CooMnritkio RcsonroaB 
 Llg-F>e«» Type I 
 
 IH> a C D.UK. 
 
E 449 
 .R921 
 Copy 2 
 
THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF SLAVERY; 
 
 
 THE INSTITUTION CONSIDERED 
 
 IN REGARD 
 
 TO ITS INFLUENCE ON PUBLIC WEALTH AND THE GENERAL WELFARE. 
 
 Br 
 
 EDMUND RUFFIN, OF VIRGINIA. 
 
 Printed by Lemuel Towers. 
 
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THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF SLAVERY; 
 
 THE INSTITUTION CONSIDEKED IN IIEGAIID TO ITS INFLUENCE 
 ON PUBLIC WEALTH AND THE GENERAL Vv^ELFAEE. 
 
 BY EDMUND RUFFIN, OF VIRGINIA. 
 
 Slavery c/oicral in AiicitiU times — CaiixcH of 
 Slavery — Aversion to labor of degraded 
 classes and of barbarous communities. 
 Slavery has existed from as early time as 
 historical records furnish any information of 
 the social and jiolitical condition of mankind. 
 There was no country, in the most ancient 
 time of its history, of which the pecyde liad 
 made any cont^iderable advances in ihdustry 
 or refinement, in which slavery lia*! n5| been 
 previously and long established, and in general 
 use. The reasons for this universal early ex- 
 istence of slavery, and of domestic or indi- 
 vidual slavery, (except among the most igno- 
 rant and savage tribes,) can be readily deduced 
 from the early conditions of society. 
 
 Whether in savage or civilized life, the low- 
 er that individuals are degraded by poverty 
 and want, and the fewer aic liicir means for 
 comfort, and the enjoyment of either intellec- 
 tual or physical pleasures, or of relief from 
 physical sutferings, the lower do they descend 
 in their appreciation of actual and even' natu- 
 ral wants; and the more do they magnify and 
 dread the etforts and labors necessary to 
 protect themselves against the occurrence of 
 the privations and sufferings with which they 
 are threatened. When man sinks so low as 
 not to feel artificial wants, or utterly to dis- 
 pair of gratifying any such v>'ants, he becomes 
 brutishly careless and indolent, even in pro- 
 viding for natural and physical wants, upon 
 which provision even life is dependent. All 
 such persons soon learn to regard present and 
 continuous labor as an evil greater than the 
 probable but uncertain future occurrence of 
 extreme privation, or even famine, and conse- 
 quent death from want. Hence the most sav- 
 age tribes of tropical regions are content to 
 rely for sustenance almost entirely on the nat- 
 ural productions of a fertile and bounteous 
 soil. The savage inhabitants of less fruitful 
 lands, and under more rigorous climates, de j 
 pend on huuting and fishing for a precariitus 
 support, and with irregular alternations of 
 abundance and lavish waste, with destitution 
 and hunger and famine. And in every civi- 
 
 lized and plentiful, and even generally indus- 
 trious country, there are to be found, in «the 
 lowest grade of free inhabitants, many indi- 
 viduals, families, and communities of many 
 families, who live in the most abject condition 
 of poverty and privation in which life can be 
 preserved, (and is not always preserved,) and 
 prefer such wretched existence to the alterna- 
 tive of steady labor, by which they might 
 greatly imitrove tlieir co.idition, if not relieve 
 all wants for the necessaries of life. Even in 
 countries, and among a general population, in 
 which the highest rewards are held out for la- 
 bor and industry — where some intellectual, 
 and also moral and religious instruction, are 
 within the reach of all who will seek and ac- 
 cept such benefits, there are numerous cases 
 of men who not only forego all intellectual 
 and moral improvement for themselves and 
 their tamilies, and the attempt to gratify all 
 artificial wants, but who also neglect the relief 
 of the most humble comforts and even neces- 
 saries of life, rather than resort to that regu- 
 lar course of labor which would furnish the 
 means for comfortable subsistence. In all such 
 cases — whether in civilized or in savage socie- 
 ty, or whether in regard to individuals, fami- 
 lies in successive generations, or to more ex- 
 tended communities — a good and proper reme- 
 dy for this evil, if it could be applied, would 
 be the enslaving of these reckless, wretched 
 drones and cumberers of the earth, and there- 
 by compelling them to habits of labor,' and in 
 return satisfying their wants for necessaries, 
 and raieing them and their progeny in the scale 
 of humanity, not only physically, but morally 
 and intellectually. Such a measure would be the 
 most beneficial in young or rude communities, 
 where labor is scarce and dear, and the means 
 for subsistence easy to obtain. For even 
 among a barbarous people, wi.ere the aversion 
 to labor is universal, those who could not be 
 induced to labor with their own hands, and in 
 person, if they became slaveholders, would 
 be ready enough to compel the labor of their 
 slaves, and also would soon learn to economize 
 and accumulate the products of their labor. 
 Hence, among any savage people, the intro- 
 
^.action and e«ubH«hnient of domestic slavery 
 it ne«e«8arilv an imiimvemeut of the eoiRiition 
 and wealth and well-being of the community 
 in general, and also of the comfort of the en- 
 slaved class, if it had consi(>ted of such |>ert»oiis 
 tu ware lowest in the Micial scale — and is bene- 
 ficial in every such cas« to the master class, 
 and to the community in general. 
 
 Indolence of frre lahorert at hir/h teases — Dif- 
 frrrnl inerntiv*$ to free and davf labor — 
 C'omparativf valuts. 
 
 Uut the disposition to indulge indolence 
 (even at great (iiicrificesof benefit which mi^ht 
 be secured by industrious labor) is not ])ecu- 
 liar to the lowest and mostdegra<led classes of 
 civilixed comniunities. It is notorious that, 
 whenever ihe demand for labor is nuioh great- 
 er liian the 8Ui>|ily, or the wages of labor are 
 much higher th'in the expenses of living, verj- 
 iiiunv, even of the ordinary laboring class, 
 are remarkable for indolence, and work no 
 more than compelled by necessity. The great- 
 er the demand, and the higher the rewai'ds, 
 lor labor, the less will be performed, as a gene- 
 ral rule, by each indiviihial laborer. If the 
 wages of work for one day will support the 
 laborer or meclionic and his faiiiil}' for three, 
 it will be very likely thai h',' will be idle two- 
 third* of his time. 
 
 Slave labor, in each individual case, and foi' 
 each small measure of time, is more slow and 
 inefficient than the labor of a free man. The 
 latter knows that the more wni-k he performs 
 ill a short time, the greater will be his rewai'd 
 in earnings. Hence, he has every induceiiient 
 to exert himself while at work for himself, 
 even though he may be idle for a longer time af 
 terwards. The slave receives the same suf>- 
 port, in food, elothing, and other allowances, 
 whctlicr he works much or little ; and hence 
 lie has every inducement to spare liiniseif as 
 rnoch as possible, and to do iis little work a^ 
 he can, without drawing on himself puiiish- 
 ment, which is the only incentive to slave la- 
 bor. It is, then, an uiujucstionable general 
 truth, that the labor of a free man, for any 
 stated time, is more than the labor of a slave, 
 and if at the same cost, would be cheaper to 
 the employer. Hence it has been iiifi'iicd, and 
 asserteti by all who argue against slavery, and 
 is often admitted even by those who would 
 defend its expediency, that, as a general rule, 
 and for whole conimunities, free labor is cheap- 
 er than slave labor. The rule is false, and the 
 exceptions only are true. Suppose it admit- 
 ted that the labor of slaves, for t'lieh hour or 
 day, will amount t<i but two-thirds of what 
 hired free laborers would [lerform in the same 
 time. Hut the slave labor is continuous, and 
 uvery day at lea^t it returns to the em|iloycis 
 and to the community, this two thirds of full 
 lal><»r. Flee lali'Mers, if to be hind for the 
 like duties would rccpiirc at lea-t double the 
 amount of wages to perform oii<-lliird more 
 Inljor ill each day, and in geneml, wmild be 
 idle and earning .lothing, more length of time 
 than that »|ierit in labor. Then, on these prem- 
 i»^ and «upj).mitioMs, it is inaitifcst thai slave 
 labor, with lU a<liiiitled defect in tlfn resj)ect, j 
 
 will be cheapest and most profitable to the em- 
 ployer, aud to the whole community, and will 
 yield more towards the general i-ncicase of 
 production and ]nil)lic wealth; and- that the 
 free laborer who is idle two days out of three, 
 even if receiving double wages for his days 
 of labor, is less laborious, and less ]iroductive 
 for himself, and for the communily, and the 
 public wealth, than the slave. 
 
 The mistake of those who maintain, or ad- 
 mit, this generally asserted piojiosilion, that 
 "free labor is cheaper than slave labor," is 
 caused by assuming as true, that self-interest 
 induces free hirelings to labor continuously 
 and regulai'ly. This is never the case in gene- 
 ral, e.Kcept where daily and continuous labor 
 is required to obtain a bare daily subsistence. 
 Thai ease, and its conse<iueiu-es, will be con- 
 sidered herealtei'. For the ]iresent, 1 will re- 
 turn to the causes of slavery. 
 
 War formerly a source and producer of -slavery. 
 
 Though slavery would, in the manner above 
 staled, have been introduced (if not otherwise) 
 among ever}' savage people above the lowest 
 and least improvable condition of the savage 
 state, still the institution generally preceded, 
 and so prevented, the existence <if' these condi- 
 tions. For there were other still eailierand 
 sufficiently operative causes. As soon as men 
 outgrew find emerged from strictly patriarchal 
 or pure f;mih' government, (the most ancient 
 of all.) n\.d wn-e included in larger communi- 
 ties, under governments of usurjiation and 
 force, it must be supposed that the strong 
 ruled and oppressed the weak, whether acting 
 or acted upon as individuals (ir as communi- 
 ties, and in that manner that the weaker 
 would become slaves to the stronger. If not 
 produced otherwise, this would necessarily be 
 the result of war between semi-barbarous 
 communities; and war has existed between 
 such communities, and has rar< ly ceased, since 
 men were first arrayed in diti'erent political 
 bodies. Where civilization and relinement 
 were so low as amcuig the most ignorant sava- 
 ges of Australia, or most of the JS'orlh Ameri- 
 can Indians, the prisoners of war would be' 
 put to death, because no profitable use could 
 he made of them. But where any advances 
 had been made in regular indu>try, and espe- 
 <;ially where the right of private })roperty in 
 land had been established, the expediency of 
 making domestic slaves and laborers of )>rison- 
 eis of war would soon be acknowledged and 
 .•icted ujion. Thus one of the eailie>t effects 
 of the institution of slavery would be to lessen 
 the horrors of war by saving lives that would 
 otherwise be sacrificed. 
 
 Slaver 1/ imposed as penaUt/ for erimc or debt. 
 In the early conditions of society and of 
 private proi>erty, most of the debtors to indi- 
 viduals, or to the sovereign, or delinquents 
 whose punishmenl,s were pecuniaiy or pro- 
 perty amercements, would raiidy have any 
 other |iropeity or means for payment thao 
 their own person.s. Hence would certainly 
 I'ldlow (as still is the usage in barbarous coun- 
 tries) slavery as the payment for debt, and 
 
penalty for crimes, or offences against the sove- 
 reign or tiie laws. With the injustice and 
 cruelty usual in all barbarous coinnumities, 
 the families of delinquents thus condemned to 
 slavery would also be enslaved. And if this 
 were not ordered by vengeance and cruelty, 
 it would almost surely be required byexpedi 
 ency, and even humanity. For the destitute 
 wife and young cliildren of a slave, and any 
 future and more helpless infants, would gene- 
 rally need to be supported, or would perish 
 from want. In barbarous eouununitics, regu- 
 lar maintenance in such cases can only be liad 
 from a master who can afford to support in- 
 fant and then unprofitable slaves, to be com- 
 pensated by the subsequent labors of their 
 mature life and profitable service. Thus, 
 slavery would necessarily, and from the begin- 
 ning, become hereditary, and be everywhere 
 a permanent and fixed condition. 
 
 Where prrsonal slavery is not needed, and if 
 previously established would cease to exist. 
 By the two modes above stated, slavery 
 would necessarily be established in the early 
 State of society of every young and barbarous 
 community which was not so savage as to be 
 destitute of all regular industry, and of the 
 artificial wants wiiich induce a demand for, or 
 the desire to possess, the accumulated pro- 
 duets of labor. Without the existence of 
 such a demand for the services of slaves as 
 will induce and compensate the providing for 
 their regular and sufficient suppoi-t, domestic 
 slaverj' caimot be begun. And if before ex- 
 isting, neither can it be continued in old coun- 
 tries densely peopled, where the support of a 
 «lave will be more costij' than the liire of a 
 free man, driven to his greatest exertion by 
 extreme want, and depressed by the competi- 
 tion of his fellows to the lowest rate of wages 
 at which subsistence is possible. 
 
 The evils and benefits of slavery stated gene- 
 rally. 
 Slavery, when thus introduced, would be 
 frequently attended with circumstances of 
 great hardship, injustice, and sometimes atro- 
 cious cruelty. Still, the consequences and 
 general results were highlj' beneficial. By 
 tills means only — the compulsion of domestic 
 slaves — in the early conditions of society, 
 could labor be made to pi'oduce wealth. By 
 this aid Old}' could leisure be afforded to the 
 master class to cultivate mental improvement 
 and refinement of manners ; and artificial 
 wants be created and indulged, which would 
 etimulate the desire and produce the effect, to 
 accumulate tiie products of labor, which alone 
 constitute private and public wealth. To the 
 operation and first results of domestic slavery 
 were due the gradual civilization and general 
 improvement of manners and of arts among 
 all originally barbarous peoples, who, of them- 
 aelves, or without being conquered and sub- 
 jugated (or enslaved politically) by a more en- 
 lightened people, have subsequently emerged 
 from barbarism and dark ignorance. The 
 slavery supposed to be thus introduced would 
 be the subjection of people of the same race 
 with their masters — of equals to equals — and 
 
 therefore this would be slavery of the most 
 objectionable kind. It would involve most 
 injustice and hardsiiip to the enslaved — would 
 render it more difiicult for the masters to com- 
 mand and enforce obedience — and would make 
 the bonds of servitude more galling to the 
 slaves, because of their being etpial to their 
 masters (and, in many individual cases, greatly 
 superior,) in natural endowments of mind. 
 
 The greatest toorks of ancient nations due to 
 slavery, and in its worst fonn. 
 Still, even this worst and least proiit-able 
 kind of slaverj' (the subjection of equals, and 
 men of the same race with tiieir masters) 
 served as the foundation and the essential first 
 cause of all the civilization and refinement, 
 and improveinentof arts and learning, thatdif- 
 tinguished the oldest nations. Except where 
 the special Providence and care of (>od may 
 have interposed to guard a particular family 
 and its descendants, there was nothing but the 
 existence of slavery to prevent any race or 
 society in a state of nature from sinking into 
 the rudest barbarism. And no people could 
 ever have been raised from that low condition 
 without the aid and o[)eration of slavery, 
 either by some individuals of the community 
 being made slaves to others, or the whole com- 
 munity being enslaved, by conquest and sub- 
 jugation, in some form, to a foreign and more 
 enlightened people. The very ancient and 
 wonderful works of construction and sculp- 
 ture in Egypt and Hindostan could never 
 have been executed, nor even the desire to 
 possess them conceived, except wheie compul- 
 sory labor had long been in use, and could be 
 applied to such great works. And to the 
 same cause was due, not only the later and far 
 more perfect and admirable works of art in 
 Greece and Rome, but also the marvellous 
 triumphs of intellect among these successive 
 masters of the then known world. And not 
 only were great works of utility and orna- 
 ment so produced, nations enriched and 
 strengthened, and empires established and 
 maintained, but also there were moral results, 
 in private and social life, of far more value. 
 In much earlier lime, it was on this institution . 
 of domestic slavery that was erected the ad- 
 mirable and benificent mastership and govern- 
 ment of the patriarch Abraham, who owned. 
 so many domestic slaves that he could sud- 
 denly call out and lead three hundred and 
 eighteen of them, able to bear arms, to repel 
 and punish the invasion of foreign hostile 
 tribes. The like system of domestic slavery 
 then, and for many ages after, subsisted in 
 every part of the world in which any consid- 
 erable moral or mental progress or economical 
 improvement was to be seen. 
 
 Soils of anciejit slavery, and its great extension 
 and abuse, and relief offered by another kind. 
 
 The institution of slavery in ancient tioaed, 
 with its great benefits, hud also its great e«il8,_ 
 and not only in its first establishment, but in 
 its latest incidents. The ease and cheapness 
 with wiiich slaves could be acquired in the 
 latter times of the llomau Empire induced 
 their being held in great aid unnecessary 
 
numbei-e, and no einull proportion of them effectually nnd at greater expense. Under 
 were of coptive barbarian uuJ warlike ene-,snch conditions, slaves (if they could not be 
 raiea. These conditions were necessary causes sold and removed to some other country, 
 of weakness of the ma.-'ter class, and of the I where needed) would be readily emancipated 
 genrral eommuiiity, and helped to invite and I by masters to whom they liad l)ecome bur- 
 
 to aid the success 'of the hordes of barbarian 
 invaders that swept over the then civilized 
 ■world like a delug<', and, for ages afterwards, 
 buried Kurope under dark ignorance and bar- 
 barian rul*. Still, slow-gvowing, yet complete, 
 final relief, sprang from tiie same cause — 
 alavery — that had produced the former civili- 
 zation. In one or other form, whether of the 
 general and j^olitical slavery of a people, (as 
 uf the conquered to their conquerors,) or of 
 class to eliiss, or of serfdom, villenage, or 
 slavery to the soil, or of personal slavery, this 
 institution was universal during the dark and 
 Bemi-barbarous middle ages of Eurojie. And 
 in the bciinning it was from the slaves made 
 of the enlightened and refined, but effeminate 
 and eowardiy former musters of the lands, 
 that the latter civilization iirst began, and 
 was eommunicated to their barbarous con- 
 querors and their masters. Thus, and con- 
 trary to the general order of things in this 
 case, the enslaved, and Tiot the master class, 
 was the source of improvement to the other. 
 To this cause it was owing that the revival of 
 civilization and learning in Europe occurred 
 centuries earlier than would have been the 
 case if the slaves, after the complete con- 
 quests made b\' barbarians, had been as igno- 
 rant as their masters. 
 
