SECTION II. SECTION II. 
English farmers settling in the United States used to be ajoke to their native neighbours. The Englishman began withlaughing, or being shocked, at the slovenly methods ofcultivation employed by the American settlers: he was next seento look grave on his own account; and ended by following theAmerican plan.
The American ploughs round the stumps of the trees he hasfelled, and is not very careful to measure the area he ploughs,and the seed he sows. The Englishman clears half the quantity ofland,-- clears it very thoroughily; ploughs deep, sows thick,raises twice the quantity of grain on half the area of land, andpoints proudly to his crop. But the American has, meantime,fenced, cleared, and sown more land, improved his house andstock, and kept his money in his pocket. The Englishman has paidfor the labour bestowed on his beautiful fields more than hisfine crop repays him. When he has done thus for a few seasons,till his money is gone, he learns that he has got to a placewhere it answers to spend land to save labour; the reverse of hisexperience in England; and he soon becomes as slovenly a farmeras the American, and begins immediately to grow rich.
lt would puzzle a philosopher to compute how long someprejudices will subsist in defiance of, not only evidence, butpersonal experience. These same Americans, who laugh (reasonablyenough) at the prejudiced English farmer, seem themselvesincapable of being convinced on a point quite as plain as thatbetween him and themselves. The very ground of their triumph overhim is their knowledge of the much smaller value of land, andgreater value of labour, in America than in England: and yet,there is no one subject on which so many complaints are to beheard from every class of American society as the immigration offoreigners. The incapacity of men to recognise blessings indisguise has been the theme of moralists in all ages: but itmight be expected that the Americans, in this case, would be anexception. It is wonderful, to a stranger, to see how they fretand toil, and scheme and invent, to supply the deficiency ofhelp, and all the time quarrel with the one means by which labouris brought to their door. The immigration of foreigners was theone complaint by which I was met in every corner of the freeStates; and I really believe I did not converse with a dozenpersons who saw the ultimate good through the present apparentevil.
It is not much to be wondered at that gentlemen and ladies,living in Boston and New York, and seeing, for the first time intheir lives, half-naked and squalid persons in the street, shouldask where they come from, and fear lest they should infect otherswith their squalor, and wish they would keep away. It is not muchto be wondered at that the managers of charitable institutions inthe maritime cities should be weary of the claims advanced byindigent foreigners: but it is surprising that these gentlemenand ladies should not learn by experience that all this endswell, and that matters are taking their natural course. It wouldcertainly be better that the emigrants should be well clothed,educated, respectable people; (except that, in that case, theywould probably never arrive;) but the blame of their badcondition rests elsewhere, while their arrival is, generallyspeaking, almost a pure benefit. Some are intemperate andprofligate; and such are, no doubt, a great injury to the citieswhere they harbour; but the greater number show themselves decentand hardworking enough, when put into employment. Every Americanacknowledges that few or no canals or railroads would be inexistence now, in the United States, but for the Irish labour bywhich they have been completed: and the best cultivation that isto be seen in the land is owing to the Dutch and Germans itcontains. What would housekeepers do for domestic service withoutforeigners? If the American ports had been barred againstimmigration, and the sixty thousand foreigners per annum, withall their progeny, had been excluded, where would now have beenthe public works of the United States, the agriculture, theshipping?
The most emphatic complainers of the immigration of foreignersare those who imagine that the morals of society suffer thereby.My own conviction is that the morals of society are, on thewhole, thereby much improved. It is candidly allowed, on allhands, that the passion of the Irish for the education of theirchildren is a great set-off against the bad qualities some ofthem exhibit in their own persons; and that the second and thirdgenerations of Irish are among the most valuable citizens of therepublic. The immigrant Germans are more sober and respectablethan the Irish; but there is more difficulty in improving themand their children. The Scotch are in high esteem. My own opinionis that most of the evils charged upon the immigrants arechargeable upon the mismanagement of them in the ports. Theatrocious corruption of the New York elections, where anIrishman, just landed, and employed upon the drains, perjureshimself, and votes nine times over, is chargeable, not uponimmigration, nor yet upon universal suffrage, but upon faults inthe machinery of registration. Again, if the great pauper-palace,over the Schuylkill, near Philadelphia, be half full offoreigners; if it be true that an Irish woman was seen to walkround it, and heard to observe that she should immediately writeover for all her relations; the evil is chargeable upon therebeing a pauper-palace, with the best of food and clothing, and nocompulsion to work, in a country where there is far more work andwages than there are hands to labour and earn. There is in NewYork a benevolent gentleman who exercises a most useful andeffectual charity. He keeps a kind of registry office for thedemand and supply of emigrant labour; takes charge of the fundsof such emigrants as are fortunate enough to have any; andbefriends them in every way. He declares that he has an averageof six situations on his list ready for every sober, able-bodiedman and woman that lands at New York.
The bad moral consequences of a dispersion of agriculturallabour, and the good moral effects of an adequate combination,are so serious as to render it the duty of good citizens toinform themselves fully of the bearings of this question beforethey attempt to influence other minds upon it. Those who haveseen what are the morals and manners of families who live alonein the wilds, with no human opinion around them, no neighbourswith whom to exchange good offices, no stimulus to mentalactivity, no social amusements, no church, no life, nothingbut the pursuit of the outward means of living,--any one who haswitnessed this will be ready to agree what a blessing it would beto such a family to shake down a shower of even poor Irishlabourers around them. To such a family no tidings ought to bemore welcome than of the arrival of ship-load after ship-load ofimmigrants at the ports, some few of whom may wander hitherwards,and by entering into a combination of labour to obtain means ofliving, open a way to the attainment of the ends. Sixty thousandimmigrants a-year! What are these spread over so many thousandsquare miles? If the country could be looked down upon from aballoon, some large clusters of these would be seen detained inthe cities, because they could not be spared into the country;other clusters would be seen about the canals and railroads; anda very slight sprinkling in the back country, where theirstations would be marked by the prosperity growing up aroundthem.
The expedients used in the country settlements to secure acombination of labour when it is absolutely necessary, show howeminently deficient it is. Every one has heard of the"frolic" or "bee," by means of which theclearing of lots, the raising of houses, the harvesting of cropsis achieved. Roads are made, and kept by contributions of labourand teams, by settlers. For the rest, what can be done by familylabour alone is so done, with great waste of time, material, andtoil. The wonderful effects of a "frolic," in everyway, should serve, in contrast with the toil and difficultyusually expended in producing small results, to incline thehearts of settlers towards immigrants, and to plan how anincrease of them may be obtained.
Minds are, I hope, beginning to turn in this direction. In NewEngland, where there is the most combination of labour, and thepoorest land, it is amusing to see the beginning of discoverieson this head. I find, in the United States' Almanack for 1835, anarticle on agricultural improvements, (presupposing a supply oflabour as the primary requisite,) which bears all the marks offreshness and originality, of having been a discovery of thewriter's.
"If such improvements as are possible, or eveneasy," (where there is labour at hand,) "were made inthe husbandry of this country, many and great advantages would befound to arise. As twice the number of people might be supportedon the same quantity of land, all our farming towns would becometwice as populous as they are likely to be in the present stateof husbandry. There would be, in general, but half the distanceto travel to visit one's friends and acquaintances. Friends mightoftener see and converse with each other. Half the labour wouldbe saved in carrying the corn to mill, and the produce to market;half the journeying saved in attending our courts; and half theexpense in supporting government, and in making and repairingroads; half the distance saved in going to the smith, weaver,clothier, &c.; half the distance saved in going to publicworship, and most other meetings; for where steeples are fourmiles apart, they would be only two or three. Much time, expenseand labour would, on these accounts, be saved; and civilisation,with all the social virtues, would, perhaps, be proportionallypromoted and increased."
Before this can be done, there must be hands to do it.Steeples must remain four or fourteen miles apart, till there arebeings enough in the intervening space to draw them together. Isaw, on the Mississippi, a woman in a canoe, paddling up againstthe stream; probably, as I was told, to visit a neighbour twentyor thirty miles off. The only comfort was that the current wouldbring her back four times as quickly as she went up. What ablessing would a party of emigrant neighbours be to a woman whowould row herself twenty miles against the stream of theMississippi for cornpanionship!
Instead of complaining of the sixty thousand emigrants perannum, and lowering the price of land, so as to inducedispersion, it would be wise, if it were possible, in the peopleof the United States to bring in sixty thousand more labourersper annum, and raise the price of land. This last cannot,perhaps, be done: but why should not the other? With a surplusrevenue that they do not know what to do with, and a scarcity ofthe labour which they do not know how to do without, why not usethe surplus funds accruing from the lands in carrying labour tothe soil?
It is true, Europeans have the same passion for land as theAmericans; and such immigrants would leave their employers, andbuy for themselves, as soon as they had earned the requisitefunds: but these, again, would supply the means of bringing overmore labour; and the intermediate services of the labourers wouldbe so much gained. If the arrangements were so made as to bringover sober, respectable labourers, without their being in any waybound to servitude, (as a host of poor Germans once were madewhite slaves of,) if, the land and labour being once broughttogether, and repayment from the benefited parties being secured,(if desired,) things were then left to take their natural course,a greater blessing could hardly befal the United States than suchan importation of labourers.
I was told, in every eastern city, that it was a commonpractice with parish officers in England to ship off theirpaupers to the United States. I took some pains to investigatethe grounds of this charge, and am convinced that it is amistake; that the accusation has arisen out of some insulatedcase. I was happy to be able to show my American friends how thesupposed surplus population of the English agricultural countieshas shrunk, and in some cases disappeared, under the operation ofthe new Poor Law, so that, even if the charge had ever been true,it could not long remain so. By the time that we shall be enabledto say the same of the parishes of Ireland, the Americans will,doubtless, have discovered that they would be glad of all thelabourers we had ever been able to spare; if only we could sendthem in the form of respectable men and women, instead of squalidpaupers, looking as if they were going from shore to shore, torouse the world to an outcry against the sins and sorrows of oureconomy.
