Pennsylvania Citizens: Petition to the Assembly of Pennsylvania against the Slave Trade

Document Text

Petition to Prevent Slaves from Being Fitted Out at the Port of Philadelphia

To the Representatives of the Freemen of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, in General Assembly met,

The Representation and Petitions of the SUBSCRIBERS, Citizens of Pennsylvania.

YOUR Petitioners have observed, with great satisfaction, the salutary effects of the Law of this State, passed on the first day of March, 1780, for the “gradual abolition of slavery.”—They have also seen, with equal satisfaction, the progress which the humane and just principles of that Law have made in other States.

They, however, find themselves called upon, by the interesting nature of those principles, to suggest to the General Assembly, that vessels have been publicly equipt in this Port for the Slave Trade, and that several other practices have taken place which they conceive to be inconsistent with the spirit of the Law abovementioned; and that these, and other circumstances relating to the afflicted Africans, do, in the opinion of your Petitioners, require the further interposition of the Legislature.

Your Petitioners therefore earnestly request that you will again take this subject into your serious consideration, and that you will make such additions to the said Law as shall effectually put a stop to the Slave Trade being carried on directly or indirectly in this Commonwealth, and to answer other purposes of benevolence and justice to an oppressed part of the human species.

[1,688 signatures]

 

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Source: The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, vol. 15. Philadelphia: Publication Fund of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, 1891.