George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 10

[357] that he ever reconciled himself to the idea of

Chap. XVII.} 1782.

emancipated black men living side by side with white men as equal sharers in political rights and duties and powers. The result of his efforts and reflections he uttered in these ominous forebodings: ‘Nothing is more certainly written in the book of fate than that these people are to be free; nor is it less certain that the two races, equally free, cannot live in the same government.’

In bondage to these views, Jefferson was not competent to solve the problem; and so early as 1782, in the helplessness of despair, he dismissed it from his thoughts as a practical question, with these words: ‘I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, that his justice cannot sleep for ever. The way, I hope, is preparing under the auspices of Heaven for a total emancipation.’

At that time Washington was a kind and considerate master of slaves, without as yet a title to the character of abolitionist. By slow degrees the sentiment grew up in his mind that to hold men in bondage was a wrong; that Virginia should proceed to emancipation by general statute of the state; that, if she refused to do so, each individual should act for his own household.

Next in order comes Delaware, which on the twentieth of September, 1776, adopted its constitution as

1776.

an independent state. In proportion to its numbers, it had excelled all in the voluntary emancipation of slaves. Its constitution absolutely prohibited the introduction of any slave from Africa, or any slave for sale from any part of the world, as an article which ‘ought never to be violated on any pretence whatever.’