It will scarcely be credited by those who are not alreadyinformed on the subject, that a proposition has been made to sendout of the country an equal number of persons to the amountbrought into it; ship loads of labourers going to and fro, likebuckets in a well: that this proposition has been introduced intoCongress, and has been made the basis of appropriations in someState legislatures: tbat itinerant lecturers are employed toadvocate the scheme: that it is preached from the pulpit, andsubscribed for in the churches, and that in its behalf areenlisted members of tbe administration, a great number of theleading politicians, clergy, merchants, and planters, and a largeproportion of the other citizens of the United States. It matterslittle how many or how great are the men engaged in behalf of abad scheme, which is so unnatural that it cannot but fail:--itmatters little, as far as the scheme itself is concerned; but itis of incalculable consequence as creating an obstruction. Foritself, the miserable abortion--the Colonisation scheme--might bepassed over; for its active results will be nothing; but it isnecessary to refer to it in its passive character of anobstruction. It is necessary to refer thus to it, not only as amatter of fact, but because, absurd and impracticable as thescheme clearly is, when viewed in relation to the whole state ofaffairs in America, it is not so easy on the spot to discern itstrue character. So many perplexing considerations are mixed upwith it by its advocates; so many of those advocates are menof earnest philanthropy, and well versed in the details of thescheme, while blind to its general hearing, that it is difficultto have general principles always in readiness to meet opposingfacts; to help adopting the partial views of well-meaning andthoroughly persuaded persons; and to know where to doubt, andwhat to disbelieve. I went to America extremely doubtful aboutthe character of this institution. I heard at Baltimore andWashington all that could be said in its favour, by personsconversant with slavery, which I had not then seen. Mr. Madison,the President of the Colonisation Society, gave me his favourableviews of it. Mr. Clay, the Vice-President, gave me his. So didalmost every clergyman and other member of society whom I met forsome months. Much time, observation, and reflection werenecessary to form a judgment for myself, after so muchprepossession, even in so clear a case as I now see this to be.Others on the spot must have the same allowance as was necessaryfor me: and, if any pecuniary interest be involved in thequestion, much more. But, I am firmly persuaded that anyclear-headed man, shutting himself up in his closet for a day'sstudy of the question, or taking a voyage, so as to be able tolook back upon the entire country he has left,-- being careful totake in the whole of its economical aspect, (to say nothing, atpresent, of the moral,) can come to no other conclusion than thatthe scheme of transporting the coloured population of the UnitedStates to the coast of Africa is absolutely absurd; and, if itwere not so, would be absolutely pernicious. But, in matters ofeconormy, the pernicious and the absurd are usually identical.
No one is to be blamed for the origin of slavery. Because itis now, under conviction, wicked, it does not follow that it wasinstituted in wickedness. Those who began it, knew not what theydid. It has been elsewhere1 ably shown how slavery hasalways, and, to all appearance, unavoidably existed, in some formor other, wherever large new tracts of land have been takenpossession of by a few agricultural settlers. Let it be grantedthat negro slavery was begun inadvertently in the West Indiaislands, and continued, by an economical necessity, in thecolonies of North America.
What is now the state of the case? Slavery, of a very mildkind, has been abolished in the northern parts of the Union,where agricultural labour can be carried on by whites, and wheresuch employments bear a very reduced proportion to manufacturingand commercial occupations. Its introduction into thenorth-western portions of the country has heen prohibited bythose who had had experience of its evils. Slavery, generally ofa very aggravated character, now subsists in thirteen States outof twenty-six, and those thirteen are the States which grow thetobacco, rice, cotton and sugar; it being generally alleged thatrice and sugar cannot be raised by white labour, while somemaintain that they may. I found few who doubted that tobacco andcotton may be grown by white labour, with the assistance frombrute labour and machinery which would follow upon the disuse ofhuman capital. The amount of the slave population is now abovetwo millions and a half. It increases rapidly in the States whichhave been impoverished by slavery; and is killed off, but notwith equal rapidity, on the virgin soils to which alone it is, inany degree, appropriate. It has become unquestionablyinappropriate in Maryland, Delaware, Virginia, and Kentucky. Tothese I should be disposed to add Missouri, and North Carolina,and part of Tennessee and South Carolina. The States which havemore slave labour than their deteriorated lands require, sell itto those which have a deficiency of labour to their rich lands.Virginia, now in a very depressed condition, derives her chiefrevenue from the rearing of slaves, as stock, to be sent toAlabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana. The march of circumstancehas become too obvious to escape the attention of the mostshort-sighted. No one can fail to perceive that slavery, like anarmy of locusts, is compelled to shift its place, by thedesolation it has made. Its progress is southwards; and now,having reached the sea there, south-westwards. If there were butan impassable barrier there, its doom would be certain, and notvery remote. This doom was apparently sealed a while ago, by theabolition of slavery in Mexico, and the fair chance there seemedof Missouri and Arkansas being subjected to a restriction of thesame purport with that imposed on the new States, north-west ofthe Ohio. This doom has been, for the present, cancelled by theadmission of slavery into Missouri and Arkansas, and by theseizure of Texas by American citizens. The open question,however, only regards its final limits. Its speedy abolition inmany of the States may be, and is, regarded as certain.
The institution of slavery was a political anomaly at the timeof the Revolution. It has now become an economical one also.Nothing can prevent the generality of persons from seeing this,however blind a few, a very few persons on the spot may be to thetruth.2
It has thus obviously become the interest of all to whomslavery still is, or is believed to be, a gain; of those who holdthe richest lands; of those who rear slaves for such lands; ofall who dread change; of all who would go quietly through life,and leave it to a future generation to cope with theirdifficulty,--it has become the interest of all such to turn theirown attention and that of others from the fact that the time hascome when the slaves ought to be made free labourers. They cannotput down the fact into utter silence. Some sort of compromisemust be made with it. A tub must be thrown to the whale. A tubhas been found which will almost hold the whale.
It is proposed by the Colonisation Society that free personsof colour shall be sent to establish and conduct a civilisedcommunity on the shores of Africa. The variety of prospects heldout by this proposition to persons of different views isremarkable. To the imaginative, there is the picture of therestoration of the coloured race to their paternal soil: to thereligious, the prospect of evangelising Africa. Those who wouldserve God and Mammon are delighted at being able to work theirslaves during their own lives, and then leave them to theColonisation Society with a bequest of money, (when money mustneeds be left behind,) to carry them over to Africa. Those whowould be doing, in a small way, immediately, let certain of theirslaves work for wages which are to carry them over to Africa.Those who have slaves too clever or discontented to be safeneighbours, can ship them off to Africa. Those who are afraid ofthe rising intelligence of their free coloured neighbours, orsuffer strongly under the prejudice of colour, can exercise suchsocial tyranny as shall drive such troublesome persons to Africa.The clergy, public lecturers, members of legislatures, religioussocieties, and charitable individuals, both in the north andsouth, are believed to be, and believe themselves to be,labouring on behalf of slaves, when they preach, lecture, obtainappropriations, and subscribe, on behalf of the ColonisationSociety. Minds and hearts are laid to rest,--opiated into a falsesleep.
Here are all manner of people associated for one object, whichhas the primary advantage of being ostensibly benevolent. It hashad Mr. Madison for its chief officer: Mr. Clay for its second.It has had the aid, for twenty years, of almost all the pressesand pulpits of the United States, and of most of theirpoliticians, members of government, and leading professional menand merchants, and almost all the planters of twelve states, andall the missionary interest. Besides the subscriptions arisingfrom so many sources, there have been large appropriations madeby various legislatures. What is the result? --Nothing. Exnihilo nihil fit. Out of a chaos of elements noorderly creation can arise but by the operation of a soundprinciple: and sound principle here, there is none.
In twenty years, the Colonisation Society has removed toAfrica between two and three thousand persons;3 whiletbe annual increase of the slave population is, by the lowestcomputation, sixty thousand; and the number of free blacks isupwards of three hundred and sixty-two thousand.
The chief officers of the Colonisation Society look forward tobeing able, in a few years, to carry off the present annualincrease, and a few more; by which time the annual increase willamount to many times more than the Society will have carried outfrom the beginning.
The leading Colonisation advocates in the south objectto abolition, invariably on the ground that they should be leftwithout labourers: whereas it is the Colonisation scheme whichwould carry away the labourers, and the abolition scheme whichwould leave them where they are. To say nothing of the wilfulnessof this often-confuted objection, it proves that those who urgeit are not in earnest in advocating Colonisation as ultimateemancipation.
As far as I could learn, no leading member of the ColonisationSociety has freed any of his slaves. Its president had soldtwelve, the week before I first saw him. Its vice-president is obsedeby his slaves; but retains them all. And so it is, through thewhole hierarchy.
The avowal of a southern gentleman,--"We have our slaves,and we mean to keep them,"--is echoed on political occasionsby the same gentlemen of the Colonisation Society, who, on politicor religious occasions, treat of colonisation as ultimateemancipation.
While labourers are flocking into other parts of the country,at the rate of sixty thousand per annum, and are found to be fartoo few for the wants of society, the Colonisation schemeproposes to carry out more than this number; and fails of all itsostensible objects till it does so. A glance at the causes ofslavery, and at the present economy of the United States, showssuch a scheme to be a bald fiction.
It alienates the attention and will of the people, (for thepurposes of the few,) from the principle of the abolition ofslavery, which would achieve any honest objects of theColonisation Society, and many more. Leaving, for the present,the moral consideration of the case, abolition would not onlyleave the land as full of labourers as it is now, butincalculably augment the supply of labour by substituting willingand active service, and improved methods of husbandry, for theforced, inferior labour, and wasteful arrangements which arealways admitted to be co-existent with slavery.
The greater number of eminent Abolitionists,-- eminent fortalents, zeal and high principle,--are convertedColonisationists.
This is surely enough.
It appears to me that the Colonisation Society could neverhave gained any ground at all, but for the common suppositionthat the blacks must go somewhere. It was a long while before Icould make anything of this. The argument always ran thus.
"Unless they remain as they are, Africa is the only placefor them.--It will not do to give them a territory; we have seenenough of that with the Indians. We are heart-sick ofterritories: the blacks would all perish.--Then, the climate ofCanada would not suit them: they would perish there. The Haytianswil1 not take them in: they have a horror of freed slaves.--There is no rest for the soles of their feet, anywhere but inAfrica!"
"Why should they not stay where they are?"
"Impossible. The laws of the States forbid freed negroesto remain."
