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THE
WEST INDIA QUESTION.
IMMEDIATE EMANCIPATION
WOULD BE
SAFE FOR THE MASTERS;-PROFITABLE FOR THE MASTERS;-
HAPPY FOR THE SLAVES;-RIGHT IN THE GOVERNMENT;-
ADVANTAGEOUS TO THE NATION: WOULD INTERFERE
WITH NO FEELINGS BUT SUCH AS ARE DISGRACEFUL AND
DESTRUCTIVE:--CANNOT BE POSTPONED WITHOUT CONTIN-
UALLY INCREASING DANGER.
AN OUTLINE FOR IMMEDIATE EMANCIPATION;
AND
REMARKS ON COMPENSATION.
BY CHARLES STUART.
REPRINTED FROM
THE (Eng.) QUARTERLY MAGAZINE AND KEVIEW, OF APRIL, 1832.
"Am I not a woman and a sister ?
NEW HAVEN:
H EZEKIAH HOWE & Co.
1833.





Τ Η Ε
,
WEST INDIA QUESTION.
IMMEDIATE EMANCIPATION
WOULD BE
SAFE FOR THE MASTERS;-PROFITABLE FOR THE MASTERS;
HAPPY FOR THE SLAVES;-RIGHT IN THE GOVERNMENT;-
ADVANTAGEOUS TO THE NATION; WOULD INTERFERE
WITH NO FEELINGS BUT SUCH AS ARE DISGRACEFUL AND
DESTRUCTIVE; CANNOT BE.POSTPONED WITHOUT CONTIN-
UALLY INCREASING DANGER.
AN OUTLINE FOR IMMEDIATE EMANCIPATION;
AND
REMARKS ON COMPENSATION.
BY CHARLES STUART.
REPRINTED FROM
THE (Eng.) QUARTERLY MAGAZINE AND REVIEW, OF APRIL, 1832.

"Am I not a woman and a sister ?"
NEW HAVEN:
HE Z EK I AH HO WE & 60,
1833.


SA 1175166
Printed by Hezekiah Howe & Co.


4
"the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness
and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness,"
and to believe, that as far as he knows himself, this is his motive for
writing as he does: not to judge, but to warn; not as desiring to de-
stroy, but as wishing to be an instrument of salvation.
The subject, is Negro Slavery as it exists under British power
And the question, is how may it be remedied?
The Negro Slave party, that is, they who are interested, from
whatever motives, in the continuance of Negro Slavery, honorable
wealthy, talented and united, declare that immediate abolition is
forbidden by self-presevation; regard for the negroes; rights of the
masters; pledges of goverment; and national interests. And another
reason, not much avowed, but well understood, and of all others
the most deeply felt by the great body of managers and of resident
proprietors, is the fear of losing that endless variety of gratifications,
which the possession of despotic power affords. But of all, few or
none under the British empire, pretend at this day, that Negro
Slavery should be interminable. All agree that it ought to be even-
tually abolished; but they require time, in order to avert the dangers,
which they anticipate from so a great and sudden a change as imme-
diate emancipation would produce. Now if it can be clearly shewn,
that these objections have no force, either in nature or in fact; that
the immediate emancipation of the negroes, is the best way to give the
masters security, and the negroes happiness; to absolve the duty of
the government, and to support or improve the colonial and national
revenues: and if it can be further shewn, that delay is a cruel and
dangerous delusion: and that the licentious gratifications of despotic
power, dear though they be to the sinner, as a hand or an eye, are
altogether ruinous and degrading: the difficulties which are heaped
like mountains in the way of duty, will be removed, and unless
rottenness have altogether gotten hold of us, we shall open our eyes
and see how safe, and only safe it is, to obey God and let the op-
pressed go free.
Can such proofs be supplied; or where are they?
I propose briefly exhibiting them under the following heads, by
shewing that THE IMMEDIATE EMANCIPATION OF THE NEGROES-
1st. Would be safe and profitable for the masters.
2nd. Would be happy for the negroes.
3rd. Would be right in the government.
4th. Would be advantageous to the nation.
5th. Would interfere with no passions but such as are disgraceful
and destructive; and
6th. Cannot be postponed without great danger.
But two things must be premised; viz:
1. The real condition of the enslaved negroes in the British Colo-
nies ; and
II. What we mean by immediate emancipation.


1st. The real condition of the enslaved negroes in the British
Slave Colonies.
Each estate is a little despotism : the master may imprison, *
flog, torture, sell and seperate his slaves, under certain limitations
essentially more or less inefficient, at his discretion. He gives them
no wages; merely supporting them as beasts are supported. He
may impose upon them, at all times, an overwhelming amount of
labor; and this is left particularly to his own ungoverned discretion,
during the season of crop, or for about four months in each year.
His slaves may be seized and sold without any fault, or imputation
of a fault, for their master's debts. They can be mortgaged like
goods and chattels; and the greater number of them could not obtain
their liberty, though thousands were offered to redeem them, except
their masters pleased. When they come or are brought to England,
they are free while in England; but should they return to their na-
tive country, they are again made slaves. This is their general con-
dition. Kind masters alleviate it; but it is generally aggravated by
unkindness; and where sugar is cultivated, this aggravation is so
severe, as to eventuate yearly in the slaughter of thousands of them,
by the most lingering and painful deaths.f
But who are these slaves? Or of what enormous transgressions
have they been guilty, that they should thus be consigned to a state
of such hopeless and consuming oppression? Where is the record
of their crimes and condemnation? Who were their judges? By what
special commission were they tried?
They are British subjects. The great body of them were born
within the king's allegiance, and have never forfeited his protection
by any crime. They were never condemned; never tried; never
accused. They are unoffending British subjects, with the same
rights to the king's protection which any other British subject has;-
endowed with property in their own bodies by their Maker, and in-
heriting a right to the King's protection, by having been born within his
allegiance. They are slaves merely because they are in the hands
of their enemies, who are stronger than they; and because their king
and their country, who are bound by the most sacred ties to do them
right, still choose to crouch beneath the pride and wickedness of
their oppressors, and, with God's judgments ringing a thunder alarum
through the world, to leave his poor to be destroyed.
2ndly. What do we mean by immediate emancipation?
We mean, immediately to treat the unoffending negroes in their
true character, as guiltless British subjects; to give them the pro-
* See Jamaica Slave Law of 1831. Regulations for Crown Colonies of 1831.
Nine Letters to the Duke of Wellington, by Ignotus. J. Jeremie's Four Essays,
James Stephen's 2 volumes. Jamaica Christian Record. Colonial Gazettes, and
Parliamentary Papers.
+ See Population Returns, as quoted from Parliamentary papers in the House of
Commons, by Brougham and Buxton.


tection of the law, until they shall have been guilty of some crime,
and have been fairly tried by a jury of their peers, and found guilty;
to pay them fair wages for their labor; and to leave them to enjoy
the fruits of their industry with their families. In short, we mean,
immediately to make them the subjects of wise and righteous laws,
instead of leaving them the slaves of private and irresponsible caprice.
The following extract from J. Jeremie's work on Colonial Slavery,
will fairly introduce our subject.
“Hitherto nothing had been done at St. Lucia, either legally or prac-
tically. General Mainwaring had, it is true, advised the planters to
make an experiment, in July 1823, immediately on his receiving the
original resolutions of the House of Commons; but this attempt, if
entered on by some, was soon universally discontinued. The first
draft of the slave law was completed at the close of the year 1825,
when he had been nearly twelve months in the colony, and had had,
as conceived, the best opportunities of forming a judgment. He had
taken the most respectable colonial information, had made a tour of
the island that he might ascertain, de visú, what was the actual condi.
tion of the slaves, and had revised carefully every enactment which
appeared in the books of the colony.
6. The opinion thus formed by himself amounted to this, that he
conceived what had been alleged, of the general cruelties of slavery,
was a downright misrepresentation; and this opinion was laid upon
the tables of parliament in the subsequent year.—But hitherto the
slave had not enjoyed the liberty of freely communicating with his
protectors; he had not enjoyed those important rights which rendered
him in any degree independent of his manager.
“ Scarcely was this opinion transmitted, and the new slave law pro-
mulgated, than a negro came before him with a collar rivetted round
his neck, from which projected three prongs of about ten inches each
in length, and at the end of each of those prongs were inserted three
smaller ones about an inch long, and these were attached to a chain,
reaching to fetters joining round his ancles. His back and limbs were
wealed from neck to foot, and he declared that this collar was kept
on him by day and by night; that he worked with it in the field;
and on his return was immured in a solitary cell; and that this course
had been practised for some months in order to prevent his running
away, the crime for which he was principally charged. This might
however be a solitary instance.
“A commission of three gentleman of reputed humanity, namely,
an officer holding the situation of Procureur du Roi, or official protec-
tor of slaves, together with the commandant of the quarter in which
the plantation was situated, and the commandant of the neighboring
quarter, were sent out to investigate the affair. These gentlemen re-
turned with a written report, wherein not a word of the Negro's state-
ment was shaken. They admitted that there were three other men,
at the time, on the estate, with collars of the same description, and
that those collars were in use in the country.
" The Procureur du Roi added, that the collars in use were not quite
so heavy; but the commissioners, apparently with a view of settling


