THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE. A PART OF THE ORIGINAL AS DRAFTED BY JEFFERSON, AND SUPPRES SED BY SOUTHERN INFLUENCE. He has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights of life and liberty, in the persons of a distant peo ple who never offended him; capturing and carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur miserable death in their transportation thither. This piratical warfare-the opprobrium of infidel powers is the warfare of the Christian King of Great Britain. Determined to keep open a market where MEN should be bought and sold, he has prostituted his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or to restrain this execrable commerce. And that this assemblage of horrors might want no fact of distinguished die, he is now exciting those very people to rise in arms among us, and to purchase that liberty of which he has deprived them; thus paying off former crimes committed against the liberties of one people, with crimes which he urges them to commit against the lives of another. [This society will never, in any way, countenance the oppressed, in vindicating their rights by resorting to physical force.-Constitu tion of the American Anti-Slavery Society, Art. III.] Philanthrophy imploring America to release the Slave and revive Liberty. LUTHER MARTIN. The Genuine Information delivered to the Legislature of Maryland. The report was adopted by a majority of the convention, but not without considerable opposition. It was said, that we had just assumed a place among independent nations, in consequence of our opposition to the attempts of Great Britain to enslave us; to which God and Nature entitled us, not in particular, but in common with all the rest of mankind. That we had appealed to the Supreme Being for his assistance, as the God of Freedom, who could not but approve our efforts to preserve the rights which he had thus imparted to his creatures; that now, when we scarcely had risen from our knees, from supplicating his aid and protection-in forming our government over a free people, a government formed pretendedly on the principles of liberty and for its preservation-in that government to have a provision not only putting it out of its power to restrain and prevent the slave-trade, even encouraging that most infamous traffic, by giving the states power and influence in the Union in proportion as they cruelly and wantonly sport with the rights of their fellow-creatures, ought to be considered as a solemn mockery of, and insult to, that God whose protection we had then implored, and could not fail to hold us up in detestation, and render us contemptible to every true friend of liberty in the world. It was said, it ought to be considered that national crimes can only be, and frequently are, punished in this world by national punishments; and that the continuance of the slave-trade, and thus giving it a national sanction and encouragement, ought to be considered as justly exposing us to the displeasure and vengeance of him, who is equally Lord of all, and who views with equal eye, the poor African slave and his American master! opposition was grounded upon the preservation of those that this It was urged that by this system, we were giving the general gov ernment full and absolute power to regulate commerce, under which general power it would have a right to restrain, or totally prohibit the slave-trade: it must, therefore, appear to the world absurd and disgraceful to the last degree, that we should cept from the exer cise of that power, the only branch of commerce which is unjustifiable in its nature, and contrary to the rights of mankind. That on the contrary we ought rather to prohibit expressly in our constitution, the further importation of slaves; and to authorize the general go vernment from time to time, to make such regulations as should be thought most advantageous for the gradual abolition of slavery, and the emancipation of the slaves which are already in the states. That slavery is inconsistent with the genius of republicanism, and has a tendency to destroy those principles on which it is supported, as it lessens the sense of the equal rights of mankind, and habituates us to tyranny and oppression. It was further urged, that by this system of government, every state is to be protected both from foreign invasion and from domestic insurrections; that from this consideration, it was of the utmost importance it should have a power to restrain the importation of slaves, since in proportion as the number of slaves was increased in any state, in the same proportion the state was weakened and exposed to foreign invasion, or domestic insurrection, and by so much less it will be able to protect itself against either; and therefore will by so much the more, want aid from, and be a burthen to, the union. It was further said, that as in this system we were giving the general government a power, under the idea of national character, or national interest, to regulate even our weights and measures, and have prohibited all possibility of emitting paper money, and passing insolvent laws, &c., it must appear still more extraordinary, that we should prohibit the government from interfering with the slave-trade, than which nothing could so materially affect both our national honor and interest. These reasons influenced me both on the committee and in convention, most decidedly to oppose and vote against the clause as it now makes a part of the system. At this time we do not generally hold this commerce in so great abhorrence as we have done. When our liberties were at stake, we warmly felt for the common rights of men. The danger being thought to be past, which threatened ourselves, we are daily grow. ing more insensible to those rights. In those states who have restrained or prohibited the importation of slaves, it is only done by legislative acts which may be repealed. When those states find that they must in their national character and connexion suffer in the disgrace, and share in the inconveniences attendant upon that detestable and iniquitous traffic, they may be desirous also to share in the benefits arising from it, and the odium attending it will be greatly effaced by the sanction which is given it in the general go. vernment. With respect to that part of the second section of the first article, which relates to the apportionment of representation and direct taxation, there were considerable objections made to it, besides the great objection of inequality. It was urged, that no principle could justify taking slaves into computation in apportioning the number of representatives a state should have in the government. That it involved the absurdity of increasing the power of a state in making laws for freemen, in proportion as that state violated the rights of freedom. That it might be proper to take slaves into consideration, when taxes were to be apportioned, because it had a tendency to discourage slavery; but to take them into account in giving representation tended to encourage the slave-trade, and to make it the interest of the states to continue that infamous traffic. That slaves could not be taken into account as men, or citizens, because they were not admitted to the rights of citizens, in the states which adopted or continued slavery. If they were to be taken into account as property, it was asked, what peculiar circumstance should render this property (of all others the most odious in its nature) entitled to the high privilege of conferring consequence and power in the government to its possessors, rather than any other: and why slaves should, as property, be taken into account rather than horses, cattle, mules, or any other species; and it was observed by an honorable member from Massachusetts,* that he considered it as dishonorable and humiliating to enter into compact with the slaves of the south ern states, as it would with the horses and mules of the eastern. * ELBRIDGE GERRY. The idea of property ought not to be the rule of representation. Blacks are property, and are used to the southward as horses and cattle to the northward; and why should their representation be increased to the southward on acount of the number of slaves, than horses or oxen to the north ?-Secret debates of the Convention for forming the U. S. Constitution, 1787. |