"At present,--on account of the slaves who remain. Incase of abolition, such laws would be repealed, of course: andthen, why should not the blacks remain where they are?"
"They could never live among the whites in a state offreedorm."
"Why? You are begging the question."
"They would die of vice and misery."
"Why more than the German labourers?"
"They do in the free States. They are dying out thereconstantly."
"What makes them more vicious than other people?"
"The coloured people always are."
"You mean because their colour is the badge ofslavery?"
"Yes."
"Then, when it is no longer so, the degradation, foraught you know, will cease."
This is the circle, described by those who pity the slaves.There is another, appropriate to those who pity the masters.
"What is to become of the planters, without anylabourers? They must shut up and go away; for they cannot stay intheir houses, without any labourers on the plantations."
"Are the slaves to be all buried? Or are they toevaporate? or what?"
"O, you know, they would all go away. Nothing would makethem stay when they were once free."
"They would change masters, no doubt. But as many wouldremain in the area as before. Why not?"
"The masters could not possibly employ them. They couldnever manage them, except as slaves."
"So you think that the masters could not have thelabourers, because they would go away: and the labourers must goaway, because the masters would not have them."
To prevent any escape by a nibble in this circle, the other isbrought up round it, to prove that there is no other place thanAfrica for the blacks to go to: and thus, the alternative ofslavery or colonisation is supposed to be established.
All action, and all conversation, on behalf of thisinstitution, bears the same character,--of arguing in a circle. Amagic ring seems drawn round those who live amidst slavery; andit gives a circular character to all they think and say and doupon the subject. There are but few who sit within it whodistinctly see anything beyond it. If there were but any onemoral giant within, who would heave a blow at it with all theforce of a mighty principle, it would be shattered to atoms in amoment; and the white and black slaves it encloses would be freeat once. This will be done when more light is poured in under thedarkness which broods over it: and the time cannot now be faroff.
Whenever I am particularly strongly convinced of anything, inopposition to the opinion of any or many others, I entertain asuspicion that there is more evidence on the other side than Isee. I felt so, even on this subject of slavery, which has beenclear to English eyes for so long. I went into the slave Stateswith this suspicion in my mind; and I preserved it there as longas possible. I believe that I have heard every argument that canpossibly be adduced in vindication or palliation of slavery,under any circumstances now existing; and I declare that, of alldisplays of intellectual perversion and weakness that I havewitnessed, I have met with none so humbling and so melancholy asthe advocacy of this institution. I declare that I know the wholeof its theory;--a declaration that I dare not make with regardto, I think, any other subject whatever: the result is that Ibelieve there is nothing rational to be said in vindication orpalliation of tbe protraction of slavery in the UnitedStates.--Having made this avowal, it will not be expected that Ishould fill my pages with a wide superficies of argument whichwill no more bear a touch than pond-ice, on the last day of thaw.As I disposed in my mind the opposite arguments of slave-holders,I found that they ate one another up, like the two cats thatSheridan told of; but without leaving so much as an inch of tail
One mistake, perhaps, deserves notice. Restless slave-holders,whose uneasiness has urged them to struggle in their toils, andfind themselves unable to get out but by the loss of everything,(but honour and conscience,) pointed out to me the laws of theirStates, whereby the manumission of slaves is rendered difficultor impossible to the master, remaining on the spot, andprospectively fatal to the freed slave;--pointed out to me theselaws as rendering abolition impossible. To say nothing of thefeebleness of the barriers which human regulations presentto the changes urged on by the great natural laws of society,--itis a sufficient answer that these State laws present no obstacleto general, though they do to particular, emancipation. They willbe cancelled or neglected by the same will which created them,when the occasion expires with which they sprang up, or whichthey were designed to perpetuate. The institution of slavery wasnot formed in accordance with them: they arose out of theinstitution. They are an offset; and, to use the words of one oftheir advocates, spoken in another connexion, "they willshare the fate of offsets, and perish with the parent."
It is obvious that all laws which encourage the departure ofthe blacks must be repealed, when their slavery is abolished. Theone thing necessary, in the economical view of the case, is thatefficient measures should be taken to prevent an unwisedispersion of these labourers: measures, I mean, which should inno way interfere with their personal liberty, but which shouldsecure to them generally greater advantages on the spot than theycould obtain by roaming. It has been distinctly shown thatslavery originated from the difficulty of concentrating labour inthe neighbourhood of capitalists. Where the people are few inproportion to the land, they are apt to disperse themselves overit; so that personal coercion has been supposed necessary, in thefirst instance, to secure any efficient cultivation of the landat all. Though the danger and the supposed necessity are past, inall but the rawest of the slave States, the ancient fact shouldbe so borne in mind as that what legislation there is should tendto cause a concentration, rather than a dispersion of thelabourers. Any such tendency will be much aided by the stronglocal attachments for which negroes are remarkable. It is notonly that slaves dread all change, from the intellectual andmoral dejection to which they are reduced; fearing even theremoval from one plantation to another, under the same master,from the constant vague apprehension of something dreadful. It isnot only this, (which, however, it would take them some time tooutgrow,) but that all their race show a kind of felineattachment to places to which they are accustomed, which will beof excellent service to kind masters when the day of emancipationcomes. For the rest, efficient arrangements can and willdoubtless be made to prevent their wandering further than fromone master to another. The abolition of slavery must be completeand immediate: that is to say, as a man either is or is not theproperty of another, as there can be no degrees of ownership of ahuman being, there must be an immediate and complete surrender ofall claim to negro men, women, and children as property: butthere may and will doubtless be arrangements made to protect,guide, and teach these degraded beings, till they have learnedwhat liberty is, and how to use it. Liberty to change theirmasters must, under certain reasonable limitations, be allowed;the education of their children must be enforced. The amount ofwages will be determined by natural laws, and cannot be foreseen,further than that they must necessarily be very ample for a longtime to come. It will probably be found desirable to fix theprice of the government lands, with a view to the colouredpeople, at that amount which will best obviate squatting, andsecure the respectable settlement of some who may find their wayto the west.
Suggestions of this kind excite laughter among the masters ofslaves, who are in the habit of thinking that they know best whatnegroes are, and what they are capable of. I have reasons forestimating their knowledge differently, and for believing thatnone know so little of the true character and capabilities ofnegroes as their owners. They might know more, but for thepernicious and unnatural secrecy about some of the most importantfacts connected with slave-holding, which is induced partly bypride, partly by fear, partly by pecuniary interest. If theywould do themselves and their slaves the justice of inquiringwith precision what is the state of Hayti; what has taken placein the West Indies; what the emancipation really wasthere; what its effects actually are, they would obtain a clearerview of their own prospects. So they would, if they wouldcommunicate freely about certain facts nearer home: not onlyconversing as individuals, but removing the restrictions upon thepress by which they lose far more than they gain, bothin security and fortune,--to say nothing of intelligence. Of themany families in which I enjoyed intercourse, there was, Ibelieve, none where I was not told of some one slave of unusualvalue, for talent or goodness, either in the present or aformer generation. A collection of these alone, as they stand inmy journal, would form no mean testimony to the intellectual andmoral capabilities of negroes: and if to these were added thetales which I could tell, if I also were not bound under the lawsof mystery of which I have been complaining, many hearts wouldbeat with the desire to restore to their human rights those whosefellow-sufferers have given ample proof of their worthiness toenjoy them. The consideration which binds me to silence upon arich collection of facts, full of moral beauty and pronnise, isregard to the safety of many whose heroic obedienoe to thelaws of God has brought them into jeopardy under the laws ofslave-holders, and the allies of slave-holders. Nor would I, byany careless revelations, throw the slightest obstacle in the wayof the escape of any one of the slaves who may be about to shirktheir masters, by methods with which I happen to be acquainted.
It can, however, do nothing but good to proclaim the truththat slaves do run away in much greater numbers than is supposedby any but those who lose them, and those who help them. By whichI mean many others besides the abolitionists par excellence.Perhaps I might confine the knowledge to these last; for Ibelieve no means exist by which the yearly amount of loss of thiskind may be verified and published in the south. Everybody whohas been in America is familiar with the little newspaper pictureof a black man, hieing with his stick and bundle, which isprefixed to the advertisements of runaways. Every traveller hasprobably been struck with the number of these which meets hiseye; but unless he has more private means of information, he willremain unaware of the streams of fugitives continually passingout of the States. There is much reserve about this in the south,from pride; and among those elsewhere who could tell, from farother considerations. The time will come when the whole story inits wonder and beauty, may be told by some who, like myself; haveseen more of the matter, from all sides, than it is easy for anative to do. Suffice it, that the loss by runavays, and thegenerally useless attempts to recover them, is a heavy item inthe accounts of the cotton and sugar growers of the south; andone which is sure to become heavier till there shall be no morebondage to escape from. It is obvious that the slaves who runaway are among the best: an escape being usually the achievementof a project early formed; concealed, pertinaciously adhered to,and endeared by much toil and sacrifice undergone for its sake,for a long course of years. A weak mind is incapable of such aseries of acts, with a unity of purpose. They are the choicestslaves who run away. Of the cases known to me, the greater numberof the men, and some of the women, have acted throughout upon anidea; (called by their owners "a fancy,"--a verydifferent thing:) while some few of the men have started off uponsome sudden infliction of cruelty; and many women on account ofintolerable outrage, of the grossest kind. Several masters toldme of leave given to their slaves to go away, and of the slavesrefusing to avail themselves of it. If this was meant to tell infavour of slavery, it failed of its effect. The argument was tooshallow to impose upon a child. Of course, they were the leastvaluable slaves to whom this permission was given: and theirdeclining to depart proved nothing so much as the utterdegradation of human beings who could prefer receiving food andshelter from the hand of an owner to the possession ofthemselves.