that point, had weighed the collar, and affirmed that it was heavier
than usual. The report also stated, that there was a woman covered
with sores, who was found in chains, and had been so chained for
near two years; aud yet the commissioners reported that the estate
was well managed, and that the arrangements were good !--This was
not a remote period, but in the year 1826.
“ As may be supposed, the report was not satisfactory to others, as
to those gentlemen. But no sooner was it known that the law was to
be rigorously adhered to than reports of insubordination among the
Negroes, and of the necessity of a militia, or some other armed protec-
ting force to keep them in order, were universally circulated; all
which not only surprised me but was at that time incomprehensible. A
proclamation was however issued against these collars. What follow-
ed ? Scarcely two months afterwards, other reports were spread of
discontent and actual mutiny of so serious a nature having broken out
on the same estate, that the principal officers of goverment were
directed to investigate the matter anew. The result was, that in lieu
of the collar, the following punishments had been used. The women
were hung by the arms to a peg, raised so high above their heads that
the toes alone touched the ground, the whole weight of the body res-
ting on the wrist of the arms, or the tip of the toes. The report of
a mutiny was mere invention.
“This torture was also put down, one of the offenders fined, and the
other imprisoned. But what was the third expedient adopted? The
field-stocks,-an invention forwarded from Trinidad, and which was
actually legalized by the regulations drawn up by myself—so little
aware was I of the severity of the punishment; indeed my attention
was drawn to it by a planter himself. The field-stocks are in short, or
at least may be rendered, nothing less than the most cruel picketing.
They are in the shape of a pillory, the hands of the slave are
inserted in grooves, which may be raised to any height above the
head, and the feet are inserted in other grooves at the bottom of
the instrument, the toes alone being made to touch the ground;
the body is thus suspended in mid-air, its whole weight resting on
the wrist and toes.”
And it was in view of these facts, not as solitary cases, but as ex-
hibiting a fair, general character of the natural outworkings of Negro
Slavery, that J. Jeremie, in alluding to the proceedings at an Anti-
Slavery Meeting which he had attended just before he left England,
says, “On reading over these proceedings now, it is singular how
altered they appear to my mind. With the experience I have since
had of Slavery, there is not a sentiment I could not now adopt.”
J. Jeremie's work presents as luminous and fair a picture of the
subject as could be drawn. Every person who would know what
Negro Slavery actually is, should read it.
And now for our argument.
I. The immediate emancipation of the negroes, would be safe and
profitable for the masters.
First. It would be safe. We will take Jamaica for an example.


while their unoffending fellow subjects are perishing upredressed.
The slave-master is confounded by it in every speculation; enter-
prise withers; credit fails, or is obtained at a ruinous premium. The
oppressed negroes are now buoyed up by hope: again, they are goad-
ed to madness and despair; meanwhile, with the progress of knowl-
edge, they are unavoidably becoming more and more acquainted with
their rights as British subjects, equally entitled with their masters to
the King's protection; they are continually gaining new force (as far
as the cultivation of sugar does not kill them off) to vindicate what
every British spirit would die rather than relinquish. And the wrath
of God is waxing hotter and hotter against us, while we hug the en-
tanglements of our wickedness, and refuse the path of duty, which
would at once disenthral us, by obeying God and letting our oppressed
brethren go free.
Three possibilities only exist of preventing the slaves from vin-
dicating their rights, if we do not emancipate them ere it be too late.
1st. Encouraging and increasing the cultivation of sugar, so as to
increase the annual slaughter of which we are already guilty, and
thus eventually to exterminate them entirely!
2nd. The shutting out of knowledge from them altogether.
3rd. The general establishment of the christian spirit in its sweetest,
gentlest, meekest form.
The first of these, that is their destruction by sugar, is in opera-
tion; it is reeking with the blood of hundreds of thousands already
slaughtered, and is clamorous for aid to complete its work of death.
Consumers of slave sugar, look to it well; you will want a good an-
swer at the day of judgment.
The second, that is keeping them in ignorance, we have passed
by and cannot return to it. Knowledge is abroad; it is spreading,
and will spread; it is searching out the lies of ages, and exposing
and overturning them; and nothing but the truth in love is capable of
arresting its surges, and of confining them to limits of order and hap-
piness. Seek to circumscribe it by other means, and you only dam
up the flood, that with a deeper and mightier swell. it may presently
roll over you, and bury you with your puny barriers in a deeper
ruin.
The third, that is the attainment of the christian spirit, is depen-
dent upon a mightier energy than man's; and even when men seek
it, they so mar and hinder the object of their own pursuit, by their
own discrepances, that for one christian spirit which they gain of
the meek and lowly order above-mentioned, they gain a thousand
warlike christains, who like the pious officers of our army and navy,
at once draw the sword of flesh in the battles of this world, and the
sword of the spirit in the battles of a better. As far indeed, as
christianity of the meeker stamp is obtained, security is obtained
against resistance by the sword. But christians of this holy order,
above all others, have learnt to obey God rather than man, and when


12
vantage, which could in any common possibility occur; but the pro-
fits of the proprietor would be immediately and progressively increa-
sed: because
1st. He would suffer less from petty depredations.
2nd. He would be more able to obtain the extra aid, which agri-
culture needs on emergent occasions; and in this would be included
the important advantage of having every thing done in its proper sea-
son. The slaves are generally worked the year round beyond their
strength, so that on the present system, there is no proper resource
for the emergencies of the seasons, or of the crops.
3rd. The land, instead of being worn out, would be improved, and
rent could be obtained for much of that which is now fruitless.
4th. The proprietors would have the advantage of voluntary labor
urged on by interest, want, hope, and affection; over forced labor,
maddened indeed, at times, to a spasmodic exertion by fear; but ha-
bitually depressed by despondency, and rendered unproductive by a
writhing and smothered sense of wrong. It is a part of the fearſul
infatuation of the slave system, that it first deprives a man of every
right and happy motive to labor; then wondering that he is idle, with
demoniac bitterness, applies the lash or the stocks, or the dungeon, or
the chain!! as if the effect, which results from a cause, could be rem-
edied by corroborating and aggravating the cause which produced it.
The negroes continually increasing, the price of labor would pro-
portionably diminish, and facilitate the opening of new lands; cattle,
&c. would be reared, and the land would revive as they multiplied.
The colonies would be safer, less expensive, and more productive;
for a free and loyal population fostered by us, would throng their
plains, and would be continually extending the mutual demand and
supply, by which commerce prospers.
The large capital which the slave system requires for the purchase
of slaves, is not needed where labor is free. This fact chills the
spirit of general and useful enterprise by confining the cultivation of
our slave colonies, or rather the profits of that cultivation, to a few
wealthy individuals. The government, the nation at home, and the
negroes abroad, being dishonored, degraded, and plundered, in order
to gratify the unbending pride, and the crazy fears, and the mistaken
interests of a few wealthy capitalists.
For we may observe, that wherever speculations in slave labor, as
is commonly the case, are pursued on credit, the debtor is entangled
in all his exertions; his crops are mortgaged; he must procure, at
whatever expense of life to the negro, or of disadvantage to himself,
the stipulated quantity of produce, and he must commit it to the stip-
ulated agencies,-he must force the seasons if unfavorable—he loses
the advantages of the market—he is driven even as he drives the
poor negro-except indeed that brutal force urges one-hastening
to get rich the other,—that the poor negro sees no hope in his toil,-
but the speculator in the poor negro's sweat is buoyed up for his little