 The extinction of individual davery the neces- 
 sary result of an excess of free labor — The 
 competition of free laborers, and their (jreat 
 est sufferings^ produce the greatest profits of 
 capital. 
 
 densome. Soon, under the opcr.'Jting influ- 
 ence of self-interest alone on the master class, 
 domestic slaver\- would come to an end of 
 itself — give place to the far more stringent 
 and oppressive rule of want, as a compeller 
 of labor, and be substituted by class-slaverj', 
 or the absolute subjection of tiie jvvhole class 
 f laborers to tln^ whole class of employers — 
 or of labor to capital. Then, in the progress 
 of society, first begins to be true, and soon 
 becomes entirely' true, the hackneyed propo- 
 sition that " free labor is cheaper than slave 
 labor;" and it is only true under these cir- 
 cumstances, when the supply of labor is regu- 
 larly or generally greater than the demand. 
 Then the surplus hands must be left without 
 emploj-meut, and therefore without means for 
 subsistence. They can obtain employment 
 only by under-bidding the rate of wages then 
 received by the laborers einploj-ed, and so be 
 engaged by throwing as many other laborers 
 out of work. These must, in like manner, 
 submit to the same reduction of wages, to be 
 enabled again to obtain employment by get- 
 ting the jilaees of as many others. Finally, 
 all are compelled to work for the reduced wages. 
 But, after this general reduction, still, as 
 before, the sujiply of hands will exceed (and 
 more and nioie with the increase of popula- 
 tion) the demand i'or their labor; as many 
 therefore as are surplus must be always out of 
 employment, and struggling to obtain it — and 
 by the same process, competition, urged by ex- 
 treme want, will tend still more to lower wages. 
 Thus want and competition will continue to 
 But in every country, when covered by a I compel the supertiuous and unemployed hands 
 
 dense ])opulalion, ancl when subsistence to free 
 laborers becomes diHicult to be obtained, the 
 competition for employment will tend to 
 depress the price of labor, gradually, to the 
 lowest rate at wiiich a bare subsisteuee cai» 
 be jiurchased. The indolence natural to man, 
 and especially in his lowest and most degra- 
 ded state, can then no longer be indulged; 
 because to. be idle would not be to sufl'er pri- 
 vation otdv, ami '^^ incur risks of greater suf- 
 fering, but absolutely and speedily to starve 
 an'l die of want. If domestic slavery could 
 have cwilinued to exist so long, the slaves 
 then would be in a very much better condi- 
 tion than tile free laborers, because possessing 
 ■ assured means for support, and that for much 
 less labor and hardship. For sharp want, 
 bungi;r and i-old, uri; more effi-cLive incentives 
 to labor than the slaveowner's whij), even if 
 its use is n»>t restrained by any feeling of jus- 
 tice or mercy, iiut uniler such eoniiitions of 
 free labor, domestic or in*livi*lual slavery 
 could not exist. For whisnever want and 
 competition shall reduce the wages of free 
 labor bilow the cost of slave labor, then it 
 will be more prolilablo for the slaveowner 
 and emjdoyer to hire free lalior (both cheap- 
 ened an<l driven by liunger and misery) than 
 to mainlain slaves, and compel their labor less 
 
 to submit to more and more reduction of 
 wages, until the amount generally obtained 
 is very nuich less than what is needed for the 
 comfortable subsistence and healthy support 
 of the laborer. And durin<j all the time of 
 this long continued competition and struggle 
 for subsistence, while the rate of wages is 
 being gradually lowered, the amount of toil 
 of each laborer'is ii\creased — or at least as long 
 as the human fiame can bear increased exer- 
 tion. When the greatest posdUe amount of 
 labor is thus obtained for the lowest amount of 
 wages that can bnrcltj' sustain life and strength 
 for labor, there has been attained t/ic most per- 
 fect and profitable condiliuu of industrial 
 operations for the class of capitalists and em- 
 ployirs, and also for the most rapid increase 
 of ^general and national wealth, lint these 
 ben'elits (so much lauded and deemed so desi- 
 rable for every country, and by almost every 
 writer,) are purchased only by the greatest 
 possible amount of toil, privation.'aiul misery 
 of the class of laborers under which they can 
 live and work. It is readily admitted that 
 slave labor coiild never yield anything like 
 such large net rtjturns — an'd that it would rot 
 only i)roduce less, but would cost more. 
 .Slaves could not be subjected to such extreme 
 l)rivaliou and misery, because they must be 
 
fed and clothed, and cannot generallj' De 
 greatly' over-worked, (and never to the jirofit 
 of the master,) as is caused continnally by 
 the pressure of extreme want, iind tluoiii;h 
 competition, on free laborers. If tlie ])f))itiiul 
 and eeonomical problem to be worked out i^ 
 tlie production of the greatest amount of 
 .profit to capitalists, and of wealth to tlie 
 nation, in a country of dense population and 
 advanced industrial operations, without re- 
 gard to tlie ^uHVrini^s of tlie lahoriiis^ class, it 
 is certain that the laborers must not be staves, 
 but free from all masters except extreme 
 want. England, after the general aboli ion of 
 slaver}', was nu>rc tiian two centuries ap- 
 proaching this condition, which was finally 
 reached, and has now been fully enjoyed for 
 many years. Since then, England has been, 
 of all the countries of the world, the most 
 prosperous in manufactures, eoiiimerce, and 
 all industrial employments of capital and 
 labor — and the laboring and poorest classes 
 have been among the most destitute and mis- 
 erable. That they have not been sunk, by 
 competition for food, to still greater misery, 
 and that many more numerous and frequent 
 deaths have not occurred from absolute starv- 
 ation, is owing to the introduction and pro- 
 tection of another kind of slaver^' — paujjcr 
 slavery — wliich is the certain consequence of, 
 ferings produced by the competition of free 
 and the partial remedy for, the evils and suf- 
 labor. 
 
 Pauper slavery. 
 
 Though, after the supply of labor in any 
 country has long exceeded the demand, com- 
 petition for employment will, necessarily, re- 
 duce wages to as little as will serve to main- 
 tain life under great suJYering — yet wages 
 cannot be reduced any lower, at least to tlie 
 further profit of the whole class of capitalists 
 or employers. For, when laborers can no 
 longer subsist on their wages, the deficiency 
 must in some way be supplied by the property 
 owners. In lawless or badly governed coun- 
 tries, beggary and theft ma}' be the irregular 
 means of drawing that support from property 
 ■which was denied in wages. In better regu- 
 lated communities, the supplj- is furnished by 
 tlie "poor law," or a compulsory provision for 
 the laboring poor who cannot subsist on their 
 wages, as Wcil as for the infirm poor, incapa- 
 ble of labor. This system is most extensive 
 and complete in England, and is the necessary 
 result of the competition for employment of 
 free laborers — of England's great and boasted 
 fuccess in all industrial pursuits and profitable 
 employment of labor by capital. And thus 
 it is, that the cruel ojipression by capital, in 
 reducing wages to the lowest rate, is avenged 
 by the tax levied by and for the poor, equal 
 to the deficiency of wages for the amount 
 necessary for bare subsistence. And to this 
 relief, wiiich the poor law promisesand affords, 
 every day-laborer in England looks forward 
 as the almost certain destiny and last resource 
 oi himself and his family. Ti;ere are but few of 
 that class who do not, at some tirne, have to 
 resort to support by the parish ; and every 
 
 English laborer lias more reason to expect to 
 die a parish-supported pauper, thou other- 
 wise. 
 
 Etit tliis aid held out to pauperism, wretch- 
 ed as it is, serves to encourage improvidence, 
 and to increa.«e, as iiiiich as to relieve extreme 
 want. The paujier laborer, BUpi)ortc<i by the 
 compulsory ami reluctant charily oi his jiai'ish, 
 lis but, a little better olf than those wlio peij.sh 
 elsewhere for want of such provision. But 
 it is not my purpose to consiilcr the system in 
 either of tiiese aspects, but in another. The 
 pauper, wliether laborer or otherwise, receiv- 
 ing support from thi* jiarish, is neitlur more 
 nor less than a slave to the administrators of 
 the law and dispensers of the public charity. 
 Tilt! pauper ceases to be a free agent iu any 
 resjifct. If at work far from the ])lacc of his 
 birth, (iu England,) he is remanded and trans- 
 ported to his own or native parish, there to 
 obtain support, if either this forced exile 
 from his long previous i)!acc of residi.'iice and 
 labor, or other reasons of ex[)edi(Miry I'cquire 
 it, husband and wife, and pai-ents and chil- 
 dren, are separated, and severally disposed of 
 at the will of the overseers of the poor. The 
 able-bodied laborer, who at his agricultural 
 or oiher work can earn but six sliillings a 
 week, and cannot support his family for less 
 than ten, may, indeed, obtain llie deficiej^t four 
 shillings from the parish. But to do so, he is 
 subject to be forced to take any service that 
 the authorities may direct And as the em- 
 ployer receives the pauper laborer against his 
 will, and only because he thereby pays so 
 much of his share of the poor-tfi.v, he not 
 only has the pauper as an involuntary slave, 
 but he has not even the inducemenl of self- 
 interest to treat the pauper slave well, or to 
 care to preserve his health or life. The death 
 of the {)auper laborer is no loss to his tem- 
 porary employer, and is a clear gain to the 
 parish. Hence, while all of the millions of 
 [lauper population of England are truly slaves, 
 and as much under constraint as if each one 
 and his family belonged to an individual mas- 
 ter, or as negro slaves are here, they have not 
 the fanily comforts, or the care for the pre- 
 servation of their health and lives, enjoyed by 
 every negro slave iu Virginia or Mississippi. 
 The negro slaves in the United States have 
 increased from 300,000, the number originally 
 imported from Afiica, to nearly 4,000,no0, or 
 more than twelve for one. This is a sut|icient 
 evidence of their general good treatment, in- 
 duced by the self-interest of the owners. If 
 it were possible to designate, separately, the 
 whole class of poor laborers in England, and 
 to trace them and their descendants for two 
 hundred years, it is most probable that the 
 original number would be found diminished 
 in as great proportion as that in which our 
 negro slaves. have increased — or reduced to 
 less than one-twelfth part. Yet this wide- 
 spread, miserable, and lite-destroying hunger 
 slavery and pauper slavery in Eng'aiid is there 
 called" freedom by the fanatics and so-called 
 philanthropist*, who abhor, and call inces- 
 santly for God's vengeai'.ce upon, the negro 
 slavery of this country! 
 
8 
 
 £vils caused to thu former serfs and to the coin- , the labor of the country, there is no possibil- 
 muuiti/, bv'lheir e/naucipitlion. i ity of tlic occurrence of the sufferings of the 
 
 Such are the "present conditions of things, i '^boring class, .-^uch as were described above, 
 and the relations of labor and caj.ital in Eng- ' 'i"'"-Te, the evils winch are caused by extreme 
 laud, especially— and also to great extent in j ^'^"1 and destitution, the conipotition forsus- 
 Frauce, and tlie other most populous and rich- 1 tenance, class slavery ot labor to capital, and 
 est oouniries of the civilized world. When I las^'y P'*"P*''' sl'iverv, are all the incidents and 
 these latter condition* (usually understood to I necessary results ot free society, and "free^ 
 be evidences of tiie highest state of national I '"^J*""." Before such evils can visit any la- 
 prosperitv) were tirst i'^n progress, and were j l^«"ng c^"** «'' personal slaves, they must 
 extended: personal slavery rapidly disappear- 1 ^''^'e first been emancipated, and personal 
 ed. It hai%?rinerly been general in some *l»^«'"y abolished. This abolition of slavery 
 form in every part of Europe. It now only |i« indeed like to occur in every country 
 remains as s'erfdoin in the Russian and Aus- I" ^he progress of society, and where the 
 trian dominions, and some other of the least '^ceasing population has no sufficient and 
 improved portions of Europe. advantageous outlet. But so long as do- 
 
 When the slaves or serfs of Europe were ™*-stic slavery remains, and is the main 
 left free, their masters were relieved f,-om ?"{Tb' "f labor, among any civilized people, 
 ■what was then comparatively a burden, be- it is a certain indication, and the most unques- 
 
 cause they were able to hire cheaper free 
 labor. But the former slaves suffered from 
 the change more than their former masters 
 gained. All of them were necessarily thrown 
 into the lowest class of free laborers. The 
 most industrious and provident among them 
 could but enter u}>on the struggle for employ- 
 ment with the most necessitous competitors, 
 previously free. The indolent and the reckless 
 •would either live by depredating on the com- 
 munity, as beggars or thieves, or would per- 
 ish from disease or starvation, or other con- 
 sequences of want and Buffering. And such 
 ■were the etfects. Even as late as 1693, the 
 amount of jmuperism and beggary, vagrancy, 
 thieving, and other petty crimes, and of ex- 
 treme misery, was so great among the poorest 
 class in Scotland, that Fletcher of Salton, (an 
 able statesman, a true patriot, and a stern re- 
 publican, and also a strong reasoner, and an 
 elegant scholar,) wrote and published an elabo- 
 rate argument, maintaining and urging the 
 expediency of reducing this class of persons 
 to the condition of slavery, not only to relieve 
 the community, but for their own benefit, 
 and to save them from the extremity of suf- 
 ■f«ring.' . i 
 
 • General and extreme mffcring from want im- 
 posfible tn a slave- holding community. 
 So long as domestic slavery is general in 
 - any country, and for the most part supplies 
 
 • Flel<'lier's '• Tim l>i»cour>en on the Affairs of 
 . S-'oUati'l." The author therein Rltile(>, Ihut there were 
 
 then not li-ji« than 'JoO.OOO pursoas iu bcoilund t)Cf;gin(» 
 • Uieir hnad from door to door. Th.il whs a time of 
 
 uduiuhI <li»lri-mi. Hut, he adds, " yet, In nil lime, there 
 "liavc bet-n altoul 1(Xi,000 of tbete Yagabonds who have 
 ' llred icitUout any regard to the luxe* of the land, or 
 •.to thott of (iod and natur«y He ruyn, further, that 
 
 all the othrr DBlions of Europe (except Holland) 
 
 froan'-d undrr a similar prensure. As no such evil | ' 
 ad been complained of bf any of the writers of an- | ployment, or eini>loyed only at much reduced 
 ' U<iuiiy, and as much poverty waa the consequonce, in i wages. Hence all such per:<on8 were greatly 
 Kurvp.. of ihr m.numl«ion of .laves, Kletchor in- i damaged or distressed, and thousands of th« 
 ferred that thr existence uf slavery was the cause of i . \ .-. . i . , -rr 
 
 ' the Comfort and Industry of the lower ordern in tormer 
 . tlin<-". H«-nce, this "statesman and patriot of the 
 fcgfhrst order" proposed the reducing of all th«-«e iles- 
 
 tionable evidence, tiiat extensive and lon£ 
 continued suffering from want or hunger have 
 as yet had no existence in that country. The 
 first great effect of such distress will be to re- 
 duce (by competition) the wages of free labor 
 below the cost of maintaining slaves — and 
 this effect would next cause the extinction of 
 slavery, by the mode of sale and exp)ortation, 
 or otherwise the emancipation of all the slaves. 
 After this step has been made, of course, in 
 due time, the want and suffering, which are 
 the necessary incidents and consequences of 
 free society, are to be expected to follow in 
 after times. 
 
 When temporary evils, great loss, and dis- 
 tress, fall upon slaveholding countries, it is 
 not the laboring class (as in free society) that 
 feels the first and heavest infliction, but the 
 masters and employers. If a slaveholding 
 country is visited by dearth, rav^ed by war, 
 or by pestilence — or sutlers under any other 
 causes of wide-.-[iread calamity — every domes* 
 tic slave is as much as before assured of his 
 customary food and other allowances, and of a 
 master's care in sickness and infirmity, even 
 though the master class, and the country at 
 large, have but half the previously existing 
 profits, or valuefof capital. A striking proof 
 of this was afforded by the recent (and still 
 continuing) general suspension of payments of 
 the banks in this country, and the consequent 
 universal pecuniary loss and distress. Pay- 
 ments of debts could not be obtained, com- 
 modities could not be sold, and all manufac- 
 turing and some other great industrial opera- 
 tions either had to be continued for greatly re- 
 duced prices and wages, or to be entirely sus- 
 peiidea, if of such kind as could be suspended, 
 in consequence, in the Northern States, the 
 free hired laborei-s were thrown out of em- 
 
 most deslitute were ready to starve. Hence 
 
 hunger mobs were menacing the city 9i New 
 
 ^^,.^„. ...... ,,...,.....^ .... ..v-j.....^ ..,.,. .>.„>:„„. \^^J\^ ^.jt^}, pillnge, and the last evils of a 
 
 Ulult ineudicanU and their posteritv to slavery, by a I . . , ' , ?,, , i ^ ■ i 
 
 •d.inn a.i r.f the lenlslaturr, (in and for Scotland.) as vicious and unbridled and starving populace, 
 
 .4h««nly iiieMiis by « bich iL<-y could be compelled to excited to insurrection and defiance of legal 
 ^ork, and have insured U. them Ihe nerrs,arles of life, authority. Universal los.s from this cause aUo 
 (.•>e« firiiele " Helcher of haJton," in Kdinburch Kn- • •. i ".i i i u- ... . i 
 
 eycloi...dinand (juouiilon iherofrom, aij-agerVvoI. ^""^''^l "'« slaveholding States, and every 
 
 . ill, "jaruier's UegUtcr." property holder, and also, to some extent^every 
 
other free man tlierein. Bui. not a slave has 
 lost a meal, or a comfort; and as a class, 
 the slaves scarcely know of tiie occurrence 
 of this great uationnl calamity which has 
 so universally damaged their masters, and 
 the capitalists and employers of labor. Is'or 
 was the difference of efl'oct owing to the slaves 
 being generally engageci in ai^ricuUural labors. 
 The very large busin''ss of niaiiuriu-tiiriiig to- 
 bacco, in Virginia, is carried on almost exclu- 
 sively by the labor of slaves, and those mostly 
 hired by the year. Tiie late hank suspension 
 serving to suspend all payniftits of debts to, 
 and income of, their great establishments, they 
 were generally compelled to suspend work, 
 even thousjli still obliged to feed and support 
 their hired slave laborers, who, for some time, 
 thus received their full allowance and sup- 
 port, while remaining perfectly idle, and re- 
 turning no com[)ensation whatever to their em- 
 ployers who had hired them for the year. 
 
