Tempest at Dawn (57 page)

“
A slaveholder and Virginian?” Morris
threw his arms out.

“
Gouverneur, I’ll not jeopardize the
entire Constitution on this issue.”

With that, Morris swallowed the last of his
tea and lurched onto his wooden leg. “Thank you, James. I shall
count on you.”

On Wednesday they were supposed to
take up the qualifications required to be a member of Congress.
King asked for the floor and walked to the front of the chamber. He
stood silently for a long time, gathering attention. When he
started, he spoke slowly. “The issue of slavery grates on me. I’ve
previously not made a strenuous objection because I hoped this
convention would restrict the vice.”

The best orator in the chamber had
launched the first salvo to reignite the slave trade question.
Again, Madison wished he had a seat that allowed him to see the
reaction of the delegates. Glancing up, he noticed a twinge of
disapproval on Washington’s face.

King walked in a measured pace across the front of
the chamber, shaking his head like a man perplexed. “There is so
much inequality in all this. I had hoped some accommodation might
take place.”

King stopped his pacing, as if
coincidentally, in front of the South Carolina table. He suddenly
waved the committee report over his head and spoke in a voice that
shook the chamber. “This report is an abomination. Slaves are
represented. The importation of slaves cannot be prohibited or even
taxed. Exports cannot be taxed. I ask, is this reasonable?” King
slapped the report onto the South Carolina table. “The South cannot
have it all!”

Madison saw Rutledge bristle. “I
don’t know where you got this idea that slaves are represented.
That’s foolishness.”

“
I read it in the report!” King boomed. “Do
not fifteen slaves have the same representation as twenty-five
freemen?”

Instead of answering, Rutledge
crossed his arms against his chest and glared until King marched
back to his seat.

Sherman asked for the floor. “The
point of representation has been settled. As for the slave trade, I
consider it sinful but don’t believe myself bound on the issue.
That is my position on the matter.”

Madison was stunned by Sherman’s
feeble response, but before he could think it through, Washington
banged his gavel. “Delegates, confine your comments to the
report—in sequence. We’ll consider the entire report in due
course.” He ended this order with a single sharp rap of the
gavel.

The next section set the ratio of
one representative per forty thousand “inhabitants.”

“
I move to
insert
free
before the word
inhabitants
.” When Gouverneur Morris
uttered this incendiary sentence, Madison sensed a silent gasp from
the delegates. Morris had had the effrontery to ignore Washington’s
admonition and return the debate to slavery. Morris stood but did
not bang his wooden leg. With a sad note in his voice, he said,
“Rather than saddle posterity with a Constitution that tolerates
slavery, I’d sooner pay a tax to free every
Negro.”

Madison scribbled in increasing
agitation. He knew Morris would not relent on the slave issue,
which meant that everything closed could be reopened. Madison
wondered if the leaves would turn color as he sat in this chair.
Then a horrible thought struck him. He cringed at the thought of
seeing snow piled on the windowsill.

As Madison entered the Indian
Queen, he asked the doorman to send tea and a barber to his room.
When he entered his quarters, he laid his valise on the bed and
collapsed into the easy chair. This was a dangerous moment. Things
could easily go astray. After a few minutes, he decided to seek
help. He had ridden events ever since Sherman engineered a
successful challenge to the Virginia Plan, but he vowed to assert
himself. He wouldn’t allow his dream to be dashed because of
passivity.

He hoped the knock at the door
meant his tea had arrived but discovered the barber
instead.

“
Come in.”

“
Thank you, sir.” The barber looked around and
said, “May I move the chair nearer the light?”

“
Of course.”

He picked up a ladder-back chair and set it
carefully by the window. As Madison took a seat, the barber asked,
“How would you like it cut?”

“
Short. Crop it short enough to feel a breeze
on my head.”

“
And where will you find this
breeze?”

“
I shall find it in the bluster of my fellow
delegates.”