Amidst the mass of materials which accumulated on my handsduring the process of learning from all parties their views onthis question, I hardly know where to turn, and what to select,that will most briefly and strongly show that the times haveoutgrown slavery. This is the point at which every fact andargument issue, whatever may be the intention of those who adduceit. The most striking, perhaps, is the treatment of theAbolitionists: a subject to be adverted to hereafter. The insanefury which vents itself upon the few who act upon theprinciples which the many profess, is a sign of the times not tobe mistaken. It is always the precursor of beneficial change.Society in America seems to be already passing out of this stageinto one even more advanced. The cause of abolition is spreadingso rapidly through the heart of the nation; the sound part of thebody politic is embracing it so actively, that no disinterestedobserver can fail to be persuaded that even the question of timeis brought within narrow limits. The elections will, ere long,show the will of the people that slavery be abolished in theDistrict of Columbia. Then such buckling politicians, mercenarytraders, cowardly clergy, and profligate newspaper corps, as arenew too blind to see the coming change, will have to choose theirpart; whether to shrink out of sight, or to boast patrioticallyof the righteous revolution which they have strived to retard,even by the application of the torture to both the bodies and theminds of their more clear-eyed fellow-citizens.
After giving one or two testimonies to the necessity of aspeedy change of system, I will confine myself to relating a fewsigns of the times which I encountered in my travels through thesouth.
In 1782, Virginia repealed the law against manumission; and innine years, there were ten thousand slaves freed in that State.Alarmed for the institution, her legislature re-enacted the law.What has been the consequence?--Let us take the testimony of thetwo leading newspapers of the capital of Virginia, given at atime when the Virginian legislature was debating the subject ofslavery; and when there was, for once, an exposure of the truthfrom those best qualified to reveal it. In 1832, the followingremarks appeared in the "Richmond Enquirer."
"It is probable, fromwhat we hear, that the committee onthe coloured population will report some plan for getting rid ofthe free people of colour. But is this all that can be done? Arewe for ever to suffer the greatest evil which can scourge ourland not only to remain, but to increase in its dimensions? 'Wemay shut our eyes and avert our faces, if we please,' (writes aneloquent South C:arolinian, on his return from the north a fewweeks ago,) 'but there it is, the dark and growing evil, at ourdoors: and meet the question we must at no distant day. God onlyknows what it is the part of wise men to do on that momentous andappalling subject. Of this I am very sure, that thedifference--nothing short of frightful --between all that existson one side of the Potomac, and all on the other, is owing to thatcause alone. The disease is deep seated; it is at theheart's core; it is consuming, and has all along been consuming,our vitals; and I could laugh, if I could laugh on sucha subject, at the ignorance and folly of the politician whoascribes that to an act of the government, which is theinevitable effect of the eternal laws of nature. What is to bedone? O my God, I don't know; but something must be done.'
"Yes, something must be done; and it is the part of nohonest man to deny it; of no free press to affect to conceal it.When this dark population is growing upon us; when every newcensus is but gathering its appalling numbers upon us; whenwithin a period equal to that in which this federal constitutionhas been in existence, those numbers will increase to more thantwo millions within Virginia; when our sister States are closingtheir doors upon our blacks for sale; and when our whites aremoving westwardly in greater numbers than we like to hear of;when this, the fairest land on all this continent, for soil andclimate and situation combined, might become a sort of gardenspot if it were worked by the hands of white men alone, canwe, ought we to sit quietly down, fold our arms, andsay to each other, 'well, well, this thing will not come to theworst in our day? We will leave it to our children and ourgrand-children and great-grand-children to take care ofthemselves, and to brave the storm. Is this to act like wise men?Heaven knows we are no fanatics. We detest the madness whichactuated the Amis des Noirs. But something oughtto be done. Means, sure but gradual, systematic but discreet,ought to be adopted for reducing the mass of evil which ispressing upon the south, and will still more press upon her thelonger it is put off. We ought not to shut our eyes, nor avertour faces. And though we speak almost without a hope that thecommittee or the legislature will do anything, at the presentsession, to meet this question, yet we say now, in the utmostsincerity of our hearts, that our wisest men cannot give too muchof their attention to this subject, nor can they give it toosoon."
The other paper, the "Richmond Whig," had thesame time, the following:
"We affirm that the great mass of Virginia herselftriumphs that the slavery question has been agitated, and reckonsit glorious that the spirit of her sons did not shrink fromgrappling with the monster. We affirm that, in the heaviest slavedistricts of the State, thousands have hailed the discussion withdelight, and contemplate the distant, but ardently desiredresult, as the supreme good which Providence could vouchsafe totheir country."
This is doubtless true. One of the signs of the times whichstruck me was the clandestine encouragement received by theabolitionists of the north from certain timid slave-holders ofthe south, who send money for the support of abolitionpublications, and an earnest blessing. They write, "ForGod's sake go on! We cannot take your publications; we dare notcountenance you; but we wish you God speed! You are our onlyhope." There is nothing to be said for the moral courage ofthose who feel and write thus, and dare not express theiropinions in the elections. Much excuse may be made for them bythose who know the horrors which await the expression ofanti-slavery sentiments in many parts of the south. But, on theother hand, the abolitionists are not to be blamed forconsidering all slave-holders under the same point of view, aslong as no improved state of opinion is manifested in therepresentation; the natural mirror of the minds of therepresented.
Chief Justice Marshall, a Virginian, a slaveholder, and amember of the Colonisation Society, (though regarding thissociety as being merely a palliative, and slavery incurable butby convulsion,) observed to a friend of mine, in the winter of1834, that he was surprised at the British for supposing thatthey could abolish slavery in their colonies by act ofparliament. His friend believed it would be done. The ChiefJustice could not think that such economical institutions couldbe done away by legislative enactment. His friend pleaded thefact that the members of the British House of Commons werepledged, in great numbers, to their constituents on the question.When it was done, the Chief Justice remarked on his having beenmistaken; and that he rejoiced in it. He now saw hope for bisbeloved Virginia, which he had seen sinking lower and lower amongthe States.The cause, he said, was that work is disreputable in acountry where a degraded class is held to enforced labour.4He had seen all the young, the flower of the State, who were notrich enough to remain at home in idleness, betaking themselves toother regions, where they might work without disgrace. Now therewas hope; for he considered that in this act of the British, thedecree had gone forth against American slavery, and its doom wassealed.
There was but one sign of the times which was amusing to me;and that was the tumult of opinions and prophecies offered to meon the subject of the duration of slavery, and the mode in whichit would be at last got rid of; for I never heard of any one butGovernor M'Duffie wllo supposed that it can last for ever. Hedeclared last year, in his message to the legislature of SouthCarolina, that he considers slavery as the corner-stone of theirrepublican liberties: and that, if he were dying, his latestprayer should be that his children's children should live nowherebut amidst the institutions of slavery. This message might havebeen taken as a freak of eccentricity merely, if it had stoodalone. But a committee of the legislature, with Governor Hamiltonin the chair, thought proper to endorse every sentiment init.This converts it into an indication of the perversion of mindcommonly prevalent in a class when its distinctive pecuniaryinterest is in imminent peril. I was told, a few months prior tothe appearance of this singular production, that though GovernorM'Duffie was a great ornament to the State of South Carolina, hisopinions on the subject of slavery were ultra, andthat he was left pretty nearly alone in them. Within a year,those who told me so went, in public, all lengths withGovernor M'Duffie.
I believe I might very safely and honourably give the names ofthose who prophesied to me in the way I have mentioned; for theyrather court publicity for their opinions, as it is natural andright that they should, as long as they are sure of them. But itmay suffice to mention that they are all eminent men, whoseattention has been strongly fixed, for a length of years, uponthe institution in question.
A. believes that slavery is a necessary and desirable stage incivilisation: not on the score of the difficulty of cultivatingnew lands without it, but on the ground of the cultivation of thenegro mind and manners. He believes the Haytians to havedeteriorated since they became free. He believes the whitepopulation destined to absorb the black, though holding that thetwo races will not unite after the third mixture. His expectationis that the black and mulatto races will have disappeared in ahundred and fifty years He has no doubt that cotton and tobaccomay be well and easily grown by whites.
B. is confident that the condition of slaves is materiallyimproved, yet believes that they, will die out, and that therewill be no earlier catastrophe. He looks to colonisation,however, as a means of lessening the number. This same gentlemantold me of a recent visit he had paid to a connexion of his own,who had a large "force," consisting chiefly of youngmen and women: not one child had been born on the estate forthree years. This looks very like dying out; but does it go toconfirm the materially improved condition of the slaves?
C. allows slavery to be a great evil; and, if it were nownon-existent, would not ordain it, if he could. But he thinks theslaves far happier than they would have been at home in Africa,and considers that the system works perfectly. He pronounces theslaves "the most contented, happy, industrious peasantry inthe world." He believes this virtue and content woulddisappear if they were taught anything whatever; and that if theywere free, they would be, naturally and inevitably, the mostvicious and wretched population ever seen. His expectation isthat they will increase to such a degree as to make free labour,"which always supersedes slave labour,"necessary in its stead; that the coloured race will wander off tonew regions, and be ultimately "absorbed" by the white.He contemplates no other than this natural change, which hethinks cannot take place in less than a century and a half. Ayear later, this gentleman told a friend of mine that slaverycannot last above twenty years. They must be stringent reasonswhich have induced so great a change of opinion in twelvemonttls.
D. thinks slavery an enormous evil, but doubts whethersomething as bad would not arise in its stead. He is acolonisationist, and desires that the general government shouldpurchase the slaves, by annual appropriations, and ship them offto Africa, so as to clear the country of the coloured people inforty or fifty years. If this is not done, a servile war, themost horrible that the world has seen, is inevitable. Yet hebelieves that the institution, though infinitely bad for themasters, is better for the slaves than those of any country inEurope for its working classes. He is convinced that the tillageof all the crops could be better carried on by whites, with theassistance of cattle and implements, than by negroes.
E. writes, (October 1835,) "Certain it is that if men ofproperty and intelligence in the north have that legitimateinfluence which that class has here, nothing will come of thisabolition excitement. All we have to say to them is, 'Hands off!'Our political rights5 are clear, and shallnot be invaded. We know too much about slavery to be slavesourselves. But I repeat, nothing will come of the present, orrather recent excitement, for already it is in a great degreepassed. And the time is coming, when a struggle between pauperismand property, or, if you choose, between labour and capital inthe north, stimulated by the spirit of Jacksonism, will occupythe people of that quarter to the exclusion of our affairs. Ifany external influence is ever to affect the institution ofslavery in the south, it will not be the vulgar and ignorantfanaticism of the northern States, intent upon a cheap charitywhich is to be done at our expense; but that influence will befound in English literature, and the gradual operation of publicopinion. Slavery, so to speak, may be evaporated;--it cannot bedrawn off. If it were, the whole land would be poisoned anddesolated."
