Antifederalist No. 54 

APPORTIONMENT AND SLAVERY: NORTHERN AND SOUTHERN VIEWS 



This four part essay shows both northern and southern 
dissatisfaction with "the Great Compromise"   
    The first is taken from the third essay of "BRUTUS." 
    The second: from the speeches of Rawlins Lowndes to the South 
Carolina ratifying convention on January 16, 17, and 18, 1788.  
    The third: from the sixth essay by "CATO." 
    The fourth: from an essay by "A GEORGIAN," appearing in The 
Gazette of the State of Georgia on November 15, 1787. 


    "Representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned among 
the several States, which may be included in this Union, 
according to their respective numbers, which shall be determined 
by adding to the whole number of free persons, including those 
bound to service for a term of years, and excluding Indians not 
taxed, three-fifths of all other persons." What a strange and 
unnecessary accumulation of words are here used to conceal from 
the public eye what might have been expressed in the following 
concise manner: Representatives are to be proportioned among the 
States respectively, according to the number of freemen and 
slaves inhabiting them, counting five slaves for three freemen. 
     "In a free State," says the celebrated Montesquieu, "every 
man, who is supposed to be a free agent, ought to be concerned in 
his own government, therefore the legislature should reside in 
the whole body of the people, or their representatives." But it 
has never been alleged that those who are not free agents can, 
upon any rational principle, have anything to do in government, 
either by themselves or others.  If they have no share in 
government, why is the number of members in the assembly to be 
increased on their account?  Is it because in some of the States, 
a considerable part of the property of the inhabitants consists 
in a number of their fellow-men, who are held in bondage, in 
defiance of every idea of benevolence, justice and religion, and 
contrary to all the principles of liberty which have been 
publicly avowed in the late Glorious Revolution?  If this be a 
just ground for representation, the horses in some of the States, 
and the oxen in others, ought to be represented-for a great share 
of property in some of them consists in these animals; and they 
have as much control over their own actions as these poor unhappy 
creatures, who are intended to be described in the above recited 
clause, by the words, "all other persons." By this mode of 
apportionment, the representatives of the different parts of the 
Union will be extremely unequal; in some of the Southern States 
the slaves are nearly equal in number to the free men; and for 
all these slaves they will be entitled to a proportionate share 
in the legislature; this will give them an unreasonable weight in 
the government, which can derive no additional strength, 
protection, nor defense from the slaves, but the contrary.  Why, 
then, should they be represented?  What adds to the evil is, that 
these States are to be permitted to continue the inhuman traffic 
of importing slaves until the year 1808-and for every cargo of 
these unhappy people which unfeeling, unprincipled, barbarous and 
avaricious wretches may tear from their country, friends and 
tender connections, and bring into those States, they are to be 
rewarded by having an increase of members in the General 
Assembly.... 
               BRUTUS 

