Note (return) — Chapter IV

In spite of this victory for slavery, however, the general force of the events in Hayti was such as to make more certain the formal closing of the slave-trade at the end of the twenty-year period for which the Constitution had permitted it to run. The conscience of the North had been profoundly stirred, and in the far South was the ever-present fear of a reproduction of the events in Hayti. The agitation in England moreover was at last about to bear fruit in the act of 1807 forbidding the slave-trade. In America it seems from the first to have been an understood thing, especially by the Southern representatives, that even if such an act passed it would be only irregularly enforced, and the debates were concerned rather with the disposal of illegally imported Africans and with the punishment of those concerned in the importation than with the proper limitation of the traffic by water.67 On March 2, 1807, the act was passed forbidding the slave-trade after the close of the year. In course of time it came very near to being a dead letter, as may be seen from presidential messages, reports of cabinet officers, letters of collectors of revenue, letters of district attorneys, reports of committees of Congress, reports of naval commanders, statements on the floor of Congress, the testimony of eye-witnesses, and the complaints of home and foreign anti-slavery societies. Fernandina and Galveston were only two of the most notorious ports for smuggling. A regular chain of posts was established from the head of St. Mary's River to the upper country, and through the Indian nation, by means of which the Negroes were transferred to every part of the country.68 If dealers wished to form a caravan they would give an Indian alarm, so that the woods might be less frequented, and if pursued in Georgia they would escape into Florida. One small schooner contained one hundred and thirty souls. "They were almost packed into a small space, between a floor laid over the water-casks and the deck—not near three feet—insufficient for them to sit upright—and so close that chafing against each other their bones pierced the skin and became galled and ulcerated by the motion of the vessel." Many American vessels were engaged in the trade under Spanish colors, and the traffic to Africa was pursued with uncommon vigor at Havana, the crews of vessels being made up of men of all nations, who were tempted by the high wages to be earned. Evidently officials were negligent in the discharge of their duty, but even if offenders were apprehended it did not necessarily follow that they would receive effective punishment. President Madison in his message of December 5, 1810, said, "It appears that American citizens are instrumental in carrying on a traffic in enslaved Africans, equally in violation of the laws of humanity, and in defiance of those of their own country"; and on January 7, 1819, the Register of the Treasury made to the House the amazing report that "it doth not appear, from an examination of the records of this office, and particularly of the accounts (to the date of their last settlement) of the collectors of the customs, and of the several marshals of the United States, that any forfeitures had been incurred under the said act." A supplementary and compromising and ineffective act of 1818 sought to concentrate efforts against smuggling by encouraging informers; and one of the following year that authorized the President to "make such regulations and arrangements as he may deem expedient for the safe keeping, support, and removal beyond the limits of the United States" of recaptured Africans, and that bore somewhat more fruit, was in large measure due to the colonization movement and of importance in connection with the founding of Liberia.