The Great Abolition Debate of 1792
Introduction
A false narrative has taken hold about the legacy of Henry Dundas. Fueled by inaccurate information on social media, and at the height of the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020, activists in two cities began to allege that Dundas was instrumental in causing a 15-year delay in the abolition of the slave trade. Edinburgh City Council voted in 2020 to install a plaque with stark factual errors about Dundas’s role in the abolition movement. Toronto City Council adopted Edinburgh’s view, and in 2021 voted to rename its iconic Dundas Street and other locations with the Dundas name.
Both cities ignored important evidence showing that Dundas opposed slavery and supported abolition throughout his political career. He chose a gradual approach to abolition because he believed, with good reason, that it was the only achievable option given the political realities of the day. Three decades later, leading abolitionists admitted he was right. Toronto and Edinburgh, however, insisted that they knew better. They ignored criticism from some of the world’s most eminent historians, who accuse them of getting the facts wrong. They clung to the views of a small minority of modern historians who vilified Dundas.
A careful review of records of proceedings in Parliament, court documents, biographies of key players, and authoritative publications, points to an important truth: Henry Dundas was a moderate, principled, and practical abolitionist.
Analytical Framework
The broad facts are not in dispute: Henry Dundas introduced an amendment to a motion for abolition of the slave trade, and his amendment resulted in the House of Commons resolving that the slave trade should be gradually abolished. It is also not disputed that another15 years passed before Parliament enacted the Anti-Slave Trade Act 1807.
The dispute concerns two questions:
1. Did Henry Dundas’s amendment, which inserted the term “ gradual” into a motion for abolition, cause a 15-year delay in the abolition of the slave trade?
2. Did Henry Dundas intend to obstruct the abolition of the slave trade?
The first question is about causation. In law, causation is proved using the “but for” test. The evidence on this point would have to address the likelihood of Wilberforce’s motion could have resulted in a law to abolish the slave trade in 1792, “but for” Dundas’s amendment for “gradual” abolition. The second question concerns motive or purpose, i.e. Dundas’s moral culpability. The analysis below addresses both.
I. DUNDAS’S HISTORICAL BATTLE TO FREE A SLAVE
In 1776, Henry Dundas was a brilliant young lawyer and member of Parliament who had just been appointed as Scotland’s Lord Advocate — Scotland’s most senior cabinet minister. He made history, however, doing pro bono work on behalf of a Scottish slave — the case of Joseph Knight, an 18-year-old African man who was fighting for freedom in Scottish courts.
Knight had been born to African slaves in Jamaica, and “purchased” as a child by John Wedderburn, a Scottish plantation owner. Wedderburn had recognized in Joseph a certain intelligence. He saw to his education and kept him close. When Wedderburn returned to Scotland, he took Joseph with him, and continued his education while Joseph served the Wedderburn family as a servant.
Years later, Joseph Knight and a household maid fell in love. They married. When his new wife became pregnant, Knight wanted his independence so he could care for his family. Could he be paid wages for his work, and could he live in a separate cottage with his new family? Wedderburn refused. He fired the maid. He threatened to return Knight to Jamaica.
Knight had, however, read about a legal case in England that denied an Englishman the right to send his slave back to a sugar plantation in the West Indies. The case gave him hope, and he planned his escape. Wedderburn discovered the plan, and had him arrested before he could flee. Joseph, however, armed with knowledge of the English decision, was determined to fight for his freedom.
When Henry Dundas stepped forward to lead Knight’s legal team, he was a fellow-traveler with influential members of the Scottish Enlightenment, including Dr Samuel Johnson and James Boswell.[1] The prevailing ideology of the Enlightenment concerned reliance on science and rationality, and belief in the potential of human beings to evolve and better themselves.
