Mr. Gerry (of Massachusetts) thought property not the rule of representation.  Why, then, should the blacks, who were property in the South, be in the rule of representation more than, the cattle and horses of the North?

On the question,—­Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, aye—­9; New jersey, Delaware, no—­2. Vol.  II. pp. 842-3.

Saturday, June 30, 1787.

He (Mr. Madison) admitted that every peculiar interest, whether in any class of citizens, or any description of states, ought to be secured as far as possible.  Wherever there is danger of attack, there ought to be given a constitutional power of defence.  But he contended that the States were divided into different interests, not by their difference of size, but by other circumstances; the most material of which resulted partly from climate, but principally from the effects of their having or not having slaves.  These two causes concurred in forming the great division of interests in the United States.  It did not lie between the large and small States.  IT LAY BETWEEN THE NORTHERN AND SOUTHERN; and if any defensive power were necessary, it ought to be mutually given to these two interests.  He was so strongly impressed with this important truth, that he had been casting about in his mind for some expedient that would answer the purpose.  The one which had occurred was, that instead of proportioning the votes of the States in both branches to their respective numbers of inhabitants, computing the slaves in the ratio of five to three, they should he represented in one branch according to the number of free inhabitants only; and in the other, according to the whole number, counting the slaves us free.  By this arrangement the Southern scale would have the advantage in one House, and the Northern in the other.  He had been restrained from proposing this expedient by two considerations; one was his unwillingness to urge any diversity of interests on an occasion where it is but too apt to arise of itself; the other was, the inequality of powers that must be vested in the two branches, and which would destroy the equilibrium of interests. pp. 1006-7.

Monday, July 9, 1787.

Mr. Patterson considered the proposed estimate for the future according to the combined rules of numbers and wealth, as too vague.  For this reason New Jersey was against it.  He could regard negro slaves in no light but as property.  They are no free agents, have no personal liberty, no faculty of acquiring property, but on the contrary are themselves property, and like other property, entirely at the will of the master.  Has a man in Virginia a number of votes in proportion to the number of his slaves?  And if negroes are not represented in the States to which they belong, why should they be represented in the General Government.  What is the true principle of representation?  It is an experiment by which