better use than being given as a bounty to induce white men to enlist,
James Madison suggested that the slaves be liberated and armed.[34] "It
would certainly be consonant to the principles of liberty," said he,
"which ought never to be lost sight of in a contest for liberty." John
Laurens, of South Carolina, was among the first to see the wisdom of this
plan, directed the attention of his coworkers to it, and when authorized
by the Continental Congress, proceeded to his native State, wishing that
he had the persuasive power of a Demosthenes to make his fellow citizens
accept this proposition.[35] In 1779 Laurens said: "I would advance those
who are unjustly deprived of the rights of mankind to a state which would
be a proper gradation between abject slavery and perfect liberty, and
besides I am persuaded that if I could obtain authority for the purpose,
I would have a corps of such men trained, uniformly clad, equipped and
ready in every respect to act at the opening of the next campaign."

All of the colonies thereafter tended to look more favorably upon the
enlistment of colored troops. Free Negroes enlisted in Virginia and so
many slaves deserted their masters for the army that the State enacted in
1777 a law providing that no Negro should be enlisted unless he had a
certificate of freedom.[36] That commonwealth, however, soon took another
step toward greater recognition of the rights of the Negroes who desired
to be free to help maintain the honor of the State. With the promise
of freedom for military service many slaves were sent to the army as
substitutes for freemen. The effort of inhuman masters to force such
Negroes back into slavery at the close of their service at the front
actuated the liberal legislators of that commonwealth to pass the Act of
Emancipation, proclaiming freedom to all Negroes who had thus enlisted
and served their term faithfully, and empowered them to sue _in forma
pauperis_, should they thereafter be unlawfully held in bondage.[37]