When Wedderburn appealed to Scotland’s highest court, Dundas relied on principles of religion and morality. He argued that no matter what the laws of Jamaica said, Dundas Scottish law did not and could not countenance ownership of any human being. He also argued against the very concept of slavery as being valid at law:
Human nature, my Lords, spurns at the thought of slavery among any part of our species.
A decisive majority of the court agreed,[2] and declared that Joseph Knight was a free man. The justices wrote:
…the dominion assumed over this Negro, under the law of Jamaica, being unjust, could not be supported in this country to any extent. […]
Slavery is abolished by the law, or at least by the manners of this country, although in some places it is permitted from reasons of expediency. All rights of subjects in this country must be regulated by the law of this country […].[3]
John Boswell was Samuel Johnson’s eyes and ears at the hearings. Boswell reported back to him:
I cannot too highly praise the speech which Mr. Henry Dundas generously contributed to the cause of the sooty stranger.”
He then went on to say:
Mr. Dundas’s Scottish accent, which has been so often in vain obtruded as an objection to his powerful activities in Parliament, was no disadvantage to him in his own country. And I do declare, that upon this memorable question he impressed me, and I believe all his audience, with such feelings as were produced by some of the most eminent orations of antiquity.[4]
The Court declared in unambiguous terms that no one could be a slave on Scottish soil.
The decision made legal history.[5] Dundas’s critics, however, downplay the importance of this case. They argue that lawyers are hired guns and what they say in court cannot be taken to represent their personal views. They ignore that Dundas volunteered his services at a time when there was little public interest in slavery, and little political capital to be had in backing an anti-slavery position.
Dundas’s passionate advocacy on behalf of Knight is evidence that he held strong sympathies for the plight of enslaved Black people, and that he was prepared to fight for their freedom. This formative experience early in his legal career increases the likelihood that years later, Dundas was sincerely interested in abolishing the slave trade when he introduced his amendment and his subsequent 12-point plan.
II. DUNDAS’S PUBLIC RECORD ON ABOLITION
(1) Dundas proposes an amendment for “gradual” abolition
In early 1792, William Wilberforce — the acknowledged leader of the abolition movement in Britain in the late 18th century — tabled a motion in the House of Commons to abolish the Atlantic slave trade. He faced a monumentally difficult task. A similar motion had gone down to a crushing defeat in 1791 by a vote of 163–88,[1] and powerful opposing forces in Parliament remained.
In 1792, however, the political climate had changed. Hundreds of thousands of British citizens had signed petitions in support of abolition, thanks to the tireless campaigning by William Wilberforce. Nonetheless, members of Parliament were regularly lobbied by those with interests in the slave-based economies in the West Indies (“WI”) that the British economy was heavily dependent on West Indian trade and commerce. Many MPs stood to suffer personal financial setbacks from immediate abolition, and the others were heavily lobbied by those with substantial WI investments. Between 40 and 50 members of Parliament were members of the “Society of West India Planters and Merchants”, a lobby group based in London comprised of direct investors, absentee plantation owners and paid agents who were intent on preserving the slave-based economy in the British colonies.[2] Several peers in the House of Lords were members of the Society. There was, in effect, a virtual wall of opposition against abolition. Even Edmund Burke, a conservative MP who had previously been an ardent supporter of immediate abolition, lost faith, abandoning the goal of immediate abolition, believing that it was impossible to overcome these obstacles.[3]
Historian Dale H. Porter, author of a definitive text on Britain’s abolition movement, assessed the prevailing forces and wrote that Wilberforce’s anti-slave-trade motion in 1792 was heading for a “resounding defeat.”[4]
On April 2, 1792, debate in the Commons lasted through the night into the early hours of the next morning. Dundas was one of the last to speak. This was the first time he would speak publicly about the slave trade, although he noted that several MPs already knew from their private conversation s that he favoured gradual abolition, rather than immediate and “abrupt” abolition:[5]
My honourable friends […] have very known that I have long entertained the same opinion with them as to the Abolition of the Slave Trade, though I have differed from them as to the mode of effecting it. I have felt equally warm with themselves I the pursuit of the general object, and I feel so at the present moment. [6] […]
My opinion has been always against the Slave Trade. I will not, therefore, vote against his motion. I may, however, think it proper to qualify it.[7]
Dundas canvassed the reasons for abolishing the trade, and said:
In all of these great leading questions I concur with my Honourable Friend; it may then be asked, Do you not agree then, to the Abolition of the Trade? I answer, that neither do I differ in this opinion. But, the point of difference between us is this: I cannot help doubting as to the prudence or practicability of the mode of abolishing it, as proposed by my friend.
