ssed of the right to import slaves, as the public good
did not require it to be taken from them, and as it was
expedient to have as few objections as possible to the
proposed scheme of government, he thought it best to leave
the matter as we find it. ... He urged on the Convention the
necessity of despatching its business.

"Col. MASON. This infernal traffic originated in the avarice
of British merchants. The British Government constantly
checked the attempts of Virginia to put a stop to it. The
present question concerns, not the importing States alone,
but the whole Union. The evil of having slaves was
experienced during the late war. Had slaves been treated as
they might have been by the enemy, they would have proved
dangerous instruments in their hands. But their folly dealt
by the slaves as it did by the Tories. He mentioned the
dangerous insurrections of the slaves in Greece and Sicily,
and the instructions given by Cromwell to the commissioners
sent to Virginia,--to arm the servants and slaves, in case
other means of obtaining its submission should fail.
Maryland and Virginia, he said, had already prohibited the
importation of slaves expressly. North Carolina had done the
same in substance. All this would be in vain, if South
Carolina and Georgia be at liberty to import. The Western
people are already calling out for slaves for their new
lands; and will fill that country with slaves, if they can
be got through South Carolina and Georgia. Slavery
discourages arts and manufactures. The poor despise labor
when performed by slaves. They prevent the emigration of
whites, who really enrich and strengthen a country. _They
produce the most pernicious effect on manners. Every master
of slaves is born a petty tyrant. They bring the judgment of
heaven on a country. As nations cannot be rewarded or
punished in the next world, they must be in this. By an
inevitable chain of causes and effects, Providence punishes
national sins by national calamities_. He lamented that some
of our Eastern brethren had, from a lust of gain, embarked
in this nefarious traffic. As to the States being in
possession of the right to import, this was the case with
many other rights, now to be properly given up. He held it
essential, in every point of view,