 The " associated labor " doctrine of the social- 
 ists true — but deficient in tlie main agency, 
 which slavery only can supply. 
 
 The socialists of Europe, and of the Northern i 
 States of this Union, (there are none existing j 
 in our Southern States,) of every sect, and I 
 however dilfering on other points, have all ' 
 advocated the association of labor, in some 
 form or other, as the great means for reforming 
 the evils of society arising from starving com- ' 
 petition for labor. The founders and preach- 
 ers of socialism had all observ^ed and earnestly j 
 appreciated these evils. They saw that, in ad- 1 
 vaneed society, labor was the slave of capital, ! 
 and that the more capital was enriched by 
 the employment of labor, the less was acquir- 
 ed and retained by the individual laborers, I 
 and the more their wants aad sufferings were 
 increased. They also saw, and correctly, that ' 
 there was great loss of time and labor in the 
 domestic operations of every poor family, and ! 
 most in the poorest families — and also, that' 
 the productive labors of all, if associated, and | 
 thus aiding each other, might be made much j 
 more produetivei And if by laborers being 
 associated in large numbers, and directed by 
 their combined knowledge to the most profit- 
 able purposes and ends, all unnecessary waste ' 
 (as occurs in isolated families) was prevented, i 
 and all the actual efforts of labor utilized — i 
 the net profits and economy of such associa- 
 ted labor would be much increased, and thus, j 
 the laborers might secure and retain a suffi- [ 
 cient subsistence, out of the larger share of 
 the profits of their labors, which now goes to 
 the share of employers and capitalists. Their 
 views and doctrines are true in the main, and 
 are altogether so plausible, and so ajiplicable 
 to the wretched condition of labor in tiie most 
 advanced conditions of society in Europe, that 
 the teachers have found numerous believers 
 and zealous disciples. Sundry associations 
 have been originated in Europe, and establish- 
 ed in America, (as a new country only offered 
 the needed facilities,) to carry out, in difft-rent 
 modes, the great object of associating and com- 
 bining labor, for the common and general 
 profit and benefit. But every such attempt 
 
 has met with signal, and also spedly, failure; 
 except a few, of religious associations, which 
 were under tiie guidance and direction of a 
 single despotic head. In all other cases, no mat- 
 ter how benevolent and intelligent tiie lead- 
 ers — and though one hour of labor, in each 
 day, in this cliea]i ami fertile country, would 
 yield more food than fifteen hours' labor in 
 I'lurope — still these assoeiations soon failed ia 
 their every aim and purpose, and were several- 
 ly broken up as soon as their inherent defects 
 were made manifest, and seen to be inevita- 
 ble and incurable incidcints of the system. 
 
 Yet, sofarastheirfactsand reasoiiiin;go, and 
 in their main doctrines, the so<'ialists are i-ight. 
 Assoeiatc<l labor cftn be much more, produc- 
 tive, an<l be coiiducte<I more eeonoiuieally, 
 than the laboi-s of individual persons or fami- 
 lies. The socialist theorists reasoned correctly, 
 and in their practical experiments they devised 
 good but defective plans. They constructed 
 admirable and complex machinery to produce 
 certain final results, in which every wheel 
 and other operating agent was well adjusted as 
 a secondary cause, or effect of another preced- 
 ing cause. But in all these great and com- 
 plicated works, the artificers had omitted to 
 supply the first and great motive power, which 
 is to be found only in one directing mind, and 
 one controlling will. Suppl\- the one sujjreme 
 head and governing power to the association 
 of labor, (for the suitable conditions of socie- 
 ty,) and the scheme and its operation will be- 
 come as perfect as can be expected of any 
 human institution. But in supplying this sin- 
 gle ruling power, the association is thereby con- 
 verted to the condition of domestic slavery. 
 And our system of domestic slavery otters in 
 use, and to the greatest profit for all parties 
 in the association, the realization of all that is 
 sound and valuable in the socialists' theories 
 and doctrines, and supplies the great and 
 fatal defect of all their plans for practically 
 associating labor. A few illustrative views 
 will be submitted, which will apply to both 
 the theoretical free associated labor, and to 
 the practical domestic slave labor. 
 
 Suppose that some extensive industrial ope- 
 ration, as the tillage of a great farm, the work- 
 ing of a mine, or a cotton factory, is carried 
 on by the labor of fifty men, with that of such 
 other few members of their families as can be 
 spared from home. Tiiese men, as usual, gene- 
 rally, are married, and have one or more 
 young children. But whether sinirle and 
 without children, or hnsbands. or wiilowers 
 with children, every man is the head of an 
 isolated family, for which separate services are 
 indispensable. Each home or family requires, 
 and has, its separate ])urehasing of food, (and 
 at retail and highest prices,) its separate cook- 
 ing, washing, fires, lights, nursing of children, 
 and of the sick, Ac, ifec. Such duties, in an 
 ordinary or average family, fully occupy the 
 time of the wife and mother. If there is no 
 wife, or the mother is dead, the single man, or 
 the father, is more or less rec^uired to perform 
 ! the like household and woman's duties. Thus, of 
 the supposed fifty households, probably includ- 
 j ing not less than from 1 50 to "200 persons, there 
 
10 
 
 may be but the tifly iiien to labor for wages, profitable. And as it was agricultural labor 
 All" the in:inv others eapitble of labor, are fully that was required, and at first for the rudest 
 eiiipioved a« menial servants and nurses for [ processes, slaves as igt.orant aud savage as the 
 tlieir rtj-ipective fuiuiiies. This is necessarily i native Africans would serve the purpose, 
 the condition of free Inlwrers, each working | Ileuce arose, and was extended, the African 
 for hinifelf and his family. ; slave-trade. It was first begun, by the Por- 
 
 Now suppose, instead "of this free popula- 1 tugucse, in the latter piut of the fifleo*ith cen- 
 tion, tluit all the laborers aud their families [tury. But the regular African slave-trade, 
 were siave-s to the employer. Then, with pro- 1 and the extensive use aud employment of Af- 
 
 ]ier and convenient arrangement of buildii 
 ite,, instead of there being fifty woujfii cook- 
 ing, •washing, and nui-sing the sick or the help- 
 less of so many diiierent small households, 
 four or fivvi rnisriit even better (with the better 
 means and facilities afforded by the luiu^ter) 
 perform those services for all. Tiiis ivould dis- 
 ]>eu£e with some forty five women, or other 
 iiandsfit for labor,, previously engaged in these 
 household duties, and wliieh would nearly 
 double the immber previously working for 
 production and profit. This great increase of 
 numbers would fully compensate for tiie gene- 
 ral lessening of each individual's labor, wiiicli 
 is certain of domestic slaves compared to free 
 laborers driven by hunger. This abatement 
 of toil, together wiih the allowances indispen- 
 sable to the profitable existence of slaver}', 
 would render certain the cou)fortable subsist- 
 ence of the slaves, whicli, if it could hav« been 
 for free laborers, woidd ultinuitelj' have given 
 way to the sufferings from competitiou and 
 slavery, to want, aud next to the pau|)er 
 slaver}' now so general in England. Further, 
 
 which the socialists correctly counted upon, 
 besides those already mentioned. By the sin- 
 i^le head and master providing all the necessa- 
 ries for the maintenance and comfort of ihe 
 
 can slaves in America, occurred in the six- 
 teenth century — the same remarkable epoch 
 when the European mind, and Euraj)eaa en- 
 terprise, received their greatest imjndse, and 
 made the greatest improvements — vrhen the 
 ait of printing was discovered, the Protestant 
 religion was established, the modern route to 
 India and the rich East was found, and whea 
 America was discovered, and a new hemis- 
 phere, almost unfilled jireviously, was, for the 
 fii-st time, ready to receive setthTiient and cul- 
 ture from the white race, directing the labor 
 of blaek slaves. When the Caucasian mind 
 thus comiuands and directs the bodily powers 
 of the 'ignorant negro, it is the best possible 
 form of slavery, and the condition which con- 
 duces most to the benefit of both the white 
 and the black race — and especially is best for 
 the happiness and improvement of the latter. 
 Indeed, it is the only condition in which the 
 negro race has received much enlightenment, 
 or civilization, or real Christianity, in the 
 thousands of years during which African bar- 
 barism has been known to exist. 
 
 in this form of associated labor, there would Having designed to confiue ray remarks 
 be secured many of the savings in expenses-, to tlie politico economical or utilitarian view 
 
 of negro slavery, other questions have not 
 even been touched, which some readers would 
 deem much the most important, to wit: the 
 Bible authority for. and the reliirious and 
 
 laboring class, the contracts and purchases Christian infiuence and operation of slavery. 
 ■would be few and on a large scale, aud at i These branches of the general subject have 
 wholesale prices. There would not, at any | been fully discussed |j}- earlier writers, far bet- 
 timo, be a deficiency of food, nor anj' necessa- 1 ter qualified than myself to treat them. But 
 ry deficiency of medical or nursing attendance | there is one remarkable statistical fact, which, 
 on the sick." \S'hen required by economy, fire | though it is the most importayt in its religious 
 
 and light could be supplied to all at half the 
 ccst that would be reijuircd separately for 
 eacli family. TIuis, in the institution of do- 
 mestic Blavcry, and in that only, are most 
 completely realized the dreams and sanguine 
 hopej of tiic socialist scliool of idiilanlhropists. 
 Yet the socialists are all arrayed among the 
 most fanatical and intolerant deiu)uncers of 
 domestic slavery, and the most malignant ene- 
 mieS'of slaveholders. 
 
 77u hcjinning of negro slavery in America, 
 and its effects. 
 
 Ab Blavery or serfdom (for tlie causes above 
 stated) was eoasi^ig to exist in ]'2ngland, an- 
 other kind of siaveij- was beginning to be es- 
 Uibii.^licil in the iiuw settlements in America. 
 Tliis was the slavery of African negroes to 
 Kuropean musters — of one among the most in- 
 ferior to the most HU|>eriur raee of mankind. 
 
 bearing, is al.-o connected with my sjjeeial pur- 
 pose. The following jiassage, copied from the 
 recent work of the Rev. J. C. Stiles, goes to 
 show that negro slavery in the Southern 
 States has made twice as many Christians as 
 all other missionary efforts have effected 
 among heathens, throughout the world: 
 
 "In 1855, heathen ehurch-membership is 
 set down at ISO.OuO. The present estimate of 
 colored church members in the Methodist 
 Church South alone, [which includes slave- 
 holding States only, and does not include Mary- 
 land aud a partof Viruinia,] is 175,000. Eight 
 or ten years ago, the Baptist colored member- 
 shi]) at the .South was rec<U'ded as only 4,000 
 lets than the Mi;lhodist. When to tliese two 
 numbers, you add all the colored members of 
 other Uniticludeil organizations of Methodists 
 and Baptists, also of l';|>iscopalians, Lutherans, 
 and I'resbyterians, Old School, jNiew School, 
 and Cumberland, you n-adily reach an aggre- 
 
 The condition of young colonies, \vlu-r»? land igate of colored church lutMubership near twice 
 wa.t at the lowest price, labor at the highest, i ax targe as the sliulhi hcatlii'n orthodox church 
 and the d.-mand for labor ex('<-eding nny ]»>ii-\vi<tnl>irslii ft of the world." — Modern Reform 
 Bible supply, made slavery there especially j L'xainincd — Apjicndix, p. 277. 
 
11 
 
 2'Ae (jrcat extent of slavery in Africa, and the 
 change therefrom to slaver;/ in America. 
 
 The social and political state of the iiepiro 
 race in Africa has always boon the same. Tiie 
 darkest itj^norance, with savajre ferocitj' and 
 cruelty, have been universal. The wlio]« ]iop- 
 ulation was divided into different and usually 
 hostile tribes, each governed by an ignorant, 
 savage, and bloody despot, liaving unlimited ] 
 authority. Personal slavery was everywhere 
 so extended that much the greater number of 
 the people were slaves to individual mjisters; 
 and their slavery was tiie most galling and in- 
 tolerable, because of the savage ignorance of 
 the masters, and their consequent recklessness 
 of the hap]iiness or the live? of those in their 
 power. Tlie excliange of pliysieal conditions, 
 from being a slave in Africa, in savage society 
 and to a savage master, and under the general 
 form and conduct of unlimited despotic gov- 
 ernment, there universal, to the general or 
 usual condition of slaves in these Southern 
 States, would be even more conducive to the 
 benefit of the slaves than of their new mas- 
 ters. And even with all the evils, injustice, 
 sufferings, and cruelties which accompanied 
 the transporting of shives fronr Africa to Amer- 
 ica, (while the traffic was legal and uninter- 
 rupted,) the change still was j-robably benefi- 
 cial to most of the transported slaves, and cer- 
 tainly to tlieir descendants in all subsequent 
 time. The slaves so obtained were generally 
 such as had been slaves in Africa, or recent 
 captives in war, whom enslavement saved 
 from being killed. If an}- previously free 
 were included, it was because the tenure of 
 freedom was of little value, and every man's 
 freedom, as well as his life, was at the dispo- 
 
 slaves, is no ground for condemning and de- 
 nouncing the institution of slavery, more than 
 any other wide spread and generally benefi- 
 cial institution, because of its accompanying 
 L-vils, and even if sucli evils are inevitable. 
 
 Former and more recent opinions as to the 
 vioraliti/ or immorality of slavery. 
 It is interestinir and curious to observe the 
 different and ."hirting lights in whi.-h slavery 
 and the slavc-ti-ade have been viewed at dif- 
 ferent times. From all historical and coternpo- 
 raneous testimony, it may be inftM'red that, un- 
 til in modern times, slavery in itself was never 
 deemed bj' any to be a violation of morality, 
 ■or as contrary to humanit}'', or as ground for 
 offence to the conscience or sensibility of the 
 most virtuous and religious peisons. In 
 Greece, and aftei-wards in the Roman Empire, 
 neither among masters nor slaves, did the in- 
 stitution of slavery, or the ordinai'y condition 
 and file obligations of slaves, seem to be ever 
 considered as unjust or oppressive, more than 
 the difference of conditions of property and 
 rank, of luxurious iiidulgencc and abject want 
 and misery, and the extremity of hnmaii suf- 
 fering, sucli as now exist everywhere, and arc 
 especially to be noticed- in free and rich Erg- 
 land. Indeed, there are now hundreds who, 
 entertaining socialist or agrarian O[)inions, 
 denounce and contend against what they 
 deem the wrong and iniquity of the unequal 
 distribution of property, and would be ready 
 to maintain their doctrines by force and blood- 
 slied, where, in ancient times, there was one 
 moral reasoner, or even one slave, who held 
 the modern doctrine of slavery being essen- 
 tially wrong and sinful, and a grievous and 
 unjust oppression of the slave by the master. 
 
 sal, either by caprice or cruelty, of the despot The philosopher Epictetus was a slave, and 
 of the tribe.' It was manifestly to the inte-lwas undoubtedly and immeasurably superior 
 rest of the slave-traders to bring their cargoes I to his master in learning and moral worth. 
 in the best condition to the market in Ameri- Yet, he did not complain, either of his own 
 
 ca. Therefore, self-interest prompted them to 
 take the best care of the health, and lives, and 
 consequently of the comfort, of the slaves 
 when on tlieir passage across the ocean. Con- 
 sidering the diff(ii'ence of the previous respee 
 
 position, or of the injustice and wrong of 
 slavery in general. The great moral writer 
 and moralist, Samuel Johnson, when, with all 
 his intellectual labors, he could scarcely earn 
 h bare and wretched subsistence, would have 
 
 tivfo conditions, it is probable that all the evils been as like to complain that he was not raised 
 and physical sufferings of the Africans, when ; as much higher in fortune and rank, as he was 
 thus transported to America, were not greater j truly superior in intellect and worth, to most 
 to their brutish feelings than are the different of the actual possessors of either in England, 
 evils, both moral and physical, suffered by the Frombeforethe days of Abraham to witliinthe 
 lower class of free and voluntarv European! nineteenth century, the mere fact of a man's be- 
 emigrants, who are now continuall}' brought, I ing a slave was no more deemed wrongful than 
 in ship loads, to America. There are, indeed, the other general fact that all the political 
 abundant causes for wrongs and sufferings powt-r and wealth of a country should be held 
 
 from injustice and cruelty, previous to and du 
 ring the transportation, in both these cases, as 
 in every other state of complete subjection of 
 any human beings to others. There were, doubt- 
 less, numerous cases of great injustice and hor- 
 rible cruelty in the early slave-trade, as there 
 are now in many particular and exceptional 
 
 by a few jiersons, (and these not the most wise 
 or virtuous,) without regard to the consent or 
 opinions of others; and tliat a much greater 
 number of their countiymen should be with- 
 out any political power even for defence, and 
 without daily bread, or means for subsistence. 
 These differences in England, the most free 
 
 cases of the existing negro slavery in these i country in the Old "World, are greater, and 
 Southern States. Many such abuses in the more important than the difference between 
 slave-trade might have been, and ought to I the necessaiy conditions of master and slave, 
 have been, prevented l>y proper legal regula- j The propriety of placing these cases in com- 
 tions. But the existence of such evils, both parison will be'denied on the ground that the 
 in the former and present condition of negro [ free man, however low, is not debarred by 
 
" r 
 
 12 
 
 law, as the slave is, from rising above his first 
 conJitioii. It is, indeed, theoretieall}- and 
 pliysicttUy possible that the child of a day 
 laborer, or a jiauper, in Enirland, nioy rise to 
 the highest political distinctions that are not 
 hereditary. IJut, in ]irnctice, such elevation 
 would be more improbable tliau a slave, in 
 other countries, rising to wealth and higii pub- 
 lie lionors. Wliere difference of race did not 
 (as it docs of African slaves) forbid, tliere have 
 been many more eases of slaves and tiie sons 
 of shivcs, becoming leaders of armies and rulers 
 of kingdoms, than tliere have been of the sous 
 o{ free English laborers or peasants rising to 
 high rank and wealth. When Diocletian rose 
 from th^ condition of a slave to be Em]ieror 
 of the lioman world, he did not encounter and 
 overcome such great obstacles to his ascending 
 progi'ess as would the free laborer of the 
 greatest uatural talent in England, to become 
 Prime Minister of the kingdom, or Coiimiaud- 
 er in-chief of its armies. 
 
