"There shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said territory, otherwise than in the punishment of crimes whereof the party shall have been duly convicted: Provided always, That any person escaping into the same, from whom labor or service is lawfully claimed in any one of the original States, such fugitive may be lawfully reclaimed and conveyed to the person claiming his or her labor or service as aforesaid." — Northwest Ordinance, Article VI, July 13, 1787
This article most clearly reveals which feature of the politics of slavery in 1787?
- Acheck_circle
Sectional compromise that simultaneously restricted slavery's expansion and protected slaveholder claims
- B
An emerging national consensus that slavery would soon be abolished everywhere
- C
A complete prohibition on slavery in all territories acquired by the United States
- D
Federal authorization for the international slave trade until 1808
Explanation
The article banned slavery north of the Ohio while explicitly preserving fugitive-slave rendition — a sectional compromise that mirrored the simultaneous Constitutional Convention. There was no abolition consensus, the ban applied only to this territory, and the 1808 slave-trade clause appears in the Constitution, not the Ordinance.