Mr. BARNWELL continued to say, I now come to the
last point for consideration, I mean the clause relative to the
negroes; and here I am particularly pleased with the Constitution; it
has not left this matter of so much importance to us open to immediate
investigation; no, it has declared that the United States shall not,
at any rate, consider this matter for twenty-one years, and yet
gentlemen are displeased with it.

Congress has guaranteed this right for that space of time, and at its
expiration may continue it as long as they please. This question then
arises, what will their interest lead them to do? The Eastern States,
as the honorable gentleman says, will become the carriers of America,
it will, therefore, certainly be their interest to encourage
exportation to as great an extent as possible; and if the quantum of
our products will be diminished by the prohibition of negroes, I
appeal to the belief of every man, whether he thinks those very
carriers will themselves dam up the resources from whence their profit
is derived? To think so is so contradictory to the general conduct of
mankind, that I am of opinion, that without we ourselves put a stop to
them, the traffic for negroes will continue forever.

FEDERALIST, No. 42

BY JAMES MADISON.

It were doubtless to be wished, that the power of prohibiting the
importation of slaves, had not been postponed until the year 1808, or
rather that it had been suffered to have immediate operation. But it
is not difficult to account either for this restriction on the general
government, or for the manner in which the whole clause is expressed.

It ought to be considered as a great point gained in favor of
humanity, that a period of twenty years may terminate for ever within
these States, a traffic which has so long and so loudly upbraided the
barbarism of modern policy; that within that period, it will receive a
considerable discouragement from the Federal government, and may be
totally abolished, by a concurrence of the few States which continue
the unnatural traffic in the prohibitory example which has been given
by so great a majority of the Union. Happy would it be for the
unfortunate Africans, if an equal prospect lay before them, of being
redeemed from the oppressions of their European brethren! Attempts
have been made to pervert this clause into an objection against the
Constitution, by representing it on one side, as a criminal toleration
of an illicit practic