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By the time of the 1787 Constitutional Convention, every New England state plus Pennsylvania had begun to abolish slavery.

They had mouthed a bunch of formalities and passed a bunch of laws that said they would abolish it at some point in the future.

I tend to be an absolutist, and I don't consider stating intentions to be the same thing as doing the deed.

My measure of the abolition of slavery is that it no longer exists in any form within a state that has abolished it.

This is of course not true for the vast majority of States that "abolished it" in the 1790 era. I think Pennsylvania still had slaves on the census in the 1840s. I know some of the states did.

My point here is that even in 1776, and especially by 1787, many leading Americans, North and South, took slavery very seriously and were doing what they could to abolish it wherever possible.

I think there is a lot of truth in this. Even George Washington himself, in his later years decided he wanted to abolish it, and he often pondered how it might be accomplished.

But did most people oppose it because they thought it was wrong, or did they oppose it because they didn't want white men to have to compete with slaves for paying jobs? Did they oppose it because they didn't want "colored" living among them?

When you go back and look at it, there is indeed written evidence that some people opposed it because they thought it was immoral, but there is also a lot of evidence that the majority opposed it for economic and racial reasons.

There are all sorts of people who said they wanted to keep the territories for white people, meaning they simply didn't want any black people in them. I think Lincoln said this too.

The various "black codes" in the various Northern states indicate that the populations were primarily driven by hatred, not love.

"*NONE* of us agree with using the 14th amendment to create any of those results, but we recognize that the courts who created them, claim it was the 14th amendment which gave them the power to do so."

You know what, I can't believe I missed this initially.

I'm going to do this the aggressive way.

The one word I do want to put into your mouth is "lie" and I cannot possibly get it there.

At this point, the word "lie" won't be there, you trust the progressives too too much. So relax, I can't put any words in your mouth. Just as it's not in the slavery amendment's power to do abortion things since the war wasn't fought over slavery, its not in my power to put words into your mouth.

Think about that one for a while.

DiogenesLamp: "They had mouthed a bunch of formalities and passed a bunch of laws that said they would abolish it at some point in the future.
I tend to be an absolutist, and I don't consider stating intentions to be the same thing as doing the deed.
My measure of the abolition of slavery is that it no longer exists in any form within a state that has abolished it."

That's only because you loathe the United States and want to accuse Northerners of being evil slavers while you praise Southerners for their "care" and "concern" over their beloved "servants", right?

You don't care if that's all a lie, but it just makes you feel better to think it and say it, so you do.

Here are the facts regarding Northern gradual abolition:

1790 --
- 30,000 Northern freed blacks total
- 40,000 Northern slaves total
1810 --
- 80,000 Northern freed blacks total = 166% increase
- 30,000 Northern slaves total = 25% reduction
1830 --
- 130,000 Northern freed blacks total = 333% increase since 1790
- ....4,000 Northern slaves total = 87% reduction from 1790
1850 --
- 200,000 Northern freed blacks total = 567% increase since 1790
- .....200 individuals, Northern slaves total = 99.5% reduction (all remaining in New Jersey, Wisconsin and Utah).
1860 --
- 230,000 Northern freed blacks total = 667% increase since 1790
- ......64 individuals, Northern slaves total = 99.94% reduction (all remaining in New Jersey, Nebraska and Utah)