The best reply to this letter will be found in the memorablespeech of Mr. Preston, one of the South Carolina senators,delivered in Congress, last spring. It may be mentioned, by theway, that the writer of the above is mistaken in supposing thatthere is at present, or impending, any unhappy struggle in thenorth between pauperism and property, or labour and capital. Itis all property there, and no pauperism, (except the very littlethat is superinduced;) and labour and capital were, perhaps,never before seen to jog on so lovingly together. The "cheapcharity" he speaks of is the cheap charity of the firstChristians, with the addition of an equal ability and will to paydown money for the abolition of the slaves, for whose sakethe abolitionists have already shown themselves able tobear,--some, hanging;--some, scourging, and tarring andfeathering; some, privation of the means of living; and all, thebeing incessantly and deeply wounded in their social relationsand tenderest affections. Martyrdom is ever accounted a"cheap devotion," or "cheap charity," to Godor man, by those who exact it of either religious orphilanthropic principle.
Mr. Preston's speech describes the spread of abolitionopinions as being rapid and inevitable. He proves the rapidity byciting the number of recently-formed abolition societies in thenorth; and the inevitableness, by exhibiting the course whichsuch convictions had run in England and France. He represents thecase as desperate. He advises,--not yielding, but the absoluteexclusion of opinion on the subject,--exclusion from Congress,and exclusion from the slave States. This is well. The matter maybe considered to be given up, unless this is merely the opinionof an individual. The proposal is about as hopeful as it would beto draw a cordon round the Capitol to keep out the four winds; orto build a wall up to the pole-star to exclude the sunshine.
One more sample of opinions. A gentleman who edits ahighly-esteemed southern newspaper, expresses himself thus."There is a wild fanaticism at work to effect the overthrowof the system, although in its fall would go down the fortunes ofthe south, and to a great extent those of the north and east;--ina word, the whole fabric of our Union, in one awful ruin. Whatthen ought to be done? What measures ought to be taken to securethe safety of our property and our lives? We answer, let us bevigilant and watchful to the last degree over all the movementsof our enemies both at home and abroad. Let us declarethrough the public journals of our country, that the question ofslavery is not, and shall not be open to discussion;--that thesystem is deep-rooted amongst us, and must remain for ever;--thatthe very moment any private individual attempts to lecture usupon its evils and immorality, and the necessity of puttingmeasures into operation to secure us from them, in the samemoment his tongue shall be cut out and cast upon the dung-hill.We are freemen, sprung from a noble stock of freemen, able toboast as noble a line of ancestry as ever graced this earth;--wehave burning in our bosoms the spirit of freemen--live in an ageof enlightened freedom, and in a country blessed with itsprivileges--under a government that has pledged itself to protectus in the enjoylnent of our peculiar domestic institutions inpeace, and undisturbed. We hope for a long continuance of thesehigh privileges, and have now to love, cherish, and defend,property, liberty, wives and children, the right to manage ourown matters in our own way, and, what is equally dear with allthc rest, the inestimable right of dying upon our own soil,around our own firesides, in struggling to put down all those whomay attempt to infringe, attack, or violate any of these sacredand inestimable privileges."
If these opinions of well-prepared persons, dispersed throughthe slave States, and entrusted with the public advocacy of theirinterests, do not betoken that slavery is tottering to its fall,there are no such things as signs of the times.
The prohibition of books containing anything against slavery,has proceeded to a great length. Last year, Mrs. Barbauld's workswere sent back into the north by the southern booksellers,because the "Evenings at Home" contain a "Dialoguebetween Master and Slave." Miss Sedgwick's last novel,"The Linwoods," was treated in the same way, on accountof a single sentence about slavery. The "Tales of the Woodsand Fields," and other English books, have shared the samefate. I had a letter from a southern lady, containing someregrets upon the necessity of such an exclusion of literature,but urging that it was a matter of principle toguard from attacks " an institution ordained by the favourof God for the happiness of man:" and assuring me that theliterary resources of South Carolina were rapidly improving.--Sothey had need; for almost all the books already in existence willhave to be prohibited, if nothing condemnatory of slavery is tobe circulated. This attempt to nullify literature was followed upby a threat to refuse permission to the mails to pass throughSouth Carolina: an arrangement which would afflict itsinhabitants more than it could injure any one else.
The object of all this is to keep the children in the darkabout how the institution is regarded abroad. This was evident tome at every step: and I received an express caution not tocommunicate my disapprobation of slavery to the children of onefamily, who could not, their parents declare, even feel the forceof my objections. One of them was "employed, the wholeafternoon, in dressing out little Nancy for an evening party; andshe sees the slaves much freer than herself." Of course, theblindness of this policy will be its speedy destruction. It isfound that the effect of public opinion on the subject upon youngmen who visit the northern States, is tremendous, when theybecome aware of it: as every student in the colleges of the northcan bear witness. I know of one, an heir of slaves, who declared,on reading Dr. Channing's "Slavery," that if it couldbe proved that negroes are more than a link between man andbrute, the rest follows of course, and he must liberate all his.Happily, he is in the way of evidence that negroes are actuallyand altogether human.
The students of Lane Seminary, near Cincinnati, of which Dr.Beecher is the president, became interested in the subject, threeor four years ago, and formed themselves into an AbolitionSociety, debating the question, and taking in newspapers. Thiswas prohibited by the tutors, but persevered in by the young men,who conceived that this was a matter with which the professorshad no right to meddle. Banishment was decreed; and all submittedto expulsion but fourteen. Of course, each of the dispersed youngmen became the nucleus of an Abolition Society, and gainedinfluence by persecution. It was necessary for them to providemeans to finish their education. One of them, Amos Dresser,itinerated, (as is usual in the sparsely-peopled west,)travelling in a gig, and selling Scott's Bible, to raise moneyfor his educational purposes. He reached Nashville, in Tennessee;and there fell under suspicion of abolition treason; his baggagebeing searched, and a whole abolition newspaper, and a part ofanother being found among the packing-stuff of his stock ofbibles. There was also an unsubstantiated rumour of his havingbeen seen conversing with slaves. He was brought to trialby the Committee of Vigilance; seven elders of the presbyterianchurch at Nashville being among his judges. After much debate asto whether he should be hanged, or flogged with more or fewerlashes, he was condemned to receive twenty lashes, with acow-hide, in the market-place of Nashville. He was immediatelyconducted there, made to kneel down on the flint pavement, andpunished according to his sentence; the mayor of Nashvillepresiding, and the public executioner being the agent. He waswarned to leave the city within twenty-four hours: but was told,by some charitable person who had the bravery to take him in,wash his stripes, and furnish him with a disguise, that it wouldnot be safe to remain so long. He stole auay immediately, in hisdreadful condition, on foot; and when his story wasauthenticated, had heard nothing of his horse, gig, and bibles,which he values at three hundred dollars. Let no one, on this,tremble for republican freedom. Outrages upon it, like the above,are but extremely transient signs of the times. They no morebetoken the permanent condition of the republic, than theshivering of one hour of ague exhibits the usual state of thehuman body.
The other young men found educational and other assistanceimmediately; and a set of noble institutions has grown out oftheir persecution. There were professors ready to help them; anda gentleman gave them a farm in Ohio, on which to begin a manuallabour college, called the Oberlin Institute. It is on a mostliberal plan; young women who wish to become qualified for"Christian teaching" being admitted; and there being noprejudice of colour. They have a sprinkling both of Indians andof negroes. They do all the farm and house work, and as muchstudy besides as is good for them. Some of the young women arealready fair Hebrew and Greek scholars. In a little while, theestate was so crowded, and the new applications were sooverpowering, that they were glad to accept the gift of anotherfarm. When I left the country, within three years from theircommencement, they had either four or five flourishinginstitutions in Ohio and Michigan, while the Lane Seminary dragson feebly with its array of tutors, and dearth of pupils. A factso full of vitality as this will overbear a hundred less cheeringsigns of the times. A very safe repose may be found in the willof the majority, wherever it acts amidst light and freedom.
Just before I reached Mobile, two men were burned alive there,in a slow fire, in the open air, in the presence of the gentlemenof the city generally. No word was breathed of the transaction inthe newspapers: and this is the special reason why I cite it as asign of the times; of the suppression of fact and repression ofopinion which, from the impossibility of their being longmaintained, are found immediately to precede the changes they aremeant to obviate. Some months afterwards, an obscure intimationof something of the kind having happened appeared in a northernnewspaper; but a dead silence was at the time preserved upon whatwas, in fact, the deed of a multitude. The way that I came toknow it was this. A lady of Mobile was opening her noble and trueheart to me on the horrors and vices of the system under whichshe and her family were suffering in mind, body, and estate. Inspeaking of her duties as head of a family, she had occasion tomention the trouble caused by the licentiousness of the whites,among the negro women. It was dreadful to hear the facts whichhad occurred in her own household; and the bare imagination ofwhat is inflicted on the negro husbands and fathers was almosttoo much to be borne. I asked the question, "Does it neverenter the heads of negro husbands and fathers to retaliate?""Yes, it does." "What follows?" "Theyare murdered, --burned alive." And then followed the storyof what had lately happened. A little girl, and her still youngerbrother, one day failed to return from school, and never wereseen again. It was not till after all search had beenrelinquished, that the severed head of the little girl was foundin a brook, on the borders of a plantation. Circumstances werediscovered that left no doubt that the murders were committed toconceal violence which had been offered to the girl. Soon after,two yolmg ladies of the city rode in that direction, and got offtheir horses to amuse themselves. They were seized upon by twoslaves of the neighbouring plantation; but effected their escapein safety, though with great difficulty. Their agitationprevented their concealing the fact; and the conclusion wasimmediately drawn that these men were the murderers of thechildren. The gentlemen of Mobile turned out; seized the men;heaped up faggots on the margin of the brook, and slowly burnedthem to death. No prudish excuses for the suppression of thisstory will serve any purpose with those who have been on thespot, any more than the outcry about "amalgamation,"raised against the abolitionists by those who live in the deepestsinks of a licentiousness of which the foes of slavery do notdream. No deprecatory plea regarding propriety or decency willpass for anything but hypocrisy with those who know what the lawsagainst the press are in the south-west, and what are the moralsof slavery in its palmy state. I charge the silence of Mobileabout this murder on its fears; as confidently as I chargethe brutality of the victims upon its crimes.