 Orif/iti and progress of the African slave- 
 trade — Changes of public opinion tliereupon. 
 Considerations of morality and religion, or 
 of benevolence, had no bearing wliatever on 
 the beginning or the progress of the extinction 
 of slavery, or villenage, in England, and else- 
 ■where in Europe. It was simply a question 
 of gain or loss to the previous masters. And, 
 as conscientious or religious scruples had no 
 influence to encourage or promote this move- 
 ment of emancipation in Eurojie, neither did 
 such scruples exist, or have the least operation 
 in restraining the beginning and early j)rogress 
 of the African slave-trade, for the supply of 
 America. Las Casas, one of the most benevo- 
 lent of men, a sincere and devout christian, 
 and a i>hilanthi'oi)ist as earnest and zealous as 
 "Wilbt-rforce or Clarkson, was the first to j)ro- 
 pj>se (to the Emperor Charles V.,) the bring- 
 ing of African slaves to South America, by 
 means of the slave-trade, that, by their sub- 
 Btitutc'l bondage and labor, might be saved 
 the feebler race of native Americans, who were 
 fast dying i>ut and disappearing under the 
 severe slavery and labor to which they had 
 been subjected by the Spanish colonists. This 
 bondage was destructive to the American 
 slaves, and yet of little [u-ofit to their masters. 
 Just tile reverse of both these conditions were 
 found in regard t<j the more docile, patient, 
 strong, and enduring Africans. 
 
 Tiic difttingui.-hed navigator Hawkins was 
 the earliest English slave- trader. For this and 
 other naval and patriotic services, tiueeii 
 Elizabeth bestowed on him the then liigli dig- 
 nity and reward of knighthood; and further, 
 she pun-based a^i investment, and held a share 
 in Sir .lohn Hawkins' continued slave-trading 
 Lusiness. l^iigland became the great slave- 
 trader, exceeding in tlie number of negroes 
 annually transported to, ami sold in .\iiicriea, 
 the vessels of all the world besides. Tiie busi- 
 ness wits deeme<l of great cummereial and 
 national value, was encouraged bv the laws, 
 was rcromniriided by the public ueclaratiiins 
 ofs evtiul English monarchs, (one of them 
 Williaui Hi.,) and certainly was diticouute- 1 
 
 nanced b}' none. The extensive smuggling of 
 African slaves by English ships into Spanish 
 I America, in eontiavcntion of the laws and ex- 
 ' elusive commercial policy of S])ain, (which did 
 J. not oppose the colonies receiving slaves, but 
 I only the trading with any other nation than 
 Spain,) was the cause of war between the two 
 j countries ; and by the treaty of peace (of 
 Utrecht) which closed that war, England re- 
 j quired and obtained from S|iaiii llie furmal grant 
 of the right to bring and sell a certain lai'genum- 
 I ber of African slaves annually to the Spanish 
 I colonies. Kow, what Queen Elizabeth did, and 
 I other English Monarchs recommended, or what 
 [any English administration sustained and pro- 
 I moled, would be far from indicating that such 
 I acts were virtuous, or even otherNyise than in- 
 ! iquitous. But such open advocating, sustaining, 
 i and participating in the slave-trade, and the 
 I almost monopolizing it b}' the English people 
 when it was most extended, and this course 
 being continued far into the reign of George 
 III., will suffice to prove that the slave-trade, 
 so approved b\' Monarchs, Parliament, and 
 people, for centuries, and oi)posed b}- not even 
 a single voice, could not have been deemed 
 contrary either to morality or religion. Even 
 within the last seventy years, and after some 
 of the fouudeis of the opposite doctrines had 
 begun to speak, the general opinion of the 
 most moral and religibus juembers of English 
 society had not begun to condemn slavery in 
 the abstract, or even the actual cruelties of 
 the African slave-tiade. A sufficient ju'oof of 
 this assertion is presented in the circumstances 
 of the life of the Ilev. John Isewton. In the 
 earlier portion, and through the prime of his 
 life, he had been regularly engaged in the 
 African slave-trade. He had continued in this 
 business as captain of a slave-ship, :ind when 
 he was free to choose any piefM.iljle trade ; 
 and moreover, he so continued to be a regular 
 slave-trader long after he had become a pious, 
 devoted, and excmplarj' christian. His sin- 
 cerity and his piety have not been doubted 
 by any of those who have since denounced the 
 iniquity of slavery in general, and more es- 
 pecially, of the African slave-trade. It is true, 
 that the Rev. John Newton, late in life, and 
 when a distinguished and venerated preacher 
 of the Gospel, allied himself to the then new 
 and growing anti-slave-trade and slavery 
 party of Clarkson and Wilberforce. But this 
 later j)ositi(ju of his, in no degree, contradicts 
 what I have inferred from his earlier and long 
 continued business as a slave-trader, and when 
 he was no less njoral, conscientious, and chris- 
 tian, than in his later and more distinguished 
 ecclesiastical position. 
 
 Beginning and progress of the anti-slavery 
 doctrine and sect in the American Revo- 
 hitiou. 
 
 Virginia and South Carolina, and perhaps 
 other of the tlien colonies of England, had 
 earnestly opposed the further introduction of 
 African slaves. But their wishes were disre- 
 garded, and their legislative enactments for 
 this purjiose were annulled by the mother 
 country, that her profits from the slave-trade 
 
13 
 
 might not be lessened. Tliese facts stand 
 forth among the grievances stated in holh tlic 
 Declarations of Independence, first of Vir- 
 ginia, and of the United States. At that time, 
 and earlier, the prohibition of the further 
 supply of slaves from Africa was proper, even 
 upon grounds of economy and expediency- 
 At an earlier time, the slaves in Vii'ginia had 
 exeeediHl the whites in number hi the pro- 
 I portion of ten to seven. In South Carolina, 
 I the slaves had been thrice as numerous as the 
 I white population. — (Dew's Essay on Slavery.) 
 I In addition, the liien settled territory of the 
 \ colonies was all east of the Alleghany nionn- 
 ' tains, and there appeared not even a chance 
 fm- expansion beyond the Mississippi. Under 
 t^se ciicunistances, sound discretion and jiol- 
 icy required the cessation of any further 
 supply of African slaves. But the most cor- 
 rect opinions in regard to national policy, 
 "when contested by an opposing and hostile 
 party or nation, are apt to run into excess 
 and extremes. Hence, when the further in- 
 troduction of slaves into this country was 
 properly deemed an evil, and a grievance 
 inflicted by England merely for hei; greater 
 profit in the slave-trade, to aid the just oppo- 
 sition to and deimnciation of this oppression, 
 every supposed evil of slavery was cited, and 
 exaggerated. This disposition, in conjunction 
 ■with the then first springing and fast growing 
 theorttic'il doctrines of the equal, natural, and 
 political rights of man, which W(^'e conceived 
 and nourished in the conflict of opinions 
 caused by the American Revolution, (and 
 which doctrines admitted of no exceptions to 
 their general application,) gave existence to the 
 anti-slavery doctrines and sect, which after- 
 wards became so greatlj' extended, and have 
 had such great influence in I oth hemispheres. 
 But while Jefferson ancJ many (if not all) 
 others of the Republican leaders and assertors 
 of American liberty, thus acquired and erro- 
 neously maintained the opinion of the evil and 
 criminality of African slavery, and hoped for 
 its future extinction in this country, none of 
 them would have advocated, or submitted to, 
 the end since and now sought by the modern 
 disciples of this doctiine, in the immediate 
 and speedy abolition of the obligations of 
 slavery. 
 
 Progress of anti-slavery doctrine mid fanat- 
 icism in England, France, and the United 
 States. 
 
 The new anti-slavery doctrines soon spi-ead 
 in England, and far more extensively. For 
 there, the enthusiasts and fanatics had no 
 practical knowledge of African slavery, and 
 addressed their arguments to a people still 
 more ignorant of the whole subject, and who 
 had nothing to lose, or to sutter, from the 
 most complete carrying into practical opera- 
 tion of these new theoretical views. Still 
 more rapidly, completely, and disastrously, 
 did these views of natural equality of races, 
 and of negro emancipation, spread in France — 
 thej' being exactly suited to the then revolu- 
 tiouar}^ madness of that country. The gen- 
 eral opinions and political dogmas prevailing 
 
 in France, at that time, which wore called 
 republican, and falsely dectncd ]>roinotivc of 
 the liberty and well-being of mankind, eai'ried 
 with them, a.s a corollary, the doctrine that 
 negro slavery was not only a great national 
 evil, but a crime; and the most moderate and 
 conservative reasoners, and even in these 
 Southern States, generally admitted thatnc^ro 
 slavery was a trreat evil and inj\istice, which 
 it was desirable .should be extinguished as 
 soon as it could be done beneficially for the 
 slaves, and safel}' for the masters. As late as 
 1830, this speculative anti-slavery opinion 
 was almost universal in Yiiginia. Kot a 
 voice was then heard to vindicate or appit)ve 
 the ins:itu(ion, oj^evcn to delciicl its existence 
 and continuance, except on tlie grounds of 
 necessitj' — a necessity caused by the political 
 inability of the coionies formerl}- to prevent 
 slaves being introduced by the mother coun- 
 try, and subsequently the manifc'st danger and 
 general destruction that would follow imme- 
 diate emancipation. While the slaveholdei'S 
 held strongly to their legal rights of j)roperty, 
 and would have resisted to death any foreign 
 interference therewith, there was scarcely- one 
 of them, of cultivated mind and feelings, who 
 did not deem negro slavery an evil, public 
 and pi'ivate, political, moral, and economical, 
 and who would not have rejoiced to have in 
 prospect its future and safe extinction. But 
 this moderate condemnation was not enough 
 for the fanatical abolition faction of the 
 Northern States, which was then beginning 
 to exhibit its malignity and strength, and 
 which has ever since been increasing in num- 
 bers and violence. These Northern opposers 
 of slavery, having nothing to lose personally, 
 or at home, have been preaching the natural 
 equality of rights of the negro race, and 
 urging the speediest and most efl'ectual con- 
 summation of their doctrines of universal 
 emancipation and libcrtj-, without the least 
 regard to the evils that would follow. These 
 sentiments have been fast growing and extend- 
 ing in the Xorthern States and in Europe, and 
 are still extending anmng the more ignorant 
 and greater number in all countries in which 
 personal slavery has no existence. But the 
 violence of the attacks and denunciations of 
 this fanatical school has driven slaveholders 
 to examine their own jiosition, and especially 
 to investigate, in proper manner, the question 
 of slavei-y in all its aspects and bearings. 
 Such examination and investigation, by strict 
 reasoning, had never been before applied to 
 this question. And the lesult has been that 
 nearly all thinking and reasoning men now as 
 fully believe negro slavery to be a great ben- 
 efit for this country, as they formerlj* be- 
 lieved it to be a great evil. And not only 
 has this change been produced in these slave- 
 holding states, where self-interest would serve 
 to quicken and fortify jierception of this truth, 
 but also in the Korthern States and in Eng- 
 land there is a great and decided reaction in 
 this respect, and change of o])inion with many 
 enlightened and the least prejudiced minds. 
 And not only have many men been thus 
 brought to acknowledge the highly beneficial 
 
14 
 
 effects of neejro slavery, but also to advocate 
 the African slave- trade, under legal permission 
 and proper regulations and restrictions. 
 
 liegislation of the Utiited States and Enrfland 
 to suppress the African slave-trade, and the 
 consetjuences. 
 
 As soon as the former colonies had become 
 free from the rule of England, Virginia and 
 most of the others prohibited, and entirely 
 jwevented thenceforward, the importation of 
 slaves from Africa or an^- other foreign coun- 
 try. At a later time, aiid after a long strug- 
 gle, the English I'ai+ianieiit enacted the suji- 
 pressiou of the slave-trade from and after 
 1807. Since, the Governments of both the 
 United States and England have t^-eatod the 
 slave-trade as jiiracy, and have used every 
 effort to pi'cveiit its being prosecuted by the 
 people or ships of the respective countries. In 
 this legal polic}- of suppression, France and 
 other important powers have concurred, and 
 all others agreed in sentiment, and iu^lenun- 
 ciation of the slave-trade, except Spain and 
 Portugal, which powers continued to receive 
 African slaves into their then colonies Cuba 
 and Brazil. Finally, Brazil has also forbid- 
 den the further importation; and to Cuba 
 alone, and against the laws and treaties of 
 Spain, is the African slave-trade still carried 
 on. Yet, with all the stringent and general 
 measures used for the supjjression of the trade, 
 and with British and American vessels of war 
 continually cruising about and watching the 
 places for embarking slaves in Africa, the at- 
 temjJted suppression of the slave-trade has 
 scarcel}' had any effect in diminishing the 
 number of negroes taken from Africa, while 
 the cruelty and suffering.'? of the ocean trans- 
 portation (or of the'" middle passage") have 
 been made ten-fold more atrocious and life- 
 destroying, than they were in the previous 
 legal and open trade. Formerly, the owners 
 and masters of slave-ships were, at least, un- 
 impeded in the use of every means of care for 
 their captive slaves that pecuniary or selfish 
 interest would dictate. It was not only the 
 most humane, but tlie most ]u-ofitable proce- 
 dure, to prote.'t the iK-alth and the lives of the 
 captives, by allowing them good food, enough 
 space, and fresh air. But, since the prohibi- 
 tion, and the heavy penalties, and great risks 
 of capture, the slave-vessels are constructed 
 entirely foi- swift sailing, to avoid being cap- 
 tured — and, because of the small sizes and 
 low decks of the vessels, the slaves are kept 
 in the most horrible condition of confinement 
 and suffering that would not be certainly des- 
 tructive of life, so as best to insure the esdape 
 and safe voyage of the vessel, though it should 
 be with bin one-half of the slaves left alive. 
 For BO much had increased the demand and 
 ])rices of slaves, that if no inoie than half of 
 a cargo of slaves perished on the middle pas- 
 sage, llie other half wouhl return enoi-mous 
 profits on th<- whole shi|jment and expense of 
 the voyage. In reference to these well-eslab- 
 li«hed facts, the so-called "8ui)|)resBion of the 
 African slave-trade," by England, lias been 
 denounced by Uiany ot the ubh-st and most 
 
 zealous of the anti-slavery sect, ^s an entire 
 failure of the object, even in lessening the 
 number of slaves exported from Africa, and 
 as serving to increase the amount of the cruel- 
 ties and sufferings which accompanied the 
 former legal trade. 
 
 Height of fanatical opposition to slavery, and 
 T'cent reaction and approval of the institu- 
 tion. 
 
 But the attempted suppression of the slave- 
 ti'ade was denounced only for its inefficiency. 
 I'A'cr}' opinion that was uttered in regard to 
 the suppression was strongly approbatory of 
 the object, and in favor of its being rendered 
 truly and fully operative. Looking to the 
 cruelties and destruction of life, caused by the 
 then existing and illegal slave-trade, it was 
 regarded with detestation atid horror, even 
 by the few persons who had so early learned 
 to a^)prove of the practical operation and re- 
 sults of negro slaverj' of long previous origin, 
 and to deem the institution bighlv beneficial 
 to all parties. The change of opinion on this 
 subject was recent. As late as 1830, in the 
 slavelioldiiig States, there were to be found no 
 defenders or approvers of slavery, but only 
 apologists for the compulsory participation 
 therein of themselves and their countrymen. 
 The existence of slavery was still deemed a 
 great and unavoidable evil, at first inflicted 
 by the unscrupulous avarice of the mother 
 and ruling countr}' — and it was hoped by all 
 that the condition was but temporary, and 
 that, finally, slavery would be removed from 
 our country and people. 
 
 Professor Dew, of Virginia, was the first, 
 in his " Essay on Slaver}'," to defend and jus- 
 tify the institution, and, as boldlj' as ably, to 
 maintain its utility, and the folly and mad- 
 ness of carrying out, in any way, the eman- 
 cipation doctrines And schemes of abolitionists, 
 wheMier they were the northei'u and practi- 
 cal, or the southern and theoi'etieal or specu- 
 lative views. Never has any work, of mere 
 reasoning on previously known facts, had such 
 great effect. It seemed as if men in modern 
 times had not before dared to think on this 
 subject. Soon the benificent operation of 
 slaver}- in general, (wherever aiiplieable and 
 needed,) and, especially, of negro slavery in 
 these Southern States, was acknowledged by 
 many — and since, it has been, and now is, uni- 
 versally recognized and maintained, wherever 
 negro slavery exists — and also by many of 
 the thinking men in countries wheie anti- 
 slavery fanaticism is most prevalent and in- 
 tolerant. At this day there ai'c moi-e men in 
 the Southern States, and even in ^'irginia, who 
 would now approve of reopening the legal 
 African slave-trade, (to Buj)])ly the present 
 great need and demand for labor,) than could 
 have been found twenty-five years ago, who 
 did not then believe that negro slavery was 
 an enormous evil and injury, in every aspect, 
 and to every intei'est concerned. And the 
 belief of the beneficial operation of African 
 slaverj-, for countries to which it is best suited, 
 is now ever^-where extending among the com,- 
 parativcly few men of intelligence, as much 
 
15 
 
 as the fanatical oppositioa to slavery is also 
 growing; and extending among tlie more nu- 
 merous body of the ignorant aad deluded, or 
 unthinking and prejudiced of the people of 
 the Northern States.* 
 
 The dogma of the natural mental eqiiaUtij of 
 the black and white races considered! 
 
 When the anti-elavr^ry doctrines were first 
 taught, and for many years after, one of the 
 main ptisitions of the advocates was, the as- 
 sumption of the natural equality and capacitj' 
 for mental improvement of the black and 
 white races, or the negro and Caucasian. This 
 bold assumption of the one party was cither 
 tacitly admitted, or but rarely and faintly de- 
 nied, by the other. It was then generally 
 supposed that, with full opportunity and fa- 
 cilities, and sufficient time for improvement, 
 the negro could be raised to be equal to the 
 white man in mental acquirements — or,' at 
 least, to the capacity for self-government, and 
 self-support and preservation. There had 
 then been no sufficiently long and full practi- 
 cal trial or experiment of this doctrine. Since, 
 there have been ample trials in practice which 
 have served so fully to prove the contrary, 
 that no unprejudiced mind can now admit the 
 equality of intellect of the two races, or even 
 the capacity of the black race either to be- 
 come or remain industrious, civilized, when in 
 a state of freedom and under self-govern- 
 ment — or, indeed, in any other condition than 
 when held enslaved and directed by white 
 men. A few general statements and com- 
 ments thereon will be here presented, on each 
 of the several great and long continued ex- 
 periments of freedom conferred on negroes, 
 either as individuals, or in societies and com- 
 munities, independent of the white race. 
 
