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Tipgrn™ wore restored to their owners only after enor-
mous expense. Northern States began promptly to
pass Personal Liberty bills, for the protection of
negroes who were claimed as slaves. In the South
these laws were regarded as a violation of the Com-
promise.
Stfirery Crnilroversy. — In colonial America slavery was general in the English possessions. In the South nearly all the unskilled labour was performed by negro slaves; in the North much of that work was done by a class of men known as "Redemptioners". For the latter class there was a prospect of entire free- dom and even of social importance. For the most, part the negro was doomed to toil forever; he had no hni)e of freedom and, perhaps, scarcely dreamt of wealth. When the War of Independence began, negro sUiA-ery existed in all the rebellious colonies. For economic and other reasons negroes were not. numerous in the North. In the diversified industries of that section slave labour was not regarded as effi- cient. In the South, on the other hand, Ufe was largely agricultural. On the large plantations the negrocould be emploj'ed to advantage. His mind was adapted to the simple operations required in the tobacco and rice fields, while his body was well .suited to its semi-tropical climate. There he thrived in spite of malaria. While the South was the section pecu- liarly interested in the institution of negro slavery, the North was not less interested in importing them from Africa. In the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson in his indictment of George III charged him, among other counts, with "supjjressing every legisla- tive attempt to prohibit or restrain this execrable commerce". In so doing he had "waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its nio.st sacred rights in tlie person of a distant people who had never offended him". Out of deference to the wishes of some Southern delegates in Congress, especially those from South Carolina and Georgia, Jefferson's denun- ciation was stricken from the final draft of the Declaration.
In the North the principles of 1776 were applied early. In 1777 Vermont, whose territory was still claimed by both New Hampshire and New York, adopted a constitution which declared that no person ought to be held as a slave after attaining to the age of maturity. In 1780 Pennsylvania enacted that the children of slaves born after that date should be free. A principle of the Massachusetts constitution of 1780 was interpreted by the supreme court of that state as abolishing slavery. In 1783 New Hampshire, and in 1784 Connecticut and Rhode Island all adopted measures looking to the gradual emancipation of their slaves. New York and New Jersey came later. ,\t the time of the adoption of the Constitution (178.')), slavery had almost disappeared in the North. Even in p.arts of the South it was unpopular. The great patriots and statesmen of Virginia, Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Ma.son, and others, hoped to see the institution quietly disappear. The Con.stitution recognized the existence of slavery and permitted the imi)ortation of negroes until 1 January, 1808. It also provides that in a census of the people three-fifths of the negroes be counted. This provision gave ri.se to two systems of enumeration. For state purposes every human being was counted, that is, if he were an inhabitant. For Federal purposes all whites were counted, three-fifths of the negroes, and any Indians who paid taxes. Thus the population of the state was not the same a-s its "Federal numbers". At the same time that the Constitution was being framed, the Continental Congress enacted the famous Ordinance of 1787. Section forever prohibits slavery in the territory north-west of the Ohio River. This measure was re-enacted by the Congress under the Constitu- tion.
When benevolent people and wise statesmen of the
South expected the gradual extinction of slavery, the
invention of the cotton gin created an industrial
revolution in that section. Slavery became a source
of extraordinary profit and was soon regarded as an
economic necessity. Thereafter cotton-raising be-
came the chief industry of the South. There was an
immense demand for negroes, and all thought of
emancipation was forgotten. The Constitution con-
ferred upon Congress no authority over the subject
of slavery except in the territories and in the District
of Columbia. After the admi.ssion of Maine as a free
state, almost to the time of the Civil War, slave states
and free states were admitted to the Union alternately.
This preserved a sort of balance between the two
sections. The American Cok)nization Society was
organized at Washington in 1817. The object of this
association wa^s to organize settlements on t he western
coast of Africa for free negi'oes who would volunteer
to go thither. During the forty years ensuing, 8000
emancipated blacks emigrated to Africa. The
promoters of this society, whose officers were largely
Southern men, were disappointed in the slender
success of the movement. At that time there were a
number of abolition societies in the South, though
very few in the North. After 1829 abolition societies
began to be organized in the North. Thesedemanded
the extinction of slavery not only in the territories
but in the states. Periodicals appealing to this con-
stituency and endeavouring to win converts were now
undertaken from time to time.
Among the pioneers in this movement was one Ben- jamin Lundy, a New Jersey Quaker. He had resided in East Tennessee, whence he removed to Baltimore. In that city he published the "Genius of Universal Emancipation". There also he made the acquaintance of William Lloyd Garrison. The hostility of the pro- slavery element compelled them to leave the city. In 1831 Garrison began publishing the "Liberator" in Boston. The "Liberator" denounced the slave- holders as criminals, and demanded the immediate emancipation of slaves throughout the United States. As a defensive measure it was excluded from circula- tion in the South. While the effect of Garrison's teachings was feared in the slave states, they were not very acceptable in Boston. In 1835, while addressing an anti-slavery meeting at the City Hall, he was taken from the building and dragged through the streets with a rope about his body. For personal safety it was necessary to lodge him in jail. As a result of Garrison's teachings anti-slavery societies were formed in the North. The first of these was the "New England Anti-Slavery Society", organized in 1831. A few years later a national organization was formed in Philadelphia. The membership of these early anti-slavery organizations included Wendell Phillips, Gerrit Smith, Emerson, Dr. Channing, Theodore Parker, Henry \\'ard Beecher, and other pensons equally well-known. Anti-slavery meetings were often disper.sed by Northern mobs. A Connecti- cut teacher. Miss Crandall, who opened her school to negro girls, was thrown into jail, while her school was broken up by the mob. An Illinois Abolitionist editor. Rev. EHjah P. Lovejoy, was killed by a pro- slavery mob.
In 1831 occurred in Southampton County, Virginia, the Nat Turner insurrection, when the slaves rose against their masters and massacred sixty persons. In the South this was ascribed, without much reason, to the influence of Abolitionist literature. Large rewards were offered, below Ma.son and Dixon's Line, for the delivery of the prominent anti-slavery leaders. Northern legislatures were called upon to suppress the Abolitionist .societies by law. They continued, however, to flood the South with their literature, and appear to have seriously expected to convince the slave-holders of the evils of human servitude. The South demanded the exclusion from