Dundas then spoke specifically about Wilberforce, personally:
If ever there was a heart purer than any other — if ever there was a man that acted upon the purest motives that ever can actuate human nature, I believe I may justly say that my Honourable Friend is that man; but still, with respect to the prosecution of his object, and the manner which prudence would suggest with a view to the practicability of it, he must excuse my stating that there is a shade of difference between us.
Dundas argued that if Britain abolished the slave trade immediately, it would create a void in the trade, and other countries would rush in to fill the void, and planters would take to smuggling slaves.[8] He said this would be contrary to the humanitarian goals of abolition. Dundas proposed a compromise — a motion for abolition, but by gradual means.[9]
In a radical departure from the approach of Wilberforce and other abolitionists, Dundas also proposed an end to hereditary slavery, i.e. an end to the right slave owners to lay claim to the newborn children of their slaves. Black children were to be educated, and after a period of service to the owners, would be emancipated.
Dundas anticipated “the total annihilation of the slavery of these children.”[10]
Dundas also proposed to mitigate financial harm to British citizens who had invested in the trade at the encouragement of Parliament.[11]
Dundas’s proposal was more than a plan for gradual abolition of the slave trade. Porter observed that Dundas’s plan exceeded the scope of what Wilberforce and others proposed. It would result in total abolition of both slavery and the slave trade:
He meant regulations to improve living conditions and to educate Negro children, so that eventually a society of educated, able, free and loyal native workers would come into being in the West Indies. Dundas was looking far into the future, and he appealed to all men of moderate views to join him in realizing his vision. […]
In a way no abolitionist had dared to do, Dundas had openly explored the long-range prospects of West Indian society. He accepted emancipation (which Wilberforce feared to mention) as the ultimate goal, and argued that abolition [of the slave trade] was only one is a series of measures which ought to be taken to realize it.[12]
Dundas’s motion to amend was adopted by the Commons: 192 in favour, 125 opposed. The resulting motion for gradual abolition then passed with an overwhelming majority: 230 in favour, 85 opposed.[13] [14]
For the first time in history, abolition of the slave trade became the official policy of the House of Commons.
Dundas’s public position, and his reasons for taking that position, exceeded what was necessary if he simply wanted to avoid being labelled as anti-slave-trade. This evidence supports the view that his purpose was to promote the eventual abolition of slavery and the slave trade.
(2) Dundas presents a 12-point plan for gradual abolition
Three weeks later, Dundas returned to the Commons with 12 resolutions to give effect to the plan for gradual abolition. He prefaced his remarks by reiterating his support for abolition in principle:
… Several years ago, he had formed his opinion upon the propriety and justice of the abolition of the trade, and the report of the evidence before the committee of privy council had confirmed him in that opinion.[15]
Dundas noted his discussions with those on both sides of the debate about the appropriate length of the transition period. He said the abolitionists set their outer limit for complete abolition of the slave trade at 5 years, while the West Indian interests said 10 years was the minimum.[16] Dundas settled on January 1, 1800–7.5 years from that day.