 * Professor Dew's Essay, the earliest modem vindi- 
 cation and defence of slavery, has obtained for its au- 
 thor the highest award of merit, not only for its pri- 
 ority, and thus exhibiting original thought and reason- 
 ing, but also because this earliest argument, taken as a 
 whole, is among the best of all the able recent writings 
 on the same side. For, since that beginning, many and 
 able publications have appeared, in which slavery has 
 been examined and defended on every different 
 ground — as in regard to morality and religion, and 
 to Christianity — and as to its political, social, and 
 economical influences and bearings. In some particu- 
 lar branch of the general subject, each of several dif- 
 ferent late writers has excelled all his predecessors. 
 But no one, yet, has so well covered the whale ground 
 of investigation, exposition, and argument, as Profes- 
 sor Dew. The next in order of time, and of merit, and 
 for its extensive scope, is a small volume which was 
 published in Philadelphia, in 1*36. It appeared with- 
 out the author's name, though it offers internal evi- 
 dence that he was a Northern man. This woric, which 
 is entitled " The South Vindicated from the Treason 
 and Fanaticism of the Northern Abolitionists," well 
 deserves republication, and the attentive perusal of all 
 who desire to l)e well informed on the general subject. 
 Of other, and able, and conclusive arguments, but di- 
 rected to particular branches only of the general ques- 
 tion, the letters of Gov. J. II. "Hammond, of South 
 Carolina, to Clarkson, and the "Scriptural and Statis- 
 tical views of Slavery," by the Kev. T. Stringfellow, 
 for their particular and limited objects and popular 
 manner, deserve especial commendation. The "So- 
 ciology," and other recent publications of George Fitz- 
 hugh, E»q., are worthy of high commendation for 
 novel and profound views on the comparison of slavery, 
 with what is miscalled, "free" society. 
 
 The intellectual inferiority of the black race, 
 tested by facts, in the United Stales. 
 
 Hundreds of thousands of individual cases 
 of emanei]>ated negro .slaves, and their de- 
 scendants, have existed in this country in the 
 last two centuries. 'Ihis class has now in- 
 creased, in Virginia alone, to more t.han 
 5(1,000 in number. In the non-slaveholding 
 States, also, there are numerous free negroes. 
 It is true, that wlien thus interspersed among 
 the much more numerous and dominant class 
 of wliite inhabitants, the free negroes are stjb- 
 jected to some depressing* and injurious in- 
 fluences, from which they would be relieved 
 if forming a separate commtmity. But, on 
 the other liand, they have derived more than 
 compensating benefits from their position, ih 
 the protection of government to person and 
 property, and the security- of both, and exemp- 
 tion from the evils of war, and from great op- 
 pression bj' any stronger power. Yet, in all 
 this long time, and among such great num- 
 bers of free negroes, everywhere protected in 
 person and projierty, and in the facililies to 
 acquire property — and in some of the North- 
 ern States, endowed with political, as well as 
 civil rights and power, equal with the white 
 citizens — still to this day, and with but few 
 individual exceptions, tlie free negroes in every 
 State of this Confederacy, are noted for ignor- 
 ence, indolence, improvidence, and poverty — 
 and very generally, also, for vicious habits, 
 and numerous violations of the criminal laws. 
 In this plentiful country, where the only great 
 want is for labor, and where every free laborer 
 may easily earn a comfortable support, this 
 free negro class is so little self-sustaining, that 
 it now scarcely increases, in general, by pro- 
 creation, and would annually decrease through- 
 out the United States, if not continually re- 
 cruited by new emancipations, and by fugi- 
 tives from slaver}'. The free negroes fare best 
 in the slaveholding States, and in them only 
 is the whole increase by procreation. In the 
 Northern or "free" States, if the free riegroes 
 were not continually added to by emancipated 
 and fugitive slaves from the South, there 
 would be seen a continued diminution of num- 
 ber, from the effects of suffering from want, 
 and vicious habits. In all this long time of 
 freedom, and with great facilities for improve- 
 ment, there has not appeared among all these 
 free tiegroes a single individual showing re- 
 markable, or even more than ordinaiy, power 
 of intellect — or any power of mind that would 
 be deemed worth notice in any individual of 
 the white race. Yet, in the Northern States, free 
 schools are open to the children of the blacks 
 as freely as to the whites — many have re- 
 ceived collegiate education — and nothing but 
 the immutable decree of God, fixing on them 
 mental inferiority, has prevented high grades 
 of intellect and of learning, being displayed 
 in numerous cases. Further, the absence of 
 industry is as general as the inferiority of 
 mental powers. Some few free negroes are 
 laborious, frugal, provident, and thrifty. A 
 very few have acquired considerable amounts 
 of property. But these rare qualities were 
 
16 
 
 not hereditary — and the children of these su- 
 perior individuals would be as like as others 
 to fall back to the ordinary condition of their 
 class. In short, taken throughout, and with 
 but few exceptions, the free negro class, in 
 every part of this country, is a luiisanco, and 
 noted for ignorance, laziness, improvidence, 
 and vicious habits. 
 
 Experiment of colonizing freed negroes in Li- 
 beria. 
 But philanthropists, while admitting these 
 facts, had associated the continued debase- 
 ment of the free nggroes in this country to 
 their previous low condition, and to their still 
 inferior position to the far more numerous 
 and dominant white class. Relief from this 
 alleged evil to the blacks, and, with it, every 
 benefit of industry, thrift, and improvement, 
 was expected to be obtained by the free negro 
 when colonizing Liberia, in Africa. That col- 
 ony has now been established forty years. It 
 has been sustained, by funds raised by or for 
 the Colonization Society, better than any 
 colony ever before planted and settled by 
 white people. It has wanted for nothing 
 that the most benevolent and parental care 
 of guardianship could provide. The settlers 
 were generallj' of the best of the class of free 
 negroes of this country, or of emancipated 
 slaves, selected and provided for by their for- 
 mer owners, to enjoy the supposed benefits of 
 freedom. The people and the government 
 have had the protecting, beneficial, and 
 always-desired guidance of white intellect; 
 and there has been no injurious influence 
 from white residents, or foreign interference. 
 Besides all the money and commodities so 
 liberally bestowed by benevolent individuals 
 in this country' to plant and support this col- 
 ony, some of the State governments have 
 afforded to it pecuniary or otluT aid, and the 
 Federal C.overnmeut has given much more 
 important, though indirect aid and support, 
 and also military and naval aid and protec- 
 tion. Further: since the so-called indepen- 
 dence and ostensible self-government of Libe- 
 ria, the higher oilicers of government have 
 been mostl}- mulattoes, who are as much of 
 the white as of the black blood and intellect. 
 With an these advantages, and such long sup- 
 
 {)ort by the money, and direction by the intel- 
 ect, of the whites, the colony of Liberia is a 
 complete (though a jiartly concealed and de- 
 nied) failure. With a soil of exuberant fer- 
 tility, and a climate no loss bountiful for pro- 
 duction, till- inhabitants of LilxM'ia do not yet 
 product; sufTicient food and other necessary 
 means f>jr subsistence. All the necessaries of 
 life, including rice, sugar, and others of the 
 most ready anil plentiful jiroducts of the coun- 
 try, sell at such exliorbitant pi'ices as to show 
 plainly their usual scarcit}-.* Lately the peo- 
 
 •Thc fr>ll'iwln(» paragraph, not lonjr slnco, appeared 
 In llie Uk'hmon'l l)l»piilpli, and various other papers, 
 without coiiiineiil, and has not been contradii'ted, and, 
 theritfore, is prciiiiuccl to ho correct, lhoii;;h the au- 
 thority was not Klatcil : 
 
 " A rf)rrefpondrnt, at Liberia, writes (hat provisions 
 are mosily linporii-d from the Uiila-il .states. Flour 
 rangca from ^\'i to $10 per barrel; hams and bacon 
 
 pie were even menaced by actual famine, be- 
 cause of the great scarcity of articles of food, 
 and the want of means to purchase food from 
 abroad. Indolence and aversion to regular 
 labor are universal. Agricultural operations 
 and production are in the lowest condition. 
 If the long-continued aid of the Colonization 
 Society was even now withheld, and also the 
 benevolent guidance and influence of the in- 
 tellect of the white guardians and protectors, 
 this much boasted and falsely eulogised colo- 
 ny, and now " Republic of Liberia," would 
 rapidly decline below its present low condi- 
 tion; and all the residents, who could not es- 
 cape from it, to find shelter under the shadow 
 of the white man's presence and governiuent, 
 would sink to the state of savage barbarism 
 and heathen ignorance and vice, such as had 
 formerly overspread the land. The only 
 means by which negroes in Africa, as well as 
 in America or elsewhere, can generally be 
 made industrious and useful as laborers, and 
 civilized, moral, and christian, will be when 
 they are placed in the condition of domestic 
 slaves to white masters. 
 
 Still earlier was made, and has been much 
 longer continued, the settlement of free ne- 
 groes in the colony of Sierra Leone, under the 
 direction and care, and at the expense of the 
 British Government. It is enough to say for 
 this experiment that its failure has been much 
 more signal than that of Liberia. The set- 
 tlers of Sierra Leone were mostly recaptured 
 and uncivilized Africans. In Liberia nearly 
 all the colonists had been civilized by the 
 best preparatory training of slavery in Ameri- 
 ca. This difference alone would serve to ac- 
 count for the greater failure of the scheme of 
 Sierra Leone. 
 
 While so many whites in Europe, and even 
 in America, blinded by prejudice, fanaticism, 
 or ignorance of the negro el, aract eristics, have 
 argued to maintain the natural equality of 
 the negro mind, the negroes themselves, in- 
 cluding the most enlightened an)ong them, 
 have universally acknowledged the inferiority ' 
 of their lace. One of the results of this ac- 
 knowledged inferiority is the well known gene- 
 ral unwillingness of negroes to be governed by 
 men of their own race, compared to their usual 
 submissive obedience and docility to the gov- 
 ernment of white rulers. It is well known to 
 every slaveholder, who has made an overseer 
 of one of his slaves, that the greatest difficulty 
 was because of the discontent of the negroes 
 to be so governed. They will, in most cases, 
 exhibit unwillingness to he commanded by the 
 most worthy aiul res])ectable of their fellows, 
 even if allied to them by ties of blood and 
 friendship, and sometimes will proceed to dis- 
 obedience, and even mutinous conduct, when 
 they would have submissivelj' obeyed and 
 res[)eeted any white man as their overseer, 
 even if, in truth, less respectable as a man, 
 and less lenient and less intelligent in exercis- 
 
 from 20 to 25 cents per j)ound ; hard bread .flS to $12 
 per loo pounds; Tin- if5 per bushel; butter 0'2i cents 
 per pound ; suit llsli rmm ^I'i to $14 per barrel ; sugar 
 W cents per pound; potatoes ,$1 '25 per bu.Hhel; and 
 everything tor I'uinily use proportionately high." 
 
17 
 
 ing the deputed authority of the master. 
 This respect for white, and impatience of ne- 
 gro inile, extends no less through the class of 
 free negroes. It is because of this general 
 feeling that so few of this class have been or 
 can be prevailed upon to emigrate voluntarily 
 to Liberia. In these slaveholding States, the 
 free negroes, in their usual degraded moral 
 position, and inferior political rights, subject 
 indirectly, if not legally, to the dominant 
 white race, necessarily must suffer injustice 
 and hardship from bad treatment in many 
 cases. Yet it is rai-e that one of them, 
 whether the most ignorant and degraded, or 
 of the most worthy and intelligent, can be in- 
 duced to accept the offered boiKity of the Col- 
 onization Society, and of the State, to be sent 
 to Liberia, and there be made a landholder, 
 and an equal sharer of political rights. So 
 strong is their repugnance to be governed by 
 negroes, or to live where there are no white 
 inhabitants, and, (as they say,) "no gentle- 
 men," that if the free negroes of Virginia 
 should be compelled to choose between being 
 sent to Liberia, to be there free citizens, or to 
 be made slaves, with their families, to white 
 men in Virginia, it is probable that more than 
 half of them would choose to become slaves, 
 to secure white rulers and protectors. 
 
 Experiment of the independence of negroes in 
 Hayti. 
 
 An earlier experiment than Liberia, and on 
 a much larger scale, has been tried in the 
 insurrection and independence of the slaves 
 of St. Domingo. Even this bloody, and finally 
 successful insurrection, which is so generally 
 understood as presenting full evidence of like 
 dangers attending the condition of slavery, 
 and of the disposition of slaves to rebel, and 
 their ability to succeed, if justly viewed, will 
 fully prove the reverse of all these positions. 
 It was not the slaves of St, Domingo, but the 
 wealthy and educated class of free mulattoes, 
 that commenced the insurrection. And even 
 their efforts would have been speedily and 
 completely quelled, if the contest had been 
 left to be decided by the people of St. Do- 
 mingo only. But the then insane government 
 of the powerful mother country interposed, 
 declaring first in favor of equal political 
 rights to the free mulattoes, afterwards re- 
 pealing that grant, and finally decreeing 
 emancipation and equal rights to all the 
 slaves. Armies were sent from France to 
 enforce these different and opposite decrees. 
 And it was by these extraneous circumstances, 
 and especially by the armed coercion b}' 
 France, that the final overthrow of the 
 whites, and their consequent general mas- 
 sacre, were effected, and this formerly beau- 
 tiful and fruitful territory was made a deso- 
 late wilderness and ruin — as it still remains, 
 after seventy years of undisturbed negro 
 domination. Even for two years after the 
 mad declaration of equal rights to the slaves, 
 by the National Convention, and after bloody 
 hostilities had been long carried on between 
 the two free classes, (of whites and mulattoes,) 
 and after a French army was in the field to 
 
 sustain universal emancipation, the slavea 
 were still peacefully laboring, as before, on 
 their masters' plantations. Jlut when so long 
 and so urgently invited, and by the then 
 stronger l>arty of their 8U]>eriors, to accept 
 their free<li(m, and (what was to their savage 
 dispositions more inviting) to rob, ravage, and 
 slay at will, it would have been strange, 
 indeed, if these long continued invitations, 
 urged by different ])artie8, had not been at 
 last obeyed. Then it was, and only by these 
 means, that the work of slave insurrection 
 was begun, and the eubseq>icnt unprecedented 
 rapine and slaughter, and luispeakable out- 
 rages and horrors, were consummated. If 
 there had been only white masters and negro 
 slaves, and no foreign and stronger power, 
 although the whites were only one-tenth the 
 number of their slaves, their mastership would 
 never have been seriously disturbed. This, 
 however, is not the present question — but the 
 success or failure of the 8ubse([uent experiment 
 of negro independence and self-government. 
 And this question does not need discussion, so 
 well established is the failure and the long 
 continued, and still continuing desolation of 
 the country, and debased condition of its in- 
 habitants. Because the facts are notorious 
 and indisputable, and can be shown bj' statis- 
 tical documents, it will be enough here to say, 
 generally, that in regard to cultivation and 
 production, population, social condition, and 
 political importance — refinement, morals, and 
 religion — in short, in everything that can 
 render a country or its people valuable — the 
 general decline of St. Domingo (or Ilayti) has 
 been far greater than any jierson or party 
 could possibly have anticipated. Neither in 
 the descendants of the former slaves is there 
 any such improvement of comfort, happiness, 
 or of capacity, that can compensate for the 
 inferiority of the present highest and ruling 
 class, compared to their former white mas- 
 ters. Of course, the individuals composing 
 the present higher classes, by the aid of 
 wealth, and means for education, are much 
 better informed than they could have been if 
 remaining slaves. But the general or aver- 
 age amount of intelligence, as of their indus- 
 try and productions, is far below what it was 
 formerly — and the class of laborers is far 
 below what they would have been, if they 
 had continued slaves, and for the last seventy 
 years had been operated on by the civilizing 
 influence of slavery. Further : as much as 
 the case of St. Domingo proves from my ar- 
 gument, after all, it was not a trial of a really 
 freed negro ])eople. The black general Touis- 
 sant, (tlie only truly great man yet known 
 of the negro race,) who, after suppressing the 
 civil war, assumed and exercised despotic and 
 severe authority, compelled the former slaves 
 to return to the plantations, and to labor, 
 under militarj' coercion, and severe punish- 
 ments for disobedience. They were to receive 
 a stated share of the products of the land (one- 
 third,) and were coerced to labor by govern- 
 ment officials, instead of by individual mas- 
 ters. But under this much less efficient, ben- 
 eficial, and profitable form of bondage, the 
 
18 
 
 former jslnves were not less than formerly 
 fonip\il.«ory laborers, and driven by cori)oie:il 
 pnnisliinent, as tliey continue to be to tlii:^ 
 time. This system of discipline nnd constraint 
 is, of necessity, extremely defective. But im- 
 perfect as it is, compared to individual slaverj', 
 It has served to retard the rapidity of tlie 
 descent ■wliieh tbi- connnuiiity has been, and 
 still is, milking to un]>roductive and savage 
 barbarism. ]f any civilized people were now 
 (as oxight to be done, and will be done in 
 some future time,) to conquer and re-colonize 
 Hayti, and reduce the whole laboring, or 
 destitute, or idle classes to iheir former condi- 
 tion of domestic slavery, the change would be 
 beneficial for the re-euslaved classes, for the 
 whole community nnd countrj', and for the 
 commercial and civilized world. 
 
 In the seventy years of independence of St. 
 Domingo, and of freedom from invasion and 
 foreign aggression, except Touissant, (who 
 liad been a slave, and continued to be perfect- 
 ly illiterate,) there has not arisen a single 
 man who woubl be deemed of more than ordi- 
 nary ability, if he had been of the white race. 
 The hiu^her classes there possess all the still 
 remaining wealth of the country, and can 
 command every facility for education, and 
 mental instruction and inipiovement. There 
 have ruled and flourished hundreds of high 
 dignitaries, military, ]iolitical, and clerical — 
 emperors and kings, dukes, generals, and bisli- 
 ops. But theie has not yet appeared even 
 one man whom all the advantages of wealth, 
 education, and rank have enabled to exhibit 
 the possession of strong or remarkable mental 
 power. Is not this alone, sufficient to prove 
 the natural and great inferiority of the negro 
 mind! 
 
