olition of the slave-trade. Also, a
memorial of the Providence Society, for abolishing the slave-trade, to
the same effect. _Ordered_, That the said memorials be referred to Mr.
Trumbull [of Connecticut], Mr. Ward [of Massachusetts], Mr. Giles [of
Virginia], Mr. Talbot [of New York], and Mr. Grove [of North
Carolina]; that they do examine the matter thereof, and report the
same, with their opinion thereupon, to the House." Annals of Congress,
iv, p. 349.

A bill was reported in conformity to the wishes of the memorialists,
passed its several stages without debate, and was approved March 22,
1794. For the bill, see Id., p. 1426.

[30] The address is as follows:

"_To the Citizens of the United States_:

"The Address of the Delegates from the several Societies formed in
different parts of the United States, for promoting the Abolition of
Slavery, in convention assembled at Philadelphia, on the first day of
January, 1794.

"FRIENDS AND FELLOW-CITIZENS: United to you by the ties of
citizenship, and partakers with you in the blessings of a free
government, we take the liberty of addressing you upon a subject
highly interesting to the credit and prosperity of the United States.

"It is the glory of our country to have originated a system of
opposition to the commerce in that part of our fellow-creatures who
compose the nations of Africa. Much has been done by the citizens of
some of the States to abolish this disgraceful traffic, and to improve
the condition of those unhappy people whom the ignorance, or the
avarice of our ancestors had bequeathed to us as slaves. But the evil
still continues, and our country is yet disgraced by laws and
practices which level the creature man with a part of the brute
creation. Many reasons concur in persuading us to abolish domestic
slavery in our country. It is inconsistent with the safety of the
liberties of the United States. Freedom and slavery can not long exist
together. An unlimited power over the time, labor, and posterity of
our fellow-creatures, necessarily unfits man for discharging the
public and private duties of citizens of a republic. It is
inconsistent with sound policy, in exposing the States which permit
it, to all those evils which insurrections and the most resentful war
have introduced into one of the richest islands in the West Indies. It
is unfriendly to the present exertions of the inhabitants of Europe in
favor of liberty. What people will advocate freedom, wi