Slavery and the Constitution

The Constitution of the United States as it was drafted and sent for ratification in 1787 did not contain the word “slave”, but slavery had been a fiercely debated topic during the Constitutional Convention and the document contained references and protections for enslavement across its parchment pages. Not until 1865 and the ratification of the 13^th Amendment to the Constitution did slavery officially end in the United States.

Among the 55 delegates who gathered for the Grand Convention (Constitutional Convention) in 1787, around 25 of them owned slaves. Some already had feelings against slavery and—like George Washington—would free enslaved people in their wills. Others like Benjamin Franklin had already manumitted the people they had held in bondage. A few—like Alexander Hamilton—would become outspoken advocates for abolition. 

The month of August 1787 found the convention delegates grappling with the issue of slavery, a moral and ethical question that threatened the unity and goals of the convention. Gouverneur Morris, a delegate from Pennsylvania, attacked slavery as a moral abomination, particularly targeting southern delegates who professed little willingness to end the practice in their home states. Representation in Congress based on population sparked the debate. Enslaved people were part of a state’s population, but should they be represented? Enslaved people were considered property without rights or privileges, but southern states argued that enslaved people should be included in the population count toward that state’s number of delegates in the House of Representatives. Smaller states and northern states realized this would distort the number of representatives that southern states sent to congress and protested on political and moral grounds. 

Eventually, the convention adopted the Three-Fifths Compromise which counted three-fifths of a state’s slave population for representation. This still gave southern states with large slave populations an advantage with more representatives and more electoral votes. The three-fifths number did not come from a belief that enslaved people were part human; rather, the number was derived from an approximation of measuring wealth that an enslaved person contributed to that state’s economy. The Three-Fifths concept predated the Constitutional Convention had had been debated in the Confederation Congress, but for the first time it was added to a national government document in 1787. The additional seats in Congress that southern states gained with the Three-Fifths Compromise created the “Slave Power” in the legislature and allowed bills favorable to the southern region to pass more easily in congress. The frustration over imbalances of regional political power led to future compromises like The Missouri Compromise (1820), the Compromise of 1850 and the Kansas-Nebraska Act. More electoral votes from slave-holding states also meant the greater likelihood of their preferred candidate for president, and in time, meant Supreme Court justices favorable to slavery. 

Other aspects of slavery in the United States came under debate and were addressed in the Constitution. 

South Carolina and Georgia delegates threatened that their states would not join the union if there were restrictions to the Transatlantic Slave Trade imposed in the Constitution. Luther Martin from Maryland, a slaveholder himself spoke out, saying, “It [slave trade] is inconsistent with the principles of the Revolution and dishonorable to the American character to have such a feature in the constitution.” He argued that the slave trade had to be regulated by the federal government because the entire nation could be affected by slave revolts. Eventually another compromise was reached. For 20 years—until 1808—there would be no restriction on the slave trade and in return the federal government could make laws requiring American ships to be used in all commerce to the benefit of shipbuilders and maritime men in the northeast region. 

On the same day that the convention reached a compromise about the slave trade and commerce, it also agreed to a fugitive slave clause. This meant that enslaved people who ran away and sought freed had to be returned to their enslavers, and that the federal government would enforce that rule. Additional fugitive slave laws would be passed in the 19^th Century, and this was not repealed in practice until 1861—the first year of the American Civil War—when General Benjamin Butler refused to return fugitives to slavery in the Confederacy. 

Lastly, when the Constitution gave power to the federal government to forcible put down domestic rebellions, that included slave insurrections. Fear of slave uprisings worried white people in slave holding states and increased in the early decades of the 19^th Century. In the event of a slave revolt, Federal troops could be sent to fight against enslaved people seeking freedom through violent means. 

Even as they compromised on issues surrounding slavery and declined to outlaw the practice during the Constitutional Convention, delegates recognized that they were not dealing with slavery and letting the moral issue fester and grow. George Mason, who enslaved people on his Virginia land, denounced slavery at the convention, saying, "Every master of slaves is born a petty tyrant. They bring the judgment of heaven on a country." Decades of suffering for enslaved men, women and children and decades of political power struggles among white politicians would culminate in a bloody Civil War. When the Civil War ended, a new amendment was ratified and added to the Constitution of the United States: "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction." But in 1787, that was still 78 years in the future.