Changes

===The Abolition of the Slave Trade===

The abolition of the slave trade to the United States, however, was a wholly different matter. In order to understand that context, it is critical to take note of the changing nature of the economies of slavery in the United States. Critical to this shift was the state of Virginia. There, tobacco planters faced the daunting fact of the depletion of the lands in the Tidewater and Piedmont regions of the state. This left the critical mass of enslaved persons without plants to cultivate and led to the attempt to generate a market of for skilled enslaved laborers and other forms of bonded work. This shifted the locus of enslavement, in some cases, from the rural settings to the cities. The consequence was a lower level of security, as the city became a place to more effectively launch rebellions.

The Virginia delegation then, had much to gain from the abolition of the slave trade. On the one hand, it would staunch the flow of native Africans from the region while opening up an internal market for the movement of enslaved people to the South. The coffle was to replace the slave ship. In order to convince others in the delegations that something needed to be done, antislavery delegates floated the idea of taxing slave ship imports. This was thought to not only increase the coffers of the central government, but to dissuade the destabilizing influence of “saltwater Africans” in the nation. The fugitive slave advertisements were generally full of warnings that such African-born enslaved persons were far more willing to participate in domestic insurrections—the danger of which greatly concerned many of the framers. Ultimately, the idea of taxation fell through. (Perhaps the battles of over taxation with Great Britain were too fresh in their memories).