The Constitution in _form_ if not in fact, pretty fully embodies the sentiments of the Declaration. The word slave is not found in it, and it was kept out not accidentally, but purposely. The framers of the Constitution carefully guarded that instrument against any endorsement of slavery. In the convention which formed the Constitution, Gov. Morris of Pennsylvania said, "He never would concur in upholding domestic slavery. It was a nefarious institution." Mr. Getry, of Massachusetts, in the same convention said, "we had nothing to do with the conduct of the States as to slavery, _but we ought to be very careful not to give any sanction to it_." The idea that there _could_ be property in man was carefully excluded from the Constitution. It was about to be foisted into that instrument by the adoption of a report of a committee fixing a tax on importations. But Mr. _Sherman_ was against "_acknowledging men to be property_, by taxing them as such under the character of slaves." _Madison "thought it wrong to admit in the constitution the idea that there could be property in man."_ But if the idea of property in man was carefully excluded from the Constitution, then it is clear that chattel slavery is not in form recognized, much less established by that instrument. It is evident that the framers of the Constitution expected the speedy abolition of slavery; and hence, while providing in fact though not in form, for its continuance under the constitution, by virtue of _local_ State laws, they so framed that instrument that it would not countenance slavery or deny the glorious doctrines of the immortal Declaration, which contained what Mr. Sumner calls "the national heart, the national soul, the national will, and the national voice."[23] _Washington_ said "That it was among his _first wishes_ to see some plan adopted, by which slavery may be _abolished_ by law." _Adams_ regarded slavery as "a sacrilegious breach of trust." _Hamilton_ considered slaves, "though free by the law of God, held in slavery by the laws of men." _Jefferson_ said that the "abolition of domestic slavery was the greatest object of desire." _Patrick Henry_ said--"I will not, I cannot justify it." _Benj. Franklin_, when 84 years of age, came up before Congress with a petition from the "Abolition Society of Pennsylvania, praying that body to countenance the restoration of liberty to those unhappy men, who alone, in this land of freedom are degraded into perpetual bondage, and who, amidst the general joy of surrounding freemen are groaning in servile subjection." This petition besought Congress to "step to the VERY VERGE of the power vested in them for _discouraging_ every species of traffic in the persons of our fellow men."