Resolved, That the Constitution of the United States, in Letter, Spirit, and Design, is Essentially Antislavery: A Debate Between Samuel Ringold Ward and Frederick Douglass in New York, New York, on May 11, 1849
RESOLVED, THAT THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES, IN LETTER, SPIRIT, AND DESIGN, IS ESSENTIALLY ANTISLAVERY: A DEBATE BETWEEN SAMUEL RINGGOLD WARD AND FREDERICK DOUGLASS IN NEW YORK, NEW YORK, ON 11 MAY 1849
New York Daily Tribune, 14 May 1849.
Samuel Ringgold Ward was not the first abolitionist to invite Douglass to speak on the status of slavery under the United States Constitution. In January 1849, C.H. Chase, a political abolitionist from Cleveland, Ohio, invited Douglass to debate the proposition that the Constitution, "‘if strictly construed according to its reading, is anti-slavery in all of its provisions.” Declining Chase’s invitation, Douglass conceded that “if strictly ‘construed according to its reading,’” the Constitution was “not a pro-slavery instrument.” Shocked by that admission, the Garrisonian editors of the Anti-Slavery Bugle urged Douglass to explain “how an anti-slavery reading can be given to those clauses which Disunionists generally regard as pro-slavery.” Gerrit Smith, on the other hand, confessed that Douglass’s reply to Chase “cheer[ed] me with the hope that you are on the very eve of wielding the Federal Constitution for the abolition of American Slavery.” In April, Ward, a fugitive slave and a
colleague of Smith’s, invited Douglass to debate the constitutionality of slavery “at any county seat in the state of New York.” Douglass reluctantly agreed to the debate, leaving it to Ward “to assert in the manner of distinct propositions, the various points of difference between us.” On 11 May 1849 the speakers appeared before a large audience in the Minerva Rooms, where Ward defended the affirmative and Douglass the negative forms of Ward’s proposition. Thomas Van Rensselaer, editor of the Ram’s Horn, presided at the afternoon and evening sessions of the six-hour meeting. Black abolitionists George T. Downing and Thomas Paul Smith assisted as vice-presidents, while Henry Highland Garnet and William C. Nell filled secretarial posts. Each speaker addressed the crowd five times, but no detailed reports of the meeting have survived. The fullest eyewitness account, that of William J. Wilson, concentrated on sketching the contrasting styles of the two orators rather than on the substance of their arguments, but the available excerpts indicate that Ward maintained that the letter of the Constitution dictated an antislavery interpretation, while Douglass alluded to historical examples to show that the document’s framers intended for it to support slavery. Wilson praised both participants profusely but gave an edge to Ward for having intercepted Douglass’s “ponderous missiles” and having returned them “to the detriment of his already fallen victim.” Douglass wrote that he enjoyed this his first formal debate, adding, “If Mr. Ward was not victorious in this argument, it was . . . solely owing to the unsoundness of the cause which he undertook to defend.” NS, 23 January, 16 March, 4, 25 May 1849; William J. Wilson, “A Leaf From My Scrap Book,” in Julia Griffiths, ed., Autographs for Freedom (Rochester, 1854), 165-73, reprinted in Appendix; ASB, 23 February, 17 May 1849; NASS, 17 May 1849; Lib., 1 June 1849.
