mmediately
prohibited altogether.

The result of this and related controversies was a debate on the merits
of slavery. Gouverneur Morris delivered his mind and heart on that
subject, denouncing slavery as a nefarious institution and the curse of
heaven on the states in which it prevailed. Mason of Virginia, a
slaveholder himself, was hardly less outspoken, saying: "Slavery
discourages arts and manufactures. The poor despise labor when performed
by slaves. They prevent the migration of whites who really strengthen
and enrich a country."

The system, however, had its defenders. Representatives from South
Carolina argued that their entire economic life rested on slave labor
and that the high death rate in the rice swamps made continuous
importation necessary. Ellsworth of Connecticut took the ground that
the convention should not meddle with slavery. "The morality or wisdom
of slavery," he said, "are considerations belonging to the states. What
enriches a part enriches the whole." To the future he turned an
untroubled face: "As population increases, poor laborers will be so
plenty as to render slaves useless. Slavery in time will not be a speck
in our country." Virginia and North Carolina, already overstocked with
slaves, favored prohibiting the traffic in them; but South Carolina was
adamant. She must have fresh supplies of slaves or she would not
federate.

So it was agreed that, while Congress might regulate foreign trade by
majority vote, the importation of slaves should not be forbidden before
the lapse of twenty years, and that any import tax should not exceed $10
a head. At the same time, in connection with the regulation of foreign
trade, it was stipulated that a two-thirds vote in the Senate should be
necessary in the ratification of treaties. A further concession to the
South was made in the provision for the return of runaway slaves--a
provision also useful in the North, where indentured servants were about
as troublesome as slaves in escaping from their masters.

=The Form of the Government.=--As to the details of the frame of
government and the grand principles involved, the opinion of the
convention ebbed and flowed, decisions being taken in the heat of
debate, only to be revoked and taken again.

_The Executive._--There was general agreement that there should be an
executive branch; for reliance upon Congress to enforce its own laws and
treaties had been a broken reed. On the character and functions of