13
span by the golden lure, which still glitters brightly before him, how-
ever certainly it in general eludes his grasp and leaves him in ruin.
The fair capitalist needs not the cruel and criminal monopoly, which
the slave system affords him, in order to enhance the advantage which
the possession of capital always must give over its poorer competitor.
In the United States, the northern part of Maryland is less fertile
and is less favorably situated for commerce than the south; but it is
cultivated chiefly by free men. Land in this part is worth twice as
much as it is in the southern and more fertile division, which is culti-
vated by slave labor; Pennsylvania is a free State ; Virginia a slave;
they adjoin one another; land of the same quality, &c. is worth twice
as much in Pennsylvania as in Virginia; wages in Virginia are twice
as high as in Pennsylvania ; Virginia compared to Pennsylvania is a
wilderness; the inhabitants of Virginia are trembling in their beds-
the people of Pennsylvania rest in safety.
Kentucky and Ohio are adjoining States; Kentucky is a slave,
Ohio a free State ; Kentucky was well settled, when not many years
ago, Ohio was still a wilderness; but now the free population of Ohio,
nearly doubles that of Kentucky, both enslaved and free.
“In 1821, the colored population of Colombia (including Indians)
amounted to 900,000. Of these a large number were suddenly eman-
cipated. The effect was, a degree of docility on the part of the blacks,
and a degree of confidence and security on the part of the whites, un-
known in any preceding period of the history of Colombia."*
“In the parishes of St. John, Philip, and George, in Barbadoes,
on a plantation of 288 slaves in June 1780, viz. 90 men, 82 women,
56 boys, and 60 girls, by the exertion of an able and honest manager,
there were only 15 births, and no less than 57 deaths, in three years
and three months. An alteration was made in the mode of governing
the slaves, the whips were taken from all the white servants; all
arbitrary punishments were abolished, and all offences were tried by a
negro court. In four years and three months, under this change of
government, there were 44 births, and only 41 deaths, of which ten
were of superannuated men and women, and past labor, some about
eighty years old. But in the same interval, the annual net clearance
of the estate, was above three times more than it had been for ten
years before.”+
And should it here be said, “but the negroes were still slaves ;"
I reply, it is true that the negroes were still slaves, legally, but prac-
tically they were free: they were secured from all arbitrary punish-
ments; their few crimes were tried by their peers; they received
wages, and freely enjoyed the fruits of their labor; they loved the
locality to which they were accustomed, and had no desire to leave it.
* Enquiries relating to Negro Emancipation. Hatchard and Son, Piccadilly.
1829. p. 77.
+ See Adam Hodgson's Letter to J. B. Say. Hatchard and Son, Piccadilly. pages
24, and 25.


16
The question is not, whether in some cases, it would not be better
for a poor man to be entirely dependant upon a kind employer, and
to be entirely provided for by him; but whether, in all cases, general-
ly, it is better for a poor man to be the subject of just and equal laws,
or the slave of the humor and will of his employer?
The answer is obvious. Unfit as the man may be to be entrusted
with liberty, still his happiness will be more secure, under God, in
his own keeping, than in any other man's. In keeping his own lib-
erty, he is liable to abuse it. True; but who is not subject to the
same liability ? and if no man were to be free, until he were secure
from abusing his liberty, where would the free man be!! But lia-
ble as the poor man unquestionably is to abuse his liberty, it is a still
more striking and awful truth, that the rich or the strong man, armed
with despotic authority, is yet more liable to abuse his power. Who
in his senses would give his son for a slave to the Turk, because his
son was liable to abuse his liberty! Yet the Turks, generally speak-
ing, are kinder slave masters than the British are. And if the Brit-
ish slave master excuse himself from this procedure, by saying, that
he has better means of securing his son from the abuse in question,
than by giving him to a Turk; who does not see, that as truly, the
British slave masters have vastly better means for securing the hap-
piness of the negroes, than by keeping them in slavery? The follow-
ing facts are selected from many, to prove that immediate emancipa-
tion would be happy for the negroes.
In the year 1794, the French National Convention at once declar-
ed all the slaves in their colonies to be free. Capt. W. of Cove Cork,
was at that time residing in Cayenne. Liberty was proclaimed to
the slave population around him, and slavery instantly ceased. He
declared to me, that there was no disorder or fear; but all flourished.
The masters and the laborers were alike happy, until Buonaparte, in
1802, restored slavery there.
The case of Hayti, or St. Domingo, is still more in point, because
it was on a large scale, and its history is better known; and it is im-
portant to sketch it, as it has been grossly perverted by the advocates
for slavery, and the enemies of the negroes.
In the latter end of 1793, liberty was proclaimed to the slaves by
the government of the island, for the purpose of extinguishing a civil
war, which had been for sometime raging, and which the government
found itself, although aided by troops from France, unable to quell;
as well as in order to resist an invasion of the English. Early in
1794 this act was confirmed by the National Convention. The
emancipation of the negroes, 500,000 in a body, produced the effects
desired. The civil war was extinguished; the English were expel-
led ; and Hayti continued to flourish until 1802, when Buonaparte
endeavored to restore slavery there. He was foiled. But his horri-
ble attempt led to a second civil war, which long distracted the isl-
and, and which led to the expulsion of the whites. It is now at


peace; and a French merchant, with whom I met last winter in Bel-
fast, and who had resided chiefly in Hayti for upwards of twenty
years past, told me, that though well acquainted with Great Britain
and the United States; he knew of no country, in which there were
so few infractions of the criminal code, and so much general comfort,
good order, kindness, and independence as in Hayti.
The late first president of the Royal Court of St. Lucia, J. Jere-
mie, presents to us the following contrast, in facts of his own experi-
ence in St Lucia.
“One day I visited officially a plantation in the highest order,—the
cleanliness of the buildings, their perfect state of repair, the luxuriance
of the crops, all that concerned the manager's interest, bore an appear-
ance truly gratifying. But it was my duty to inspect the gang: they
were wretched to a degree, all but naked, eaten up with sores, wealed
with flogging, diminishing rapidly, the only exception being a fine
healthy child about six years of age. And on full inquiry, all this
order, all this splendor, had been purchased at their expense.
"Much about the same time, I was called on to visit another estate,
which the proprietors had quitted for some years, and for about three
had left even without a manager!! The house and buildings were in
decay, the general cultivation neglected, the appearance of the proper-
ty, in all respects, the contrast of the other ; but that contrast also ex-
tended to the gang.–The men were a stout, healthy body of laborers.
Men, women, and children, were well clothed and well fed; their
grounds stored with ample provisions; a mother with her nine, another
with six children around her; a great grandmother with a numerous pro-
geny, all smiling and cheerful; their cottages well wattled, the inside
separated into two or three different compartments, clean to a degree,
and each containing a trunk filled with good clothing and some female
ornaments. Yet was this plantation in the most remote, the other in
the most convenient, part of country” p. 62.
In 1829 it became generally known in the Islands proximate to St
Lucia, that a foreign slave, upon landing in a British colony was free;
and the consequence was, that in 1830, upwards of 100 made their
escape and came over to St. Lucia, from Martinique. These per-
sons were described by their governors as incendiaries, idlers, and
poisoners !!
Mr. Jeremie says respecting them, page 51—2.
“When I left the colony in April last, some were employed for
wages in the business they were best acquainted with; some as masons,
and carpenters; some as domestics; others in clearing land, or as.
laborers on estates; whilst about twenty-six had clubbed together and
placed themselves under the direction of a free colored man, an
African-one of the persons deported from Martinique in 1824. These
last had erected a pottery at a short distance from Castries: they took
a piece of land, three or four cleared it, others fished up coral, and
burnt lime, five or six quarried, and got the stones and performed the
mason-work, the remainder felled the timber and worked it in; and the


