qualification of its own, it must have taken upon itself the introduction of this restriction into every one of the states of the union. On the question of representation the only embarrassment that remained grew out of that part of the report of the committee of detail which sanctioned the perpetual continuance of the slave-trade. Everywhere, always, by everybody, in statutes alike of Virginia and South Carolina, in speeches, in letters, slavery in those days was spoken of as an evil. Everywhere in the land, the free negro always, the slave from the instant of his emancipation, belonged to the class of citizens, though in Virginia, South Carolina and Georgia, and in Delaware, for all except those who before 1787 had already acquired the elective franchise,* color barred the way to the ballot-box. The convention did nothing to diminish the rights of black men ; and, to the incapacities under which they labored in any of the states, it was careful to add no new one. Madison, in the following February, recommending the constitution for ratification, writes: "It is admitted that, if the laws were to restore the rights which have been taken away, the negroes could no longer be refused an equal share of representation with the other inhabitants." + The convention had agreed to the enumeration of two fifths of the slaves in the representative population; but a new complication was introduced by the sanction which the committee of detail had lent to the perpetuity of the slave-trade. "I never can agree," said King, in the debate of the eighth, "to let slaves be imported without limitation of time, and be represented in the national legislature." + Gouverneur Morris then moved that there should be no representation but of "free inhabitants." "I never will concur in upholding domestic slavery. It is a nefarious institution. It is the curse of heaven on the states where it prevails. Compare the free regions of the middle states, where a rich and noble cultivation marks the prosperity and happiness of * I so interpret the Delaware statute of 1787. Gilpin, 1262; Elliot, 392. VOL. VI.-21 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 institution become visible. Passing 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 shall slaves 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 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 damns them to the most cruel bondage, shall have more votes in a government instituted 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. I will add, that domestic slavery is the most prominent feature in the aristocratic countenance of the proposed constitution. The vassalage 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 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. 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 assurance 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. I will sooner submit myself to a tax for paying for all the negroes in the United States than saddle posterity with such a constitution."* Dayton seconded the motion, that his sentiments on the subject might appear, whatever might be the fate of the amendment.† Charles Pinckney "considered the fisheries and the western frontier as more burdensome to the United States than the slaves." + Wilson thought an agreement to the clause would be no bar to the object of the motion, which itself was premature. New Jersey voted aye, ten states in the negative. So ended the skirmish preliminary to the struggle on the continuance of the slave-trade. Great as was the advance from the articles of the confederacy, the new grants, not less than the old ones, of power to the legislature of the United States to lay taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, and collect them; to regulate foreign and domestic commerce; alone to coin money and regulate the value of foreign coin; to fix the standard of weights and measures; and establish post-offices, were accepted on the sixteenth, with little difference of opinion.# No one disputed the necessity of clothing the United States with power " to borrow money." The committee of detail added a continuance of the permission "to emit bills on the credit of the United States." Four years before, Hamilton, in his careful enumeration of the defects in the confederation, pronounced that this authority "to emit an unfunded paper as the sign of value ought not to continue a formal part of the constitution, nor ever, hereafter, to be employed; being, in its nature, pregnant with abuses, and liable to be made the engine of imposition and fraud; holding out temptations equally pernicious to the integrity of government and to the morals of the people." A * Gilpin, 1263-1265; Elliot, 392, 393. Gilpin, 1265, 1266; Elliot, 393-397. # Gilpin, 1343; Elliot, 434. Gouverneur Morris on the fifteenth recited the history of paper emissions and the perseverance of the legislative assemblies in repeating them, though well aware of all their distressing effects, and drew the inference that, were the national legislature formed and a war to break out, this ruinous expedient, if not guarded against, would be again resorted to.* On the sixteenth he moved to strike out the power to emit bills on the credit of the United States. "If the United States," said he, "have credit, such bills will be unnecessary; if they have not, they will be unjust and useless." Butler was urgent for disarming the government of such a power, and seconded the motion. It obtained the acquiescence of Madison. Mason of Virginia " had a mortal hatred to paper money, yet, as he could not foresee all emergencies, he was unwilling to tie the hands of the legislature. The late war could not have been carried on had such a prohibition existed." # "The power," said Gorham, " as far as it will be necessary or safe, is involved in that of borrowing money." Mercer of Maryland was unwilling to deny to the government a discretion on this point; besides, he held it impolitic to excite the opposition to the constitution of all those who, like himself, were friends to paper money.A "This," said Ellsworth, "is a favorable moment to shut and bar the door against paper money, which can in no case be necessary. The power may do harm, never good. Give the government credit, and other resources will offer."◊ Randolph, notwithstanding his antipathy to paper money, could not foresee all the occasions that might arise. t "Paper money," said Wilson, "can never succeed while its mischiefs are remembered; and, as long as it can be resorted to, it will be a bar to other resources." "Rather than give the power," said John Langdon of New Hampshire, "I would reject the whole plan." ↑ With the full recollection of the need, or seeming need, of paper money in the revolution, with the menace of danger in *Gilpin, 1334; Elliot, 429. | Gilpin, 1344; Elliot, 435. A Gilpin, 1344, 1345; Elliot, 435. Ibid. Gilpin, 1346; Elliot, 435. future time of war from its prohibition, authority to issue bills of credit that should be legal-tender was refused to the general government by the vote of nine states against New Jersey and Maryland. It was Madison who decided the vote of Virginia; and he has left his testimony that "the pretext for a paper currency, and particularly for making the bills a tender, either for public or private debts, was cut off." This is the interpretation of the clause, made at the time of its adoption alike by its authors and by its opponents,* accepted by all the statesmen of that age, not open to dispute because too clear for argument, and never disputed so long as any one man who took part in framing the constitution remained alive. History can not name a man who has gained enduring honor by causing the issue of paper money. Wherever such * For Madison's narrative and opinion, see Gilpin, 1344-1346, and note on 1346; Elliot, 434, 435. The accuracy of the historical sketch of Luther Martin, officially addressed, 27 January 1788, to the speaker of the house of delegates of Maryland, has in ninety-six years never been questioned. It may be found in Elliot, i., 369, 370, and is as follows: "By our original Articles of Confederation, the congress have power to borrow money and emit bills of credit on the credit of the United States; agreeable to which was the report on this system as made by the committee of detail. When we came to this part of the report, a motion was made to strike out the words 'to emit bills of credit.' Against the motion we urged that it would be improper to deprive the congress of that power; that it would be a novelty unprecedented to establish a government which should not have such authority; that it was impossible to look forward into futurity so far as to decide that events might not happen that should render the exercise of such a power absolutely necessary; and that we doubted whether, if a war should take place, it would be possible for this country to defend itself without having recourse to paper credit, in which case there would be a necessity of becoming a prey to our enemies or violating the constitution of our government; and that, considering the administration of the government would be principally in the hands of the wealthy, there could be little reason to fear an abuse of the power by an unnecessary or injurious exercise of it. But, sir, a majority of the convention, being wise beyond every event, and being willing to risk any political evil rather than admit the idea of a paper emission in any possible case, refused to trust this authority to a government to which they were lavishing the most unlimited powers of taxation, and to the mercy of which they were willing blindly to trust the liberty and property of the citizens of every state in the union; and they erased that clause from the system." With regard to the paper money issued during the late civil war, congress healed the difficulty by obtaining, in the fourteenth amendment, from the whole, country what may be regarded as an act of indemnity; and, while the country made itself responsible for the debt which was contracted, the amendment pre served the original clause of the constitution in its full integrity and vigor. |