibit citizens of the United States from supplying foreign
countries with slaves, and to forbid foreigners fitting out slave ships
in our ports; and finally that they would exercise all the authority
they had to promote the views presented by the memorialists.
Our limits will not permit us to give even an abstract of the
arguments, thinly scattered through six days of congressional
declamation, upon this memorable report. The speakers readily
divided themselves into the three parties which have ever since been
maintained, whenever a similar question has arisen in either house--the
earnest and uncompromising opponents of slavery; its equally zealous
defenders; and a third party, which from that day to this has uniformly
stood between the two, with temporising, soothing, and compromising
measures, promising peace, but sowing the seeds of future war, quieting
the temper but not satisfying the understanding, sweet to the mouth but
bitter to the belly. Jackson and Smith, after deprecating the question
altogether as unconstitutional and uncalled for, finally took bolder
ground than any they had yet assumed, insisting on the justice and
necessity of their favorite institution; on the happy condition of the
Southern slave, as compared with the laborers of Europe, and the lower
classes of the North; that slavery, sanctioned by the example of every
illustrious nation of ancient and modern times, looked for its original
to the will of God himself; that this unnecessary measure bade fair to
plunge the Union into confusion; that the South was prepared to defend,
and would defend their property against every aggression; that if the
compromises of the Constitution were not to be respected, the Union,
which had been cemented by them must at once and forever be dissolved.
The opposite side was supported mainly by Virginia, Delaware, and
Pennsylvania; but the only speech of interest on their side, was that
of Scott, from the last named State, who labored, with no little
ingenuity, to prove that Congress were in no wise bound to inactivity
by the clause in question; that, as the arbiters of commerce, the
framers of naturalization laws, and the punishers of piracy, they could
in many ways not only control, but if they saw fit, at once abolish the
traffic, in spite of this ambiguous and disgraceful restriction.
There was not, and there could not be, anything original in the views
of the third party, except perhaps that their most earnest advocate,
Baldwin, came from Georgia.
This famous debate, the parent of a countless offspring, resulted in
a compromise, recommended as “the most conciliatory, and the best
adapted to the present situation of things.” It consisted in carefully
striking out of the report every clause to which any body could frame a
serious objection, and entering the rest on the Journal without taking
any final action on it. The report as entered, asserted the power of
Congress to regulate the slave-trade, so far as to secure the humane
treatment of the slaves during their passage, to prohibit foreigners
from fitting out slave ships in our ports, and our citizens from
supplying foreign States with this commodity; but disclaiming all right
to interfere further before 1808, or to exercise any authority in the
emancipation of slaves already in bondage, or in the amelioration of
their condition. No intimation was made as to how they might choose
to exercise the powers thus claimed. The influence which this result
has had upon all after times, singularly confirms a prediction made
by Scott, in the course of the speech already referred to--“that what
was said, and more particularly what was done in Congress, at that
time, would in some degree form the political character of America on
the subject of slavery.” In fact, congressional legislation has never
departed from the standard here established. All attempts to make this
really a national question, have been uniformly employed for the mere
purposes of temporary agitation, and have as uniformly ended in a
compromise between a doubting majority and a resolute and unflinching
minority.
A question of much more practical importance at the present day, and
on which it would be extremely interesting to know the views expressed
by the sages who watched over the infancy of the Republic, must have
arisen in the House shortly afterwards. North Carolina had ceded
a portion of her enormous but unsettled territory to the General
Government, on the express condition, however, that Congress should do
nothing towards emancipating the slaves already to be found there. No
report, however, of the debate upon the bill has been preserved.
For some time after this, all agitation of the subject was carefully
avoided. Petitions were occasionally received from Abolition Societies
in New York and Pennsylvania, praying Congress to put to some practical
use the powers which, by the report entered on the Journal of the
House, they had declared themselves possessed of. Some were referred
to committees which never reported, others suffered to sleep quietly
on the table of the House, and one from Warner Mifflin, a well-known
Delaware Friend, escaped the obscurity in which its fellows were
forgotten, only to be returned to him with an abusive speech from North
Carolina, which nobody thought it worth while to answer.
