The Constitution's Slave Language

The original United States Constitution did not contain the words slave or slavery within its text, despite the fact that slavery was a major component of the economy and society in the United States at the time of its drafting in 1787. Instead, the Constitution used terms such as “persons”, “other persons”, “bound servants”, and “all other persons to refer to slaves, and included clauses that indirectly protected the institution of slavery, such as the Fugitive Slave Clause and the Three-Fifths Clause. The Thirteenth Amendment, passed in 1865, abolished slavery in the United States, and prohibited slavery and involuntary servitude within the country.

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The US Constitution never uses the words 'slave' or 'slavery'

The US Constitution never uses the words "slave" or "slavery". However, it dealt directly with American slavery in at least five of its provisions and indirectly protected the institution elsewhere in the document. The Constitution prohibited Congress from outlawing the Atlantic slave trade for 20 years and included a fugitive slave clause requiring the return of runaway slaves to their owners. The three-fifths clause, which counted three-fifths of a state's slave population in apportioning representation, gave the South extra representation in the House of Representatives and extra votes in the Electoral College. The framers of the Constitution consciously avoided the word "slave", recognising that it would sully the document.

The three-fifths compromise was not an original idea of the men at the Constitutional Convention. It was part of a compromise devised by James Madison in 1783, which was initially rejected and then revived by Alexander Hamilton. It was presented as a proposed amendment to the Articles of Confederation in hopes of providing the federal government with a more reliable income. The allocation of seats in Congress and the number of people to be taxed, although it was only three-fifths of the slaves, acknowledged that slaves were considered human beings and not merely property.

The next mention of the institution of slavery in the Constitution is found in Article I, Section 9. Once again, it is not mentioned by name, but it is implied. This section deals with issues of importation and taxation of the slave trade. It reads: "The Migration and Importation of such Persons as any of the States now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the Year one thousand eight hundred and eight, but a Tax or duty may be imposed on such Importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each Person." The phrase "Migration and Importation of such Persons" implies the slave trade.

The next reference to slavery in the Constitution is found in Article IV, Section 2, known as the fugitive slave clause. This clause reads: "No Person held to Service or Labour in one State, under the Laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in Consequence of any Law or Regulation therein, be discharged from such Service or Labour, but shall be delivered up on Claim of the Party to whom Service or Labour may be due." This clause explains that no person held in service or labour in one state, and under that state's laws, can escape into another state and be released from service.

The issue of slavery was a major source of tension in the United States, leading to the Civil War and the passage of the 13th Amendment, which abolished slavery and prohibited involuntary servitude in the United States.

The Three-Fifths Clause

Slaveholding states wanted their entire population to be counted to determine the number of Representatives they could elect and send to Congress. Free states, on the other hand, wanted to exclude the counting of slave populations in slave states, given that those slaves had no voting rights. The Three-Fifths Compromise was a resolution to this dispute.

The compromise counted three-fifths of each state's slave population toward that state's total population for the purpose of apportioning the House of Representatives. This effectively gave Southern states more power in the House relative to the Northern states. The three-fifths ratio was also used to determine the federal tax contribution required of each state, thus increasing the direct federal tax burden of slaveholding states.

The Three-Fifths Compromise was part of Article 1, Section 2, Clause 3 of the Constitution. Section 2 of the Fourteenth Amendment (1868) later superseded this clause and explicitly repealed the compromise.

It is important to note that neither the word "slave" nor "slavery" appears in the Three-Fifths Clause or anywhere in the unamended Constitution.

Fugitive Slave Clause

The Fugitive Slave Clause, also known as the Slave Clause or the Fugitives From Labour Clause, is Article IV, Section 2, Clause 3 of the United States Constitution. It states that a "person held to Service or Labour" (usually a slave, apprentice, or indentured servant) who escapes to another state must be returned to their master in the state from which they fled. The clause was adopted at the Constitutional Convention of 1787 and remained in effect until the abolition of slavery under the Thirteenth Amendment.

The Fugitive Slave Clause was a compromise between the Northern and Southern states, as slavery was outlawed in most Northern states but was a way of life in the South. The clause gave slaveholders the right to reclaim their "property" across state lines. It provided a legal basis for the Fugitive Slave Acts of 1793 and 1850, which required that fugitive slaves be returned to their owners and made the federal government responsible for capturing and returning escaped slaves.

