as allowed
to drop out of consideration. In the next year an ordinance drafted by
Jefferson was introduced into Congress for erecting territorial governments
over the whole area ceded or to be ceded by the states, from the
Alleghanies to the Mississippi and from Canada to West Florida; and one of
its features was a prohibition of slavery after the year 1800 throughout
the region concerned. Under the Articles of Confederation, the Congress
could enact legislation only by the affirmative votes of seven state
delegations. When the ballot was taken on the anti-slavery clause the six
states from Pennsylvania eastward voted aye: Maryland, Virginia and South
Carolina voted no; and the other states were absent. Jefferson was not
alone in feeling chagrin at the defeat and in resolving to persevere.
Pickering expressed his own views in a letter to Rufus King: "To suffer the
continuance of slaves till they can be gradually emancipated, in states
already overrun with them, may be pardonable because unavoidable without
hazarding greater evils; but to introduce them into countries where none
already exist ... can never be forgiven." King in his turn introduced a
resolution virtually restoring the stricken clause, but was unable to bring
it to a vote. After being variously amended, the ordinance without this
clause was adopted. It was, however, temporary in its provision and
ineffectual in character; and soon the drafting of one adequate for
permanent purposes was begun. The adoption of this was hastened in July,
1787, by the offer of a New England company to buy from Congress a huge
tract of Ohio land. When the bill was put to the final vote it was
supported by every member with the sole exception of the New Yorker,
Abraham Yates. Delegations from all of the Southern states but Maryland
were present, and all of them voted aye. Its enactment gave to the country
a basic law for the territories in phrasing and in substance comparable to
the Declaration of Independence and the Federal Constitution. Applying
only to the region north of the Ohio River, the ordinance provided for
the erection of territories later to be admitted as states, guaranteed in
republican government, secured in the freedom of religion, jury trial and
all concomitant rights, endowed with public land for the support of schools
and universities, and while obligated to render fugitive slaves on claim
of their masters in the original states, shut out from the regime of
sla