swood's fears were well founded, we have already seen. As the
sectaries of the back country increased, dissatisfaction with the
established church grew. After the Revolution came, Jefferson, with the
back country behind him, was able finally to destroy the establishment,
and to break down the system of entails and primogeniture behind which
the tobacco-planting aristocracy of the coast was entrenched. The desire
of Jefferson to see slavery gradually abolished and popular education
provided, is a further illustration of the attitude of the interior. In
short, Jeffersonian democracy, with its idea of separation of church and
state, its wish to popularize education, and its dislike for special
privilege, was deeply affected by the Western society of the Old
Dominion.

The Virginian reform movement, however, was unable to redress the
grievance of unequal apportionment. In 1780 Jefferson pointed out that
the practice of allowing each county an equal representation in the
legislature gave control to the numerous small counties of the
tidewater, while the large populous counties of the up-country suffered.
"Thus," he wrote, "the 19,000 men below the falls give law to more than
30,000 living in other parts of the state, and appoint all their chief
officers, executive and judiciary."[114:1] This led to a long struggle
between coast and interior, terminated only when the slave population
passed across the fall line, and more nearly assimilated coast and
up-country. In the mountain areas which did not undergo this change, the
independent state of West Virginia remains as a monument of the contest.
In the convention of 1829-30, the whole philosophy of representation was
discussed, and the coast defended its control as necessary to protect
property from the assaults of a numerical majority. They feared that
the interior would tax their slaves in order to secure funds for
internal improvements.

As Doddridge put the case:[115:1]

The principle is that the owners of slave property must be
possessed of all the powers of government, however small their
own numbers may be, to secure that property from the rapacity
of an overgrown majority of white men. This principle admits
of no relaxation, because the weaker the minority becomes, the
greater will their need for power be according to their own
doctrines.

Leigh of Chesterfield county declared:[115:2]

It is remarkable--I mention it for the c