upon the importation of slaves prior to the decade before the Revolution, but it would appear that these taxes were more for revenue than as prohibitive means, and that they were of no value in diminishing the demand and the number of negroes imported. However, in 1769, a distinct sentiment crystallized in Virginia against the further importation of slaves, and the Legislature passed a law prohibiting it, but this was vetoed by the Royal Governor, acting under orders from the Crown; the same thing occurred in Massachusetts two years later. In 1772 Lord Mansfield proclaimed the law, "As soon as a slave sets foot on the soil of the British isles he becomes free." This decision had a marked influence on the anti-slavery sentiment, which was now strong in the Colonies, and the approach of the Revolution, with its spirit of national independence and of individual right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, seemed to promise freedom to a people who had already suffered three centuries of terrible bondage.

CHAPTER IV.

THE EARLY FEDERAL GOVERNMENT.

"The policy to sustain which Mr. Lincoln was elected President in 1860 was first definitely outlined by Jefferson in 1784. It was the policy of forbidding slavery in the National Territory."

John Fiske.

The history of slavery from the opening scenes of the Revolution to the meeting of the First Congress affords a curious example of the direct influence of self-interest upon the opinions of mankind. The opening of the Revolution saw an emphatic and unanimous expression against slavery and the slave trade, and a general spirit of emancipation was abroad. Two years later this had changed, for when the Declaration was promulgated there was no mention of anti-slavery sentiments in it, and as Independence became more and more assured, the feeling against slavery seems to have weakened, and finally, when a serious attempt to perfect the Union was made, the slave question was decided by expediency and not by principle.

In 1773 and 1774, when the colonists spoke their final defiance against Great Britain, and the latter launched her retaliatory measures, the climax was reached. It is to be kept in mind that at this time slavery existed in every one of the Colonies. The First Continental Congress, representing all the Colonies except Georgia (who agreed to concur), met at Philadelphia in September, 1774, to determine what should be done in this grave crisis. It turned out to be largely a Peace Congress, but a protest, several addresses and a non-importation and non-consumption agreement was signed. One of the Articles of this agreement provided that "We will neither import nor purchase any slave imported after the first day of December next, after which time we will wholly discontinue the slave trade, and will neither be concerned in it ourselves, nor will we hire our vessels or sell our commodities or manufactures to those who are concerned in it." This important and far-reaching resolution received the unanimous support of all the Colonies. Would that its spirit had been kept alive!

[Illustration: The White House, Washington, D. C.]

Almost two years after the First Continental Congress met (the Revolution having been started in the meantime) the Declaration of Independence was adopted, but there was no expression in it against slavery or the slave trade. The original draft of that instrument contained a fierce denunciation of England's part in the slave trade:

"He has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights of life and liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him; capturing and carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur a 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 could be bought and sold, he has prostituted his negative by suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or restrain this execrable commerce."

These burning words were from the pen of Jefferson, who had been the most active in his opposition to slavery. They were omitted from the Declaration, out of compliance to South Carolina and Georgia, but they voiced unquestionably the sentiment of a large majority of the Continental Congress. This was the first fatal concession to South Carolina and Georgia, and we shall find them again united and influencing the other Southern Colonies to maintain a bold stand for slavery at the most critical period in the nation's history.

On the same day in June, 1776, that the Committee was appointed to draft the Declaration of Independence, Congress resolved that "A Committee be appointed to prepare and digest the form of a Confederation to be entered into between the Colonies." The work of this Committee was the Articles of Confederation, which were presented in November, 1777, for ratification by the States. These Articles contained no anti-slavery sentiments, and we are only concerned with them in noting the unexpected and most important results which came up before the ratification was completed. Several of the States claimed a right to the territory west of the Alleghanies to the Mississippi under their original charter. Their claims were conflicting, and Maryland refused to ratify the Articles of Confederation until the land-claiming States should relinquish all their rights to Congress. For a number of years these States were obdurate, but Maryland held out resolutely and bravely, and finally, by her firm action and the magnanimity of New York and Virginia, the question was settled by the cession of the disputed lands to Congress. The acquisition of the Northwest Territory is one of the great turning points in American history, for we shall see that the subsequent development of this territory was of no less importance than the saving of the Union from annihilation by the slave power.

Thomas Jefferson was the most urgent against slavery of all the founders of the nation. His statesmanship foresaw the evils negro slavery would bring upon the nation's social and political development, and his nature was stirred by the great moral wrong. Long before the Declaration of Independence he worked untiringly in Virginia to bring about a sentiment against the slave trade, and his efforts met with success. His fierce denunciation of England's part in the slave trade was stricken from the Declaration, but he did not give up the fight, although the material interests of the South thwarted his plans for the moment. When, by the unforeseen results attendant upon the ratification of the Articles of Confederation, that imperial domain reaching from Pennsylvania to the Mississippi and from the Ohio to the Lakes became national territory, Jefferson, with the prescience of a mighty genius, saw an opportunity to deal a death blow to slavery. This magnificent public domain, subsequently to be divided into the States of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin and Michigan, was given to the nation on condition that it should be cut up into States, to be admitted when they had a certain population, and that the land should be sold to pay the debts of the United States. Throughout this vast region there were very few people, and there had been no social, political or economical development, and so the only opposition which could come in Congress to any measure for the future government of the Territory would be from the original States. No sooner had the cession been fully made than Jefferson suggested a plan which, if it had succeeded, would have confined slavery North and South to the mountain boundaries of the original States. His plan for the government of this new territory, among other things, provided that after the year 1800 slavery should be prohibited in