[19] Mr. King steadily voted for slavery prohibition
and against all compromises, while Mr. Pinckney as steadily voted
against slavery prohibition and against all compromises. By this,
Mr. King showed that, in his understanding, no line dividing local
from federal authority, nor anything in the Constitution, was
violated by Congress prohibiting slavery in federal territory; while
Mr. Pinckney, by his votes, showed that, in his understanding, there
was some sufficient reason for opposing such prohibition in that
case.[20]
The cases I have mentioned are the only acts of the "thirty-nine,"
or of any of them, upon the direct issue, which I have been able to
discover.
To enumerate the persons who thus acted, as being four in 1784, two
in 1787, seventeen in 1789, three in 1798, two in 1804, and two in
1819-20--there would be thirty of them. But this would be counting
John Langdon, Roger Sherman, William Few, Rufus King, and George
Read each twice, and Abraham Baldwin three times. The true number of
those of the "thirty-nine" whom I have shown to have acted upon the
question, which, by the text, they understood better than we, is
twenty-three, leaving sixteen not shown to have acted upon it in
anyway.
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