Chapter 33

Sherman stared at a small ship supposedly powered by
steam instead of wind. The polished brass machinery looked heavier
than a printing press and seemed to take up the entire deck. He
thought it a poor idea.

“
Absolutely brilliant.” Ellsworth looked like
a child who had just peered through his first telescope. “I must
meet the inventor.”

Sherman, Ellsworth, and Dickinson stood at the
midpoint of a narrow dock that extended into the Delaware River. It
felt like a parade, with about thirty men shoulder to shoulder on
the dock and hundreds more on shore. John Fitch had brought his
steam-powered ship to Philadelphia to impress the delegates and
garner investors. The steam engine supposedly used twelve powered
oars, six to a side, to propel the boat without sails. Sherman
thought the wind undependable but easier to gather than a cord of
wood.

He shifted his stance a bit wider to balance against
the rolling dock. “We’ve not yet formed our government, and the
rapacious already want to pillage the public treasury.”

“
Fitch wants private investors,” Ellsworth
said.

“
Then why did he bring his novelty to
us?”

Sherman felt Dickinson’s hand on his shoulder. “In
case you haven’t noticed, most of the rich are here.”

“
Just because something can be done, doesn’t
mean it should be done. Ships move cargo.” Sherman looked at
Ellsworth. “That metal barrel with its levers, treadles, and cranks
takes all the space and tonnage. Water is plentiful in the
Atlantic, but trees are scarce.” Ellsworth and Dickinson laughed,
trading a knowing glance. “Could you gentlemen explain the humor in
my comments?”

Dickinson squeezed Sherman’s shoulder. “Roger, you
may be inscrutable in chamber, but you’re predictable outside.”

“
You think this has merit?” Sherman said in
disbelief.

Ellsworth swept his arm across the ship. “Fitch
proposes his steamship for the Mississippi River. Environs with
plenty of trees, if I recollect.”

Dickinson used his foot to caress the gunwale.
“Innovations like this will increase the value of western
lands.”

Sherman grunted. “Driving the Spanish from our
frontier will—”

A loud voice yelled, “All those game, climb aboard!
We’ll push off in a moment.”

Ellsworth immediately squeezed onto a deck crowded
with an unbelievable menagerie of rods, tubes, and struts. Madison
suddenly exploded from the crowd and slipped on the wet wood as he
tried to board. Sherman gripped him by the scruff of his coat and
gave a gentle tug that righted the little man squarely on the
ship’s deck. Madison beamed. “Thanks. Aren’t you coming?”

“
I’ll forego the experience, but I’ll expect a
report.”

Seamen pushed the boat away with long poles and let
it drift until it slipped a dozen yards into the river. About a
dozen delegates had jumped aboard for the promised ride against the
river’s current. Suddenly, the weird boat issued a deep-throated
growl that made conversation impossible. Twelve oars thrashed the
water, lifted, and then thrashed again, until the river was a
carpet of white foam. Despite a deafening roar and a frenzied
whipping of the river, Sherman guessed the boat moved at less than
two knots.

Turning to Dickinson, he shouted, “Let’s step
away.”

When they reached the shore, Dickinson was laughing
uproariously. “I believe that thrashing may kill all the fish
within a hectare.”

Sherman took a moment to catch his breath and
suppress his own laughter. “Now I know what prompted Fitch to bring
his boat to us. He spotted a kindred spirit in our braying and
pointless thrashing.”

Gouverneur Morris opened Thursday’s session with a
motion to require senators to be citizens for fourteen years.

Surprisingly, Butler backed the motion. “I oppose
foreigners in the Senate. I was called to public life within a
short time after coming to America, but my foreign attachments
should have made me ineligible.”

Madison said, “The parts of America that encourage
emigration advance faster in population, prosperity, and the arts.
The issue is negligible, because foreigners are rarely elected to
office.”

