s is certain. But in
justice to loyal citizens and communities, and to avoid the danger of
foreign intervention by prolonging the contest, it is our duty, after
the close of this year, to withdraw the slaves in the rebel States from
the culture of the crops used to support their armies, which can only be
done by general emancipation in such States persisting then in the
rebellion. This is a necessary war measure, designed, like battles or
blockades, to suppress the rebellion (alike ruinous to North and South),
and which must no longer be permitted to accumulate an immense debt and
oppressive taxation, and to exhaust our blood and treasure. The census
shows that very few slaves are held by the deluded masses of the South,
that the slaveholders are few in number; and full compensation is
contemplated by Congress and the President, in all cases of the
manumission by us of the slaves of loyal citizens.

By the census of 1790, all the sixteen States then enumerated held
slaves, except Massachusetts (then including Maine, although numbered
separately), where the institution was abolished by a judicial
construction of their constitution of 1780. The following table, from
the census, shows the gradual disappearance of slavery from seven of
these States, the remaining eight States still continuing the
institution:

1790 1800 1810 1820 '30 '40 '50 '60
N. Hamp. 158 8
R. Island 952 381 108 48 17 5
Conn. 2,759 951 310 97 25 17
Vermont 17
N. York 21,824 20,343 15,017 10,088 75 4
N. Jer. 11,423 12,422 10,851 7,657 2,254 674 236 18
Penn. 3,737 1,706 795 408 211 64

Illinois, by her constitution of 1818, continued slavery in the State,
but declared that 'children hereafter born shall be free.' An effort was
made in Congress to defeat the admission of Illinois, on the ground that
its constitution 'did not conform to the ordinance of 1787.' But it was
then decided by the House of Representatives (117 to 54) that 'the
ordinance did not extend to States.' In the Senate the vote was
_unanimous_. (See Niles's Register, vol. xix. p. 30.) Rhode Island
adopted the Pennsylvania system. Connecticut declared free, at the age
of 26, all born after the 1st March, 1784. Indiana pursued in its
results the course of Illinois. By the census, Illinois had 917 slaves
in 1820, 747 in 1830, 33