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 of others, whose influence and services are incorporated in the history of the republic.

Benjamin Franklin, according to Steuben's account, (see Life of Franklin, by William Temple Franklin,) was President of the Pennsylvania Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery, and as such signed the memorial that was presented to the House of Representatives of the United States, on the 12th of February, 1789, praying that body to exert, to their fullest extent, the power vested in em by the Constitution, in discouraging the traffic human flesh. In the memorial the system of slavery is condemned in the strongest language, and it poses with a most touching and earnest appeal to the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States, "to devise means for removing this consistency from the character of the American people, and to step to the very verge of the power rested in them for discouraging every species of traffic in the persons of our fellow men."

Other memorials were sent in 1791. In the memorial from Connecticut it is stated:

"That the whole system of African slavery is unjust in its nature, impolitic in its principles, and in its consequences ruinous to the industry and enterprise of the citizens of these States."

The memorialists from Pennsylvania say:

"We wish not to trespass on your time by referring to the different declarations made by Congress, on the inalienable