     . . . . six of the Eastern States formed a majority in the 
House of Representatives.  In the enumeration he passed Rhode 
Island, and included Pennsylvania.  Now, was it consonant with 
reason, with wisdom, with policy, to suppose, in a legislature 
where a majority of persons sat whose interests were greatly 
different from ours, that we had the smallest chance of receiving 
adequate advantages?  Certainly not. He believed the gentlemen 
that went from this state, to represent us in Convention, 
possessed as much integrity, and stood as high in point of 
character, as any gentlemen that could have been selected; and he 
also believed that they had done every thing in their power to 
procure for us a proportionate share in this new government; but 
the very little they had gained proved what we may expect in 
future-that the interest of the Northern States would so 
predominate as to divest us of any pretensions to the title of a 
republic.  In the first place, what cause was there for jealousy 
of our importing Negroes?  Why confine us to twenty years, or 
rather why limit us at all?  For his part, he thought this trade 
could be justified on the principles of religion, humanity, and 
justice; for certainly to translate a set of human beings from a 
bad country to a better, was fulfilling every part of these 
principles.  But they don't like our slaves, because they have 
none themselves, and therefore want to exclude us from this great 
advantage.  Why should the Southern States allow of this, without 
the consent of nine states? . . . 
     We had a law prohibiting the importation of Negroes for 
three years, a law he greatly approved of; but there was no 
reason offered why the Southern States might not find it 
necessary to alter their conduct, and open their ports. 
     Without Negroes, this state would degenerate into one of the 
most contemptible in the Union; and he cited an expression that 
fell from General Pinckney on a former debate, that whilst there 
remained one acre of swampland in South Carolina, he should raise 
his voice against restricting the importation of Negroes.  Even 
in granting the importation for twenty years, care had been taken 
to make us pay for this indulgence, each negro being liable, on 
importation, to pay a duty not exceeding ten dollars; and, in 
addition to this, they were liable to a capitation tax.  Negroes 
were our wealth, our only natural resource; yet behold how our 
kind friends in the north were determined soon to tie up our 
hands, and drain us of what we had!  The Eastern States drew 
their means of subsistence, in a great measure, from their 
shipping; and, on that head, they had been particularly careful 
not to allow of any burdens: they were not to pay tonnage or 
duties; no, not even the form of clearing out:  all ports were 
free and open to them!  Why, then, call this a reciprocal 
bargain, which took all from one party, to bestow it on the 
other! 
     Major [Pierce] BUTLER observed, that they were to pay five 
per cent impost. 
     This, Mr. LOWNDES proved, must fall upon the consumer.  They 
are to be the carriers; and, we being the consumers, therefore 
all expenses would fall upon us.  A great number of gentlemen 
were captivated with this new Constitution, because those who 
were in debt would be compelled to pay; others pleased themselves 
with the reflection that no more confiscation laws would be 
passed; but those were small advantages, in proportion to the 
evils that might be apprehended from the laws that might be 
passed by Congress, whenever there was a majority of 
representatives from the Eastern States, who were governed by 
prejudices and ideas extremely different from ours. . . . 
     Great stress was laid on the admirable checks which guarded 
us, under the new Constitution, from the encroachments of 
tyranny; but too many checks in a political machine must produce 
the same mischief as in a mechanical one-that of throwing all 
into confusion.  But supposing we considered ourselves so much 
aggrieved as to reduce us to the necessity of insisting on 
redress, what probability had we of relief? Very little indeed.  
In the revolving on misfortune, some little gleams of comfort 
resulted from a hope of being able to resort to an impartial 
tribunal for redress; but pray what reason was there for 
expectancy that, in Congress, the interest of five Southern 
States would be considered in a preferable point of view to the 
nine Eastern ones? 
     .... the mode of legislation in the infancy of free 
communities was by the collective body, and this consisted of 
free persons, or those whose age admitted them to the right of 
mankind and citizenship, whose sex made them capable of 
protecting the state, and whose birth may be denominated Free 
Born; and no traces can be found that ever women, children, and 
slaves, or those who were not sui juris, in the early days of 
legislation, met with the free members of the community to 
deliberate on public measures; hence is derived this maxim in 
free governments, that representation ought to bear a proportion 
to the number of free inhabitants in a community; this principle 
your own state constitution, and others, have observed in the 
establishment of a future census, in order to apportion the 
representatives, and to increase or diminish the representation 
to the ratio of the increase or diminution of electors.  But, 
what aid can the community derive from the assistance women, 
infants and slaves, in their deliberation, or in their defense?  
What motives, therefore, could the convention have in departing 
from just and rational principle of representation, which is the 
governing prince of this state and of all America? 
                      CATO 


     Article 1, section 2. This section mentions that, within 
three years after the first meeting of the Congress of the United 
States, an enumeration shall take place, the number of 
representatives not to exceed one member for every 30,000. This 
article I believe to be inadmissable.  First, it affords to small 
a representation, (supposing 48 at the highest calculation) and 
especially in the southern states, their climate, soil, and 
produce, . . . not being capable of that population as in the 
northern states.  Would it not therefore be better to increase 
the number of representatives, say one member for every 20,000 
for the states north of Virginia, and one for every 15,000 south 
of the said state, itself included?  Or, secondly, divide the 
states into districts which shall choose the representatives, by 
which every part of a state will have an equal chance, without 
being liable to parties or factions? Should it be said it will 
increase the expense, it will be money well laid out, and the 
more so if we retain the paying them out of our own bands.  And, 
supposing the voting in the house of representatives was 
continued as heretofore by states, would it not be more equal 
still?  At any rate I would strenuously recommend to vote by 
states, and not individually, as it will be accommodating the 
idea of equality, which should ever be observed in a republican 
form of government.  Or, thirdly, if it was in proportion to the 
quotas of the states, as rated in taxation, then the number of 
members would increase with the proportion of tax, and at that 
rate there would always be an equality in the quota of tax as 
well as representation; for what chance of equality according to 
the constitution in question, can a state have that has only one 
or two votes, when others have eight or ten, (for it is evident 
that each representative, as well as senator, is meant to have a 
vote, as it mentions no other mode but in choosing the 
president), and as it is generally allowed that the United States 
are divided into two natural divisions, the northern as far as 
Virginia, the latter included forms the southern?  This produces 
a wide difference in climate, soil, customs, manners of living, 
and the produce of the land, as well as trade, also in 
population, to which it is well observed the latter is not so 
favorable as the former, and never can nor will be, nature itself 
being the great obstacle.  And when taxation is in agitation, as 
also many other points, it must produce differences in 
sentiments; and, in such dispute, how is it likely to be decided?  
According to the mode of voting, the number of members north of 
Virginia the first three years is 42, and the southern, Virginia 
included, 23.... 
     Is human nature above self interest?  If the northern states 
do not horde the southern in taxation, it would appear then 
really that they are more disinterested men than we know of.