“The most marked peculiarity of the revolution,” continues the able historian, Hildreth, to whom we are so largely indebted, “was the public recognition of the theory of the equal rights of man”—a theory set forth in the declaration of colonial rights, made by the first congress at Philadelphia; solemnly reiterated in the Declaration of Independence; and expressly or tacitly recognised as the foundation-principle of all the new governments. This principle however, encountered, in existing prejudices and institutions, many serious and even formidable obstacles to its general application, giving rise to several striking political anomalies. Of these the most startling was domestic slavery, an institution inconsistent with the equal rights of man. That this anomaly was felt at the time, is clearly enough evinced by the fact that no distinct provision on the subject of slavery appears in any State constitution, except that of Delaware, which provided “that no person hereafter imported from Africa ought to be held in slavery under any pretence whatever; and that no negro, Indian, or mulatto slave ought to be brought into this state for sale from any part of the world.”
Prior to the revolution the anti-slavery struggle had begun in New England; and in 1777, a number of slaves on board a prize-ship taken by an American privateer and brought into Salem for sale, were at once set at liberty by the interference of the General Court, and yet the provisional congress of Massachusetts at the same time forbade any negro to enlist into the army. Its Bill of Rights declared all men to be born free and equal, and this was considered by the Supreme Court to prohibit slavery.
The assembly of Pennsylvania in 1708 forbade the further introduction of slaves, and gave freedom to all persons thereafter born in the state. The most enlightened and illustrious citizens of Virginia and Maryland responded to the feelings which led New England and Pennsylvania to abolish slavery in their states, and they too forbade the further introduction of slaves and removed the restrictions on emancipation, though slavery as an institution was retained. New York and New Jersey followed the example of Virginia and Maryland, forbidding also the introduction of slaves from other states. The Quaker population of North Carolina strongly advocated the same Christian line of conduct, but were not supported by the legislators of the state. South Carolina and Georgia made no alteration whatever in their laws regarding slavery.
The importation of “indented servants,” so numerous in some of the states, and who were slaves in a modified sense, ceased with the war of the revolution. But in Connecticut, even to within the present century, debtors unable to meet the claims against them might be legally sold by their creditors into temporary slavery.
The year 1784 brought with it all the anxieties and difficulties consequent on the termination of a struggle, such as that through which America had just passed. The crisis of a great fever was over, and the sufferer was left with prostrated strength, excited nerves, and irritable temperament. Wisdom and prudence, and the vigour of his youthful constitution would, however, restore him to perfect health. In the meantime many a long depression and many a sally of impatience and petulance must be borne.
This was precisely the case with America. She had suffered from every calamity of war; her towns had been burned, her country ravaged, her frontiers laid waste by Indians; her citizens had been called out to serve in her army, and to suffer even more than the average miseries of camps, hunger, nakedness, and disease, with insufficient hospital resources. Citizen had been armed against citizen, and even brother against brother. Civil war had here assumed its direst aspect. Agriculture, trade and manufactures, had decayed during the war, and thousands of otherwise industrious and prosperous inhabitants were thrown out of employment, and so totally impoverished as to be nearly destitute of clothing. The once imposing navy was now completely annihilated. Almost every vessel, whether home-built or purchased, had been destroyed or had fallen into the hands of the enemy. The only ship of the line built during these disastrous years, and finished in 1782, was presented to the king of France, to supply the loss of one of his in Boston harbour. Add to all this an immense debt, the natural consequence of war, universal distress and discontent.
Congress met; and financial affairs claimed its first attention. Secondly came an important fact. Virginia ceded all her claims to lands lying north-west of the Ohio. New York had already set this example two or three years before, and now prided herself on having been the first to do so. By her act of cession, Virginia stipulated for the security of the French inhabitants already occupying those lands, and that those lands should be erected into republican states, to be admitted into the Union with the same rights as the older states. This led to vast plans for the laying out of states, and the government of the immense territory which the United States expected to acquire by the cession of the claims of the different states. The originators of these plans were Jefferson, who sat in congress as delegate from Virginia; Chase, of Maryland; and Howell, of Rhode Island. Among other proposed conditions for new states was the following: “After the year 1800, there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, other than in the punishment of crimes whereof the party shall have been duly convicted.” But the requisite votes of nine states could not be obtained, and this condition was lost.
Everything was done by congress to reduce the public expenditure. The military force retained at the peace amounted to 700 men, placed under Knox, in garrison at West Point and Pittsburg. These however, being thought too many, all were disbanded, excepting twenty-five men to guard the stores at Pittsburg, and fifty-five for West Point and other magazines, while no officer above the rank of captain was retained. Nor was even a minister-of-war considered necessary.
In March, 1785, Benjamin Franklin, after an absence of nine years, solicited his recall, and Jefferson was appointed to succeed him as the American representative at the French Court, and just about the same time John Adams was appointed to the same office in England. The now aged Colonel Oglethorpe, the founder of Georgia, was the first person who waited on the American minister in London. Great Britain declined as yet to send over a diplomatic agent to the United States.
In October, 1784, a treaty was concluded at Fort Schuyler between the United States and the chiefs and warriors of the Six Nations, by which the Mohawks, Onondagas, Cayugas and Senecas, who during the war had been adherents of the British, consented to peace and the release of prisoners. At the same time they ceded all their claim to the territory west of Pennsylvania. In the following January a similar treaty was entered into with the Wyandots, Delawares, Chippewas and Ottawas, by which the two former nations agreed to limit themselves to a tract on Lake Erie. The Shawanees refusing to form any pacific treaty, congress empowered the enlistment of 700 men for three years, to defend the western frontiers.