Dundas’s 12 resolutions included measures to abolish part of the slave trade immediately.[17] Within a year, no British person or ship would be able to conduct human trafficking with any foreign territories.[18] He explained that this measure alone would immediately eliminate 45% of British involvement in the slave trade.[19]
Other measures would add to this reduction. No British colony would be able to import slaves from America, causing a further diminishment. Ships or companies not already in the trade would be prohibited from entering it, which would cause reduction by attrition. Treaties would be negotiated with other countries involved in the slave trade to prevent them from trafficking with Britain’s West Indian colonies. The measures also would make human trafficking more expensive through additional fees, thereby discouraging the trade.[20] In addition, conditions on ships were to be improved, and children were to be educated. A particularly controversial resolution was to cut off the trafficking of older Africans, who Dundas said tended to suffer from higher rates of disease and fatality and who were less susceptible to education. The plan proposed upper age limits of 20 for females and 25 for males — although he said this particular measure was not essential.[21]
Dundas’s plan also included two critical legislative initiatives: (1) the government would set up a commission to address compensation to the West Indian interests;[22] and (2) it would introduce legislation to provide for enforcement of the new measures.[23] These measures were intended to discourage West Indian interests and slave traders from doing an end-run around the legislation.
Although the Commons had recently voted decisively in favour of a policy of abolition by gradual means, the MPs who supported immediate abolition bitterly condemned Dundas’s 7.5-year plan. Dundas said a shorter deadline for complete abolition could be considered, as long as it was not too short a time since his plan required cooperation of the West Indian legislative assemblies.[25]
On May 1, 1792, the resolutions were again before the house, and the “immediate abolitionists” heavily amended the plan. They shortened the transition period, setting a new deadline of January 1, 1796. They dispensed with many of the remaining resolutions and removed any reference to compensation. They also removed the proposal for encouragement of international treaties to ban the slave trade.
Dundas objected to this gutting of his plan, with its dramatically shorter timeline. Nonetheless, records of debate show he did not vote against it.[26]
At least one of the leaders of the abolition movement was disappointed in the dismantling of Dundas’s plan. Bishop Beilby Porteus, a member of the House of Lords and a prominent advocate for abolition, was especially concerned that the shorter deadline may have destroyed the prospects of success:
This alteration I most sincerely regret, as I fear it will occasion the entire loss of the Question. The term of eight years is a reasonable term and would probably have prevented further opposition. Mr. Dundas himself told me that the West India Planters and Merchants would have acquiesced in the annihilation of the trade in 1800. [27] [28]
As a member of the House of Lords, Porteus was privy to the opinions of the peers. If Porteus believed that Dundas’s plan original plan could have survived a vote in the House of Lords, that is good evidence that there were sufficient numbers of moderates among the Lords to make it possible to achieve a successful vote for gradual abolition.
The abolitionists, however, pushed the House of Lords beyond the limits it would tolerate. The Lords declined to support the amended plan. They decided they needed to hear evidence. After starting hearings on the issue, they adjourned to the next session. The Lords later dropped the matter altogether, effectively quashing it.[29]
(3) The onset of war with France
On January 23, 1793, French revolutionaries beheaded King Louis the 16th. Britain expelled the French ambassador, and on February 1st the new revolutionary government in France declared war on Britain.
Wilberforce was undeterred by the onset of the revolutionary wars. In late 1795, he again proposed a complete end to the slave trade.[30] He argued that because Dundas had originally proposed the plan for gradual abolition, he should now, in 1795, vote for complete abolition of the slave trade by 1 January 1796, ignoring the fact that Dundas’s plan had a target date of 1 January 1800.
