Reflective southerners had long regretted the introduction of black slavery but feared that emancipation would invite race war, at least in areas with substantial black populations. To the economic fear of losing western slave markets was added the physical fear of living amidst an ever-increasing population of potential rebels—“dammed up in a land of slaves,” as Judge Spencer Roane put it.67 Southern statesmen on record as deploring slavery, such as ex-president Jefferson, now found themselves having to argue that it would be better if the institution were diffused thinly into newly settled
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