In response to the ongoing
debate in Congress concerning the admission of Missouri as a state and its effect on the existing balance of slave and free states, Tallmadge, an opponent of
slavery, sought to impose conditions on Missouri's statehood that would provide for the eventual termination of legal slavery and the emancipation of current slaves: There were two senators from each state, regardless of its population. The number of seats in the House of Representatives, however, was based on the population of the state, and to complicate matters further, slave states were allowed to count
three fifths of their slave population, which increased their number of representatives. The population of the
North had grown more rapidly than that of the
South, which also had a large percentage of slaves and so resulted in a lower countable populace. Thus, the proposed Tallmadge Amendment was seen as a way to restrict the weight of the slaveholding South in Congress further. Tallmadge delivered an impassioned speech on February 16 in support of his amendment and of
abolitionism in general. By a close vote on the same day, the House adopted the Tallmadge Amendment, but the Senate promptly rejected it.
Congress adjourned on March 4, 1819 without acting on Missouri's request for statehood. Heated discussions on the Tallmadge Amendment and Missouri statehood continued through the summer and the fall. Southerners in Congress asserted that the Tallmadge Amendment was unconstitutional because it put restrictions on states as a condition of admission to the Union. They argued that it was the decision of Missouri, not of Congress, to allow slavery there. The proponents of the Tallmadge Amendment argued that "slavery itself was a moral and political evil that was contrary to the spirit of the
Declaration of Independence, and that it had been tolerated in the
Constitution only by necessity and ought to now be restricted." ==See also==