Mr. Ward, in support of his position that the spirit, letter and design of the Constitution was opposed to Slavery, cited Sec. 9, Art. I, prohibiting bills of attainder; Sec. 10 making a like prohibition; Sec. 2, Art. IV, giving to the citizens of each State the privileges of the several States; and the lst, 4th, 5th, and 8th Amendments, as being Anti-Slavery. These, he contended, were directly opposed to Slavery and Slavery must be unconstitutional. The Slave is not a thing, he is a person, and as such comes under the provisions of the Constitution which says, “nor shall any person be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law.” Now this was clear in its meaning, and could not be susceptible of misapprehension; it insured to every man his right to Liberty, and agreed with the Declaration of Independence, which declares that “all men are created equal; that they are endowed with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” It was no matter what were the sentiments of these men when writing that document, we are to go by what
is written. The Courts of law will not hold a parole agreement binding upon the parties concerned; it must be written and interpreted according to its sense. The right to hold property in persons did not exist, nor was it acknowledged in any part of the Constitution, for it would be a direct violation of the principles for which the fathers of the Republic struggled. He asserted that when a fugitive slave had been returned to his master, he was not returned in compliance with any law calling him a person, and that as a human being, entitled to rights under the Constitution, he could not be seized upon as a chattel; the Constitution allowed representation to persons only, and here was a direct admission of the slave being a person. Mr. Ward, in support of the validity of a written agreement, and the invalidity of a parole agreement made a very happy illustration. He said that if Mr. Dandher (Mr. W.) had entered into a mere verbal agreement for the sake of convenience to call a horse a cow, and that Mr. D. had signed a written agreement, promising to pay $150 for cow, the parole agreement was null and void in the eyes of the law, and would not be binding on him (Mr. W.) If I, said Mr. W. in accordance with the strict letter of our written agreement, having been paid the money for the cow, should in reality give him a cow for the money so paid, he, Mr. D. would have no redress from a Court of law. Just so it is, said Mr. W. with regard to Slavery. No matter what were the intentions and sentiments of the framers of the Constitution, or what was the understanding the slave-holding and non-slaveholding States had upon the matter, that Constitution in no portion of it acknowledges the rights of property in human beings. I admit, said Mr. Ward, that there are some difficulties in the way of a perfect understanding of that clause of the Constitution, which relates to representation and taxation, but it cannot be proved to clear understanding of it that it sanctions Slavery.
Mr. DOUGLASS rose and said:
I am, glad that my friend confesses that there are some difficulties in that clause of the Constitution relating to representation and taxation; that clause of the Constitution has already been read, and I shall not read it again. It declares that representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned to the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the number of free persons, including Indians not taxed, three-fifths of all other persons. Mr. Ward1Samuel Ringgold Ward (1817-c. 1866) was a black Congregational minister, writer, abolitionist, editor, temperance advocate and, most notably, orator. Like Henry Highland Garnet, to whom he was related. Ward claimed descent from African royalty. Ward's parents carried him along on their escape from slavery on Maryland's Eastern Shore in about 1820. The family fled to New Jersey and settled six years later in New York City, where young Ward received an elementary education. In 1833 he embraced religion and planned for a career in the ministry. After teaching briefly in elementary schools in the New York City, Newark, and Poughkeepsie areas, Ward received ordination in 1839. His two New York congregations, at South Butler (1841-43) and Cortland (1846-51), consisted mostly of whites, but Ward vigorously agitated for the rights of both slaves and free blacks. His conversion to abolitionism came in 1834 after he was attacked by a New York City mob and then jailed following a speech by the black reformer Benjamin Hughes. By 1837 he was aiding the black press as an agent for the Weekly Advocate and then for the Colored American. Active as a speaker in peace and literary societies, Ward soon won the attention of Lewis Tappan and Joshua Leavitt. The American Anti-Slavery Society appointed Ward a lecturing agent in 1839. During the ensuing years, Ward organized for the New York State Anti-Slavery Society and, as one of the earliest black supporters of political abolitionism, acted as a spokesman for the Liberty party after 1844. He served as a vice president of the American Missionary Association in 1846. Ward studied law and medicine briefly, and also tried his hand at editing during the late 1840s. His Impartial Citizen, published from Syracuse, and another newspaper venture both failed financially. In 1851 Ward 's leading role in the Jerry Rescue caused him to fear arrest and to emigrate to Canada. There he launched the Provincial Freeman in 1853 and acted as agent