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with which, by the Constitution, they have no concern. CHAPTER At a time when other communities were witnesses of the most horrid and barbarous scenes, these petitioners were 1797. endeavoring to excite a certain class to the commission of like enormities here. Were he sure that this conduct would be reprobated as it deserved, he would cheerfully vote for a reference; but not believing that it would be, he was for laying the memorial on the table or under the table, that the House might have done with the business, not for to-day, but forever.

Gallatin, by whom the memorial had been offered, maintained that it was the practice of the House, whenever a petition was presented, to have it read a first and second time, and then to commit, unless it were expressed in such indecent terms as to induce the House to reject it, or related to a subject upon which it had been recently determined by a large majority not to act. It was not best to decide under the influence of such passion as had just been exhibited, and that furnished an additional reason for a reference. He also vindicated the character of the Quakers against the aspersions in which Rutledge had very freely indulged.

Sewall suggested a third case, applicable, as he thought, to the present memorial, in which petitions might be rejected without a commitment, and that was when they related to matters over which the House had no cognizance, especially if they were of a nature to excite dis agreeable sensations in a part of the members possessed of a species of property held under circumstances in themselves sufficiently uncomfortable. The present memorial seemed to relate to topics entirely within the jurisdiction of the states.

Macon declared that there was not a man in North Carolina who did not wish there were no blacks in the

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CHAPTER Country. Negro slavery was a misfortune; he consider ed it a curse; but there was no means of getting rid of 1797. it. And thereupon he proceeded to inveigh against the Quakers, whom he accused not only of unconstitutional applications to Congress, but of continually endeavoring to stir up in the Southern States insurrection among the

negroes.

Against these assaults on the petitioners Livingston warmly protested. There might be individuals such as had been described; but as against the body of the Quak. ers these charges were false and unjust. The scruples of the Quakers on the subject of war were relied upon as a help toward blocking the administration and preventing any hostile demonstrations against France, and that circumstance may in part explain the zeal of Livingston and others in their behalf.

Parker of Virginia, and Blount of North Carolina, warmly opposed the reference of the memorial. Nicholas felt as much as other Southern gentlemen on this. subject, but as he thought the holders of slaves had nothing to fear from inquiry, he was in favor of a reference. So, also, was Smith of Maryland. Finally, after a very warm debate, the reference was carried, and a special committee was appointed, of which Sitgreaves was chairman, Dana, Smith of Maryland, Nicholas, and Schureman of New Jersey, being members. This committee, after hearing the petitions, subsequently reported leave to withdraw, in which the House concurred, on the ground, as set forth in the report, that the matter complained of was exclusively of judicial cognizance, and that Congress had no authority to interfere.

Another debate involving the subject of slavery occurred somewhat later. The president had suggested at the previous session the expediency of establishing a ter

see.

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ritorial government over the population on the Lower CHAPTER Mississippi, hitherto under Spanish authority, but acknowledged by the recent treaty with Spain to be within 1797. the limits of the United States. There were in Natchez and its vicinity five or six thousand inhabitants, most of them of English origin, remains of the immigration just before the breaking out of the Revolutionary war, or settlers who had come in since upon Spanish invitation. Under a royal proclamation and a cession to her by South Carolina of the rights of that state under the Carolina charter, Georgia claimed the whole territory east of Louisiana, north of Florida, and south of TennesThe United States claimed, on the other hand, as the common property of the Union, all the territory south of an east and west line from the mouth of the Yazoo to the Chattahoochee; that territory having been annexed, prior to the Revolution, to the British province of West Florida; and having been ceded to the United States by the British treaty of 1783-a title lately made complete by the relinquishment, under the late Spanish treaty, of any claim to it on the part of Spain. Previous to the Spanish treaty, Georgia had offered to cede her claims to the southernmost portion of the territory on condition of being confirmed in possession of the residue; but the continental Congress had refused to accept this partial union, on the ground that Georgia ought to cede-to place her on a level with other states by which cessions had been made all the territory west of the Chattahoochee. Such a cession of that whole wilderness, encumbered as it was by the claims of the land companies already mentioned, Georgia was now ready to make; but only on condition of being, paid a large sum of money, and of an undertaking on the part of the United States to extinguish within a limited time the Indian title, ex

CHAPTER tending over two thirds or more of her reserved territo XII. ry. To facilitate the negotiation of some such arrange1797. ment, an act was passed for the appointment of commissioners to adjust the conflicting claims of Georgia and the United States, and also to receive proposals from Georgia for the cession of her share of the South-western Territory, and at the same time to provide a government for the settlers on the Mississippi. Provision was was also made by the same act for erecting all that portion of the late British province of West Florida within the jurisdiction of the United States-that is, the terri tory between the thirty-first degree of north latitude and a due east line from the mouth of the Yazoo to the Chattahoochee-into a government to be called the MISSISSIPPI TERRITORY, to be constituted and regulated in all respects like the Territory northwest of the Ohio, with the single exception that slavery would not be prohibited.

1798.

While this section of the act was under discussion, March 23. Thacher having first stated that he intended to make a motion touching the rights of man, moved to strike out the exception as to slavery, so as to carry out the original project of Jefferson, as brought forward by him in the Continental Congress, of prohibiting slavery in all parts of the Western Territory of the United States, south as well as north of the Ohio.

Rutledge hoped that this motion would be withdrawn; not that he feared its passing, but he hoped the gentleman would not indulge himself and others in uttering philippics against a usage of most of the states merely because his and their philosophy happened to be at war with it. Surely, if his friend from Massachusetts had recollected that the most angry debate of the session had been occasioned by a motion on this very subject, he

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would not again have brought it forward. Such debates CHAPTER led to more mischiefs in certain parts of the Union than the gentleman was aware of, and he hoped, upon that 1798. consideration, the motion would be withdrawn. The allusion, doubtless, was to the advantage taken of these debates by the opposition to excite hostility against the Federal government in those Southern States in which its friends were at best but too weak.

Otis very promptly responded to Rutledge in hoping that the motion would not be withdrawn; he wanted gentlemen from his part of the country to have an opportunity to show by their votes how little they were disposed to interfere with the Southern States as to the species of property referred to.

Thacher remarked, in reply, "that he could by no means agree with his colleague (Otis). In fact, they seldom did agree, and to day they differed very widely indeed. The true interest of the Union would be promoted by agreeing to the amendment proposed, of which the tendency was to prevent the increase of an evil acknowledged to be such by the very gentlemen themselves who held slaves. The gentleman from Virginia, (Nicholas) had frequently told the House that slavery was an evil of very great magnitude. He agreed with that gentleman that it was so. He regarded slavery in the United States as the greatest of evils-an evil in direct hostility to the principles of our government; and he believed the government had a right to take all due measures to diminish and destroy that evil, even though in doing so they might injure the property of some individuals; for he never could be brought to believe that an individual could have a right in any thing that went to the destruction of the government-a right in a wrong. Property in slaves is founded in wrong, and never can