and the Constitution. At the outbreak
of the Revolutionary War the region west of Pennsylvania, east of the
Mississippi River, north of the Ohio River, and south of Canada, was
claimed by Virginia, New York, Connecticut, and Massachusetts. This
territory afforded to these states a source of revenue not possessed by
the others for the payment of debts incurred in the war, and Maryland
and other seaboard states insisted that in order to equalize matters
these claimants should cede their rights to the general government. The
formal cessions were made and accepted in the years 1782-6. In April,
1784, after Virginia had made her cession, the most important, Congress
adopted a temporary form of government drawn up by Thomas Jefferson for
the territory south as well as north of the Ohio River. Jefferson's most
significant provision, however, was rejected. This declared that "after
the year 1800 there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude
in any of the said states other than in the punishment of crimes whereof
the party shall have been duly convicted to have been personally
guilty." This early ordinance, although it did not go into effect, is
interesting as an attempt to exclude slavery from the great West that
was beginning to be opened up. On March 3, 1786, moreover, the Ohio
Company was formed in Boston by a group of New England business men for
the purpose of purchasing land in the West and promoting settlement; and
early in June, 1787, Dr. Manasseh Cutler, one of the chief promoters of
the company, appeared in New York, where the last Continental Congress
was sitting, for the concrete purpose of buying land. He doubtless
did much to hasten action by Congress, and on July 13 was passed "An
Ordinance for the Government of the Territory of the United States,
Northwest of the Ohio," the Southern states not having ceded the area
south of the river. It was declared that "There shall be neither slavery
nor involuntary servitude in the said territory, otherwise than in
punishment of crimes, whereof the parties shall be duly convicted." To
this was added the stipulation (soon afterwards embodied in the Federal
Constitution) for the return of any person escaping into the territory
from whom labor or service was "lawfully claimed in any one of the
original states." In this shape the ordinance was adopted, even South
Carolina and Georgia concurring; and thus was paved the way for the
first fugitive slave law.

Slavery, al