Notwithstanding the many symptoms of an unmanly andanti-republican fear which met my observation in these regions,it was long before I could comprehend the extent of it;especially as I heard daily that the true enthusiastic love offreedom could exist in a republic, only in the presence of aservile class. I am persuaded that the southerners verily believethis; that they actually imagine their northern brethren livingin an exceedingly humdrum way, for fear of losing their equality.It is true that there is far too much subservience to opinion inthe northern States: particularly in New England. There is therea self-imposed bondage which must be outgrown. But this is nomore like the fear which prevails in the south than theapprehensiveness of a court-physician is like the terrors ofTiberius Caesar.
I was at the French theatre at New Orleans. The party withwhom I went determined to stay for the after-piece. The firstscene of the after-piece was dumb-show; so much noise was made byone single whistle in the pit. The curtain was dropped, and thepiece re-commenced. The whistling continued; and, at onemovement, the whole audience rose and went home. I was certainthat there was something more in this than was apparent to theobservation of a stranger. I resolved to find it out, andsucceeded. The band was wanted from the orchestra, to serenade aUnited States senator who was then in the city; and one or twoyoung men were resolved to break up our amusement for the purposeof releasing the band. But why were they allowed to do this? Whywas the whole audience to submit to the pleasure of one whistler?Why, in New Orleans it is thought best to run no risk of any disturbance.People there always hie home directly when things do not go offquite quietly.
It is the same, wherever the blacks outnumber the whites, ortheir bondage is particularly severe. At Charleston, when a firebreaks out, the gentlemen all go home on the ringing of thealarm-bell; the ladies rise and dress themselves and theirchildren. It may be the signal of insurrection: and the fireburns on, for any help the citizens give, till a battalion ofsoldiers marches down to put it out.
When we were going to church, at Augusta, Georgia, one Sundayafternoon, there was smoke in the street, and a cry of fire. Whenwe came out of church, we were told that it had been verytrifling, and easily extinguished. The next day, I heard thewhole. A negro girl of sixteen, the property of a lady from NewEngland, had set her mistress's house on fire in twoplaces, by very inartificially lighting heaps of combustiblestuff piled against the partitions. There were no witnesses, andall that was known came from her own lips. She was desperatelyignorant; laws having been fully enforced to prevent thenegroes of Georgia being instructed in any way whatever.The girl's account was, that she was "tired of livingthere," and had therefore intended to burn the house in themorning, but was prevented by her mistress having locked her upfor some offence: so she did it in the afternoon. She was totallyignorant of the gravity of the deed, and was in a state of greathorror when told that she was to be hanged for it. I askedwhether it was possible that, after her being prevented by lawfrom being taught, she was to be hanged for her ignorance, andmerely on her own confession? The clergyman with whom I wasconversing sighed, and said it was a hard case; but what elsecould be done, considering that Augusta was built of wood?He told me that there was great excitement among the negroesin Augusta; and that many had been saying that "a mean whiteperson" (a white labourer) would not have been hanged; andthat the girl could not help it, as it must have been severitywhich drove her to it. In both these sayings, the slaves werepartly wrong. A white would have been hanged; but a white wouldhave known that she was committing crime. It did not appear thatthe girl's mistress was harsh. But what does not the observationconvey? I have never learned, nor ever shall, whether the hangingtook place or not. The newspapers do not insert such things.
This burning would be a fearful art for the blacks to learn.There were four tremendous fires in Charleston, during the summerof 1835; and divers residents reported to the north that thesewere supposed to be the work of slaves.
Wherever I went, in the south, in whatever town or othersettlement I made any stay, some startling circumstance connectedwith slavery occurred, which I was assured was unprecedented. Nosuch thing had ever occurred before, or was likely to happenagain. The repetition of this assurance became, at last, quiteludicrous.
The fear of which I have spoken as prevalent, does not extendto the discussion of the question of slavery with strangers. Myopinions of slavery were known, through the press, before I wentabroad: the hospitality which was freely extended to me wasoffered under a full knowledge of my detestation of the system.This was a great advantage, in as much as it divested me entirelyof the character of a spy, and promoted the freest discussion,wherever I went. There was a warm sympathy between myself andvery many, whose sufferings under the system caused me continualand deep sorrow, though no surprise. Neither was I surprised attheir differing from me as widely as they do about the necessityof immediate action, either by resistance or flight, while oftenagreeing, nearly to the full, in my estimate of the evils of thepresent state of things. They have been brought up in the system.To them, the moral deformity of the whole is much obscured by itsnearness; while the small advantages, and slight prettinesseswhich it is very easy to attach to it, are prominent, and alwaysin view. These circumstances prevented my being surprised at thecandour with which they not only discussed the question, butshowed me all that was to be seen of the economical management ofplantations; the worst as well as the best. Whatever I learned ofthe system, by express showing, it must be remembered, was fromthe hands of the slave-holders themselves. Whatever I learned,that lies deepest down in my heart, of the moral evils, theunspeakable vices and woes of slavery, was from the lips of thosewho are suffering under them on the spot.
It was there that I heard of the massacre in Southamptoncounty, which has been little spoken of abroad. It happened a fewyears ago; before the abolition movement began; for it isremarkable that no insurrections have taken place since thefriends of the slave have been busy afar off. This is one of themost eloquent signs of the times,-- that, whereas rebellionsbroke out as often as once a month before, there have been nonesince. Of this hereafter. In the Southampton massacre, upwards ofseventy whites, chiefly women and children, were butchered byslaves who fancied themselves called, like the Jews of old, to" slay and spare not."
While they were in full career, a Virginian gentleman, who hada friend from the north staying with him, observed upon its beinga mistaken opinion that planters were afraid of their slaves; andoffered the example of his own household as a refutation. Hesummoned his confidential negro, the head of the houseestablishment of slaves, and bade him shut the door.
"You hear," said he, "that the negroes haverisen in Southampton."
"Y es, massa."
"You hear that they have killed several families, andthat they are coming this way."
"Yes, massa."
"You know that, if they come here, I shall have to dependupon you all to protect my family."
The slave was silent.
"If I give you arms, you will protect me and my family,will you not ?"
"No, massa."
"Do you mean, that if the Southampton negroes come thisway, you will join them?"
"Yes, massa."
When he went out of the room, his master wept withoutrestraint. He owned that all his hope, all his confidence wasgone. Yet, who ever deserved confidence more than the man whospoke that last "No" and "Yes?" The moreconfidence in the man, the less in the system. This is thephilosophy of the story.
I have mentioned the fact that no insurrections have for along time taken place. In some parts of the slave regions, theeffect has been to relax the laws relating to slaves; and suchrelaxation was always pointed out to me as an indication thatslavery would go out of itself, if it were let alone. In otherparts, new and very severe laws were being passed against theslaves; and this was pointed out to me as a sign that thecondition of the negro was aggravated by the interference of hisfriends; and that his best chance lay in slavery being let alone.Thus the opposite facts were made to yield the same conclusion. Afriend of mine, a slave-holder, observed to me, that both therelaxation and the aggravation of restrictions upon slaves werean indication of the tendency of public opinion: the first beingdone in sympathy with it, the other in fear of it.
There was an outcry, very vehement, and very general among thefriends of slavery, in both north and south, against the crueltyof abolitionists in becoming the occasion of the laws againstslaves being made more severe. In my opinion, this affords noargument against abolition, even if the condition of the slavesof to-day were aggravated by the stir of opinion. The negroes ofthe next generation are not to be doomed to slavery for fear ofsomewhat more being inflicted on their parents: and, severe asthe laws already are, the consequence of straining them tighterstill would be that they would burst. But the fact is, that sofar from the condition of the slave being made worse by theefforts of his distant friends, it has been substantiallyimproved. I could speak confidently of this as a necessaryconsequence of the value set upon opinion by the masters; but Iknow it also from what I myself saw; and from the lips of manyslave-holders. The slaves of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama,and Louisiana, have less liberty of communication with eachother; they are deprived of the few means of instruction thatthey had; they are shut in earlier in the evenig, and precludedfrom supping and dancing for half the night, as they used to do;but they are substantially better treated; they are less workedby hard masters; less flogged; better fed and clothed. The eyesof the world are now upon the American slave and his master: thekind master goes on as he did before: the hard master dares notbe so unkind as formerly. He hates his slave more than ever, forslavery is more troublesome than ever; but he is kept in order,by the opinion of the world abroad and the neighbours around; andhe dares not vent his hatred on his human property, as he oncecould. A slave-holder declared in Congress, that the slaves ofthe south knew that Dr. Channing had written a book on theirbehalf. No doubt. The tidings of the far-off movement in theirfavour come to them on every wind that blows, calming theirdesperation, breathing hope into their souls; making the best oftheir masters thoughtful and sad, and the worst, desperate andcruel, though kept within bounds by fear.
The word 'hatred' is not too strong for the feeling of a largeproportion of slave-holders towards particular slaves; or, asthey would call them, (the word 'slave' never being heard in thesouth,) their 'force,' their 'hands,' their 'negroes,' their'people.' I was frequently told of the 'endearing relation'subsisting hetween master and slaves; but, at the best, itappeared to me the same 'endearing relation' which subsistsbetween a man and his horse, between a lady and her dog. As longas the slave remains ignorant, docile, and contented, he is takengood care of, humoured, and spoken of with a contemptuous,compassionate kindness. But, from the moment he exhibits theattributes of a rational being,--from the moment his intellectseems likely to come into the most distant competition with thatof whites, the most deadly hatred springs up;--not in the black,but in his oppressors. It is a very old truth that we hate thosewhom we have injured. Never was it more clear than in this case.I had, from time to time in my life, witnessed something of humanmalice; I had seen some of the worst aspects of domestic servicein England; of village scandal; of political rivalship; and othercircumstances provocative of the worst passions; but pure,unmitigated hatred, the expression of which in eye and voicemakes one's blood run cold, I never witnessed till 1 becameacquainted with the blacks of America, their friends andoppressors: the blacks and their friends the objects; theiroppressors the far more unhappy subjects. It so happens that themost remarkable instances of this that I met with were clergymenand ladies. The cold livid hatred which deformed, like a mask,the faces of a few, while deliberately slandering, now thecoloured race, and now the abolitionists, could never beforgotten by me, as a fearful revelation, if the whole countrywere to be absolutely christianized tomorrow. Mr. Madison toldme, that if he could work a miracle, he knew what it shouldbe. Hewould make all the blacks white; and then he could do away withslavery in twenty-four hours. So true it is that all thetorturing associations of injury have become so connected withcolour, that an institution which hurts everybody and benefitsnone, which all rational people who understand it dislike,despise, and suffer under, can with difficulty be abolished,because of the hatred which is borne to an irremoveable badge.