Gerry jumped in. “Eligibility ought to be restricted
to native-born Americans. Otherwise, foreigners will infiltrate our
councils and meddle in our affairs. Everyone knows the vast sums
Europe lays out for secret services.”

Wilson reminded Sherman of a neglected stew pot
ready to spew. “I’m not a native, and if these ideas are approved,
I’ll be ineligible to hold office under the Constitution I’m
entrusted to write. I’d feel humiliated.”

Gouverneur Morris thumped his leg and said, in a
snit, “Reason, not feelings, man. We should never strive to be
polite at the expense of good sense. Some Indian tribes carry their
hospitality so far as to offer their wives and daughters to
strangers. I’ll admit foreigners into my home, invite them to my
table, provide them with lodging, but I don’t carry hospitality so
far as to bed them with my wife.”

Morris limped across the front of the chamber but
kept his eyes on Wilson. “The privileges we allow foreigners exceed
those in any other part of the world. As for those philosophical
‘citizens of the world,’ I don’t want them in public councils. I
don’t trust a man who shakes off attachment to his country.”

Gouverneur Morris plopped into his chair with a
finality that conveyed his firmness, but his motion to extend the
citizenship requirement to fourteen years failed. Someone
immediately made a motion for thirteen years, which also failed.
Then a motion for ten years failed. Finally, a motion for nine
years passed.

Pinckney again raised the
issue of property requirements. “The members of the legislature,
the executive, and judges should possess enough property to make
them independent. If I were to fix an amount, I should think not
less than one hundred thousand dollars for the president and half
that sum for judges and members of Congress.”

Franklin spoke in a lilting voice as he gently
scolded Pinckney. “If honesty always accompanied wealth, then I’d
agree with my illustrious colleague from South Carolina, but some
of the greatest rogues I know are rich.”

Sherman wondered if Pinckney’s idea would have found
acceptance if he had prescribed a more reasonable property
requirement. One hundred thousand dollars would have prevented many
men in the chamber from seeking the presidency.

“
Morris hit Wilson hard today.”

Sherman tilted the book he was reading so he could
see Ellsworth. “Don’t step into a family feud.”

“
Family?” Ellsworth asked.

“
Political family. Morris and Wilson tussle
for leadership of Pennsylvania.”

The two men sat on chairs they had hauled to Mrs.
Marshall’s backyard. Sherman had strategically placed his chair so
he could rest his legs on the stump of an elm, which in its day
must have been a magnificent tree. He briefly lamented its foregone
shade but appreciated the utility of the carcass.

Ellsworth broke his reverie. “What about
Franklin?”

“
Franklin devotes his time and fortune to
Philadelphia. He leaves the state to younger men.”

After fiddling with his snuff, Ellsworth said, “So
Morris took umbrage that Wilson didn’t follow his lead on
citizenship.”

“
And Wilson didn’t like Morris trying to
exclude him from national office.”

“
You didn’t take offense when Pinckney tried
to exclude you.”

“
Pinckney’s motion was flummery.”

“
How rich do you think he is?”

“
Somewhere in excess of one hundred thousand
dollars,” Sherman said distractedly.

Ellsworth laughed. “Indeed.” After a moment, he
mused, “We must be nearing the end.”

Sherman dropped his book again. “Why do you say
that?”

“
Because Morris tried to exclude his
competitor from national office, and Pinckney tried to exclude all
but the crème de la crème. The ambitious already assume a new
government.”

“
Why, Mr. Ellsworth, you embarrass me. I was
so engrossed in this book, I missed that.”

Ellsworth beamed at the roundabout praise. “What’re
you reading?”

“
Robinson Crusoe
.”

“
You like it?”

“
No.”

“
It’s very popular.”

“
It is popular because it’s a tale well told.
I object to the underlying message. It means to teach religious
tolerance, but it goes too far.”

“
Too far?”

“
It preaches that all religions are
equal.”

“
I can see why you’d have difficulty with
that.”

“
As would anyone devout.”