The Fugitive Slave Clause did not explicitly mention the word "slave", instead referring to a "person held to Service or Labour". This was a deliberate choice to avoid the appearance of constitutionally sanctioning slavery. However, the intent of the clause was clear, and it had a significant impact on the lives of enslaved people. It allowed slaveholders to pursue and reclaim their escaped "property", and local laws that penalised the seizure of fugitive slaves were deemed unconstitutional.

The Fugitive Slave Clause was largely rendered irrelevant by the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which abolished slavery except as punishment for criminal acts. This amendment made it so that the Fugitive Slave Clause could no longer be enforced, and it is now considered a mostly moot point in the Constitution.

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The Constitution's pro-slavery interpretation

The US Constitution has been interpreted as pro-slavery, despite the word "slave" not appearing in the document. The Three-Fifths Clause, also known as the "federal ratio", is a key example of this interpretation. This clause counted three-fifths of a state's slave population when apportioning representation, giving Southern states with a large slave population greater representation in the House of Representatives and more votes in the Electoral College. The Fugitive Slave Clause, which required the return of runaway slaves to their owners, is another provision that has been interpreted as pro-slavery. Additionally, the Constitution prohibited Congress from banning the Atlantic slave trade for 20 years, indicating a protection of slavery.

The framers of the Constitution consciously avoided using the word "slave" to avoid sullying the document. However, the absence of explicit references to slavery does not mean that it was absent from the Constitution. The Importation of Persons Clause in Article 1, Section 9, Clause 1, implies the slave trade by referring to the "importation of persons". Similarly, the Three-Fifths Clause refers to "all other persons", which were the African slaves who made up a significant portion of the Southern states' population. These careful wordings show the framers' reluctance to include slavery explicitly in the Constitution.

The Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, the first African American to sit on the court, described the Constitution as "defective from the start" due to its treatment of slavery. He argued that the framers left out a majority of Americans by writing "We the People" and consented to a document that laid the foundation for tragic events. Similarly, Frederick Douglass examined the historical context and structure of four provisions of the Constitution, describing them as pro-slavery.

The pro-slavery interpretation of the Constitution is further supported by the Dred Scott v. Sandford case, where Chief Justice Roger B. Taney held that the right of property in a slave was affirmed in the Constitution. This interpretation was based on the prevailing idea at the time of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution that African Americans had no rights that whites were bound to respect. The Three-Fifths Compromise, which was part of the Constitution, also played a role in Thomas Jefferson's election win in 1800.

In conclusion, despite the absence of the word "slave", the Constitution included several provisions that protected and perpetuated slavery. The framers' reluctance to explicitly include slavery in the document does not negate the fact that it was a major component of the economy and society at the time. The Constitution's pro-slavery interpretation has been a controversial and contentious topic in American history, with scholars and statesmen debating its true nature.

The 13th Amendment: Abolition of Slavery

The 13th Amendment to the US Constitution, passed on January 31, 1865, and ratified on December 6, 1865, abolished slavery in the United States. It was the first of three Reconstruction Amendments and it forbids chattel slavery across the United States and in every territory under its control, except as punishment for a crime. The official text of the amendment states:

> "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction. Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation."

The 13th Amendment was the culmination of a long and contentious history of slavery in the United States. The original Constitution implicitly recognised slavery in provisions such as the Three-Fifths Compromise, which provided that three-fifths of each state's enslaved population was to be added to its free population for the purposes of representation and taxation. The Fugitive Slave Clause also ensured that slaves who escaped to another state did not become free but remained slaves. Despite the moral qualms of some of its framers, the Constitution gave important protections to slavery, and the issue was a source of growing sectionalism between the North and the South.

During the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, declaring all persons held as slaves within any state in rebellion against the United States to be "forever free." However, this proclamation only applied to areas of the Confederacy in rebellion and did not end slavery nationwide. Lincoln recognised that a constitutional amendment was necessary to guarantee the abolishment of slavery. The 13th Amendment was passed at the end of the Civil War, but Lincoln did not live to see its ratification, as he was assassinated shortly after the war ended.

The 13th Amendment was a significant milestone in the history of the United States, finally abolishing the institution of slavery and ensuring that it could no longer be legally sanctioned. It was a crucial step towards fulfilling the nation's founding ideals of liberty and equality for all.

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