It was not a bait and switch. From my readings of the constitutional convention it was the only way to get Georgia and South Carolina to agree to the constitution. There were proposals to get rid of slavery during the convention but Georgia and South Carolina would not agree to them.
The founders believed it was more important to get all the states to agree on the constitution then putting an end to slavery. Considering that the articles of confederation were a failure I would have to reluctantly agree with them.
Though I wonder if they would have told Georgia and South Carolina to go pound sand maybe they would have eventually agreed to join the Unites States and we could have ended slavery much sooner.
Why blame it on “the founders.” In the context of this discussion, the northern states believed it was more important to agree on the constitution with slavery than to put an end to slavery.
I would add that, even then, the northern states only agreed to enshrine slavery into the U.S. Constitution because it was in their economic and political best self-interest. Otherwise, you can be sure, the North would have stood firm against slavery.
Because they anticipated later the ability to use the power of the collective government to destroy it anyways. Some of them as much as said so here.
And you say this does not constitute a bait and switch?
Though I wonder if they would have told Georgia and South Carolina to go pound sand maybe they would have eventually agreed to join the Unites States and we could have ended slavery much sooner.
If they prospered, then they would not have been alone for very long. The fear at the time was that England was powerful enough to defeat them, and that only by hanging together could they create a sufficient deterrence force to convince England not to try.
Had Georgia and South Carolina rejoined England, that would have wrecked the rest of the system, because then England would have had a better means of reconquering the Colonies.
With this in mind, it looks as if the very existence of the USA as an independent nation depended heavily on convincing the states to band together.