for the Anti-Slavery Society of Canada. In the latter capacity, Ward journeyed to Britain in 1853 on a fund-raising tour. He addressed the annual British and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society meetings in 1853 and 1854. During the following year, Ward published his Autobiography of a Fugitive Negro and accepted a British Quaker's gift of fifty acres of land in Jamaica. He lived his last decade on that island, farming, writing, and ministering to a small Baptist congregation. Sketchy accounts of his last years allude to both his dire poverty and great influence in local politics. His lasting fame is as an orator whose platform presence rivalled Douglass's. On Ward's death, Douglass mourned the loss of a black leader who “[i]n depth of thought, fluency of speech, readiness of wit, logical exactness, and general intelligence... has left no successor." Douglass, Life and Times, 308; Samuel Ringgold Ward, Autobiography of a Fugitive Negro: His Anti-Slavery Labors in the United States, Canada & England (1855; Chicago, 1970); New York Weekly Advocate, 7 January 1837; New York Colored American, 4 March 1837; NS, 2 February 1849; Quarles, Black Abolitionists, 79, 98, 133, 138, 210; Winks, Blacks in Canada, 206-08, 227, 265-66, 361, 395. says that some other persons beside slaves may be included in these
three-fifths; he does not deny that the slaves were intended, by any means; he tells you that the term free, in this clause, is not necessarily the correlative of slave. I affirm that slaves are included, were meant to be included; and in proof, I will read a few remarks made in the Convention that framed the Constitution. On Monday, June 11, 1787, this very point which we are now discussing was under discussion in the Convention. I read from the Madison Papers: “It was then moved by Mr. Rutledge to add the words ‘equitable ratio of representation’ at the end of the motion just made,” which was, “the proportion of direct taxation shall be regulated by the whole number of inhabitants of every description in proportion to the number of whites,” &c., &c.2The above is a badly garbled extract from James Madison's notes of the debates in the Federal Convention. Douglass may have referred to H. D. Gilpin, ed., The Papers of James Madison, 3 vols. (Washington, 1840), more than half of which is given over to the Convention debates. On 11 June 1787 the Convention resolved “that the right of suffrage in the first branch of the national Legislature ought not to be according to the rule established in the articles of confederation; but according to some equitable ratio of representation." John Rutledge of South Carolina then proposed to add the words “according to the quotas of contribution" but his amendment was postponed while the Convention considered James Wilson's motion to add the words “in proportion to the whole number of white & other free Citizens & inhabitants of every age, sex & condition including those bound to servitude for a term of years and three fifths of all other persons not comprehended in the foregoing description, except Indians not paying taxes, in each State. "The three-fifths compromise was adopted by a vote of 9 to 2. Max Farrand, ed., The Records of the Federal Convention of 1787, 4 vols. (1937; New Haven, 1966), 1: 192-201. It is evident that this same clause of the
Constitution refers to the slaves; on the face of it there is a direct reference to the slaves.
It is said that the clause relating to the three-fifths [ratio] does not support Slavery, in as far as that it takes from the Slaveholder two-fifths of his representative power in the nation, instead of conferring upon him the whole five-fifths. Now this would be taking from him the three-fifths he already enjoys; it was a bonus offered to Slavery. Every Slaveholder was virtually told by that Constitution, virtually instructed by it, to add as many to his stock as possible, for the more slaves he possessed he would not only have more wealth but more political power. For every five slaves he might be said to have three votes. I think this case is made out. I cannot flourish trumpets much about it, but it is plain and obvious. I am not sure but that the South—indeed I am certain that it would have an increase of representation in the Legislature. were Slavery and the Slaves permitted to vote. But it would not be an increase of the slave power. You must remember that it was the slave power that demanded a three-fifths representation of their slaves. Some of the good people of the North said, “We had as well ask for a representation for our cows, our sheep and our horses, as you to ask for it in your slaves."3Douglass possibly refers to Massachusetts delegate Elbridge Gerry's response to the three-fifths proposal on 11 June 1787. Gerry “thought property not the rule of representation. Why then should the blacks, who were property in the South, be in the rule of representation more than the cattle & horses of the North.” Farrand, Records of the Federal Convention, 1: 201. The answer was, that although the slave is property, he is a person, and his service is not worth more than three-fifths of the service of freemen, and therefore it was argued that the South had a right to that representation. The North bowed to the mandates of Slavery.
Mr. Douglass concluded with an eloquent denunciation of Slavery, and resumed his seat amid the cheers of the audience. After the discussion the house adjourned, according to previous agreement, without taking a vote on the question.