 Exptriiiienl of general emancipation in the 
 British colonies. 
 
 A fourth great experiment of negro freedom 
 has been devised and conducted under the 
 direction, ])ntronaee, and philanthropic care 
 of the enlightened and powerful British Gov- 
 ernment. This was the general emancipation 
 of tbe ."slaves in all the Bi-itish colonies of the 
 West India Islands, British Guiana, nnd 
 wherever African and domestic slavery had be- 
 fore existed under British authority. Proofs 
 and details of facts are not called for in this case. 
 The failure is universal, signal, and undeniable, 
 (with a few notable exceptions.) even by the 
 most zealous of the previous British advocates 
 of the act of emancipation, or the abolition- 
 iflts wlio continue to urge the like measure, 
 with the like results nmnifestly impending, 
 for our siaveholding States. 
 
 Previous to this extensive, siinultaneous, and 
 peaceful emuiieipation, the abolitionists of 
 linglaiid, and elsewhere, had maintained that, 
 after einahc-i|)ation, the negroes would imme- 
 diately become hired laborers — and (judging 
 erronoou-^ly from the condition of things in 
 England) that the free labor thus supplied 
 ■would be even more valuable and chea|> to the 
 employers than the former slave labor. (Jn 
 the c/)ntrary, universal idleness of the blacks 
 has taken the place of the former universal in- 
 
 dustry in the British island.s. As the philan- 
 llu'iipic British sentiment which induced the., 
 einiinci]iation, (and forced it on the former 
 slaveholders,) cannot resort to the wholesome 
 discipline of Touissant, to force the newly 
 freed blacks to labor, the general neglect of 
 labor, and decrease of production, are even 
 worse and more hopeless in .Jamaica, than iil 
 St. Domingo. And although the continued 
 supremacy of British Government and author- 
 ity, and the j^resence of British military and 
 naval forces, have so far secured the lands to 
 the white owners, and prevented general con- 
 fiscation of propei'ty, and massacre of the few 
 whites, still Jamaica and the other British 
 West Indian colonies are totally ruined in re- 
 gard to industry, production, and all social 
 blessings. 
 
 If required, or suitable to the occasion, I 
 could quote at greater length than all this 
 article besides, testimonj' of facts, and statis- 
 tical and official reports, going to show the 
 utter ruin of industry and production in Hay-' 
 ti and the British colonies — the unquestion- 
 able results of the suppression of slavery, 
 ilany of such facts may be seen in the " Pre- 
 sent State of Ilay ti," written by James Frank- 
 lin, an intelligent Englishman, and former 
 lesident — in Bigelow's " Notes on Jamaica " — 
 and extracts from official reports! to the British 
 Parliament, and from British '(and anti-slave- 
 rv) writers, inserted in Bledsoe's "Liberty 
 and Slaver\-." I will give here, merely as ex- 
 amples, the following few short passages: 
 
 The sutrar exported from St. Domingo, now 
 Havti, in'l789, was 672,000,000 lbs.; i"n 1806, 
 it was 47,510,531 lbs.; in 1825, it was 2,020 
 lb.=.; and in 1832, none. Franklin (whose 
 book ap]ieared as far buck as 1810, even then) 
 said: "There is every reason to ajiprehend 
 that it (Hayti) will recede into irrecoverable 
 insignificance, povertj', and disorder." 
 
 Bigelow, a Northern Abolitionist and negro- 
 philist, saj's of Jamaica in 1850: "Capable, 
 as it is, of pi'oducing almost everything, and 
 actually producing nothing which might not 
 become a staple with a proper application 
 of capital and skill, its inhabitants are misera- 
 bly j)oor, and daily sinking deeper and deeper 
 into the utter heli)lessness of abject want. 
 Shij)ping has deserted her ports, her magnifi- 
 cent sugar and coffee phmtatinns are running 
 to weeds, her private dwellings are falling to 
 decay, the comforts and lu.Nuries which belong 
 to industrial pi'osperity have been cut off, one 
 by one, from her inhabitanls, and the day, I 
 think, is at hand when there will be none 
 left to represent the wealth, intelligence, and 
 hospilality for which the Jamaica ])laMter was 
 once distinguished." Heni'y Carey, another 
 Xorthern and anti-slavery writer, says: "It is 
 i im|i()ssible to read Mr. Bigelow's volume with- 
 j out arriving at the eonelusion that the free- 
 dom granted to the negro has had little effect, 
 i except that of enabling him to live at the ex- 
 pense of the planter so long as anything re- 
 mained. Sixteen years of freedom dicl not ap- 
 j pear, to its author, to have "advanced the dig- 
 ] nitv of labc>i', or of the laboring classes, one 
 ] particle, while it had ruined the proprietors of 
 
19 
 
 the land." Yet, while all Bigelow's facts go 
 to prove these evils to bo the result of the in- 
 curable indolence and improvidence of the 
 freed negroes, so inveterate is his negropliilisni 
 that he ascribes their indolence and degrada- 
 tion to the continued residence of the few re- 
 maining whites, and looks to the removal of 
 the latter as the ]iropei' remedy. And, in an- 
 ticipating this future event, and the benefit of 
 an unmixed negro poj)ulation in the Britisli 
 "West Indies, he also, with all complacency, and 
 without any intimation of objection on iiis 
 part, supposes that these ishmds will then foi'm 
 a portion of the United States — and, as must 
 be inferred, as a jiart of their improved con- 
 dition, must necessarily then be represented 
 in Congress by negro delegates, 
 
 "The finest land in the world," says Bige- 
 low, "maybe had at aiiy ]>i'ice, and almost for 
 the asking." Labor ''receives no compensa- 
 tion, and the product of hibor does not seem 
 to know how to fiiid its way to market." 
 
 Mr. Robert Baird. xV. M., (quoted by Profes- 
 sor Bledsoe,) is an Englishman, and, like Bige- 
 low, a strong approver of the previous eman- 
 cipation of the slaves in the English colonies; 
 and, like Bigelow, wiiile he arrays numerous 
 strong faets to show the ruinous results of that 
 act, he ascribes the evil, not to the act itself, 
 bxit to the want of some further supposed 
 measures of reform. lie says: 
 
 "Let any one who thinks that the extent 
 and clamor of the complaint [of the former 
 planters and proprietors] exceeds the magni- 
 tude of the distress whicli has called it forth, 
 go to the West Indies and judge for himself. 
 Let him see, with his Qwn ej'cs, the neglected 
 and abandoned estates, the uncultivated fields, 
 fast hurrying back into a state of nature — the 
 dismantled and silent machinery, the crumb- 
 ling walls, and deserted mansions, which are 
 familiar sights in most of the West Indian 
 colonies. Let him, then, transport himself to 
 the Spanish Islands of Porto Rico and Cuba, 
 and witness the life and activitj'' which in 
 these slave colonies prevail. Let him observe 
 for himself the activity of the slavers, the im- 
 provements daily making in the cultivation of 
 the fields, and tlie processes carried on at the 
 sugar mills, and the general indescribable air 
 of thriving and prosperity which surrounds 
 the whole," &c. 
 
 The degradation of British Guiana since, 
 and because of, emancipation, as shown in the 
 Parliamentary and other oflicial reports, is still 
 worse. But I will quote no more, except a 
 passage of general comment from the British 
 historian, Alison: "Tlie negroes," says he, 
 "who, in a f^tate of slavery, wereicomfortable 
 and prosperous beyond any peasantry in the 
 world, and rapidly approaching the condition 
 of the most opulent serfs of luirope, have 
 Been, by an act of emancipation, irretrievably 
 consigned to a state of Jliarbarisni," Yet, even 
 with this admission, I presume that Alison, 
 like every other Englisimian of distinction, 
 and of high reputation as an author or states- 
 man, (excepting Carlyle only,) is an enemy of 
 negro slavery, and a denouncer of the iniquity 
 of slaveholding. With all this present una- 
 
 nimity of opposition to, and violent denuncia- 
 tion of, African slaver^*, the prc<liction may be 
 ventured, that a change of opinion is about to 
 take i)lace. Reason and trntii will not much 
 loiii^ei- be kept out of sight by prejudiced and 
 ignorant fanaticism, even in England and the 
 Northern American States. 
 
 But with such proofs of entire failure of the 
 emancipation scheme in the British colonies, 
 and With thousands of like facts that can be 
 adduced from stati.-tical ami oflicial re|>ort8, 
 or testified by unim]ica<'hable and iiitciligcnt 
 witnesses, so bcs(jtted and blind is fanaticism, 
 and so strongly does it cling to its first errors,"^ 
 and reject all light and truth, that a few men 
 have dared to test'fy and to publish, that the 
 experiment has been eminently successful — 
 that the lands had increased in jirice and in 
 production — the negroes were industi-ious — 
 even their former proprietors were benefitted 
 and content, and that everything had been 
 improved. J. J. Gurney, of England, first pub- 
 lished an elaborate report of such false state- 
 ments, alleged to be on his personal examina- 
 tion ; and his pamphlet was largely circulated, 
 by anti-slavery advocates in the United 
 States. Even within the last few months, the 
 same general assertions were made l)y a speak- 
 er, without contradiction, in a public meeting 
 ill one of the Northern cities. This statement 
 was matched by, if not copied from, the fol- 
 lowins, which was republished in the "African 
 Repository," the organ of the Colonization So- 
 ciety in this country, without conimeut, or ex- 
 pression of even a doubt: 
 
 "The British We-^t lN-inE.s. — At a meeting 
 in London to take measures to present an ap- 
 propriate testimonial to Dr, Livingstone, the 
 African traveler; Mr. Montgomery Martin 
 made the following statement: 'lie had re- 
 eeiitly visited the West Indies to ascertain if 
 the emancipation of the slaves had }>roduced 
 ruin there. He found thei-e a free, hajqiy, and 
 prosperous population, (hear, hear;) and. 
 speaking commercially, the West Indies now 
 yield more rum, sugar, and other produce, than 
 they had ever done during the existence of 
 slavery, (hear, hear,) Since the abolition of 
 slavery in the West Indies, not a drop of blood 
 was shed, not a single crime was committed — 
 nor was there desti-uction of property through- 
 out the whole of the West Indies." (Cheers.) — 
 lY. Y. Col. Jour. 
 
 Robespierre, in the French Convention, 
 when urging the emancij^ation of tlie slaves 
 iij St. Domingo, and in answer to jiredietions 
 of opjionents of the ruin that woiilil follow, 
 uttered the memorable sentiment, "Perish the 
 colonics, rather than sacrifice one iota of our 
 ]uinciples! " The Northern Abolitionists, our 
 fellow-citizens and political "brethren," con- 
 tinue to reassert, in effect, Robespierre's atro- 
 cious declaration, after they now well know, 
 what their great exemplar, the bh)od\- Robes- 
 pierre, did not know, the wide-spread ruin 
 and destruction that wouiil follow the practi- 
 cal establishment of their dogma and purpose 
 of negro emancipation. Their procedure says, 
 louder than words could do, "Perish the 
 wealth and all production of the Southern 
 
20 
 
 Sfatt'«, witli all tliiit refiner, improve?, and Jig 
 nifies iiiankiml witliiii thoir bmintk; perish 
 there, the white raee, men, women, and hahes, 
 by niassnero, so that the negro slaves shall be 
 freed! Perish even Northern manufactures, 
 commerce, and wealth, if dependent on the 
 products of Southern slavery — and perish the 
 industry, tiie eomforts, the civilization, the 
 morals, religion of the slaves, and e\en the 
 slaves themselves, if to be necessarily caused 
 by their receiving the gift of freedom! " 
 
 Tlie aUcfjcd r/rratcst atrocities of negro slavery 
 
 coiisiihrtil in ciriitparison with those of free 
 
 iocittif, or class slavery. 
 
 The main objections of the opposers and de- 
 nouncers of slavery may be stated under two 
 general heads, viz: first, the great injustice 
 and wrong of subjecting human beings, our 
 natural equals, to slavery, and of the so hold- 
 ing them and their po.-terity ; and second, the 
 hardships and sufferings of the persons sub- 
 jected to and held in slavery. The numerous 
 other objections urged are incidental, and of 
 minor importance to these. 
 
 The alleged injustice and wrong'-doing of 
 producing or maintaining the relations and 
 opposite conditions of master and slave, have 
 already been here considered in another con- 
 nection. If it is unjust and wrongful, it is in 
 the same manner as property, wealth, and po- 
 litical rank and power, in almost every civi- 
 lized and even free country, are ])ossessed by 
 a small number of the ])eo])le, while the far 
 greater number are without land or other pro 
 perty, without political power, or, perhaps, 
 even political rights, and with scarcely a hope 
 of acquiring either, in a whole life of unceas- 
 ing toil and privation. Except some of the 
 most rabid socialists and disorganizers, as 
 Proudhon, who declares all " property to be 
 robbcrv," no English philanthropist, or North- 
 ern anti-slavery writer, has denounced all he- 
 reditar}' magistrates and rulers as \isurpers, 
 and all ])roperty-holders as unjust and fi-audu- 
 lent ])osst'ssors — and declared that both these 
 classes of usurpers and robbers ought to be 
 deprived of their acquisitions for the benefit 
 of the mullitude of destitute persons, whose 
 equal rights had been thereby' violated. The 
 abstract right of all mankind to personal 
 libertj-. and the right to ecjual participation in 
 the goverruiu-nt, and of ]pi'oj)erty in land, (if no 
 more,) stand upon precisely e()ual and like 
 grounds. The end obtained l)y each of these 
 eevernl violations of natural and equal rights, 
 or claims, is the same — the general and great 
 benefit of the whole eonimnnity, and of all 
 inankin<] — evi.-n inchnliug (and especially as to 
 jiersonal slavery) the class U'ust favored in the 
 distribution of rights and property. The pos- 
 sessor of hereditary aulhoiity, in free ICng- 
 land, or of authority delegated by hereditary 
 rulers, either civil or niilitury, lay or clerical, 
 is to the |)oor and starving laborer, as much a 
 fraudulent ami forcilile usurper of the power 
 and property of which the laborer is t-ntirely 
 dcitilulc, as the slaveholder is unjustly depriv- 
 iHg his slave of any right to freedom. Vet, 
 juit as is this comparison, no English uionarch- 
 
 ist or Nuithern capitalist seems to have 
 thought of the parity of the different cases. 
 
 The second great objection to negro slavery 
 is the severe and cruel treatment of the slaves, 
 and the great sufferings incidental to the con- 
 dition of every slave. It is a certain and de- 
 plorable truth, that wherever men have power 
 over others, there will occur eases of un- 
 just and sometimes cruel exercise of power. 
 Such cases occur even where the superior in- 
 dividual, or class, has no interest to serve in op- 
 pressing the inferior; and they are much more 
 frequent, if not general, when the unjust op- 
 pression of the inferior, and subject, is advanta- 
 geous to the superior ])ersi)n or class. Thus there 
 are many (though still exccjitional) cases of 
 slaveholders in these Southern States maltreat- 
 ing their slaves, allhougli such procedure is 
 generally opposed to, and never promotive o^ 
 the master's interest. And so in the Northern 
 States and in England, theie are many (yet 
 also exceptional) cases of husbands using their 
 superior power to maltreat, and even to tor- 
 ture or kill wives — parents their young chil- 
 dren — and adult children their parents. But 
 with all these cases, and many ot them of 
 horrible cruelty and atroeit}-, the relations of 
 masters to their personal slaves, as well as of 
 parents to children, and husbands to wives, are 
 much more generally kind, just in intention, 
 and benefieient. The owner of negro slaves 
 is interested in obtaining from them the great- 
 est amount of continued useful labor and ser- 
 vice ; and also, (and especially, at their present 
 high prices,) to have the property continued 
 by the preservation of health and long life, 
 and increased in successive generations. These 
 objects, it is manifest, must be opj)Osed, if not 
 defeated entirely, by the slaves being too 
 severely worked, or being subjected to other 
 suffering from want of sutHcieiit food, and 
 other necessaries of life and health. Further: 
 capricious and tyranical treatment of slaves, 
 even though not damaging their bodily ability 
 and health, would be as detrimental to the 
 master's interest, by ju'oducing discontent and 
 disobedience. Besides these motives for just 
 and kind treatment, addressed to the self-inte- 
 rest of the master of slaves, thei-e are others 
 which appeal even more strongl}' to the best 
 feelings and attributes of man. The intimate 
 association of the master and his slaves, through 
 years of direction and service — in many cases 
 continued from early childhood to death — 
 must produce, and does jiroduce, strong and 
 mutual feelings of personal regard and attach- 
 ment. In very many cases this attachment of 
 love has such sway, that the master's kindness 
 of feeling overpowers his judgment, and he 
 fails touuiintain the proper degree of discipline 
 and obedience that is necessary for the well- 
 being and ha[)piness of the slaves, as well as 
 for the profit of the !naster. The sternest 
 m;ister, however deficient in the softer feelings, 
 has at least more of persomil attachment to 
 his own slaves than toother persons unknown 
 to, and unconnected with him. And the 
 smallest share of this universally existing feel- 
 ing of personal all'ection, is just so much more 
 than is felt, or can possibly be felt, by either 
 
21 
 
 party in any form of class slavery, or of sub- 
 jection of labor to caj)ital. Tliiis, wbether 
 reasoniiiij a priori from the nature of man, or 
 deducing conclusions fi-oni existiiifi; known 
 and g'lnerul facts, there are many and strong 
 reasons to induce the owner of domestic slaves 
 to be kind in his treatment, and to strive to 
 avoid injustice and cruelty. Such are generally, 
 and of necessity must l)e, tlic general accom- 
 paniments and condition of slavery in these 
 Southern Stat^^s, at tiie i>resent, arul in recent 
 times. But I admit that the case might be 
 (and has been elsewhere) very different. 
 While England supplied America with African 
 slaves, negroes were so cheap in the liritish 
 West Indies, and wherever else slaves were 
 then admitted, that the ma.ster's self-interest 
 was small to preserve his slave's life to old age, 
 and no increase bj' procreation was desired, or 
 would have been profitable. It was cheaper 
 to buy an adult male negro, than either to 
 rear one from infancy, or to maintain his in- 
 firm and useless old age. Hence, according to 
 Immau nature, (and just as capitalists in both 
 Old and New England now act towards their 
 free laborers, or class slaves,) self-interest 
 generally overcame any promptirtgs of hu- 
 manity. It was to the gain of the owners to 
 treat their slaves hardl}' and cruellj', and, ac- 
 cordingly, it was so done generallj'. Neither 
 were the promptings of self-interest often 
 counteracted by any feeling of attachment to 
 the newly imported, brutal, debased, and 
 savage African negroes. Mureovei', most of 
 the owners, in the British West India Islands 
 were non-residents, and, therefore, were in- 
 capable of forming personal attachment to any 
 of their unknown slaves. 
 
