Public sentiment in Virginia was not ready to follow the champions of
individual freedom to the emancipation point, and it refused as
strenuously to be coerced as it did in later years. When the Quakers
of Philadelphia attempted to secure by law the freedom of a body-servant
whom a neighbour of Washington had taken with him on a visit to that
city, the General wrote to his friend, Robert Morris, the wealthy
merchant of Philadelphia, "If the practice of this society, of which
Mr. Dalby speaks, is not discountenanced, none of those whose
_misfortune_ it is to have slaves as attendants, will visit the city
if they can possibly avoid it."
However, the clause which was struck from the Ordinance of 1784 was
not intended to abolish slavery where it already existed, but to prevent
the extension of the system to new territory. It was the forerunner
of a similar controversy which attended every addition to the national
territory as the people spread westwardly, and which eventually became
a strong factor in precipitating the Civil War. The motion to cast out
was made by Spaight, of North Carolina, but Williamson, his colleague,
voted to retain the clause and thus divided the State.
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