But, during the second session of the Second Congress, the highly
important act was quietly passed, which from that time till 1850
regulated the return of fugitives from justice and labor. The Governor
of Virginia, acting under the advice of counsel, had refused to deliver
up a fugitive criminal to the Executive of Pennsylvania, conceiving
that the provision in the Constitution did not sufficiently define
the manner in which this duty was to be complied with. The matter had
been submitted to President Washington, who made it the subject of
a special message to the Senate, whereupon an Act providing for the
practical enforcement of both Constitutional provisions, was shortly
after proposed and passed. With regard to fugitives from labor, it
enacted that the owner, or his agent, might seize such fugitive, take
him before a United States Judge, or any magistrate of the city, town,
or county, where the arrest was made, prove to his satisfaction, by
evidence written or oral, that the claim was a just one, and, having
obtained his certificate to that effect, carry him back as his slave,
without any further proceedings whatever.
The Bill became a law, with little or no opposition in either House,
attracting scarce any public attention either in the North or South.
From this time till the year 1807, the history of the subject may be
very briefly summed up. Petitions were from time to time received,
complaining of the hardships suffered by emancipated negroes in some
of the southern States, and praying the interference of Congress to
mitigate the horrors of the slave trade. They gave birth to the usual
amount of declamation, were in some cases referred to committees, in
others either rejected, censured, or suffered to sleep on the table.
The two parties of Federalists and Democrats, into which the nation
was divided had long before this, become distinctly marked, every
question which was broached assumed more and more a political aspect,
and as the power of the Federalists hurried to its fall, the tendency
grew constantly stronger in both, to make almost any sacrifice or
concession, to win over southern votes. Hence the triumphs of the
friends of emancipation were pretty evenly balanced by their losses.
Slavery was rapidly disappearing from the northern States and the
attempt repeatedly made to introduce it into the territory of Indiana,
was as often defeated. But on the other hand South Carolina, after
a long interval, again opened her ports to African slavers, and all
attempts failed to impose the Constitutional tax upon the importation;
while the purchase of Louisiana and the organization of Mississippi,
gave additional strength to the South, though the danger of flooding
them with slaves through the open ports of South Carolina was in some
measure obviated by a special provision which closed these newly
acquired territories against any of the recent arrivals.
The long wished for time at length arrived when Congress might
constitutionally abolish the slave trade, when the third compromise of
the Federal Convention was at length to expire, and the most glaring
contradiction in our history was to exist for the future only as a
recollection of the past, not as a present and pressing disgrace.
All parties were alike resolved to seize the happy occasion. Even
South Carolina for a while did not venture to disturb the general
unanimity, and resigned herself quietly to her fate. But as the
course of Congressional legislation never yet ran smoothly, so here
a singular notion was started in Committee by which it was proposed
to prohibit the traffic by heavy penalties, and yet at the same time
to enrich the National treasury by its proceeds. This extraordinary
plan proposed, in short, that all slaves captured in our vessels by
the United States cruisers, should be forfeited and sold by the United
States into perpetual slavery. Yet a plan so preposterous as this, by
which the National Government was to be deeply implicated in a crime
which it was the very object of the law to prevent, was triumphantly
carried by the violence of the southern members through every stage
of legislation to the very verge of final passage. Happily for the
honor of the country the North was at last aroused from her lethargy,
and by a desperate effort obtained a recommitment of the bill even at
this latest possible moment; the obnoxious clause was altered into a
binding out to service for a term of years in the free States, and
the bill came up for final action. What possible objection could be
taken to a provision which threw almost the whole burthen on the free
States, it is hard indeed to discover; but the idea of emancipating an
African, no matter under what circumstances, was altogether too much
for the equanimity of southern blood. Their members, as Ellsworth would
have expressed it, “immediately flew off into a variety of shapes,”
protesting that they would sacrifice their lives rather than submit to
it, and that military force should in vain attempt to force it on them.
This meaningless declamation was persisted in on the following day upon
some minor parts of the Bill providing for the transportation of slaves
by coasting vessels, requiring _manifests_ certified by proper officers
in order to prevent the obvious danger of deception being practised in
this way upon the general Government. The most audacious threats were
freely uttered. Randolph, the eccentric member from Virginia, took the
lead, gave his singular genius for virulent abuse full scope, and at
last concluded by hoping that if the Bill were signed by the President
in its present form, not a single southern member would be seen on the
floor of the next Congress. The bill was nevertheless signed as it
passed, the southern members came back punctually at the opening of the
next session, and have with praiseworthy regularity been drawing their
eight dollars per day from the National Treasury from that time to this.