This hatred is a sign of the times; and so are the allegedcauses of it; both are from their nature so manifestly temporary.The principal cause alleged is the impossibility of giving peopleof colour any idea of duty, from their want of natural affection.I was told in the same breath of their attachment to theirmasters, and devotion to them in sickness; and of their utterwant of all affection to their parents and children, husbands andwives. For "people of colour," read "slaves,"and the account is often correct. It is true that slaves willoften leave their infants to perish, rather than take any troubleabout them; that they will utterly neglect a sick parent orhusband; while they will nurse a white mistress with muchostentation. The reason is obvious. Such beings are degraded sofar below humanity that they will take trouble, for the sake ofpraise or more solid reward, after they have become dead to allbut grossly selfish inducements. Circumstances will fully accountfor a great number of cases of this sort: but to set againstthese, there are perhaps yet more instances of domestic devotion,not to be surpassed in the annals of humanity. Of these I knowmore than I can here set down; partly from their number, andpartly from the fear of exposing to injury the individualsalluded to.
A friend of mine was well acquainted at Washington with awoman who had been a slave; and who, after gaining her liberty,worked incessantly for many years, denying herself all butabsolute necessaries, in order to redeem her husband andchildren. She was a sick-nurse, when my friend knew her; and, byher merits, obtained good pay. She had first bought herself;having earned, by extra toil, three or four hundred dollars. Shethen earned the same sum, and redeemed her husband; and hadbought three, out of her five, children when my friend last sawher. She made no boast of her industry and self-denial. Her storywas extracted from her by questions; and she obviously felt thatshe was doing what was merely unavoidable. It is impossible tohelp instituting a comparison between this woman and thegentlemen who, by their own licentiousness, increase the numberof slave children whom they sell in the market. My friendformerly carried an annual present from a distant part of thecountry to this poor woman: but it is not known what has becomeof her, and whether she died before she had completed her object,of freeing all her family.
There is a woman now living with a lady in Boston, requiringhigh wages, which her superior services, as well as her story,enable her to command. This woman was a slave, and was married toa slave, by whom she had two children. The husband and wife weremuch attached. One day, her husband was suddenly sold away to adistance; and her master, whose object was to increase his stockas fast as possible, immediately required her to take anotherhusband. She stoutly refused. Her master thought her so farworthy of being humoured, that he gave her his son,-- forced himupon her, as her present feelings show. She had two morechildren, of much lighter complexion than the former. When theson left the estate, her master tried again to force a negrohusband upon her. In desperation, she fled, carrying one of herfirst children with her. She is now working to redeem the other,a girl; and she has not given up all hope of recovering herhusband. She was asked whether she thought of doing anything forher two mulatto children. She replied that, to be sure, they wereher children; but that she did not think she ever couldtell her husband that she had had those two children. If thisbe not chastity, what is? Where are all the fairest naturalaffections, if not in these women?
At a very disorderly hotel in South Carolina, we were waitedupon by a beautiful mulatto woman and her child, a pretty girl ofabout eight. The woman entreated that we would buy her child. Onher being questioned, it appeared that it was "a badplace" in which she was: that she had got her two olderchildren sold away, to a better place; and now, her only wish wasfor this child to be saved. On being asked whether she reallydesired to be parted from her only remaining child, so as neverto see her again, she replied that "it would be hard topart," but for the child's sake she did wish that we wouldbuy her.
A kind-hearted gentleman in tbe south, finding tbat the lawsof his State precluded his teaching his legacy of slavesaccording to the usual methods of education, bethought himself,at length, of the moral training of task-work. It succeededadmirably. His negroes soon began to work as slaves are never,under any other arrangement, seen to work. Their day's task wasfinished by eleven o'clock. Next, they began to care for oneanother: the strong began to help the weak:--first, husbandshelped their wives; then parents helped their children; and, atlength, the young began to help tbe old. Here was seen theawakening of natural affections which had lain in a dark sleep.
Of the few methods of education which have been tried, nonehave succeeded so well as this task-work. As its general adoptionmight have the effect of enabling slavery to subsist longer thanit otherwise could, perhaps it is well that it can be employedonly to a very small extent. Much of the work on the plantationscannot be divided into tasks. Where it can, it is wise in themasters to avail themselves of this means of enlisting thewill of the slave in behalf of his work.
No other mode of teaching serves this purpose in any degree.The shutting up of tbe schools, when I was in the south, struckme as a sign of the times,--a favourable sign, in as far as itshowed the crisis to be near; and it gave me little regret onaccount of the slave children. Reading and writing even (whichare never allowed) would be of no use to beings withoutminds,--as slaves are prior to experience of life; and religiousteaching is worse than useless to beings who, having no rights,can have no duties. Their whole notion of religion is of powerand show, as regards God; of subjection to a new sort of rewardand punishment, as regards themselves; and invisible reward andpunishment have no effect on them. A negro, conducting worship,was heard to pray thus; and broad as the expressions are, theyare better than an abject, unintelligent adoption of thedevotional language of whites. "Come down, O Lord, comedown,-- on your great white horse, a kickin' and snortin'."An ordinary negro's highest idea of majesty is of riding aprancing white horse. As for their own concern in religion, Iknow of a "force" where a preacher had just made astrong impression. The slaves had given up dancing, and sangnothing but psalms: they exhibited the most ludicrous spiritualpride, and discharged their business more lazily than ever,taunting their mistress with, "You no holy. We be holy. Youno in state o' salvation." Such was the effect upon themajority. Here is the effect upon a stronger head.
"Harry," said his master, "you do as badly asever. You steal and tell lies. Don't you know you will bepunished in hell?"
" Ah, massa, I been thinking 'bout that. I been thinkingwhen Harry's head is in the ground, there'll be no moreHarry,--no more Harry."
"But the clergyman, and other people who know better thanyou, tell you that if you steal you will go to hell, and bepunished there."
"Been thinking 'bout that too. Gentlemen bewise, and so they tell us 'bout being punished, that we may notsteal their things here: and then we go and find out afterwardshow it is."
Such is the effect of religion upon those who have no rights,and therefore no duties. Great efforts are being now made by theclergy of four denominations6 to obtain converts inthe south. The fact, pointed out to me by Mr. Madison, that the"chivalrous" south is growing strict, while thepuritanic north is growing genial, is a very remarkable sign ofthe times, as it regards slavery. All sanctions of theinstitution being now wanted, religious sanctions are invokedamong others. The scene has been acted before, often enough tomake the catastrophe clearly discernible. There are no truereligious sanctions of slavery. There will be no lack of Harrysto detect the forgeries put forth as such: and, under the mostcorrupt presentments of religion, there lives something of itsgenuine spirit,--enough to expand, sooner or later, and explodethe institution with which it can never combine. Though I foundthat the divines of the four denominations were teaching acompromising Christianity, to propitiate the masters, and grosssuperstitions to beguile the slaves,--vying with each other inthe latter respect, that they might outstrip one another in thenumber of their converts,--I rejoiced in their work. Anything isbetter for the slaves than apathetic subjection; and, under allthis falsification, enough Christian truth has already come in toblow slavery to atoms.
The testimony of slave-holders was most explicit as to nomoral improvewent having taken place, in consequence of theintroduction of religion. There was less singing and dancing; butas much lying, drinking, and stealing as ever: less docility, anda vanity even transcending the common vanity of slaves,--to whomthe opinion of others is all which they have to gain or lose. Thehouses are as dirty as ever, (and I never saw a clean room or bedbut once, within the boundaries of the slave States;) the familyare still contented with their "clean linen, as long as itdoes not smell badly." A new set of images has beenpresented to the slaves; but there still remains but one idea, byand for which any of them live; the idea of freedom.
Not for this, however, is the present zeal for religion a lessremarkable sign of the times.
Another is, a proposition lately made in Charleston to removethe slave-market further from public observation. Thisacknowledgment, in such a place, that there is somethingdistasteful, or otherwise uncomfortable, in the sale of humanbeings, is portentous. I was in that Charleston slave-market; andsaw the sale of a woman with her children. A person presentvoluntarily assured me that there was nothing whatever painful inthe sight. It appears, however, that the rest of CharlestonIthinks differently.
I was witness to the occasional discussion of the questionwhether Congress has power to prohibit the internal slave trade;and found that some very eminent men had no doubt whatever ofsuch power being possessed by Congress, through the clause whichauthorizes it to "regulate commerce among the severalStates." Among those who held this opinion were Mr. Madisonand Mr. Webster.
The rapid increase of the suffrage in the north, compared withtlie south, affords an indication of some speedy change ofcircumstances. Three fifths of the slave population isrepresented; but this basis of representation is so narrow incontrast with that of the populous States where every man has thesuffrage, that the south must decrease and the north increase, ina way which cannot long be borne by the former. The south has noremedy but in abolishing the institution by which her prosperityis injured, and her population comparatively confined. She seeshow it is in the two contiguous States of Missouri and Illinois:that new settlers examine Illinois, pass on into Missouri, whereland is much cheaper, and return to Illinois to settle, hecausethere is no slavery there: so that the population is advancingincalculably faster in Illinois than in Missouri. Missouri willsoon and easily find her remedy, in abolishing slavery; when thewhites will rush in, as they now do into the neighbouring States.In the south, the case is more difficult. It will be long beforewhite labour becomes so reputable there as elsewhere; and thepresent white residents cannot endure the idea of the suffragebeing freely given, within any assignable time, to those who arenow their slaves, or to their dusky descendants. Yet this is whatmust be done, sooner or later, with more or fewer precautions, ifthe south means to hold an important rank in Congress. It is incontemplation of this difficulty that the loudest threats areheard of secession from the Union; a movement which, as I havebefore said, would be immediately prevented, or signallypunished. The abolition of slavery is the only resource.
