From: wwarf@silver.ucs.indiana.edu (Wayne J. Warf)
Subject: Re: Slavery in the Old Northwest
Organization: Indiana University
Date: Mon, 25 Jan 1993 08:49:55 GMT

In article <1jvqkrINNht7@moe.ksu.ksu.edu> jsanders@phys.ksu.edu (Justin M. Sanders) writes:
>A few days ago, there was a little bit of discussion concerning
>slavery in the northern states.  I've found two very interesting
>papers which deal with slavery in Indiana and Illinois-- two Northwest
>territory states that in principle should have been free states, but
>in which slavery or "apprenticeship" existed for 30 or 40 years
>after the Northwest Ordinance.  The papers are:
>
>Paul Finkelman, "Slavery and the Northwest Ordinance: A Study in 
>   Ambiguity", Journal of the Early Republic, vol. 6, p 343 (1986).
>Paul Finkelman, "Evading the Ordinance: The Persistance of Bondage
>   in Indiana and Illinois", Journal of the Early Republic,
>   vol. 9, p. 21 (1989).
>

From "The Indiana Way: A State History", James H. Madison, Indiana Univ. Press

	"Slavery had existed among the French at Vincennes as early
	 as the mid-eighteenth century, and, dispite the prohibition
	 slavery in the Northwest Ordinance, it continued with 
	 considerable support during the territorial period. In
	 1802 Harrison called a territorial convention to consider
	 repealing the portion of the Northwest Ordinance prohibiting
	 slavery. The convention voted to petition Congress for repeal,
	 arguing that legalization of slavery would attract more
	 settlers to Indiana. Congress did not grant the petition,
	 but Governor Harrison and the territorial judges nonetheless
	 permitted slavery under various guises. The first General
	 Assembly, in 1805, passed an act allowing slaves to be brought
	 into the territory and held for very long indentures, often
	 beyond their life expectancy, a brazen and successful flouting
	 of the antislavery terms of the Northwest Ordinance. Many
	 prominent citizens of Indiana, including Harrison, owned
	 slaves. The exact number of slaves in Indiana is impossible
	 to know, in part because of efforts to disguise the fact of
	 slavery, but the census of 1810 listed 237 slaves and 393
	 free blacks concentrated in the Vincennes area. It is likely
	 that many of the free blacks were in fact slaves."
	 	"The antislavery tenor of territorial government
	 began to receive challenge by the middle of the decade in
	 antislavery meetings and petitions to Congress. In 1810 the
	 General Assembly repealed the 1805 indenture law, though repeal
         did not affect pre-1810 indentures and slavery continued to
	 exist. It should be noted that many of the people opposed to
	 slavery were also opposed to allowing free blacks to settle
	 in Indiana, but their efforts to bar blacks from the territory
	 were unsuccessful."


Indiana was granted statehood in 1816 and the constitutionl convention
(though composed mostly of Southern men) banned slavery in Indiana in 
a badly worded provision that provided a loophole until the early
1820's until several state Supreme Court decisions made it clear that
all slavery and involuntary servitude was illegal. Slavery was virtually
eradicated by 1830. Though slavery would remain illegal, the Constitution
of 1851 declared, "No negro or mulatto shall come into or settle in the
State". This provision was declared invalid in 1866.

-- 
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 | Wayne J. Warf -- WWARF@ucs.indiana.edu -- I speak for myself only  |
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