The reported plan of the executive department was next considered. After much discussion, and several attempts to strike out the ineligibility of the executive a second time, and to change the term of office and the mode of election, these provisions were retained. The report of the committee of the whole, as amended, was accepted by the convention, and, together with the New Jersey plan, and a third drawn by Charles Pinckney, of South Carolina, was referred to a committee of detail, consisting of Messrs. Rutledge, Randolph, Gorham, Ellsworth, and Wilson, who, on August 6th, after an adjournment of ten days, reported the Constitution in proper form, having inserted some new provisions and altered certain others. Our prescribed limits forbid a particular account of the subsequent alterations which the Constitution received before it was finally adopted by the convention. There is one provision, however, which, as it forms one of the great "Compromises of the Constitution," deserves notice. To render the Constitution acceptable to the Southern States, which were the principal exporting States, the committee of detail had inserted a clause providing that no duties should be laid on exports, or on slaves imported; and another, that no navigation act might be passed except by a two-thirds vote. By depriving Congress of the power of giving any preference to American over foreign shipping, it was designed to secure cheap transportation to Southern exports. As the shipping was principally owned in the Eastern States, their delegates were equally anxious to prevent any restriction of the power of Congress to pass navigation laws. All the States, except North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia, had prohibited the importation of slaves; and North Carolina had proceeded so far as to discourage the importation by heavy duties. The prohibition of duties on the importation of slaves was demanded by the delegates from South Carolina and Georgia, who declared that, without a provision of this kind, the Constitution would not receive the assent of these States. The support which the proposed restriction received from other States was given to it from a disposition to compromise, rather than from an approval of the measure itself. The proposition not only gave rise to a discussion of its own merits, but revived the opposition to the apportionment of representatives according to the three-fifths ratio, and called forth some severe denunciations of slavery.