18
little money that was requisite was supplied, in advance, by the con-
tractor for the church, on the tiles to be furnished for the building. This
pottery was completed, a plain structure, but of great solidity, and
surprising neatness. Thus had they actually introduced a new man-
ufacture into the country, for which it was previously indebted to our
foreign neighbors, or to the home market.”
The evidence respecting the liberated crown slaves in the crown
colonies, as the law has not been evaded or abused, is altogether
delightful.-It unanswerably proves that the native Africans are quite
as fit for liberty as any people upon earth; and by consequence that
the creole slaves, if at all improved by our management of them, are
yet more fit. But if on the contrary, they are not so fit, what are
we about thus grossly to defy God, and deliberately to lie, by pretend-
ing all the time to wish to prepare them for liberty, while we persist
for our own purposes, in grinding and wasting the unoffending poor !*
The following fact is from my own experience :-
Between the years 1817 and 1822, about 150 slaves succeeded in
making their escape from the United States into Upper Canada. I
became more or less acquainted with them all, and found them quite
equal to any class of laborers in the country. These, with many oth-
ers since escaped, are now comfortably settled upon lands, the pur-
chase of their own industry, near Malden, in the western district of
Upper Canada; one of them, a man named Adams, was one of the
most interesting persons with whom I have ever met.
The following illustration is given me by my friend W. T. Blair,
Esq. of Cotham Lodge, near Bristol.
“It is well known that the Hottentot has been represented as the
lowest of all the African tribes in the scale of humanity. He is gene-
rally considered as a type of all that is degraded in human nature;
scarcely raised a degree above the level of the brute creation, and in-
capable of improvement.
“It is true, that when Vanderkemp first went amongst them, they
were in a very lawless and uncivilized condition; that they knew no-
thing, and cared nothing about the arts and comforts of civilized life;
that they lived chiefly by plunder, and were a terror to the colony.
But, they have since by kindness and christian instruction, been con-
verted into peaceable industrious subjects.
“When I visited Bethelsdorp in 1824, there were about 2000 peo-
ple on the books of the Institution. They had acquired about 2000
head of cattle, 177 horses, 240 sheep and goats, and 60 waggons,
which latter is in South Africa, an expensive and valuable article of
property; 300 children attended the sunday school, and there were
about 60 communicants. But few carosses or sheep skin coverings (the
native dress of the hottentots) were to be seen in the premises; nearly
*See Anti-Slavery Reporter, No. 70, Vol. iii, page 453–475, and No. 89, Vol. iv,
page 453_-454.


19
all the men were dressed in English broad-cloth, and the women in En-
glish chintzes. In 1823, or 24, they competed successfully with the
English and Dutch farmers, in the neighborhood, for the conveyance
of government stores from Algoa Bay to Graham's Town, and in the
same year they expended 20,000 rix dollars in the purchase of British
manufactures. The year I visited the station, an Auxiliary Missionary
Society had been re-established amongst the Hottentots, and 500 rix
dollars had been contributed by them, chiefly by small weekly sub-
scriptions."
III. The immediate emancipation of the negroes would be right in
the government.
This is a truth so evident, and so little disputed, that I shall dwell
but briefly on it.
The chief difficulty seems to consist in the persuasion that the gov-
ernment is bound, on emancipating the negroes, to compensate the
masters for the loss, which they declare they will suffer. Without
discussing this question here, I will observe that the emancipation of
the negroes, and the remuneration of their masters, are two essen-
tially distinct things, and ought always to be kept separate. The ne-
groes, as unoffending British subjects, have an unquestionable right to
the King's protection, whether their masters be remunerated or not. If
the masters can substantiate any real claim on the nation, it undoubtedly
ought to be liquidated. But the claim which the negroes have upon
the government, without a question is louder, and more solemn far.
The one (the negro) demands the restoration of rights which he has
never forfeited, which are his by British Law, but of which he is depriv-
ed by wicked power; he demands security for his life, for his person,
for the fruits of his toil, for his wife, and his child, and his cot. The
other (the master) demands security for a portion of his money.-
To put the master's claiin upon a par with that of the negro, is to
confound all distinction between things of the most vital and unal-
terable importance, and things comparatively insignificant and of
fluctuating value. But to set the master's claim above the negro's;
the claim of the wrong doer above that of the sufferer of wrong; the
claim of money, above life, liberty, wife, children, and the fair fruits
of the man's own labor, is to outrage all righteousness. Unquestion-
ably the master ought to be remunerated, whenever he can prove a
just claim to remuneration. But more unquestionably far, the negro
ought to be restored to his unforfeited rights as a British subject; the
right of the unoffending sufferer ought to be preferred to the money
of the oppressor.
The government has no right, except the right of the free-booter ;
the dreadful right of the strongest, to continue to permit the outrage
of the poor, because the rich are afraid that they will lose some mon-
ey, should that outrage be arrested. As far as the government has
sanctioned or connived at negro slavery, it has sinned and has dis-
graced itself in the eyes of every right mind. The government has


21
of the brute force, by which they are at present goaded; and that
the fruits of their own labor, instead of remaining the legalized booty
of another, should become their own.
The only difficulty, in this case, arises from the idea that the ne-
groes would not work. But abundant evidence proves that this is
simply a prejudice, with no other grounds, but the oppression which
produces it, or the ignorance which it deceives.
The following evidence on this subject was adduced by Mr. Pitt,
in the House of Commons, in April, 1792. “The assembly of
Grenada had themselves stated, “ that though the negroes were al-
lowed the afternoons of only one day in every week, they would do
as much work in that afternoon, when employed for their own bene-
fit, as in the whole day, when employed in their master's service.”
Now after this confession, the House might burn all its calculations
relative to the negro population. A negro, if he worked for himself
could do double work. By an improvement then, in the mode of
labor, the work in the islands could be doubled."*
And what improvement in labor can be so great, as giving the la-
borer a personal interest, well secured to him, in the produce of his
labor; as winning his affections to the work in which he is employed !
In 1780, Kentucky was a flourishing state, and had a considera-
ble population; the same year Ohio had scarcely thirty white inhab-
itants. But Kentucky was a slave state, and Ohio a free one.
In 1830, the population of Kentucky was less than seven hun-
dred thousand, but that of Ohio was nearly one million; and land
of the same quality in Ohio, was worth twice as much as in Ken-
tucky.
In 1780, Virginia had a population of six or seven hundred thou-
sand, New York only about four hundred thousand. But Virginia
was a slave state while New York had but few slaves.
In 1830, the population of Virginia was only about 1,211,266, of
whom 469,724 were slaves. But the population of New York,
where there were only forty six slaves, had increased to 1,913,508.
And why was this?
Kentucky and Virginia can scarcely be surpassed in natural fertil-
ity; they are two of the garden spots of the world. In every other
advantage excepting one they had an equal share with Ohio and
New York. That one was free labor. Kentucky and Virginia re-
fused it when it was at their option, and they refuse it still. Ohio
and New York accepted the boon, and they are largely reaping the
benefit.
A missionary and his wife, who returned from Jamaica last year,
after a residence there of about fifteen years, told me at Birming-
ham, where I met them, that having been much acquainted with the
coffee plantations of that island, they had generally found the slaves
* Clarkson's History of the Abolition of the Slave Trade, Vol. 2, page 428.


23
“ He accounted for it, among other causes, by the too great intima-
cy between slaves and the lower class of free persons; and in proof
of this he offered to submit for inspection certain small plantations,
often occupied by a free colored man and his wife alone, the former
being either a fisherman, mason, carpenter, or sportsman; and yet,
observes the reporter, “his plantation is better cultivated, and he has
more land in cultivation, than proprietors of several slaves. Who
then,' he adds, cultivated his property? Perhaps day laborers. No,
he employs none; he employs runaway slaves !""
And what does this statement prove? Clearly that if the reporter
affirmed rightly, runaway slaves, under all the depressing fears of dis-
covery and oppression, labor well because the fruits of their labor
are immediately their own : how much better then, if freed from those
fears, and if stimulated by the still fairer hopes, which warm the bo-
som of the free man! Or if the reporter was in error, that one free
man and his wife, in the midst of other avocations, can do more than
a slave master with several slaves. I feel indeed that I am almost
insulting the understandings of my readers, in dwelling on this evi-
dence ;—and perhaps nothing but the thick darkness, which pride
and prejudice have woven round a subject in itself so plain, could
excuse me.
But if the evidence adduced have force, and darkness be fleeing
before the light of truth, we see that the immediate emancipation of
800,000 souls, would give the nation upwards of a million, instead
of 2 or 300,000 consumers for its varied productions : the agricul-
ture of the colonies, which is perishing, would be retrieved: the
sources of insolvency, vice, sterility and ruin, which are interwoven,
fundamentally, in the Negro slave system, being removed by its abo-
lition; and every mind in the colonies being left free to bring its
quota of talent and of energy into the common stock for the public
good, the whole would rapidly increase in number and in wealth :
character would improve; credit would be restored; enterprize, no
longer reduced to a monopoly by the immense capital requisite for
slave speculations, would revive; and the fertile lands, which though
now rendered comparatively barren, still call our ships across the
sea, restored by the willing nerve of freedom to their fertility, would
soon demand a double number.
V. The immediate emancipation of the negroes would interfere
with no feelings, but such as are disgraceful and destructive. .
What are the feelings which forbid the immediate emancipation of
the negroes ?—that is, their being immediately made the subjects of
wise and benignant laws, instead of leaving them, as they now are,
the slaves of private caprice?.
Not regard for the law of God, for the Divine law is the law of
all righteous liberty : the express command to masters is, to give to
servants that which is just and equal, and the part which God choos-
es is, “to let loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy bur-
dens, and to let the oppressed go free.”


