Читать книгу American Democracy in Context - Joseph A. Pika - Страница 167

The U.S. Constitution did not contain the words slave or slavery, but debates about slavery—by then a firmly entrenched and legally recognized practice—greatly influenced the framers. Slavery, of course, does not comport with the framers’ lofty rhetoric of rights, but the hard truth is that several sections of the Constitution not only recognized but indirectly sanctioned the practice of slavery.

For example, Article I, Section 9, in roundabout language, prohibited Congress from abolishing the importation of slaves until 1808 and empowered Congress to impose a tax or duty “on such Importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each Person.” Article IV, Section 2 contained the so-called fugitive slave clause, which required the return of slaves (those “held to Service or Labour in one State under the Laws thereof”) if they escaped to another state—even one where slavery was outlawed. And the so-called Three-Fifths Compromise of Article I, Section 2, discussed in Chapter 2, allowed each slave to be counted as three-fifths of one person for purposes of representation and taxation. Even the Bill of Rights originally did nothing to protect African Americans because the incorporation of the Bill of Rights—made possible by the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868—is mostly a twentieth-century phenomenon (see Chapter 4).

civil rights Freedom from governmental discrimination (unequal treatment) based on age, gender, race, or other personal characteristics.

fugitive slave clause A provision of Article IV, Section 2 of the Constitution that required the return of escaped slaves to their owners even if they fled to a state where slavery was outlawed. Repealed by the Thirteenth Amendment (1865).

Congress outlawed the importation of slaves in 1808, but the legality of slavery itself was a decision left to individual states. Early on, some states, such as Vermont (1777, before it officially entered the Union in 1781), Massachusetts (1780), and New Hampshire (1784) abolished slavery through their state constitutions. But slavery continued to be legal in many states, and slaveholders in those states argued that slaves were property protected by the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. (See Figure 5.1 for a chronology of slavery around the world.) Proslavery and anti-slavery forces in Congress agreed on the Missouri Compromise in 1820, which—with the exception of Missouri—banned slavery in new states north of the 36° 30̍ latitude line (see Figure 5.2). But Congress repealed the Missouri Compromise through passage of the Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854, thereby allowing each territory to decide for itself whether or not to allow slavery.

Figure 5.1 Timeline of the Abolition of Slavery

Source: “Who Banned Slavery When?” Reuters, March 22, 2007, https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-slavery/chronology-who-banned-slavery-when-idUSL1561464920070322

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Figure 5.2 The Missouri Compromise, 1820

Source: https://teachingamericanhistory.org/static/neh/interactives/sectionalism/lesson1/