 This worst and very deplorable condition of 
 negro slaves was owing to accidental and extra- 
 neous circumstances, (and mainly to the greedy 
 and unscrupulous avarice of England, minis- 
 tered to by the great profits of the slave-trade,) 
 and would have been but temporarj' and tran- 
 sient there, as was the somewhat similar eai-ly 
 condition of slavery in Virginia. But the ne- 
 cessary hardships of free laboi-ers, and the 
 cruel sufFeringS'of class slavery instead of be- 
 ing transient, are fixed, and will be increasing 
 as long as the competition for labor, and the 
 pressure of want, shall continue to opeuite. 
 The class of employers of free labor cannot 
 possibly feel any love or personal attachment 
 for their numerous and often changed hire- 
 lings. The only rule on which they act (or 
 indeed can act) towards them, as laborers, is 
 to obtain from them as much work as possi- 
 bly can be performed, for as low wages as will 
 be taken for such woik. This is not even a mat- 
 ter of choice with the employers. They have 
 their places iu a complicated system of .';ocial 
 machinerj', and each one is compelled to act 
 his required part of the general operation. It 
 is often the case that an individual owner and! 
 director of a plantation, worked by his negro 
 slaves, either through his own indolence and 
 carelessness, or his too kind indulgence to his 
 slaves, or both these cause^combined, fails to 
 obtain half of his proper products and income. 
 Such neglect and waste of means have often 1 
 
 I led, finally', to the ruin of the proprietor, and, 
 jConseiiuently, the subsciiuent .sale of tlie 
 [slaves. But, more generally, the less extent of 
 such errors only causes to the proja-ietor such 
 loss of profit as lie can bear without destruction 
 of his business, or diminution of his original 
 capital. But anj- eucli diminution of jirt-fit., 
 to a great maimfacturer or mine owner, would 
 be ruinous. The compeiition for ]>ui'cha9er8, 
 among great propi-ietors of manufactories, and 
 for the trade of the world, is as keen as is the 
 competition for eniplovment among their la- 
 borei'S. Many of such cajiitalists are us con- 
 scientious and humane men as any other em- 
 l)loyers of labor, and they probably perform 
 as many acts of charity, a.s- charlt.i/, m other 
 rich people. But an waycs, no employer of 
 numerous laborers is able to add to the pit- 
 tance that will engage the needed labor, 
 though knowing it to be inadequate. A very 
 large pai't of the expense of these great in- 
 dustrial operations is the wages of labor. A 
 master manufacturer is bound, by the current 
 market values, to take certain rates of prices 
 for his products; which prices return to him, 
 on the general average, but a fair and proper 
 profit on his capital and expenses. If, to 
 make these sales, and secure this profit, he can 
 and does hire his laborers at twenty pence for 
 each day's work, he could not add two pence 
 to that rate of wages without taking that 
 amount out of his own previous and but mod- 
 erate profits. He might be sensible that hie 
 laborers required higher wages to sustain 
 health and life, and his feelings of compassion 
 and benevolence might strongly urge him to 
 make the increase; but for the great expense 
 of labor to be increased to him even by one- 
 tenth more than was paid by all his competi- 
 tors, could not possibly be done without de- 
 struction to his [irofits, and ruin and sjieedy 
 stoppage to the business. Such a man would 
 pay his share of tax, under the poor law, for 
 aiding to support his and other pauper labo- 
 rers, and, besides, might give alms voluntarily 
 to the extent of his ability-; but as an em- 
 ployer of laborers, and payer of their wages, 
 he would have no choice but to fulfil his hard 
 and severe part in the great sj-stem of "free 
 labor," urged to the utmost by competition, 
 and by want. 
 
 And precisely in like manner acts every 
 employer of labor, or purchaser of the pro- 
 ducts of labor. It is the universal law of 
 trade, of which no particular departures from, 
 or exceptions to, can prevent or aft'ect the 
 general operation, that every one will seek to 
 hire the lowest priced labor, and to buy the 
 lowest priced products of labor. All the 
 knowledge of the facts of want and hunger, 
 and consequent vice and misery, and all that 
 benevolence and charity can feel and wish, 
 cannot materiallj" alter or alleviate the work- 
 ing to its end of the great law of competition, 
 and its deplorable consequences. 
 
 There are but few, even among the most 
 fanatical denouncers of negro slavery, who, if 
 acquainted with both conditions, would not 
 admit that the far greater amount of suffer- 
 ing is to be found iu the class which they 
 
22 
 
 falsely term "free laborers." Yet, to remedy, 
 or {jreatly alleviate these certain, permanent, 
 and iirowing distresses of free society, no 
 statesman has even attempted; and, except 
 wild and disorganiziiiir socialists, no reformer 
 has proposed even visionary means for relief. 
 Yet all tliese statesmen, theoretical reformers, 
 arid socialists of every sect, who have all the 
 horrors of class slavery standing and growing 
 under their eyes, neglect its miseries and vic- 
 tims to unite in oneuniversal howl of dennnci- 
 ation of negro slavery in tliis epuntry — which 
 is a far ha|«pier condition than that of any 
 class of free laborers in England, and the hap- 
 piest and best condition in which the negro 
 race can possibly be placed. 
 
 Expedi-^ncy of the permanence of negro slavery, 
 and of the extension of the area. 
 Assuming as an indisputable fact that God 
 has created and designed the negro race to be 
 inferior in intellect to the wliite — that the 
 negro possesses in a superior degree the qual- 
 ities of docility and obedience, and of ability 
 to endure the heat and miasmatic air of trop- 
 ical climates, and that he only can safely 
 labor in these most fi-uitful regions of the 
 earth — while his feel)!eness of mind and indo- 
 lence of body prevent his vuluntary and sus- 
 tained labor, even to preserve life — that the 
 white man can and does direct, control, and 
 compel the labors of the negro beneficially for 
 both, an ' best' for profitable ])roduction, for 
 civilization, and for the general well-being of 
 the world — 1 thence deduce the expediency 
 and propriety of not only maintaining, and 
 preserving inviolate, tlie existing condition of 
 African slavery, but of its being extended to 
 wherever the condition of the earth and its 
 inhabitants would be manifestly improved 
 thereby. Nearly all Spanish America has 
 been degraded, and is now sunk below the 
 hope for resuscitation, partly in consequence 
 of the previous general mixture of blood of 
 the inferior with tlie superior race — and still 
 more because of the subsequent extinction of 
 slavery, and the end of the former subordina- 
 tion of the African and native races to the 
 European. With the throwing off the o|)- 
 pressive Spanish j'oke, and declaring the 
 political independence of all these extensive 
 and fruitful colonies of Spain, it was univer- 
 sally expected that they would rajiidly im- 
 prove, and rise, in every attribute of worth 
 and greatnes-5. But ail these sanguine aiul 
 philanthropic hopes and expectations have 
 been mi-senibly and conqiletely disappointed. 
 By each of these revolutionary governments, 
 miscalled free and republican, negro slavery 
 was abolished by law, and equal political 
 rights decreed to all classes of tl»e popula- 
 tion. Tliu coiwequence was an immediate and 
 progressive decline of industry and produc- 
 tion; and now, afl*r forty years of political 
 independence, general security from foreign 
 invadci's, ami with the possession of (their so- 
 called) freedom and rcjiublican government, 
 each and all of these re|)ub]icri are but an- 
 archies, more di'graded and wretched in every 
 respect than when under the op[)ression and 
 
 tyranny of their former colonial government. 
 Of all tropical and South America, Brazil, 
 which escaped civil wur, and Cuba, which has 
 continued a Spanish province, only, have 
 retained the institution of African slavery. 
 .\nd these two eoualries ordy, and certainly 
 for that cause, have greatly extended and 
 exceeded their former production, notwith- 
 standing all the evils of bad govei-nment in 
 both these countries, and for Cuba, the most 
 horrible political oppression by the mother 
 country. From the mongrel races that oc- 
 cupy Mexico, Central America, the immense 
 basins of the Orinoco, the upper Amazon, and 
 the La Plata and its tributaries, and which 
 are everywhere spreading and maintaining 
 desolation over these fair and fertile regions of 
 the earth, theie is no hoj)e for improvement 
 under their present policy, and their miscalled 
 free institutions. If any or all of tlieso great 
 countries had been subdued, and occupied, and 
 governed by men of Anglo-Saxon race, and 
 for even the last forty years of their free exist- 
 ence had been tilled by negro slaves, there 
 would have been as much and as rapid im- 
 provement made in population, wealth, and 
 greatness, as there has been of actual decline 
 and degradation under the dift'erent existing 
 conditions. And these countries, and their 
 inhabitants, will still continue to decline, until . 
 the only present and sure remedy shall be in 
 operation. No tropical country, or people, in 
 any age, has ever greatly prospered, or been 
 raised to a high grade of industry, production, 
 refinement, and moral worth, except by the 
 aid, and general diffusion (>f domestic slavery. 
 And in modern times, the important and valu- 
 able products of sugar and cotton, have no- 
 where been great articles of exportation, 
 except when obtained from the labor of do- 
 mestic slaves. 
 
 CauHCS of the prosperity of the Northerii States 
 without the aid of slavery. 
 
 It may be objected to the claims here made 
 for the superior economy of sltu'e labor in new 
 countries,and wherever labor isscarce and dear, 
 that the Northern States of this Confederacy, 
 without slavcrj', have prospered as much and 
 (as most have said) much more than the slave- 
 holding States. There afe sutficient causes of 
 all ^hat is well founded in this claim of equal- 
 ity or superiority, and for the outward appear- 
 ance of much more than is true. • 
 
 The settlers of all the present United States 
 brought with them from Eui'o]ie habits of in- 
 dustry and artificial wants, which had been 
 l)roduced and cultivated in thi'ir ancestors by 
 their former, and then extinct, ohl system of 
 slavery. The first colonists of America, though 
 Settlers in a new country, were an old people, 
 with established habits of industry. A cold 
 and severe climate, and generally land but 
 moilerately productive, required and eom- 
 l)elled labor and frugality. To be indolent 
 and wasteful would bo e(nuvalent to starving 
 bef<n-e the end of the next winter of six months 
 duration. Further, the settlers of New Eng- 
 land were still ni«re inqielled to exertion by 
 their religious fanaticism, Avhich had first 
 
23 
 
 made them seek a new home on a barren soil, 
 and under a rigorous climate, and prepared 
 them to endure nny defj;ree of hdi'ir and pri- 
 vation. Not oidy tlic viitnes, but the follies 
 and the vices nourished by the religion and 
 theocratic government of this peculiar people, 
 served to stimulate effort and labor much 
 more than ordinary physical necessities and 
 inducements alone would have done. But, in 
 addition, the puritan New Englanders availed 
 themselves, as much as was serviceable to 
 them, not only of African slaves, but of their 
 Indian captives, whom thej' systematically re- 
 duced to domestic slavery. And they contin- 
 ued to hold their slaves until after the war of 
 the Revolution. But in so cohl a country, and 
 where the products of agricultural labor were 
 of so little amount, slave labor was of much 
 less value than in countries under opposite 
 conditions. As soon as there was even a mod- 
 erate supply of free labor, it became cheaper 
 to hire such, even at liigher rates, for the few 
 months only when it was available, than to 
 maintain a slave throughout the j'ear, and for 
 months together of winter, when no agricul- 
 tural work could be performed. Hence the 
 time for the natural and economical extinc- 
 tion of slavery in New England soon arrived. 
 And if the masters had not had (and used) 
 the resource of selling their slaves to the 
 South, they would have emancipated them, 
 not for any conscientious scruples, (which now 
 60 heavily oppress them in regard to Southern 
 slavery,) but for profit. The like reasons and 
 causes operated more slowly to extinguish do- 
 mestic slavery in the middle Atlantic States ; 
 and the growing anti-slavery docti'ines served 
 still more to forward and extend the removal 
 of slavery where it had existed, and to forbid 
 and prevent its being established in the new 
 Northwestern States. Tlie longer and more 
 rigorous winters there also prevented regular 
 or continuous agricultural labor, and would 
 have served to detract much from the profits 
 of negro slavery, if it had existed tliere. But 
 if both law and fanaticism had not forbidden, 
 ^ it would be both profitable and highly benefi- 
 cial to Tise negro slaves to a limited extent in 
 all the Northwestern States, and especiall}' for 
 house servants. And they would have been 
 indispensable, even for agricultural labors, de- 
 spite the disadvantages of climate, if a supply 
 for such service had but been continually fur- 
 nished in the hordes of destitute European 
 immigrants, who, of course, all go to these 
 States, or newer territories, where labor is 
 most in demand, and, therefore, is most highly 
 paid for. , 
 
 But there are other and stronger reasc^s for 
 the pros)>erity and success of the Northern 
 States. Even after negro slavery was re- 
 moved from them, its continued existence and 
 extension in the Southern States served to 
 foster and stiuiulate, and reward the industry 
 of the Northern Slates. Southern products, 
 
 ever since the existence of the Federal consti- 
 tution, have been made tributary to Northern 
 navigation, commerce, and manufactures — and 
 the tribute has been nuide more and more 
 oppressive to the South, and profitable to the 
 North, by means of federal legislation giving 
 bounties, direct or indirect, to Northern in- 
 dustry, wipital, and general interests. It will 
 never be Known by tlio South, nor appreciated 
 by the North, how much tribute has thus 
 been j>aid by Southern industry and capital, 
 (and all derived from the jiroducts of negro 
 slaver}',) to swell Northern profits and wealth, 
 until the existing union of the Northern and 
 Southern States shall be dissolved. Should 
 that, contingency occur, then, for the first time, 
 will the Northern States have to support 
 themselves from their own resources, and 
 without the great and unacknowledged aid to 
 their wealth derived fiom the slave labor and 
 the products of the South — and they will then 
 learn to know the value of all that they have 
 lost. 
 
 The intellect of the vorld conmu/ to the appro- 
 val and Hupport of 'ne<jro slaver i/. 
 
 The defenders and vindicators of negro 
 slavery would have nothing to fear for the 
 final and complete success of their cause, if 
 the question were to be decided bj' reason 
 and argument, founded upon facts and expe- 
 rience. But the case is very different. In 
 these United States, the rights and property of 
 slaveholders and of the slaveholding States, 
 are assailed in every pos>^ible manner by the 
 opinions and votes, and also the lawless action, 
 of the more numerous people of the Northern 
 States, directed by ambitious and unscrupulous 
 leaders, who excite and array ignorant fanat- 
 icism in the Northern States in opposition to 
 slavery in the South, merely to gain political 
 power and rank for themselves. Under this 
 great outside pressureM)f the now powerful 
 Northern States, aided by the fanatical or 
 pretended philanthropj- of England and 
 France, it may be, that blind fanaticism, stim- 
 ulating and directing illegal and incendiary 
 action, may be able to extinguish slavery, 
 (even though in a general extermination of 
 the black race in the States where slavery 
 now exists,) before good sense, truth, and 
 sound reasoning, all of which are now extend- 
 ing in influence, shall come to the rescue. 
 The existing contest between the defenders 
 and the assailants of negro slavery is one in 
 which intellect is, or is about to be, arrayed 
 on one side, and the brute force of ignorant 
 andJ'deluded numbers, on the other. The 
 result of the contest will be of vital impor- 
 tance to the Southern States, either for weal 
 or wo, and, in a very considerable measure, to 
 every class and condition of all America and 
 Europe, and to the future civilization and wel- 
 fare of the world. 
 
A. P F E N r) I X . 
 
 THE INFLUENCE OF SLAVERY, OR OF ITS ABSENCE, ON 
 MANNERS, MORALS, AND INTELLECT. 
 
 [Extract from an Address to the Virginia State Agricultural Society, read at the First 
 Annual Meeting, December 16, 1852, by Edmu.vd Rukkin, President; and then printed by 
 order of the Society.] 
 
 * * * * The subject upon which I pro- 
 pose now to offer my opinions and remarks, 
 though not strictly agi'icultural, is of the high- 
 est degree of interest and importance to the 
 whole agricultural community of this and the 
 other Southern States of the confederacy. 
 This is, the influence of the institution of do- 
 mestic or individual slavery on manners, intel- 
 lect, and moralu, and on the welfare of both 
 masters and slaves; and in these respects 
 compared to the influence of the slavery of 
 class to class, which, in one or other form, 
 either now prevails, or soon will occur, in 
 every civilized country where domestic slavery 
 is not found. 
 
 The institution of domestic slavery, its ef- 
 fects, influences and probable consequences, 
 constitute the great and all-absorbing subject 
 of discussion at the present time — of defensive 
 and too often apologetic argument in the South- 
 ern States, and of aggressive and flerce de- 
 Bunciation throughout tlie Northern States of 
 this confederacy. Thesubjeetis as broad and 
 varied as it is important. To be fully discus- 
 sed it would require consideration in sundry 
 aspects, but of which each one may be treated 
 separately and distinctly. The expediency 
 and rightfulness of slavery may be considered 
 either as a question of religion and morals — 
 of public policy and political influence — or of 
 domestic economy and influence upon private 
 interests and on the liabits and manners of so- 
 ciety. The former and chief branches of the 
 general question have been already discussed 
 by able writers, to whose arguments I could 
 add no light, even if this occasion permitted 
 80 wide a range of discussion. But the latter- 
 named branch has had less attention, or de- 
 fence, on our part ; and as its consideration is 
 intimately connected with agricultifre and ag- 
 ricultural interests, in this connection mainly, 
 and as suitable to this occasion, I will now 
 offer some rtmaks upon the influence of the 
 existing institution of African slavery, on the 
 •ocial qualities, manners, and welfare of the 
 agricxUtural class in tlieee Southero States. 
 