26
of a plan of gradual emancipation, without improving the negroes in
knowledge, and you tell of your own folly. Speak of preparing the
negroes for liberty, without cultivating their minds, and you render
your proposition unworthy of all regard. But every step in knowl-
edge nerves the arm, and whets the sword of the wronged, for the
recovery of his plundered and unforfeited rights. “Timely reform,"
it is well said, “is reconciliation with a friend. Reform delayed, is
capitulation to an enemy."
Whatever might be the result of immediate emancipation, by the
wise and parental authority of government, the result of emancipa-
tion wrought out by the negroes for themselves, would unquestionably
reek with blood.
On the gradual system, increasing numbers are continually getting
free. The more benignant, and consequently the more worthy of
regard, that system may be, the greater are those numbers: but they
do not get their parents, wives, and children freed with them.-
“What kind of a woman was your mother,” said a slave master some
years ago, in a familiar mood, to a fine African boy whom he had
purchased. The poor boy's heart writhed beneath the associations
awakened : “Come, tell me," said the white man who regarded the
black man as a brute, only fit to be enslaved and insulted; "what
kind of woman was she, was she tall, was she thin, was she old, was
she beautiful ?” The boy's glistening eyes arose, and in broken accents
he said, “how could a mother but be beautiful in the eyes of her
child ! !" These increasing crowds of free men, eminent as far as
our slave system has not destroyed the characteristic, for filial duti-
fulness, see and hear the brutal wrongs, which their loved and honor-
ed ones are suffering. They know, for they have felt, that slavery is
no bed of roses; that consuming one's strength by force, for another's
benefit, is no pleasant toil; that licentious power, backed by oppor-
tunity, is not a fictitious terror; their souls writhe within them at the
nameless wrongs to which their parents, wives, and children, are still
subjected. Their number and intelligence; their wealth and power
continually and unavoidably increasing, give energy to the fire which
is burning within them ; every feeling of the human heart, which ex-
cites to resistance and to retaliation, rankles more and more deeply,
and they are only waiting the climax and the opportunity, to sweep
away the accursed remnants of the slave system, in the blood of its
unrelenting perpetrators.
Immediate emancipation is a certain remedy, and it is the only
remedy at once righteous in principle, and safe in fact. Delays are
dangerous. Delay in duty, that is, in what is morally right, is criminal
as well as dangerous. The Almighty, as the American Jefferson, so
solernnly and so truly said half a century ago, in relation to negro
slavery in the United States, “has no attribute, which can take side
with us, in such a contest!"


28
rather than of any value to his master; and he immediately proved
himself, and continued to prove himself, one of the most dutiful and
industrious men, that the Friend ever knew. But the great body of
the slave party are so imbruted in all their feelings towards the ne-
groes, that they will not and cannot see the broad and delightſul truth
which this bespeaks; and they persist in ruining themselves, and wast-
ing the negro by vainly endeavoring to obtain by force, what equity
and love would at once obtain without sin or difficulty. Their minds
are in the same posture in relation to the negro, as the mind of the
drunkard is in relation to his liquor, or of the adulterer in relation to
his lusts. They see the negro slavish, artful, thievish, and idle, as a
slave. They will have it, that as a freeman, he would be the same;
and therefore, with all the wisdom of infatuation, they persist in keep-
ing him a slave, in order to prepare him for liberty ; they will retain
him in the condition which has, in a great measure, forced him to be
slavish, idle, thievish, and artful, in order to teach him to be indepen-
dent, industrious, honest, and open. This fact could scarcely be
more strikingly exhibited, than it is in the following words of the as-
sembly of Jamaica, in their decision of December 14, 1827.
“The whip is not forbidden in the field, lest the abandonment too
suddenly, of a long established usage, should be misunderstood by the
slaves. * * * Until Negro women have acquired more of the sense
of shame, which distinguishes European females, it will be impossible
in respect to them, to lay aside altogether, punishment by flogging,
there being no substitute that promises to be accompanied with the
same salutary dread.”
Or in the following quotation from the Antigua Free Press of Fri-
day, June 8th, 1827.
“On the first introduction of the Slave Code into Trinidad, the
abolition of the whip, in the punishment of female slaves, coming sud-
denly on the Planter, unprovided with the authorized means of coer-
cion, was the cause of great relaxation of discipline, and frequent
disorders occurred. But the application of the hand and feet stocks
has proved fully effectual for the punishment of refractory or inso-
lent slaves; and at this period, the females are maintained in as per-
fect order and subordination as the males. These stocks, confining
the hands and feet, by which the body is kept in a position, that at
length becomes almost insupportable, are allowed by law to be applied
for six hours; but the severity of the punishment has proved so great,
that few planters will go to the extent authorized; and the female who
has once tasted of its salutary bitterness, has seldom any inclination
to try a second dose !!"
Such is the wisdom, and such are the contrivances of the great
body of the Negro Slave Masters. Such are the modes, by which
they seek to enrich themselves, and to prepare the Negroes for lib-
erly; and such is the condition, in which they would have us con-


29
tentedly leave our guiltless fellow subjects in the slave colonies; till
women, by indecent exposures, and brutal floggings, are taught mod-
esty; or by stretching on the stocks of Trinidad, are inspired with
respect for the authorities above them, and with cheerful industry!!!
The simple reason why a man who keeps his eyes fast closed, cannot
see, even while the day is pouring upon him, is because he will not
open his eyes.
* 2nd. The Planters surely love their own pecuniary interests.
The negroes are actually their property. To oppress and destroy
the negroes, would be to destroy their own property; and how can
we believe, that shrewd men like the Planters, fully awake to their
own pecuniary interests, could act so irrationally?
On our post roads of Britain, the Post Masters love their money
as well as the West India Planters do. The post horses are their
own property. Yet, who does not know that, in seasons of competi-
tion especially, the poor horses are driven beyond their strength, and
often killed ? Negro slavery is an intense competition of ardent ri-
vals, driving against each other. The driven animal, as in other ca-
ses, is the sufferer. The driver also very frequently suffers, betray-
ed by the lust of gold. This is eminently the case with the slave
party. In their horrible lottery of avarice, and lust, and blood, nine
out of ten are ruined. They are driving themselves to destruction
as fast as they can. But they resolutely shut up their senses against
the blaze of evidence which demonstrates this fact; and while they
go on railing at the government; and at the friends of humanity ;
and at the poor negroes—and even at the blessed missionaries of the
cross; they are continually deepening their guilt and their ruin. God
says to them, “Steal no more." “ Yes, yes,” they reply; “ we wo’nt
steal a man's coat; but we must steal his reputation, his wages, and
his liberty.” “Let the oppressed go free,” says God. "That we
wo'nt,” says the Negro Slave party. “The way of transgressors is
hard,” saith the Lord. “Oh, that,” they cry, “is the fault of the
sufferers, and their friends.” God opens to them the pleasant way
of love and holiness. But they hate that pleasant way, and sting
themselves to death, while they are wasting the unoffending poor,
and abusing every one who does not sympathize with them in their
wickedness.
Few, comparatively, of the Negro Slave proprietors are manag-
ers. The actual authorities, generally in charge of the poor ne-
groes, are hirelings, and have no other interest in them, than to
wring out of them as much labor, year by year, as possible. With
these men interest concurs with passion and opportunity, in wasting
the negro.
Of the few proprietors who are managers, very few indeed, are
completely solvent. Overburdened, generally with debt, and deep-
ly mortgaged, they are under pecuniary engagements of the heav-
iest kind, to obtain, harvest by harvest, a stated quantity of produce,


