39. Acceptance of the Policy. As in the Federal Convention, so in the State conventions, it is noticeable that the compromise was accepted by the various States from widely different motives.[41] Nevertheless, these motives were not fixed and unchangeable, and there was still discernible a certain underlying agreement in the dislike of slavery.  One cannot help thinking that if the devastation of the late war had not left an extraordinary demand for slaves in the South,—­if, for instance, there had been in 1787 the same plethora in the slave-market as in 1774,—­the future history of the country would have been far different.  As it was, the twenty-one years of laissez-faire were confirmed by the States, and the nation entered upon the constitutional period with the slave-trade legal in three States,[42] and with a feeling of quiescence toward it in the rest of the Union.

FOOTNOTES: 

  [1] Conway, Life and Papers of Edmund Randolph, ch. ix.

  [2] Conway, Life and Papers of Edmund Randolph, p. 78.

  [3] Elliot, Debates, I. 227.

  [4] Cf.  Conway, Life and Papers of Edmund Randolph, pp.
      78-9.

  [5] For the following debate, Madison’s notes (Elliot,
      Debates, V. 457 ff.) are mainly followed.

  [6] Cf.  Elliot, Debates, V, passim.

  [7] By Charles Pinckney.

  [8] By John Dickinson.

  [9] Mentioned in the speech of George Mason.

 [10] Charles Pinckney.  Baldwin of Georgia said that if the
      State were left to herself, “she may probably put a stop to
      the evil”:  Elliot, Debates, V. 459.

 [11] Affirmative: Connecticut, New Jersey, Maryland,
      Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia,—­7.
      Negative: New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Delaware,—­3.
      Absent: Massachusetts,—­1.

 [12] Negative: Connecticut and New Jersey.

 [13] Luther Martin’s letter, in Elliot, Debates, I. 373.  Cf.
      explanations of delegates in the South Carolina, North
      Carolina, and other conventions.

 [14] Elliot, Debates, V. 471.

 [15] Saturday, Aug. 25, 1787.

 [16] Elliot, Debates, V. 477.

 [17] Elliot, Debates, V. 477.  Dickinson made a similar
      motion, which was disagreed to:  Ibid.

 [18] Ibid., V. 478.

 [19] Ibid.

 [20] Aug. 29:  Ibid., V. 489.

 [21] Ibid., V. 492.

 [22] Elliot, Debates, V. 532.

 [23] Ibid., I. 317.

 [24] P.L.  Ford, Pamphlets on the Constitution, p. 331.

 [25] Ibid., p. 367.

 [26] McMaster and Stone, Pennsylvania and the Federal
      Convention, pp. 599-600.  Cf. also p. 773.