e effort to secure slavery in the Indiana
Territory. In March, 1804, a special committee of Congress reported
in favor of the suspension of the inhibition for ten years; a
similar report was made in 1806 by Mr. Garnett, of Virginia; and
in 1807 Mr. Parker, delegate from Indiana, reported favorably on
a memorial of Governor Harrison and the Territorial Legislature,
praying for a suspension of that part of the Ordinance relating to
slavery. These reports were not acted on in the House. Subsequently,
Governor Harrison and his Legislature appealed to the Senate and
a special committee to suspend the article, but when the committee
reported adversely, all efforts to break down the legal barrier to
slavery in the Northwest Territory ceased.(20)

But notwithstanding the mandatory terms of the Ordinance, and the
repeated failures in Congress to suspend the provision relating to
slavery, it existed in the Northwest throughout its territorial
existence and in the State of Illinois until 1844.(21) The early
slaveholding inhabitants well understood the Ordinance to mean the
absolute emancipation of their slaves, and hence manumitted them
or commenced to remove them to the Spanish territory beyond the
Mississippi. Some few of the inhabitants complained to Governor
St. Clair that the inhibition against slavery retarded the growth
of the Territory. He volunteered the opinion that the Ordinance
was not retroactive; that it did not apply to existing conditions;
that it was "a declaration of a principle which was to govern the
Legislature in all acts respecting that matter (slavery) and the
courts of justice in their decisions in cases arising after the
date of the Ordinance"; and that if Congress had intended the
immediate emancipation of slaves, compensation would have been
provided for to their owners. But he admitted Congress "had the
right to determine that _property_ of that kind afterwards acquired
should not be protected in future, and that slaves imported into
the Territory after that declaration might reclaim their freedom."(22)
This unfortunate opinion operated to continue slavery in the
Territory, and fostered the idea that the sixth article might be
annulled and slavery be made perpetual in the Territory. Governor
St. Clair was President of the Congress when the Ordinance was
passed, and his opinion in relation to it was therefore given much
weight.

By Act of Congress, passed May 7, 1800, what is now the State of