30
and to consign it to the stipulated agencies. However much they
may compassionate the negroes, or be awakened to their own per-
manent interests, they have no alternative but immediate ruin, (as
they deem ruin) or the fulfilment of their pecuniary engagements.
The poor negro is the machine by which, season after season, the
bond is solved; and that bond can only be solved, as the admirers
of slave labor are persuaded, by exacting from him by force, what-
ever amount of exertion is requisite for its solution.
Interest, worldly interest I mean, is dear to man; it is like his
right hand. But passion is dearer still. It is the apple of his eye.
He will sacrifice body and soul for his money. But he will sacri-
fice body and soul, and money too, for the gratification of his pas-
sions. What tongue could utter the loathsome and bloody abomina-
tions of negro slavery in this particular? The mind of the despot,
in relation to the negro, is doubly seared. He outrages his brother,
and rushes proudly to his own ruin, even as the war horse plunges
into battle.
3. But here is a difficulty.
A man has purchased an estate in the West Indies of the value of
£20,000. The enslaved British subjects on it, estimated at one
half, or £10,000 : the lands and works at the remainder.
He has a sudden call to convert his property into money, or he
dies, and his executors are required to do the same, for the benefit
of legatees. Now, while such a sale is in progress, or before it can
be completed, if all the enslaved British subjects in the slave colo-
nies were restored to their freedom, would not such property be
largely depreciated, and would not the person in question sustain a
heavy loss?
I reply, the case is an extreme one. Such cases might occur,
but they would certainly be rare ; and even on the low ground of
political expediency, the exception can never form the rule. It is
unquestionably better in every sense, that a few criminal individuals
should suffer a pecuniary loss, than that hundreds of thousands of
innocent people, should continue bereaved of all that is most un-
alienably the real property of man, and of all that is fundamentally
dearest to every right feeling of the human heart.
But will such a loss arise; let us fairly see.
Every body knows, that land of itself is worth little or nothing
for human purposes. All, or almost all its value, depends upon the
means of cultivating it. In a slave society, like that of Jamaica, as
few or no laborers, except such as are enslaved can be procured for
the purpose of cultivating land, the value of landed property rests
eminently upon the number of enslaved laborers attached to it; and
this must continue as long as slavery continues. But if the slaves
were freed, what would be the result? There would at once be in
Jamaica between three and four hundred thousand free laborers, de-
pendant under God for the daily bread of themselves and families
aily bonded there we Build


31
upon their own labor. Every one who had land, could get a portion
of them. The value of land, which had largely gone over to the
slaves, because none but slaves could be got to cultivate it, would im-
mediately revert to the land itself, because now its cultivation would
be secured by free labor, without the waste of capital, and the over-
whelming responsibilities of the slave system. This reversion of the
value of the land, to the land, would be immediate in a measure; it
would necessarily increase with rapidity, and very soon, as is now
the case in Maryland and elsewhere, the land and buildings alone,
would be worth as much, without a single slave, as the same land
and buildings now are, with all their outraged and unoffending poor.
If the necessity, supposed in the case, were imperious and in-
stant, so that the persons concerned could not without guilt, delay
the sale, beyond the day immediately following the emancipation, it
is probable some loss would be sustained. But not so much as the
slave share of the purchase, because every one would immediately
know, that the land was now valuable without slaves. But this is a
case doubly extreme. The common necessities of sale, could clear-
ly be postponed under such circumstances, for a reasonable time,
and little or no loss need arise. For myself I am fully persuaded,
that sales would early be effected, vastly more profitable to the ven-
ders, than now could take place, or than ever can take place again,
while we continue to defy God, by refusing to let his poor go free.
They who can deem the risk of a portion of the money of a few,
in a case scarcely to be supposed; and that money, the money of
the wrong-doers; as of more value than the unforfeited right of the
sufferer of wrong to his property in his own person, and in his own
righteous liberty and earnings, may be stumbled at this difficulty if
they please. I leave them, with an earnest intreaty to study solemn-
ly and prayerfully, the 58th chapter of Isaiah, and the beginning of
the 5th of James.
But why don't the Government do its duty, and at once abolish
this atrocious system?
The only reasons that I can see, are, 1st. That Slave Masters
are members of the Government. And what, with this cancer in
its bosom, and the dreadful influence of the Slave party without;
pervading as it does, almost every corner of our empire, and holding
often the highest in its trammels,—the Government, however willing,
has not been able alone. And 2ndly. That the nation, by purcha-
sing and consuming the produce of the Slave Colonies, at once sup-
ports Slavery, and unnerves all its efforts, and all its petitions against
it. It is building up with both hands, what it is calling upon others
to pull down.
Two or three brief observations may be added.
If the negroes be fit for liberty, there is no excuse, but such as
telons use, for keeping them in bondage.


32
If the negroes be not fit for liberty, the fault must be in our negro
slave system ; since it is undeniable, that the native Africans can at
once be landed from the captured slave ships, as free men, the sub-
jects of law, with the most perfect safety to the public and them-
selves.
If we would keep them slaves, in order to prepare them for lib-
erty, where shall we find right agents for the evolution of our benev-
olent purpose? The West India planters have always been an hon-
orable body. They have had the negroes in their hands for nearly
three centuries; and they themselves declare that the negroes are
not yet prepared. There is another body, more honorable still, the
Bishops with His Grace of Canterbury at their head, who have had
a slave estate, (Codrington's Estate, Barbadoes,) for upwards of a
hundred years in their possession, and by their own last report, pub-
lished but a few months back, the negroes on it were not yet fit for
liberty.
Where could we find better agents ? Or can present or future
slave masters be more wisely trusted with the liberties of their un-
offending fellow subjects than those that are passed; while still they
remain men, and the dreadful influences of despotic authority retain
the same power as ever over the human heart? Which of us, that
has a father's spirit, could be willing that our child, imbruted by
Turkish bondage, should remain in bondage to the Turk, that his
Turkishi master might prepare him for liberty before he set him
free? And what difference is there between this case and ours, ex-
cept that a Bible is more guilty than a Koran land, where it wrongs
its unoffending brother !
Outline for Immediate Emancipation.
A Parliamentary enactment, abolishing at once and altogether, the
Negro Slave system, throughout the British dominions.
This should be transmitted, immediately after its completion, with
all requisite authority, to the slave colonies; and, at the conclusion of
the few days which might be requisite to prepare for its promulga-
tion, it ought to be promulgated and put in force.
The negroes should remain amenable to the common Statute Laws
of Great Britain, together with such local regulations, as might be
suitable in their recovered capacity, as free and righted British sub-
jects.
All compulsory labor will be at an end, except for crime, by fair
course of law, and equitable wages will be the stimulus, and the re-
ward of the negro's toil.
All great and sudden changes, being liable to difficulties from the
very nature of the human mind, the change which we are now con-
templating, should be no greater than duty requires—and therefore,
while duty is satisfied, by converting the slave of private and irres-


33
ponsible caprice, into the subject of public and equitable authority,
such regulations should be enacted, as might best provide for the
public good, on the righteous basis of equal law.
A public provision should be made for the maimed and incurably
diseased negroes.
All difference in law, on account of color, to be abolished.
The details of this outline can be filled up, only by the proper
authorities. All that seems wanting for its completion is,
That the negro slave party should open their eyes, and cultivate,
instead of destroying, both their own interests, and the unoffending
poor.
That whether the negro slave party will open their eyes or not,
the government should do its duty, by at once and totally abolishing
this atrocious crime, leaving the pecuniary question between the
criminals to be settled by due course of law.
That in order to give the government the strength which it needs
on this subject, the people should more and more urgently and nu-
merously petition.
That in order to give their petitions all their force, the people
should abstain from slave produce, as far as possible, and especially
from that dreadful article, slave sugar, which adds slaughter to
slavery.
And, as each individual's duty is perfectly independent of the
concurrence or opposition of others, that each individual should be
faithful unto death, in doing all that he can in a christian temper and
a christian manner, towards obtaining immediate obedience to the
divine command, to "let the oppressed go free.”
Should it yet be said-But why not leave the matter to govern-
ment? I reply,
1st. The measures still pursuing by government, are fundamental-
ly the same as those pursued since 1823; that is, they continue either
to leave legislation for the benefit of the oppressed, to the discretion
of their oppressors; or they aim at the mitigation, instead of the ex-
tinction of crime. While the government has been dallying over
these measures, exposed to the scoffs, and the insults, and the almost
treasonous opposition of the slave party, upwards of 30,000 of our
unoffending fellow subjects have been deliberately slaughtered in
cold blood; and upwards of 200,000 have died in slavery; and are
prepared with all their unredressed wrongs about them, to meet us
at the bar of God. From 1824 to 1831, between 4000 and 5000
yearly destroyed in sugar. The natural deaths, in the same period,
amongst 800,000, must have been at least 200,000.
2nd. The half-way measures of the British government, and the
liberty which it has taken to connive at the actual continuance of
the great crime of negro slavery, while it has been feebly aiming at
its future extinction, have encouraged other nations in their wicked-
ness. Crime, to be prevented, must be deprived of countenance ;