Dundas opposed Wilberforce’s motion, although, again, he did not vote against it. By now, Britain had been at war with France for over two years. Dundas noted that with the passage of time and the absence of progress, the former target of 1796 for gradual abolition was now a target for immediate abolition, which he could not support:
The propriety of abolishing the slave trade he thought no man could doubt; and he thought it equally clear that this was not the period for abolition.[31]
Dundas noted the perils of being at war:
All the correspondence between this country and the West Indies proved, that the latter were in a situation that required great caution at home, and every danger was to be apprehended from enemies who were anxious to take every means of distressing us.[32]
Dundas did, however, criticize the West Indian planters for measures they had taken locally to protect themselves from abolition:
He wished to address himself to the merchants and planters. It was said that they were forming combinations in order to prevent at any time the abolition of this trade. Such policy would not only be injurious to the colonies, but must be fatal to the planters themselves. He trusted they would see their own interest, and, guided by a liberal policy, give their support to the cause of humanity and justice.[33]
Dundas also noted the opposition in the House of Lords. An MP who supported immediate abolition had argued that that the Lords should be forced to accept the bill. Dundas pointed out the obvious:
He wished to know how the lords were to be forced? The commons might pass a bill, but were the Lords under more obligations to pass that bill than they were to agree to the resolutions formerly set up? Certainly not.[34]
(4) The potential for economic collapse in the middle of a war
In 1796, Dundas returned to the Commons with financial data to paint a fuller picture of the costs that the abolitionist movement was asking the country to bear. He was able to demonstrate that Britain’s survival while engaged in a war with France, its mortal enemy, was a stake.
At that time 80 per cent of Britain’s foreign income, which helped to fund the British military, came from the West Indies.[37 ] Dundas warned that immediate abolition would trigger economic collapse. Britain’s ability to fund its military forces would be decimated.
Dundas concluded his remarks with a firm rebuke against those who had accused him of obstructing abolition:
The world must decide upon the conduct of those who took different sides upon this great question. The principles of a man were not shown by having fine speeches in his mouth about humanity and justice; they were shown by his conduct.
He trusted he had as much feeling as those who were perpetually talking about it; and he should treat an insinuation to the contrary with the contempt it deserved.[38]
Dundas’s indignant reproach to those who criticized his position went far beyond mere lip service to support for abolition. It shows a man who is losing patience with those who have tainted his reputation, and mis-characterized him as an opponent of abolition.
The proposal for Wilberforce’s 1796 bill was defeated, 70–74.[39] Despite the closeness of the vote, Dundas again declined to vote against the bill.
As he did every time he spoke publicly of abolition of the slave trade, Dundas favoured a moderate and incremental approach as the most effective way to achieve abolition. But as a War Secretary whose foremost responsibility was the security of the country, he was unwilling to risk the potentially destabilizing effect of social and economic reform that would doom the nation to defeat in a war with its mortal enemy.
III. Questions of causation and motive
a. Did Henry Dundas cause a delay in abolishing the slave trade?
It is apparent, that in 1792 Dundas’s amendment for gradual abolition was not the cause of delay in the passage of abolition legislation. It was the gutting of his plan that caused it to fail. By rejecting the incremental approach in Dundas’s 12-point plan, the abolitionists lost their opportunity to win support in the House of Lords.
If Wilberforce had worked with Dundas to implement his 12-point plan, instead of against him, the proposal to abolish the slave trade by the end of the century could well have been underway in 1792, before the onset of war. British involvement in human trafficking to foreign territories could have ended, reducing British involvement by over 45%. Britain could have set itself on a course of complete abolition of the slave trade by the end of the decade.
Dundas was not the cause of delay of the abolition of the slave trade. He was a scapegoat. Among numerous political advantages, making Dundas a scapegoat allowed them to divert attention from their own strategic errors.
(b) Observations on motive
Every time Dundas spoke publicly about the African slave trade, he denounced it. He agreed with the abolitionists that the trade was contrary to humanity and justice. Although detractors accuse Dundas of being personally opposed to abolition, records from that period show not a single instance of him speaking against the principle of abolition, or in favour of slavery or the slave trade. There is also not a single instance of him voting against a motion or bill that was pro-abolition. Dundas was steadfast in his refusal to stand with the slave traders, even when he disagreed with the specific proposals of the abolitionists.