Upon the most remarkable of all the signs of the timesrelating to slavery, it is not necessary to say much. Those whichI have mentioned are surely enough to show, as plainly as if aghost had come from the grave to tell us, that the time is athand for the destruction of this monstrous anomaly. What theissue of the coming change will be is, to my mind, decided by aconsideration on which almost every man is vociferating hisopinion,--the character of the abolitionists.
It is obvious enough why this point is discussed so widely andso constantly, that I think I may say I heard more upon it, whileI was in America, than upon all other American matters together.It is clearly convenient to throw so weighty a question as thatof abolition back upon the aggregate characters of those whopropose it; convenient to slave-holders, convenient to those inthe north whose sympathies are with slave-holders, or who dreadchange, or who want an excuse to themselves for not acting uponthe principles which all profess. The character of theabolitionists of the United States has been the object of attackfor some years,--of daily and hourly attack; and, as far as Iknow, there has been no defence; for the plain reason that thisis a question on which there can be no middle party. All who arenot with the abolitionists are against them; for silence andinaction are public acquiescence in things as they are. The caseis, then, that everybody is against them but their own body,whose testimony would, of course, go for nothirig, if it wereoffered; which it never is.--I know many of them well; as everystranger in the country ought to take pains to do. I first heardeverything that could be said against them: and afterwards becamewell acquainted with a great number of them.
I think the abolitionists of the United States the mostreasonable set of people that I ever knew to be united togetherfor one object. Among them may be enjoyed the high and rareluxury of having a reason rendered for every act performed, andevery opinion maintained. The treatment they have met withcompels them to be more thoroughly informed, and more completelyassured on every point on which they commit themselves, than iscommonly considered necessary on the right side of a question,where there is the strength of a mighty principle to reposeupon. The commonest charge against them is that they arefanatical. I think them, generally speaking, the mostclear-headed, right-minded class I ever had intercourse with.Their accuracy about dates, numbers, and all such matters offact, is as remarkable as their clear perception of theprinciples on which they proceed. They are, however, remarkablydeficient in policy,--in party address. They are artless to afault; and probably, no party, religious, political, orbenevolent, in their country, ever was formed and conducted withso little dexterity, shrewdness, and concert. Noble andimperishable as their object is, it would probably, from thiscause, have slipped through their fingers for the present, if ithad not been for some other qualities common among them. It isneedless to say much of their heroism; of the strength of soulwith which they await and endure the inflictions with which theyare visited, day by day. Their position indicates all this.Animating as it is to witness, it is less touching than thequalities to which they owe the success which would otherwisehave been forfeited through their want of address and partyorganisation. A spirit of meekness, of mutual forbearance, ofmutual reverence, runs through the whole body; and by this areselfish considerations put aside, differences composed, anddistrusts obviated, to a degree which I never hoped to witnessamong a society as various as the sects, parties and opinionswhich are the elements of the whole community. With the gaiety ofheart belonging to those who have cast aside every weight; withthe strength of soul proper to those who walk by faith; with thechild-like unconsciousness of the innocent; living from hour tohour in the light of that greatest of all purposes,--to achieve adistant object by the fulfilment of the nearest duty,--andtherefore rooting out from among themselves all aristocratictendencies and usages, rarely speaking of their own sufferingsand sacrifices, but in honour preferring one another, how canthey fail to win over the heart of society,--that great heart,sympathising with all that is lofty and true?7
As was said to me, "the Searcher of hearts is passingthrough the land, and every one must come forth to theordeal." This Searcher of hearts comes now in the form ofthe mighty principle of human freedom. If a glance is cast overthe assemblage called to the ordeal, how mean and trivial are thevociferations in defence of property, the threats of revenge forlight, the boast of physical force, the appeal to the compromiseswhich constitute the defects of human law! How low and how sadappear the mercenary interests, the social fears, the clericalblindness or cowardice, the morbid fastidiousness of those who,professing the same principles with the abolitionists, are bentupon keeping those principles for ever an abstraction! Howinspiring is it to see that the community is, notwithstanding allthis, sound at the core, and that the soundness is spreading sofast that the health of the whole community may be ultimatelylooked for! When a glance shows us all this, and that theabolitionists are no more elated by their present success thanthey were depressed by their almost hopeless degradation, we mayfairly consider the character of the abolitionists a decisivesign of the times,--a peculiarly distinct prophecy that thecoloured race will soon pass from under the yoke. The Searcher ofhearts brings prophecies in his hand, which those who will mayread.8
I cannot give much space to the theories which are current asto what the issue will be if the abolition of slavery should nottake place. To me it seems pretty clear, when the great amount ofthe mulatto population is considered. Within an almost calculabletime, the population would be wholly mulatto; and the southernStates would be in a condition so far inferior to the northern,that they would probably separate, and live under a differentform of government. A military despotism might probably beestablished when the mixture of colours had become inconvenient,without being universal: slavery would afterwards die out,through the general degradation of society; and then thecommunity would begin again to rise, from a very low point. Butit will be seen that I do not anticipate that there will be roomor time for this set of circumstances to take place. I say thisin the knowledge of the fact that a very perceptible tinge ofnegro blood is visible in some of the first families ofLouisiana; a fact learned from residents of high quality on thespot.
How stands the case, finally?--A large proportion of thelabour of the United States is held on principles whollyirreconcilable with the principles of the constitution: whatevermay be true about its origin, it is now inefficient, wasteful,destructive, to a degree which must soon cause a change of plan:some who see the necessity of such a change, are in favour ofreversing the original policy;--slavery having once been begun inorder to till the land, they are now for usurping a new territoryin order to employ their slaves: others are for banishing thelabour which is the one thing most needful to their country, inevery way. While all this confusion and mismanagement exist, hereis the labour, actually on the land, ready to be employed tobetter purpose; and in the treasury are the funds by which thetransmutation of slave into free labour might be effected,--atonce in the District of Columbia, and by subsequent arrangementsin the slave States. Many matters of detail would have to besettled: the distribution would he difficult; but it is notimpossible. Virginia, whose revenue is derived from the rearingof slaves for the south, whose property is the beings themselves,and not their labour, must, in justice, receive a largercompensation than such States as Alabama and Louisiana, where thelabour is the wealth, and which would be therefore immediatelyenriched by the improvement in the quality of the labour whichwould follow upon emancipation. Such arrangements may bedifficult to make; but "when there's a will there's away;" and when it is generally perceived that the abolitionof slavery must take place, the great principle will not long beallowed to lie in fetters of detail. The Americans have done moredifficult things than this; though assuredly none greater. Therestoration of two millions and a half of people to their humanrights will he as great a deed as the history of the world willprobably ever have to exhibit. In none of its pages are therenames more lustrous than those of the clear-eyed andfiery-hearted few who began and are achieving the virtuousrevolution.
1 England and America.
2 It may surprise some that I speak of those whoare blind to slavery being an anomaly in economy as 'few.' Amongthe many hundreds of persons in the slave States, with whom Iconversed on the subject of slavery, I met with only one, a lady,vho defended the institution altogether: and with perhaps four orfive who defended it as necessary to a purpose which must befulfilled, and could not be fulfilled otherwise. All the rest whovindicated its present existence did so on tbe ground of tbeimpossibility of doing it away. A very large number avowed thatit was indefensible in every point of view.
3 With the condition of the African colony, we havehere nothing to do. We are now considering tbe ColonisationSociety in its professed relation to American slavery.
4 Governor M'Duffie's message to the legislature ofSouth Carolina contains the proposition that freedom can bepreserved only in societies where either work is disreputable, orthere is an hereditary aristocracy, or a military despotism. Heprefers the first, as being the most republican.
5 The dispute between the abolitionists anti theiradversaries is always made to turn on the point of distinctionbetween freedom of discussion and political interference. Withthe views now entertained by the south, she can never besatisfied on this head. She requires nothing short of a deadsilence upon the subject of human rights. This demand is made byher state governors of the state governors of the north. It will,of course, never be granted. The course of the abolitionistsseems to themselves clear enough; and they act accordingly. Theylabour politically only with regard to the District ofColumbia, over which Congress holds exclusive jurisdiction. Theirother endeavour is to promote tbe discussion of the moralquestion throughout the free States. They use no direct means tothis end in the slave States; --in the first place, because theyhave no power to do so; and in the next, because the requisitemovement there is sure to follow upon that in the north. It iswholly untrue that tbey insinuate their publications into thesouth. Their only political transgression (and who will call it amoral one?) is, helping fugitive slaves. The line between freediscussion and political interference has never yet been drawn tothe satisfaction of both parties, and never will be.
6 Presbyterians, Episcopahans, Methodists andBaptists.
7 It may, at the first glance, appear improbablethat such a character as this should belong to any collection ofindividuals. But let it be remembered what the object is; anobject which selects for its first supporters the choicestspirits of society. These cboice spirits, again, are disciplinedby what they have to undergo for their object, till tbey come outsuch as I bave described them. Their's is not a common charitableinstitution, whose committees meet, and do creditable business,and depart homewards in peace. They are tbe confessors of themartyr-age of America. As a matter of course, their characterwill be less distinctive as their numbers increase. Many arecoming in, and more will come in, who had not strength, or light,or warmth enough to join them in the days of theirinsignificance.
8 While I write, confirmation comes in the shape ofGovernor M`Duffie's message to tbe legislature of South Carolinn,in which he speaks of the vast and accelerated spread ofabolition principles; of the probability that slavery in theDistrict of Columbia will be soon abolished; and of the pressingoccasion that thence arises for South Carolina to resolve whatshe shall do, ratber than part with her domestic institutions. Herecommends her to declare ber intention of peaceably withdrawingfronm the Union, in such a case. Time will show whetherthemajority of her citizens will prefer sacrificing theirconnexion with the union, or their slavery; whether theseparation will be allowed by the other States to take place; or,if it be, whether South Carolina will not speedily desire areadmission.
From Harriet Martineau, Society in America, VolumeII, Part II, Chapter I, Section II, - "Rural Labour."London: Saunders and Otley, 1837, pp. 93-170.
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