34
and the temptations, which lead to it, must be removed. Immediate
emancipation, under wise and benignant regulations, would do this :
but half-way measures countenance the crime, and supply it with
temptation.
3rd. The act of legislature, which shall substitute the dominion of
wise and equitable laws, for that of private and irresponsible caprice,
will be more easy of execution, than any merely ameliorating acts
can be. In the former case, legislature will be simple, uniform, and
just; and the interests of all parties being fairly consulted, the inter-
ests of all will harmonize. But, in the latter, legislation itself ex-
ceedingly complicated, will have to contend with a discordant mass
of hostile and repellent powers. Each plantation will remain, as it
is, a little “inperium in imperio,” at variance with the supreme
government, and in a state of smothered warfare within itself; the
interests, as he deems them, of the master, on the one side, being,
from the very nature of things, at irreconcilable variance, with the
interests on the other, of the oppressed negro, and of the nation,
disgraced by the poor man's wrongs.
4th. The discordances of legislation, introduced into our slave
colonies, by the various sources, British, Spanish, French, Dutch,
Pirate, &c. from which we have derived ther, will present a laby-
rinth of legalized subterfuge and impediment, beyond all possibility
of efficient correction, by mitigating measures; and amidst the mazes
of which, “ Negro Slavery" may safely crouch, crying out “ Ameli-
oration,” and despising the cries of the negro's blood; as long as the
gradual system, with its half policies, vacillating between right and
wrong, continues to afford it covert.
5th. But let the simple, wise, and equitable dominion of British
law, be substituted by the supreme authorities of the state, for the
negro slave system; and at once, the otherwise insuperable difficul-
ties which now oppress us, will disappear: the wickedness which is
a lion in the face of indecision, is a lamb when confronted by dute-
ous energy; and truth, and love, and lawful liberty, will take place
of avarice, tyranny, and lust, and blood. Policy will be succeeded
by wisdom. Temporising between right and wrong, will be sup-
planted by decision in right; and our eight hundred thousand en-
slaved and outraged negro fellow-subjects, will no longer blazon our
inconsistency and hypocrisy over the world, whenever we boast of
our liberty.


APPENDIX.-ON COMPENSATION.
In Negro Slavery, there are two parties.—The wrong doers, and
the sufferers of wrong.
Whatever may become of the wrong doers, the sufferers clearly
ought not to continue to be wronged.
The wrong doers consist of two classes. 1st. The Negro Slave
party; that is, every body who has, or rather, who thinks he has, any
direct interest in the continuance of the outrage. And, 2nd. The rest
of the nation.
The beginning of this outrage, was the crime of the Negro Slave
party. Sir John or Captain Hawkins, by imposing upon his sovereign,
and by making himself a merchant in the liberties and blood of his
unoffending fellow men, for sake of lucre, was its infamous founder.
(I speak of Great Britain only.)
At a subsequent period, the Government, to its everlasting disgrace,
threw itself into the enterprise, and took a dreadful lead; but even
then, in the height of its guilt, the Government retained a degree of
integrity. In the debate of 1792, as quoted by Clarkson, vol. ii, p.
433, adducing Act 23. Geo. II. c. 31.
“No master of a ship trading to Africa, shall by fraud, force or violence, or by
any indirect practice whatever, take on board, or carry away from that coast, any
Negro, or native of that country, or commit any violence on the natives, to the
prejudice of the said trade; and every person so offending, shall, for every such
offence, forfeit £100.” Mr. Pitt adds, “ But the whole trade had been demonstrated
to be a system of fraud, force, and violence; and therefore, the contract was daily
violated, under which the parliament allowed it to continue.”
And who were the violators ? Not the nation or the government,
but the negro slave party!
Virginia and Jamaica, it is true, petitioned for the abolition of the
African Slave Trade; and the government rejected their petition. But
the motives for the petition and for its rejection, were of one stamp.
Both were alike sordid,-and in moral estimation, are records, not of
praise, but of infamy.
When, at a subsequent period, the African Slave Trade was ac-
knowledged by government to be what it always had been, felony, and
was abolished by law, the negro slave party clave only the more firm-
ly to their idol, its hideous parent, Colonial Slavery, which, in the
nature of things, is equally felony; and for many years past, they have
been resisting alike the influence of the government, the remonstran-
ces of the nation, the voice of humanity, and the commands of God,
in support of their destructive system. All that talent, wealth, high
connections, union, energy, lust, pride, prejudice, selfishness, deluded
passion, and perverted judgment, could do, to support the outrage, has
been done by them; and through their influence, chiefly, this intol-


36
erable disgrace still rankles in our bosom. I say, chiefly-not entire-
ly-because, by purchasing and consuming their produce, especially
their bloodbought sugars, we continue to purchase and encourage the
crime.
These facts should be always kept in mind, when we discuss the
subject of Compensation. I speak of them in a general sense, disre-
garding the exceptions; and in this sense, I proceed to observe:
1st. If the criminal, however sanctioned by legal wickedness like
his own, have no just claim to compensation, when arrested in his
iniquity; then the plunderers of the rights, and the destroyers of the
lives, of their guiltless fellow subjects, will have no such claim, if a
lawful stop be put to their cruel and destructive system.
2nd. If compensation be due to the sufferers of wrong, and not to
the perpetrators of it, then, all the compensation is due to the op-
pressed.
3d. If compensation for loss never can be due, till the fact of loss,
and an equitable claim, be substantiated; no compensation can be
due, in the case before us, till the proof of such loss is supplied, and
a just claim to remuneration be established.
4th, If the compensation claimed, be a claim of equity, that claim
must have the support of the Divine law. But every principle of the
Divine law, is against the claim in question here, as far as relates to
keeping the unoffending negroes another moment in bondage.
5th. If it be a political claim, it must be supported by political
rights. But, in the present case, the British law is fundamentally ad-
verse to it. The charters of the Slave Colonies do not support it.
The British character loathes it. Customs inherited from pirates, and
a law of custom, worthy of pirates only, together with Colonial Stat-
utes, defining its existing enormities, are its sole grounds—its sandy,
yet terrible foundation.
6th. If it be a commercial claim, it must be sanctioned by the es-
tablished principles of commerce. But every merchant exposes him-
self to all the reverses which may meet him in his speculations.
When he has had sufficient warning, he is doubly without a claim.
And when his speculations partake of robbery and murder, all that he
has a right to claim, is the robber's and the murderer's meed.
7th. If it be a claim to benevolence, it must make out a case of dis-
tress, not the result of the claimant's own obstinacy in wickedness.
In the case before us, the case of general distress seems amply made
out; but the evidence is still more ample, that this distress is entirely
the result of the dreadful infatuation in sin, of the claimant; that he
has the remedy within his power; and that nothing, but his own
unbending wickedness, has prevented, or now prevents the remedy.
8th. If the claim pretend to any degree of rectitude, it must be con-
patible with the equal or superior rights of others. But this seems
entirely overlooked by the slave-masters, in their “a priori" claims
for compensation. So sordidly selfish are their views, that no evi-
dence can be traced, in any of their proceedings, of their having the
least reinembrance, that the negroes whom they oppress, are their
brother men, entitled, by the law of their God, to their love: that the


