James
Madison poured oil on the troubled waters by stating that Congress
could not interfere according to constitutional restrictions, "Yet,"
he said, "there are a variety of ways by which it could countenance the
abolition; and regulations might be made to introduce the freed slaves
into the new states to be formed out of the Western territory." (In
parenthesis I remark that if Madison could have looked down the years,
he would have found that even though emancipated, the negro will not
leave the white settlements. Take our own little city of Lexington where
some 17,000 of them are congregated, living in discomfort and poverty in
most cases; yet their nature is to depend in some fashion upon their
white neighbors and employers.)
It was finally decided in the House that Congress could not prohibit
the slave trade until the year 1808--that Congress had no authority
to interfere in the emancipation of slaves, or in the treatment of
them within any of the States. This last resolution which is of great
historic importance, may be found on page 1523 of the II Vol.
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