Today in Supreme Court History: July 13, 1787

7/13/1787: The Articles of Confederation Congress enacts the Northwest Ordinance.

The Articles of Confederation

Comments

[Dan Schiavetta]

Fortunately it passed muster with the Articles of Confederation Supreme Court.

[dwb68]

"Under the ordinance, slavery was forever outlawed from the lands of the Northwest Territory"

https://www.britannica.com/event/Northwest-Ordinances

wait wuuuut?

I thought the American Revolution was about perpetuating slavery.

[Dan Schiavetta]

Slavery wasn't going to work in those areas anyway. And the Ordinance had a clear fugitive slave provision.

At the time it was assumed that the South would be the fastest growing part of the country and many white southerners would migrate to those areas.

[Sarcastr0]

Read the thing you're criticizing, and maybe you will be able to do more than smugly swing at reductive strawmen.

[apedad]

That was included because Southern tobacco farmers didn't want competition.

Tobacco farmer was slave-labor intensive and by agreeing to ban slavery in the new territory, they ensured a monopoly on tobacco.

The ban certainly was NOT due to humanitarian reasons.

[Syd Henderson]

Would tobacco grow well in the northern states anyway?

[Commenter_XY]

You sure about that, apedad? = The ban certainly was NOT due to humanitarian reasons.

Legislators (north and south) passing the NWO had various motives for their affirmative votes. You are correct that some legislators voted for economic reasons; other legislators had more noble (and a few unsavory) reasons. There was a growing abolitionist movement at the time of passage. Slavery had already been outlawed in a number of state constitutions. The new government was anxious for revenue and the vast lands of the west were a revenue source waiting to be tapped.

You assert a jaundiced view here of motivation when I think a much more nuanced version of the entire range of motivations is way more historically accurate.

[Krychek_2]

Plus the Northwest Ordinance was not the American Revolution.

[LawTalkingGuy]

It wasn’t necessarily about perpetuating slavery. It just so happened to create a political system that perpetuated and expand slavery and give privileged status to pro-slavery political interests.

[dwb68]

No. Didn't you ever learn about the slippery slope?

Abolitionists in the late 1700s played the long game. They knew that they simply could not outright ban slavery. They incrementally banned it. First in the new territories, then they banned the international slave trade. They did underestimate how hard the South would cling to the institution.

[Sarcastr0]

The international slave trade got banned so the existing slaves would go up in value.

I think you underestimate how much the slave-holding states ran the show in the early days of America.

[dwb68]

Actually the southern slave states went along with the ban because they hoped that the territories would be settled by southerners, so as to counter the abolitionist movement in the north.

Twenty years later, Congress later banned the international slave trade.

[Dan Schiavetta]

Actually the Constitution (drafted the same year) banned the international slave trade starting in the year 1808. Southern states were fine with this because they had plenty of slaves through "natural increase" (i.e., breeding them).

[Dilan Esper]

Not true. The Constitution merely prohibited Congress from banning it until 20 years had elapsed. But it did not require Congress to ban it.

[Dan Schiavetta]

Yes, you're right. Though that was the clear implication and as of 1808 Congress did ban it. Some Southern states had banned it long before. Both Massachusetts senators voted against the ban!

[Bob from Ohio]

Well done, dwb68.

The lib spinning in response would power California for a month.

[Sarcastr0]

It continues to be really messed up how much all you care about is owning the libs, not facts or principles.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

It's all he has left, Sarcastro. He has lost. He knows it. He is destined to be a disaffected loser, complying to increasing degree with the preferences of the liberal-libertarian mainstream until the day he is replaced. He does not want to improve, so he seethes and rants.

[Bob from Ohio]

There were no "facts" posted in response to him by you and your ilk.

Just spin, as I said.

[ReaderY]

It’s not Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Uniom Among the States?

My English teacher would roll over in her grave.