If Dundas was genuinely opposed to abolition in 1792, he did not need to add the word “gradually” to Wilberforce’s motion. He did not need to speak at length about the end of hereditary slavery, the prospect of emancipation, and the existence of a free and educated population of Africans in the West Indies. He did not need to develop and then return to the house with his 12-point plan. If Dundas wanted Wilberforce’s motion to fail, all he had to do was sit back and watch it go down to defeat. Regardless of how the House of Commons might vote, the House of Lords was certain to defeat the motion. Instead, Dundas leaned into the issue. He developed a multi-faceted incremental approach that would alleviate the conditions of slaves while reducing the numbers trafficked, and set the groundwork for emancipation.
When the country was at war, and the West Indies were a central focus of hostilities, Dundas’s caution was warranted. Destabilizing the country through social reforms in the middle of a war would have been reckless. Nonetheless, his public denunciation of the WI plantation owners indicates that he opposed their tactics, despite his cautious approach, and he opposed their goal of defeating abolition altogether.
The consistency of Dundas’s message throughout the 1790’s, and the soundness of his logic, even if one disagreed with him, supports the proposition that Dundas held a genuine intention to work towards gradual abolition of the slave trade. An experienced politician, Dundas knew that substantial reforms take time. They require the building of coalitions, and a willingness to hear from all stakeholders — a reality that is as true today as it was in the late 18th century. Dundas’s 12-point plan demonstrated an attempt to respond to multiple stakeholders, while working towards an achievable goal. Moreover, it is a truism that a time of war not a time for social and economic reform. Dundas had multiple priorities to balance, foremost among them the security of his country. Overall, the evidence from Dundas’s public statements on abolition supports the proposition that his motives were genuinely aligned with seeking the end of the slave trade and of slavery, and that he genuinely believed that the most effective way to seek abolition was to do so gradually.
III. CONCLUSION
Henry Dundas’s thick Scottish accent and expansive, familiar manner sometimes failed to charm the British elite, but he rose quickly to political prominence and fulfilled a role that is crucial to effective governance. He negotiated with political agitators, brought opposing sides together, managed crises, strengthened Scotland’s role in the Union, and delivered results. Such people are essential to the gritty work of governance. They make it possible for visionaries to achieve change that would otherwise be beyond their grasp.
A pragmatic man in all his political endeavours, Dundas also took a pragmatic approach to abolishing the slave trade while avoiding economic collapse. This appears to have resulted in his record on abolition being misunderstood, and therefore misrepresented.
Every time Dundas spoke publicly about slavery he emphasized his abhorrence of it. Even when he disagreed with William Wilberforce, he spoke his mind, sometimes bluntly, but he refused to vote against any measures to achieve abolition of human trafficking.
When Dundas proposed adding the word “gradually” to Wilberforce’s motion in 1792, and persuaded wavering MPs to support it, he achieved something remarkable. He united a decisive majority in the Commons behind a plan to abolish the Atlantic slave trade by the end of the decade. When Wilberforce and his supporters later gutted his plan, they destroyed a critical opportunity to win the support of the House of Lords. The failure of their strategy is theirs alone.
Dundas consistently supported recognition of a broad range of human rights, from the beginning of his political career when he represented Joseph Knight, to later events when he supported gradual abolition, the honouring of agreements with Black Loyalists, and the enfranchisement of Irish Catholics.
When the officers and seamen of the Royal Navy, along with Dundas’s friends, commissioned the Melville Monument more than a decade after his death, they honoured a man who was a towering figure in Scottish history. The commemorated a man whose devotion to his homeland resulted in Scotland taking its place as an equal partner in the British union. When Lieutenant-Governor Simcoe honoured Henry Dundas by naming a military road after him, he recognized the man whose guidance helped to shape the legislation of the first government of Upper Canada, including legislation to abolish slavery. In both cases they honoured a person who lived by the values of the Scottish Enlightenment, and who valued the liberty and potential of every person, of every race.
