It would seem from your historical review, that the clause in the Constitution respecting fugitive slaves was the grand compromise between the North and the South, without which "the Constitution could not have been adopted"; and that to this clause we owe our glorious slave-catching Union. You fortify this wonderful historical discovery by appealing to the "deliberate declarations" of Southern members, that they "would not enter a union with States who would tempt away their slaves," &c. It is to be regretted that you have not deemed it expedient to refer to the records of these declarations, as other students of our constitutional history are wholly ignorant of them. Suffer me, Sir, to enter into a few historical details, for the purpose of vindicating the liberty I take to differ with you as to the accuracy of your statements.
The Convention met in Philadelphia, 25th May, 1787. On the 29th of the same month, Mr. Randolph, of Virginia, submitted a plan of government. It contained no allusion to fugitive slaves. On the same day, Mr. Charles Pinckney, of South Carolina, submitted another plan. This last provided for the surrender of fugitive criminals, but was silent about fugitive slaves. On the 15th of June, Mr. Patterson, of New Jersey, submitted a third plan. This also provided for the surrender of fugitives from justice, but not from bondage. On the 18th, Mr. Hamilton announced his plan, but the fugitive slave found no place in it. On the 26th of June, the Convention, having agreed on the general features of the proposed Constitution in the form of resolutions, referred them to "a committee of detail," for the purpose of reducing them to the form of a Constitution. In these resolutions, there was not the most distant allusion to fugitive slaves. On the 6th of August, the committee reported the draft of a Constitution, and yet, strange as you may deem it, the provision without which, you tell us, the Constitution could not have been adopted, was not in it, although there was in it a provision for the surrender of fugitive criminals. For three months had the Convention been in session, and not one syllable had been uttered about fugitive slaves. At last, on the 29th of August, as we learn from the minutes, "It was moved and seconded to agree to the following proposition, to be inserted after the 15th article: 'If any person, bound to service or labor in any of the United States, shall escape into another State, he or she shall not be discharged from such service or labor in consequence of any regulation subsisting in the State to which they escape, but shall be delivered up to the person justly claiming their service or labor,' _which passed unanimously_." Really, Sir, I find in this record but little evidence of the perplexity which distressed our wise men, or of the great compromise between the North and South, on which you dwell. The 15th article, referred to above, was the article providing for the surrender of fugitives from justice, and this suggested the idea, that it would be well to provide, also, for the surrender of fugitive slaves. In an assembly consisting almost exclusively of slaveholders, the idea was exceedingly relished; and without a word of opposition, the suggestion was unanimously adopted. From Mr. Madison's report we learn that, the day before, Messrs. Butler and Pinckney had informally proposed that fugitive slaves and servants should be delivered up "like criminals." "Mr. Wilson [of Penn.]. This would oblige the Executive of the State to do it at the public expense. Mr. Sherman [of Conn.] saw no more propriety in the public seizing and surrendering a slave or servant than a horse." (_Madison Papers_, p. 1447.) The subject was here dropped. The next day the motion was made in form, and, as Mr. Madison says, "agreed to, _nem. con._" From the phraseology of the motion, and the objections of Messrs. Wilson and Sherman, it was perfectly understood that the obligation of delivery was imposed on the States, and that no power was intended to be conferred on Congress to legislate on the subject. Messrs. Wilson and Sherman's objections arose from no moral repugnance to slave-catching, but from the inconvenience they apprehended the _State_ authorities would be subjected to; and Mr. Wilson perhaps spoke from experience, as his own State had at that very time a law for catching and returning fugitive slaves from other States. The idea, therefore, that this agreement was a _compromise_ between the North and South is wholly imaginary, and you, Sir, must have mistaken some recent fulminations from the Southern chivalry for the "deliberate declarations" which you suppose were made in the Convention.