37
poor negroes, whose liberties they are plundering, and on whose
plundered wages they are living, are their fellow subjects, and have a
better claim to the king's protection, than they themselves have: that
the oppressed negroes have suffered wrongs from them, and from the
nation, which worlds of gold, and ages of holy and undissembling love,
could not repay.
9th. If the claim demand a sum of money, equal to the full existing
value of the negro, this and more than this, the claimants have already
received. The oppressed negroes themselves, have amply paid it, by
the net profits of their toil. The only difference is, that if the nation
had paid it, they would have received it, all at once, in the mere sum,
of £24,000,000; estimating, in round numbers, that there are 800,000
of our fellow subjects thus oppressed in the Colonies, and that the
price of each of these, upon an average, is £30. Whereas, receiving
it, as they have done, by daily instalments, they have received a large
addition in compound interest. Here let it also be observed, that the
nation is already two hundred millions out of pocket by the Slave
Colonies; and that in any legal balancing of pecuniary accounts, this
fact must be estimated.
10th. Whether, however, we reject or admit the claim of compen-
sation, the most convincing arguments, alike of theory and of fact,
are not wanting to prove, that the advantages of free labor, would
greatly increase the value of the estates, so as in a short time, to ren-
der the land alone worth as much as land and negroes both together
now are; and would greatly improve the income of the proprietors.
And these arguments are so conclusive, that it would be much more
reasonable for the slave masters to purchase beforehand, from the
nation, the advantages of immediate emancipation, by an advance of
millions, than it would be in the nation to pay beforehand, for an ap-
prehended loss, which there is abundant reason to believe will never
arise.
Still, the claim is boldly and loudly reiterated. Here is what may
be further said.
The quantity of produce on each plantation is annually sworn to for
internal taxation, in the slave colonies.
The quantity of exported produce, is, or ought to be, duly recorded
in passing through the Custom House.
The number of enslaved British subjects on each plantation, is an-
nually sworn to, for internal taxation.
The same thing is done triennially, stating age, sex, &c. for the
three yearly returns to the supreme Government.
The books of each plantation contain lists of all the enslaved British
subjects on the plantation, with their various employments, &c.
On these and other data, means of accurate information are always
at hand. With respect to the effect of making the negroes at once
the subjects of wise and benignant laws, instead of leaving them the
slaves of private caprice, the negro slave party, and the rest of the
nation, that is, the two parties of criminals, are at variance. The
negro slave party, will have it, that a man labors most profitably for
his employer, when compelled to do so, whether he likes it or not.


39
The king's subjects must not be left the slaves of the king's subjects.
The law which has been outraged, must be restored without delay to
its integrity. The oppressed must be let go free. This is our first
duty; and it is a duty perfectly separate from the balancing and set-
tling of the vile accounts which we, the wrong doers, have between
ourselves. But as we cordially agree, that having been your accom-
plices in the crime, should the fulfilling of our first and great duty in
this particular, subject you to inequitable loss, we ought to bear a fair
portion of the penalty; you have only to assert and substantiate
your claim to compensation, as soon as you have really suffered a
loss; and we pledge ourselves not to be wanting in justice to you.
The data already enumerated, together with other evidence, will al-
ways amply supply us with the means of coming to a fair decision.
The question of letting the oppressed go free, and of restoring to His
Majesty's unoffending subjects, the unforfeited rights of which they have
been so long and so criminally deprived, is one thing. This must be
first and independently set at rest. The question of mutual duty be-
tween the wrong doers, is another thing. And the proper time for
discussing it, will be, when any claim is peaceably advanced and sup-
ported openly, and fairly and lawfully established by either party of
the criminals against the other.”
Suppose, then, that our wishes were accomplished !
Suppose that the government should cease to defy and mistrust God;
and that in its deliberate wisdom, as God's minister, it should to-mor-
row enact a law, at once abolishing the whole slave system, and in-
stituting in its place, a law, worthy of free and Bible-England. Sup-
pose that the unoffending and loyal negro, should thus at once be re-
stored to the king, whose subject he is; and be delivered from the
despot of the plantations, whose slave he is not for a moment, except
by laws and customs, which are the stain and the curse, even of the
pirate. Suppose, I say, that this were done; and that it were accom-
panied with every truly wise and righteous precaution; for this, and
this orly, is what we are urging. What would be the difference?
Let us take Jamaica for our example.
Would God keep it less firmly on its watery bed, because now the
laborer there, was no longer plundered of his wages; and because the
master now no longer stiffened his neck against his God, or hardened
his heart against his brother? Who can believe it?
What would be the difference?
Would the lands assume a double sterility, because the causes which
are producing their sterility, were removed? Would the land, which
refuses to yield its strength to the nerveless and heartless arm of
the slave, become doubly barren, beneath the cordial arm of the
freeman?
Would the master whose beauteous fields are of no use to him, with-
out labor, keep them waste, and ruin himself with two-fold rapidity,
merely because he hated free labor, and still hankered after the long
idolized lusts of slavery ? Would he make a wilderness about him,
where, amidst the unfettered developments of every holy and tender
affection, he might, if he would, make a paradise ?


Your property would not be taken from you. It would be improv-
ed. The capital which is sunk in your negroes, is sunk. It does
not now supply your current expenditure; but on the contrary, is a
heavy burthen to you. You must have other sources of supply for
your current expenses; these will not be touched by the emancipation
in question ; but they will rather be benefited by the comparative se-
curity which results from the harmony instituted between the negroes'
interests and your own.
But should I wish to sell, where is my money? The capital sunk in
my negroes, will surely then be gone, as I shall have no negroes to
sell.
Not so.—Although you will have no negroes to sell, you will have
a substitute, equally, or more valuable. You will have the recovered
value of your land. Wherever slavery prevails, land without slaves,
is of little or no use; and as the purchase of slaves is very heavy,
and the possession is always precarious and dangerous ; few, compar-
atively, can embark in the speculation. The finest land remains, as
it were, a drug, because ten thousand acres of it, without slaves, where
you can get no other laborers, must remain a wilderness. But abolish
slavery, and at once you have as many free laborers as you had
slaves, each standing in the market anxious for employment. Get
one hundred acres then, and you can immediately render it productive
by hiring such laborers as you need for its cultivation. Thus the land
resumes its value; and in its recovered and increasing worth, you
have an ample security for the capital sunk, whenever you may wish
to sell.
But the negroes will leave us.
We can see no reason to believe it-except, indeed, you be one of
these wretches, who, by the atrocities of despotic power, doubly abu-
sed, have succeeded in awakening wrath even in the kind negro's bo-
som, and have convinced him beyond denial, that his only alternative
for peace is to leave you. In every other case, why should he go?
To whom should he go? Whither could he go? He would not leave
you-he could, as a general truth, have no motive for leaving you.
Every motive which wields the heart of man, would require him to
stay. He would want his cot-where could he get another, should
he leave you? He would want his field—where could he get a better?
He would want a master to hire him. Why should he leave you, if
you have not proved to him beyond contradiction, that you are singu-
larly unfit to be trusted? If he went from you, it would not be we,
who took him away, but it would be yourself alone, who drove him
from you. All that we should have done, would be to take away
from him the motives which you are now giving him to leave you if
he could; and to make it his interest, and his honor, and his happi-
ness, to remain with you, secured alike with yourself, beneath the
sacred and pleasant panoply of righteous law.
Here we ought to observe, that there is one class of the criminals
not included in the preceding remarks. These are the Jobbers as
they are called, who have slaves, but have no lands. Much of the
force of what has been said, clearly does not apply to them. If their


43
slaves were to be freed, they would lose their slave property, and
many of them have none other. In a moral and everlasting sense,
the emancipation of their negroes, would be to them also, an unspeak-
ably important benefit: but in a pecuniary sense, they would be losers.
I stop here, merely to notice, not to discuss the fact; and I will simp-
ly add, that in the vast expanse of fertile lands, which still belong to
the government in the slave colonies, the amplest means exist of ma-
king every provision for them, which compassion or equity can de-
mand, without the expense of a shilling to the nation.
Should it further be said, “ admitting your whole argument, still,
as the present proprietors might suffer by the foreclosure of mortga-
ges through the fears of mortgagees, upon such an extreme change of
circumstances, and through the unwillingness of capitalists to risk
their funds during the uncertainty, which for the time at least, would
be suspended over the event; and as you have unquestionably been
accomplices in the crime, you, as unquestionably, ought to share in
the loss." We may observe, that the government might provide
against this apprehended danger, by making loans, wherever requi-
site, upon the same security as other mortgagees, at three or four per
cent, to the present proprietors, wherever they might need funds, in
order to enable them to contend fairly with whatever difficulties might
arise. By this means, the proprietors would have an easier and more
certain command of money, at one half or one third of the expense
to which they are now exposed, and the government, without coun-
tenancing the impious claim of compensation, as antecedent for a mo-
ment, or as in any degree an equal duty, to the immediate rescue of
the king's unoffending subjects from the petty despots of the planta-
tions, would provide against loss to its partners in guilt, as far as hu-
man help can provide ; while in the increased value of land in the col-
onies; in the newly acquired security of property ; in the extension
of commerce; and in the general happiness of the people, it would
be itself as secure, as human things can be.