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Footnotes
SECTION 1
[1] Boswell, James (1851). The Life of Samuel Johnson: Volume III, 1776–1780
[2] Joseph Knight, a Negro, v John Wedderburn, Esq. [1778] Hailes 776 (15 January 1778) (“Knight”) https://www.bailii.org/scot/cases/ScotCS/1778/Hailes020776-0472.html
[3] Knight, supra
[4] Lovat-Fraser, J.A., Henry Dundas, Viscount Melville, Cambridge University Press, 1916, p. 3 (“Lovat-Fraser”) http://ia800903.us.archive.org/32/items/henrydundasvisco00lovauoft/henrydundasvisco00lovauoft.pdf
[5] Ibid.
[6] History of Parliament: British Political, Social and Local History, (published online by a charitable Trust composed principally of members and officers of both Houses of Parliament.) https://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1790-1820/member/dundas-henry-1742-1811#constituency
SECTION II
[1]Cobbett, William, editor, Cobbett’s Parliamentary History — volume 29: Comprising the period from the twenty-second of March 1791, to the thirteenth of December 1792, (“Cobbett, Vol 29) “The Debate on a Motion for the Abolition of the Slave-trade, in the House of Commons, April 11, 1791, Reported in Detail,” p 359 https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/4667b8fd-88e1-4532-abbc-70945bc99a65
[2] O’Shaughnessy, Andrew J. “The Formation of a Commercial Lobby: The West India Interest, British Colonial Policy and the American Revolution.” The Historical Journal, vol. 40, no. 1, 1997, pp. 71–95, at p. 75, www.jstor.org/stable/3020953.
[3] Benedict Der, Edmund Burke and Africa, 1772–1792, Transactions of the Historical Society of Ghana , 1970, Vol. 11 (1970), pp 19–20, (“Edmund Burke and Africa”) http://www.jstor.com/stable/41406356
[4] Porter, Dale H., The Abolition of the Slave Trade, 1784–1807, Archon Books, 1970, at p. 80
[5] Cobbett, Vol 29, p. 1104
[6] The Debate on a Motion for the Abolition of the Slave-trade: In the House of Commons,
[7] Ibid., at pp 97–98 [Emphasis added.]
[8] Cobbett, Vol 29 at p. 1106: https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/6dbc262d-083a-43ca-9d49-fec09c34825b
[9] The Debate on a Motion for the Abolition of the Slave-trade: In the House of Commons,
[10] Cobbett, Vol 29 at p. 1106: https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/6dbc262d-083a-43ca-9d49-fec09c34825b
[11] Cobbett, Vol 29, supra.
[12] Porter, supra, at p. 81 [Emphasis added.]
[13] Debate on April 2, 1792, supra, p. 169. https://books.google.ca/books?id=5xHejAhwH0oC&dq=%22Debate%20on%20a%20Motion%20for%20the%20Abolition%20of%20the%20Slave-trade%22&pg=PA169#v=onepage&q=gradual&f=false
[14] After analyzing the proceedings that day, Porter has calculated that the various factions broke down as follows: 40 abolitionists, 85 anti-abolitionists, and 190 moderates. [Porter, supra, at p. 82]
[15] Cobbett, Vol 29, (supra) at p.1204 https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/553bfcda-f828-45c6-8abe-34a19e10011d
[16] Cobbett, Vol 29, (supra) at p. 1208 — https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/46c46085-6f4e-435d-b0aa-d761333be237
[17] Edmund Burke had assisted Dundas in developing some of the resolutions, including making the conditions on ships healthier and more humane. [Edmund Burke and Africa, supra, p. 22]
[18] Cobbett, Vol 29, p. 1213 https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/611244c2-8e89-40cf-a708-a1e362c0ccbd
[19] Ibid., At p. 1206: https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/f24545f2-f5eb-434f-8320-ab0561e70027 Dundas noted that in 1791, British slavers trafficked 74,000 Africans across the Atlantic, 34,000 of whom were sold to foreign territories.
