d in the Assembly of Jamaica. The news
reached Great Britain before its final passage. Instructions were sent
out to the royal Governor; he called the House of Assembly before him,
communicated his instructions, and forbade any further progress of the
bill. In 1774, in spite of this discountenancing action of the mother
Government, two bills passed the Legislative Assembly of Jamaica; and
the Earl of Dartmouth, then Secretary of State, wrote to Sir Basil
Keith, the Governor of the colony, that "these measures had created
alarm to the merchants of Great Britain engaged in that branch of
commerce;" and forbidding him, "on pain of removal from his Government,
to assent to such laws."
Finally, in 1775--mark the date--1775--after the revolutionary struggle
had commenced, whilst the Continental Congress was in session, after
armies had been levied, after Crown Point and Ticonderoga had been taken
possession of by the insurgent colonists, and after the first blood
shed in the Revolution had reddened the spring sod upon the green at
Lexington, this same Earl of Dartmouth, in remonstrance from the agent
of the colonies, replied:
"We cannot allow the colonies to check or discourage in any degree a
traffic so beneficial to the nation."
I say, then, that down to the very moment when our independence was won,
slavery, by the statute law of England, was the common law of the old
thirteen colonies. But, sir, my task does not end here. I desire to show
you that by her jurisprudence, that by the decisions of her judges, and
the answers of her lawyers to questions from the Crown and from public
bodies, this same institution was declared to be recognized by the
common law of England; and slaves were declared to be, in their
language, merchandise, chattels, just as much private property as any
other merchandise or any other chattel.
A short time prior to the year 1713, a contract had been formed between
Spain and a certain company, called the Royal Guinea Company, that had
been established in France. This contract was technically called in
those days an _assiento_. By the treaty of Utrecht of the 11th of April,
1713, Great Britain, through her diplomatists, obtained a transfer of
that contract. She yielded considerations for it. The obtaining of that
contract was greeted in England with shouts of joy. It was considered
a triumph of diplomacy. It was followed in the month of May, 1713, by a
new contract in form, by which the British
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