But what is most material to be observed here is, that the plan of government reported by Mr. Jefferson, and acted upon by the Congress at that time, embraced all the “western territory.” It embraced all the “territory ceded, or _to be ceded_, by individual states to the United States.”--See _Journals of Congress, April 23, 1784_. If, then, we leave out Kentucky and Tennessee, as being parts of Virginia and North Carolina, all the residue of the territory north _or south_ of the Ohio river, within the treaty limits of the United States, was intended, by the “Jefferson proviso,” to be rescued from the doom of slavery. For that proviso there were sixteen votes, and only seven against it. Yet so singularly were these seven votes distributed, and so large a majority of the states did it require to pass an act, that it was lost. The whole of the representation from seven states voted for it unanimously. Only two states voted unanimously against it. Had but one of Mr. Jefferson’s colleagues voted with him, and had Mr. Spaight, of North Carolina, voted for it, the restrictive clause in the report would have stood. But a minority of seven from the slaveholding states controlled a majority of sixteen from the free states,--ominous even at that early day of a fate that has now relentlessly pursued us for sixty years. That vote was certainly no more than a fair representation of the feeling of the country against slavery at that time. It was with such a feeling that the “compromises of the constitution,” as they are called, were entered into. Nobody dreaded or dreamed of the extension of slavery beyond its then existing limits. Yet, behold its aggressive march! Besides Kentucky and Tennessee, which I omit, for reasons before intimated, seven new slave states have been added to the Union,--Mississippi, Alabama, Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, Florida, and Texas,--the last five out of territory not belonging to us at the adoption of the constitution; while only one free state, Iowa, has been added during all this time, out of such newly-acquired territory.[2] But there is another fact, which shows that the slaveholders have already had their full share of territory, however wide the boundaries of this country may hereafter become. I have seen the number of _actual slaveholders_ variously estimated; but the highest estimate I have ever seen is _three hundred thousand_. Allowing six persons to a family, this number would represent a white population of eighteen hundred thousand. Mr. GAYLE, of Alabama, interrupted and said: If the gentleman from Massachusetts has been informed that the number of slaveholders is only 300,000, then I will tell him his information is utterly false. Mr. MANN. Will the gentleman tell me how many there are? Mr. GAYLE. Ten times as many.