n can maintain no more cattle than one of one hundred
thousand slaves; therefore they have no more of that kind of property.
That a slave may, indeed, from the custom of speech, be more properly
called the wealth of his master, than the free laborer might be called
the wealth of his employer: but as to the State, both were equally its
wealth, and should therefore equally add to the quota of its tax.

Mr. Harrison (of Virginia) proposed, as a compromise, that two slaves
should be counted as one freeman. He affirmed that slaves did not do
as much work as freemen, and doubted if two affected more than one.
That this was proved by the price of labor, the hire of a laborer in
the Southern colonies being from L9 to L12, while in the Northern it
was generally L24.

Mr. Wilson (of Pennsylvania) said, that if this amendment should take
place, the Southern colonies would have all the benefit of slaves,
whilst the Northern ones would bear the burthen. That slaves increase
the profits of a State, which the Southern States mean to take to
themselves; that they also increase the burthen of defence, which
would of course fall so much the heavier on the Northern; that slaves
occupy the places of freemen and eat their food. Dismiss your slaves,
and freemen will take their places. It is our duty to lay every
discouragement on the importation of slaves; but this amendment would
give thee _jus trium liberorum_ to him who would import slaves. That
other kinds of property were pretty equally distributed through all
the colonies: there were as many cattle, horses, and sheep, in the
North as the South, and South as the North; but not so as to slaves:
that experience has shown that those colonies have been always able to
pay most, which have the most inhabitants, whether they be black or
white; and the practice of the Southern colonies has always been to
make every farmer pay poll taxes upon all his laborers, whether they
be black or white. He acknowledged indeed that freemen worked the
most; but they consume the most also. They do not produce a greater
surplus for taxation. The slave is neither fed nor clothed so
expensively as a freeman. Again, white women are exempted from labor
generally, which negro women are not. In this then the Southern States
have an advantage as the article now stands. It has sometimes been
said that slavery was necessary, because the commodities they raise
would be too dear for market if cultivated by freemen; but n