August 22, 1787: The Slave Trade Debate

Storm-Tossed Ships Wrecked on a Rocky Coast, by Johann Christoph Dietzsch. National Gallery of Art, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund.

"They [enslavers] bring the judgment of Heaven on a country. As nations cannot be rewarded or punished in the next world, they must be in this. By an inevitable chain of causes and effects, Providence punishes national sins by national calamities."
— George Mason

Wednesday, August 22, 1787

The argument of the day before went on over Article 7, Section 4 of the draft: "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." The bland phrase "importation of such persons" meant the slave trade — which the draft let continue forever, and which Congress could never tax or ban.

The debate

Each speaker below is shown with what the source records of his own ties to slavery.

Against a federal ban or tax

• Sherman (CT; not an enslaver) "disapproved of the slave-trade" but said "the public good did not require" a ban: several states had already abolished slavery, and the rest would "by degrees." Finish the Constitution quickly. Later he said it was "better to let the Southern States import slaves" than lose them, opposed a tax "because it implied they were property," and admitted Congress would ban the trade if it could, and be right to.
• Ellsworth (CT; never an enslaver) "could not judge of the effects of slavery on character." If ethics mattered, "we ought to go further and free those already in the country." Virginia and Maryland's enslaved populations grew so fast "that it is cheaper to raise than import them," while South Carolina and Georgia's "sickly rice swamps" killed so many that "foreign supplies are necessary" — so a ban was "unjust" to them. "Slavery in time, will not be a speck in our country."
• Charles Pinckney (SC; enslaved over a hundred people): "If slavery be wrong, it is justified by the example of all the world... In all ages one half of mankind have been slaves." Left alone, the southern states would probably stop imports themselves — but federal power to ban it might sink the Constitution.
• Charles Cotesworth Pinckney (SC; enslaved 250 people): no personal influence could get South Carolina to ratify if Congress could ban the trade. Virginia would gain — "Her slaves will rise in value." More slaves meant more produce, shipping and revenue for all. He did accept that slaves "should be dutied like other imports."
• Baldwin (GA; unlikely an enslaver): slavery was "of a local nature," not national. Georgians already feared a central government; imagine their suspicion if it threatened one of their "favorite prerogatives."
• Williamson (NC; not an enslaver): the "Southern States could not be members of the Union" if Congress could ban the trade.
• Rutledge (SC; enslaved dozens): the Carolinas and Georgia "will never be such fools as to give up" the right to import enslaved Africans.

For federal power over the trade

• Mason (VA; enslaved hundreds, yet thought himself anti-slavery) called it "an infernal traffic." He feared slave revolts, especially stirred by foreign enemies (Britain had armed people who escaped slavery during the Revolution), and slavery's spread west. "Slavery discourages arts and manufactures." "The poor despise labor when performed by slaves." "They prevent the emigration of whites, who really enrich and strengthen a country." "Every master of slaves is born a petty tyrant." He condemned northerners who "from a lust of gain, embarked in this nefarious traffic," and said the government must be able "to prevent the increase of slavery."
• Wilson (PA; enslaved a man named Thomas Purcell) found it absurd to claim the southern states would end the trade themselves yet reject a Constitution letting Congress do so. Enslaved people were the only import that couldn't be taxed — a reward for the trade.
• Dickinson (DE; had freed dozens of people he enslaved a year earlier) thought it "inadmissible, on every principle of honor and safety" for the Constitution to authorize the trade; it touched "national happiness," so it was a national question. He doubted any state would really walk away.
• Langdon (NH; raised in an enslaving family) didn't trust promises that the South would end it.

In between

• Gerry (MA; not an enslaver): say nothing about slavery, "but ought to be careful not to give any sanction to it."
• King (MA; inherited a few enslaved people, later bought and freed at least one) would treat it "in a political light only": a ban could lose the South, but the North might balk if every import but enslaved people could be taxed.

Looking for a bargain

C. C. Pinckney admitted South Carolina wouldn't soon ban the trade for good, though it did, and would, ban it "occasionally." He moved a committee to consider letting Congress tax it; Rutledge seconded.

• Gouverneur Morris (PA; not an enslaver) wanted "the whole subject" sent to committee, with export taxes and a navigation act: "These things may form a bargain among the Northern and Southern States."
• Randolph (VA; an enslaver) wanted "some middle ground." He "could never agree to the clause as it stands. He would sooner risk the Constitution." It "would revolt the Quakers, the Methodists, and many others," yet without it "two States might be lost to the Union."

The Convention voted 7–3–1 (New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Delaware against; Massachusetts absent) for a committee on taxes, imports, exports and the slave trade — one member per state present:

John Langdon · Rufus King · William Samuel Johnson (CT; an enslaver) · William Livingston (NJ; an abolitionist from a slave-trading family) · George Clymer (PA; at seven inherited an enslaved man, "Ned," who soon died) · John Dickinson · Luther Martin (MD; enslaved six people) · James Madison (VA; enslaved over a hundred) · Hugh Williamson · C. C. Pinckney · Abraham Baldwin

With perhaps one or two exceptions — both southerners who had spoken for slaveholding interests — every member had enslaved people at some point or came from a family that had.

Other business

• The Convention received reports from the Committee of Detail (on clauses proposed by Charles Pinckney and Madison) and from a committee of five on federal control of state militias and assuming state debts.
• On motions by Gerry and McHenry (MD), it barred Congress from passing bills of attainder (punishment without a trial) and ex post facto laws (punishing acts that were legal when done).

The delegates today

• Johnson (CT) dined at his boarding house and visited John Fitch's steamboat.
• Washington (VA) dined with Mary and Robert Morris at the Hills', visited Samuel and Elizabeth Powel, and asked Clement Biddle to find someone reliable to buy herring by the barrel.
• McClurg (VA), home in Richmond, wrote Madison hoping the federal veto of state laws had been restored.

Philadelphia: clear and pleasant. The Gazette ran William Will's ad asking voters to return him for sheriff.

The series: The Constitutional Convention: A Day-by-Day Account for August 16 to 31, 1787 · previous: August 21, 1787: The Slave Trade · next: August 23, 1787: The Supreme Law of the Land

Sources

Based on "August 22, 1787: Slavery in a Republic," The Constitutional Convention: A Day-by-Day Account, Independence National Historical Park, National Park Service; a work of the United States government in the public domain. The Dietzsch painting (National Gallery of Art) is in the public domain.