As the conflict between large and
small states became increasingly intense, Madison tried to be
conciliatory. Don’t worry about
combinations between large states, Madison reassured the small ones; the large
states have no common interests that would lead them to combine. The real difference in interests is not
between large and small states, but between north and south. At the time, Madison was
simply trying to ease the controversy over representation. Controversy between
north and south seemed a non-issue at the time.
To us today, knowing what lay ahead, this sounds very prescient, but not
at all reassuring. In any event, no
sooner had the Convention agreed to proportional representation in one house,
than north-south sectionalism reared its ugly head, with each section trying to
get as many representatives in the House as possible.
When I was in school, I learned
that there were several main north-south controversies at that Constitutional
Convention, which were resolved by a series of compromises. One was whether slaves would be counted in
taxation and/or representation, and as a compromise the Constitution counted three-fifths
of all slaves in both taxation and representation. Another was the importation of slaves, which
the parties agreed to allow for another 20 years (until 1808) but not
after. Another was an export tax, which
was forbidden as a concession to the South, which produced most of the nation’s
exports. Finally, copies and
commentaries of the Constitution showed that fugitive slaves, like fugitive
criminals, must be extradited when they crossed state lines. What my school textbooks never mentioned was
perhaps the hottest north-south controversy of all – whether Congress could
regulate foreign trade by a simple majority or a two-thirds vote.
Let us step back and survey the
differences between the North and the South at the time of the Constitutional
Convention. The biggest difference, as
the delegates generally acknowledged, was that the southern states had slaves
and the northern states had no slaves.
But “no slaves” was not meant as literally then as it was in the years
approaching the Civil War. Saying that
the northern states had “no slaves” did not actually mean that slavery was
illegal in the North, or that there were no slaves there whatsoever; it was a
generalization, liking saying (as delegates also did) that the South had no
ships. Ships were legal in the South, of course, and
Southerners did own a few ships, but they did not own enough ships for Southern
shipping to be considered an interest in national politics. It was the same with Northern slaves. By the time of the Constitutional Convention,
slavery had been declared unconstitutional and totally ended in
Massachusetts. The other New England
states and Pennsylvania were in the process of phasing it out. New York and New Jersey would not even begin
phasing out slavery until 1800, and in Delaware slavery was remained legal
until the outbreak of the Civil War, although in practical terms it had almost
completely died out by then. Not everyone divided states into states “with
slaves” and states “without slaves.”
Others divided states into carrying and non-carrying states, i.e.,
states with and without major shipping interests, which would carry imports and
exports.
States could also be further
sub-divided than simply North and South.
Many people divided them into New England (“Eastern”), Mid-Atlantic
(“Middle”) and Southern. The South could
be sub-divided into Upper South and Deep South.
Charles Pinckney divided the states as follows:
(1)
New England, whose major interest are fishing and
shipping (New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island);
(2)
New York, whose main interest was trade and commerce;
(3)
Mid-Atlantic states, whose main exports were wheat and
flour (Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware);
(4)
The Upper South, whose main export was tobacco
(Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina);
(5)
The Deep South, whose main exports were rice and indigo
(South Carolina and Georgia). (Cotton did not become king until several years later).
