[5] Not only did Vermont's legislature agree to abolish slavery entirely, it also moved to provide full voting rights for African-American males.

While it did set an independent tone from the 13 colonies, the declaration's wording was vague enough to let Vermont's already-established slavery practices continue."

These settlers, who named the former New Hampshire Grants "Vermont", wished to create a popular government representing their interests, among them abolishing slavery.

This was due to a compilation error; the matter is discussed at some length in The Connecticut River Valley in southern Vermont and New Hampshire; historical sketches, published in 1929.

It is true that the printed report of the United States census of 1790 gave sixteen slaves to Vermont, all of them in Bennington County.

It was not because Vermonters of that day did not know better, for the Vermont Gazette, printed at Bennington by Anthony Haswell, in its issue of Sept. 26, 1791, said, "The return of the marshal's assistant for the county of Bennington shows that there are in the county 2503 white males over sixteen years of age, and 2617 under that age; 5559 white females; 17 black males over 4 and under 16; 15 black females.

However, in historian Ira Berlin's 1998 work Many Thousands Gone: The First Two Centuries of Slavery in North America he cited the 1790 census figure of 16.