[20] MacFarlane, Charles, “Narrative of Civil and Military Transactions,” Chapter 1, Pictorial History of England, Being a History of the People, as Well as a History of the Kingdom, Vol III, Charles Knight & Co, London, 1843, at pp 10–11 https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=th48AQAAIAAJ&pg=GBS.PA10
[21] Cobbett, Vol 29, p. 1206–1208 : https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/f24545f2-f5eb-434f-8320-ab0561e70027. See also https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/51ac0037-8501-495e-abdd-715e4cfda55a Dundas noted that the Parliamentary Commission on the slave trade had found that many of the adults who were trafficked were criminals (although he later acknowledged that he had studied this further and the commission evidence may not have been representative of all those who were sold as slaves). He also said that the loss of access to older Africans, which would also reduce trafficking numbers immediately, would induce planters to improve conditions to ensure the health and productivity of the slaves they had. Wilberforce later proposed an upper age limit of 30.
[22] Cobbett, Vol 29, (supra) p. 1208 https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/46c46085-6f4e-435d-b0aa-d761333be237
[23] Ibid., at p. 1211
[24] Cobbett’s, Vol 29 (supra) At 1267 https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/51ac0037-8501-495e-abdd-715e4cfda55a
[25] Ibid., at 1292. https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/902d6d4c-a98f-476e-9a2b-f04eb4ab0c0b
[26] Ibid., at p.1293 https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/f774affa-febd-4543-b2b2-0912c976e00a The Committee also relies on private correspondence from the Archives Officer, Parliamentary Archive, Houses of Parliament, London.
[27] Hague, William, William Wilberforce: The Life of the Great Anti-Slave Trade Campaigner, Harcourt, 2007, at p 236, citing a passage from the diary of Bishop Porteous https://archive.org/details/williamwilberfor00hagu.
[28] The “Society of West India Planters and Merchants” referred to here was comprised of absentee plantation owners and merchants in London, some of whom sat in the House of Common: Parley, Christer, White Fury: A Jamaican Slaveholder and the Age of Revolution, Oxford University Press, Oxford and New York, 2018, at pp 95–96 https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=i1RuDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&dq=White%20Fury%3A%20A%20Jamaican%20Slaveholder%20and%20the%20Age%20of%20Revolution&pg=PA95#v=onepage&q&f=false
[29]Oldfield, J.R., Popular Politics and British Anti-slavery: The Mobilisation of Public Opinion Against the Slave Trade, 1787- 1807 , Routledge, London and New York, 1998 at p. 185 https://books.google.ca/books?id=9PtANRpT--8C&lpg=PP1&dq=Popular%20Politics%20and%20British%20Anti-slavery%3A%20The%20Mobilisatition%20of%20Public&pg=PA185#v=onepage&q=massive%20petition%20campaign&f=false
[30] Cobbett, Vol 31, at p. 1321 https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/3ce25bd3-d6ad-43c5-83e4-4996bd947f7a
[31] Cobbett, Vol 31, at 1340–41 https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/3ca8c767-af0d-4ff9-b08f-3caef647fc62
[32] Cobbett, Vol 31, supra
[33] Ibid.
[34] Cobbett, Vol 31, supra. p. 1340
[35] Cobbett, Vol 32, at p. 878 https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/eb10f152-460d-44de-bf5e-282e043066d3
[36] https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/monetary-policy/inflation/inflation-calculator Other methodologies show the present value of £20 million in 1796 as ranging from £1.9 billion to £171 billion https://www.measuringworth.com/calculators/ukcompare/
[37] Hague, supra at p. 119
[38] Ibid., at p. 881 https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/bb0e570d-694e-4cd5-b821-2b795593d4b9
[39] Ibid., at 901. https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/inquire/p/b63c9c89-c6c3-419a-9de7-d569e86fbc67