 This one and limited relation of slavery to 
 agricultural interests, requires a still further 
 division, into Ist: The question of the com- 
 parative pecuniary profit of slave labor, or of 
 its absence and it.-* substitutes; and 2d: The 
 question of social and moral advantages and 
 disadvantages. The first of these subdivis- 
 ions, important as it is to our interests, and 
 certain and easy as would be the demonstration 
 of the result, cannot be here discussed. The 
 superior pecuniary profit of slave-labor is a 
 subject of statistics, of calculation and detail, 
 which would be inadmissible at this time and 
 place. But it is not required to reach the 
 proof through such a course of argument. I 
 may assume as granted and unquestionable, 
 the fact almost universally admitted in the 
 Southern States, that slave-labor is in' our cir- 
 cumstances, more profitable to the employers, 
 and to agricultural interests, than could be 
 any possible substituted labor. Dismissing, 
 then, this important subdivision of this sub- 
 ject as settled, I will direct my observations 
 to private interests other than pecuniary, as 
 aff'ected by the influence of the institution of 
 slavery. 
 
 It has been a fertile subject of declamation 
 and denunciation among the opposers of 
 slavery, that the existence of domestic slavery 
 operated to corrupt manners and morals. 
 Every wide-spread and pervading institution, 
 however beneficial in general cff'ect, must also 
 have some adverse eff"ect or influence in minor 
 points, or exceptional cases. This is true in 
 regard to every great institution of public 
 economy, government, morals, or even reli- 
 gion. He is a poor reasoner who judges not 
 by general rules, but by the exceptions. And 
 that is the mode of argument generally adopt* 
 ed to oppose and denounce the institution of 
 slavery. The so-called facts or premises, if 
 not either entirely false and impossible, as is 
 generally the case, are but rare exceptions to 
 general rules. 
 
 The great economical objections to slave 
 labor are these : The compulsion of authority; 
 
26 
 
 and the foar of pimishment, to the slave, are 
 le3S potent than tlie pressure of want, and de- 
 sire of gain, stimulating free laborers, llenee 
 slaves labor less assiduously than necessitous 
 free laborers. Next^ with all this loss of etl'ort 
 still the labor of slaves is so profitable that 
 their owners are tempted by their prosperity 
 and the ease of obtaining a living, to be them- 
 selves indolent and wasti.ful. These are ef- 
 fects whieh every wliere follow siuiilar causes. 
 Their existence is certainly a great detraction 
 from what might otherwise be the profits of 
 Southern agricultural industry and capital. 
 But when tiiis detraction is urged (as i.s cpn- 
 tinually done) by the opposers of slavery to 
 
 Erove the evils of the syslcin, they are in fact 
 ut ijsserting the truths tliatthe labors of the 
 Southern slaves, in gcncrul, are lighter, and 
 yet the protits of their owners greater, than in 
 regard to the corresponding classes of laborers 
 »Bd capitalists in JCurope or the ^lorlhern 
 States. ISoitheru farmers who are now thriv- 
 ing by greater economy of labor and products, 
 would become bankrui)t if subjected to the 
 waste of both, which is general throughout 
 the Southern States. These^evils are the effects 
 certainly of slavery — but effects which are 
 the stj'ougest evidence of the greater benefits 
 of the system, and of the falsehood of the 
 charges against it, as a (Question of profit for 
 the pn)prieiors, or of oppression and sulfering 
 of the slaves. 
 
 Much is certainly wanting among the agri- 
 cultural class of the Southern States, in educa- 
 tion and menial culture; and great have been 
 and Btill remain the obstacles to the higher 
 attainment of these benefits. This also is one 
 of the attendant minor evils of the institution 
 of slaveiy, caused by the ueee.ssary dispersed 
 residences of the superior class of the popula- 
 tion. Still, iu no other class of cultivaLors of 
 the soil, whether in this young and great con- 
 fedeiuey, or in old Europe, can there be found, 
 ia proportion to numbers, so much of mental 
 improvement, enlargement of views, and gcne- 
 fal information, as in the Southern and slave- 
 holding States. In no other agricultural class, 
 throughout the world, are better nurtured, or 
 so weil preserved, the purity of all the domes 
 tic and fainilj' virtues of daughters, wives, and 
 mothers. To the most intelligent and fair- 
 judging of foreign travellers and visitors to 
 our Southern country, who have had opportu- 
 nities to observe domestic manners and coun- 
 try Society — whether such visitors were na- 
 tives of L^urope <u' of our Northern and slavery- 
 hating Slates, notliing has seemed more mark- 
 ed and peculiar than facts observed, which 
 were but iihistratioua of the pro|)ositioiis 1 
 have asserted, and necessary results of our 
 peculiar social po-<ilion. Yet it has not oc- 
 curred to these intelligeiitstrangcra, who have 
 admired and eulogised the domastic manners 
 and refinement ol the Southern country po])u- 
 lation, that the main cause, the essential 
 foundation of th« permanence of the peculiar 
 merits which they wituci^ed with surprise and 
 aduiiratioii, are due to the intititutiou of Afri- 
 can shiveiy. It is this iimlilulion, which, by 
 confining the drudgery and brutali;siug effects 
 
 of continued toil, or menial service, to the in- 
 ferior race, (and of whieh the subjection, not- 
 withstanding, has served greatly for its benefit 
 and improvement,) gives to the sujierior race 
 leisure and other means to improve mind, taste, 
 and manners. In countries where domestic 
 slavery does not exist, (or some equivalent 
 condition of societj', such as I will advert to,) 
 and where the owners of the soil and all mem- 
 bers of their families are necessarily laborers 
 in the lowe?t departments or most degrading 
 menial services, there may be much industry, 
 greater economy and frugality, and possibly, 
 (under the peculiar!}' favorable, though tran- 
 sient circumstances of a newly settled territo- 
 ly and eliea]) and fertile lands,) thei'e may be 
 even much general accumulation of profit and 
 of wealth. liut, nevertheless, such a popula- 
 tion, of necessity, must be, or in a few genera- 
 tions will become, rude in manners, and great- 
 ly deficient in refinement of feeling and culti- 
 vation of mental and social tjualities. No one 
 appreciates more highly than myself the ad- 
 vantages to a nation of producing and accumu- 
 lating wealth by the individual members of 
 the great community, and especially, as the 
 greatest public gain, the increase of agricultu- 
 ral production and riches. To advocate and 
 urge the forwarding of the latter results is the 
 especial object of my present service and em- 
 ployment, as it has been one of the most im- 
 portant objects of all my public efforts and 
 labors. Still, may God forbid that \Ve should 
 deem the accumulation of wealth — even if 
 from its most beneficial and best possible 
 source, the fertilization and culture of the 
 soil — as compensation for the loss or deteriora- 
 tion of the mental and moral qualities of 
 Southern men, and more especially of Somthern 
 women ! And if brought to the luu'd necessi- 
 ty of choosing between the two conditions, 
 with their opposite disadvantages, I would not 
 hesitate a moment to prefer the entire existing 
 social, domestic, and ii\dustrial conditions of 
 these slaveholdiiig States, with all the now 
 existing evils of indolence and waste, and 
 generally exhausting tillage and declining 
 fertility, to the entire conditions of any other 
 country on the face of the globe. Our coun- 
 try population would lose largely in grade by 
 exchanging conditions with the industrious, 
 econoruical, and thril'ty Flemish farmers — long 
 and deservedly celebrated for the excellence 
 of their agriculture, and who yet, beyond tha 
 routine oi their regular work, are almost as 
 uninformed as their most ignorant hired labo- 
 rers. Far worse would be a change to tha 
 condition of the propi'ietary class of France, 
 among whom land generally is so minutely 
 subdivided, that its possession is usually ao- 
 compained by all the toils and juivations of 
 day-laborers to the farmer and his family, aud 
 of course by the ignorance, coarseness of man- 
 ners, and moral degradation, which are the 
 necessary consciiucnces of such unceasing toil, 
 exposure, and privations. In Britain, it is 
 true, that with much of gro.ss ignorance and 
 rudeness of manners among the lower class of 
 farmers, and with all the agricultural laborers 
 thfrc are, Ju the higher classes, both of pro- 
 
27 
 
 prietors nnd tenants of lands, many persons of 
 nigh intellectual attainments. lint this ex- 
 ception to tlie general rule is owing to the 
 almost universal mode of tenure of the landed 
 property in that countrj-, and the usual sepa- 
 ration of its possession, as capital, by men of 
 ■wealth, and leisure, and tiie eondueting of the 
 cultivation by tenants vipon rent. Kven many 
 tonants are men of wealth, who iind it 
 more protitable, as tenants, to coi;duet very 
 large agricultural operations and capital, 
 than the being proprietors ol" small larms, 
 and upon a necessaril}' very limited scale 
 of operations. These causes are there fur- 
 ther aided in operation by the high price 
 of land, wiiich keeps it in tlie possession of 
 the wcaltliy and educated, and also tlie great 
 plenty and eheaptiess, and degradation, of 
 agricultural labor — nmch cheaper iu that 
 thickly pojmhited country than our slave la- 
 bor. Of tliese several conditions of British 
 .agriculture, serving to improve and refine the 
 higher rural or agricultural classes, and only 
 the higher classes, not one exists m this coun- 
 try, or possibly can occur for centuries to come. 
 
 In the JSorthern and Korthwestern iStates 
 of the confederac}", there are also to be found, 
 (as yet, though they must certainly and soon 
 disappear,) many proprietors and cuhivatoi's 
 of land who are meu of education and intelli- ! 
 gence, and whose wives and daughteis have a| 
 high degree of refinement of manners. ]3ut i 
 in nearl}' every such case, it will be found j 
 that this intelligence and refinement were de- ! 
 rived from some previous and difl'eient train- [ 
 ing and position; and that these qualities' 
 have been so far retained in agricultural life I 
 by the large agricultural profits and accumu-j 
 lations of wealth available iu a newly settled; 
 counti'3'. But even now, the general condition j 
 of the agricultural class in these non-slave-! 
 holding 8tates is much lowered, and tending} 
 to what must be hereafter a state of general j 
 and deep degradation, in intellectual and so- 1 
 cial qualities. And with them, the degrada- 
 tion will not stop when as low as that of the { 
 tenantry of England, or of the boors wlio reaj) ! 
 rich harvests from the fat soil of Belgium, i 
 The comparative poverty of soil in the older 
 Northei n IStates, and the general and repeated 
 divisions of property therein, by inheritance, 
 indicate a future condition of the proprietors 
 more like to tliat of the wretched and igno- 
 rant proprietary class of France. 
 
 Even now, it is comparatively a rare case 
 in the Korlhern States to tiud, what is so com- 
 mon in the Southern, a highly intelligent man, 
 with a well educated and refined faniil\', all 
 natives of and still residing in the country, 
 and belonging sti'ictly to theagrieulturai class. 
 Such persons have little inducement to remain 
 in (and still less to commence) country life 
 and agricultural employments in the JSorthern 
 States. And should any such, perchance, be 
 so situated, they must either abandon their 
 pursuits and their locality, or be content that 
 their children shall sink to the general level 
 of the surrounding residents, iu coarse man- 
 ners and uncultivated intellect. A sufficient 
 proof of the working of this law of circum- 
 
 stances is presented continually to the world 
 in the contrast of the repre^entation in Con- 
 gress from the rural districts of the Northern 
 and Southern States respectively. The moBt 
 distinguished men, and especially Btatesmen, 
 of the South, huve as often (at least) been na- 
 tives and continued residents of the country 
 as of towns — and in talent and in niimbers 
 they have fai' exceeded all from the North in 
 our public councils, in the Northern States 
 there are, indeed, man\ men of the liighest 
 •talents, education, and learning — and, it may 
 be, in the latter lespects exceeding any in the 
 South, because of tlie greater advantages of- 
 fered by great cities for litei-ary and .-cientific 
 pursuits. But tliese gi'cat or learned meu are 
 either produced in or gathered to the great 
 cities oidy. They are men who have acquired 
 their just renown either as lawyers, physicians, 
 divines, or professors in scieiitirtc and literary 
 institutiojis. All of great intellectual iiower 
 that now exists in the gieat States of Massa- 
 chusetts. New York, and I'eunaylvania, is to 
 be found in their po])uK)us cities ynl}- — and 
 almost exclusively in their respective great 
 capitals. Some tiuly great men may be (and 
 sometimes are) furni.-hed from these cities to 
 aid the public councils. But never does one 
 such come fi'om all the twenty-fold greater 
 counti'y and village constituencies — which 
 even when disposed thus to honoi- tlic liighest 
 talent; (which is not often the case, either in 
 town or country — North or South) — could not 
 possibly tiiid among themselves any high 
 talent to honor. The diil'erence between the 
 intellectual conditions of the Northern and 
 Southern agiiculrurai [lopulatioii, is the cause 
 of the usual long existing and well known 
 commanding inlluenee in the Eedcial Govern- 
 ment of the Southern States, through their 
 representatives, in whatever measures of na- 
 tional policy are directed by wisdom, or in- 
 tellect, or for the benefit of general interests. 
 But we are now much the weakest in votes; 
 and in whatever of public policy is connected 
 with sectional iniensts, or still baser private 
 self-interest, sujierior intellect has no influence, 
 and we are governed by the Iniite force and 
 cupidity of supeiior numbers. 
 
 The peculiar defects of Northern agricul- 
 tural laboi' in its influence on social and do- 
 mestic relations, do not (as yet) foibid great 
 pecuniary success in agricultiiial ]>ursiiits. In- 
 deed, when no farreaching inteihgtual power 
 is required to devise or direct a sy»ttm of cul- 
 ture or improvement, or while enough of such 
 direction, derived from former infiuei'ices, yet 
 remains in operation, the returns of agricul- 
 tui'al capital are even increased by the exist- 
 ing condition of things in the Nortiiern States, 
 
 A farmer or planter of the South, not rich, 
 but in inde[)endent and comfortable circum- 
 stances, gives a poition of his time to social 
 and mental occupation. rerha|>s his whole 
 object in seeking such relaxation is present eu- 
 jovment. But the final i-csult is not tlie lesa 
 improvement of mind ar.d inauners. His sons 
 and daughters grow up under these advan- 
 tages and influences of social communication. 
 And, if, iu the end, because of such iudul- 
 
28 
 
 genoe? of n fnniily, oven llioiigh moderately 
 and proiii-rlv enjoyud, there iimy be less money 
 accuinulatoiX there will he luqiiired other 
 values luiieh more than eompensntine; the dif- 
 fereiKe of peeiiiiinry ^airio. Klwood Fisher, (in 
 his exeellent lecture on "Tlie North unil tlie 
 Soiitii,'") has tihserved most truly tlint the or- j 
 dinary s.oeiiil intereourse of the jieople of the; 
 South Serves a<lmiraliU° as a sehool of instrue-l 
 lion. l^)u(itirij; liy memory only from this pro-] 
 found tliiiiker and able advocate of Southern | 
 institutions and rights, I am not e»ire whether! 
 I am indebted direelly to his expressitms, or^ 
 indirectly, (by deduction from them) for the' 
 opinion which will be here add<'d — that his: 
 social sehool, in its opi'ratinn for im]>rovinu } 
 n>a!inci-s and morals, for erdarging observatimi 
 and thought, and for alfordiiig general and \ 
 useful iiiformatitui is far better than tlie much | 
 lauded eonuiion school education of the New 
 Kngland Stales. Spelling, reailing, and com- 
 mon arithmetic are indeeil necessary and ex- 
 cellent lii.-t steps in tlie |iursuit of useful in- 
 struction and knowledge. But- he who g<ies 
 no farther in the pursuit, might as well have 
 not moved at all. 
 
 A farmer of New York or Pennsylvania, in 
 like moderate, but indej>endent circumstances 
 as to amount of propei'ty to those just sup 
 posed foi- the Soutlierner, would be coiniiellcil 
 to be one of iiis own continual laborers. . His 
 ■wife would be the most unceasing drudge on 
 the farm. His sons, and not less his datighters, 
 would be brought up to contmued labor in 
 the lowest and most repulsive emi)loyn)ents, 
 and without anv irnpioving social intercourse, 
 because iis cost enuld not be afforded. Under 
 such cii-cumstances, aided by the usual accom- 
 paniment-s of industry, frugality, and parsinm- 
 nious c-xpenditure, wealth may and probably 
 •will be increased. Hut f'e |)ossessors will 
 seek and find nearly all their objects and pleas- 
 ures in such accumulation, and they, or the 
 next geneiatioii, will descend as mnch in re- 
 finement and intelleet, as the stock of wealth 
 may be increased. Such a pr()|)rietor, in mere 
 money valuation, is just so much the richer 
 aa the value of the wages of himself, his wife, 
 and his children, as day-laborers on the farm, 
 or servants in the house. A life of continued, 
 moderate, and regidar labor, is not a life of 
 pain. Wiien encouraged by the pi-os)iect, and 
 rewarded by the fiuition of gain, it becomes 
 a life of pli-asui'c. Thus the aceum\ilation ol 
 ■wealtli, by un industrious Northern farmer, 
 does not usuhIIj' indui-e any intermission of his 
 oarly iabiu--', or i-hange the habits, labors, or 
 training of his ehihiri'h. When he may have 
 aequir-eil ik:;(i,{it)() worth of piopert\-, he con- 
 tinues to labor as steadily, and tu live nearly 
 aA rudely, as when under the pressure of his 
 early poverty. His son ^tjll drives hisfather'.- 
 vagon or l(is h>>gs to nuiiket — in no way dis- 
 tinguished iti apjiearance or habits from the^ 
 other hired lalior'T«. His wife is still the; 
 most labi-riiiUH domestic diiidge. His datigli-j 
 ters have no improving soeiel}, and their daily ' 
 and continuous eiiiplo\mentH are those of me- 
 nial Hcrvanls — whose services it would bo too! 
 costly to hir«. 
 
 This is the general condition to which agri- 
 cidtural society and manners must tend, are 
 tending, and have already reached to great 
 extent, in the older nonshiveliolding States. 
 This is the condition from which we are saved, 
 and innneasurably ex:iltcd, by the subjection 
 and slavery of an inferior race. The superior 
 race here is truly free. lu the so-oallcd free 
 countries, the far greater number of the supe- 
 rior race is, in effect, enslaved, and thereby 
 degraded to a condition suitable only for a 
 race made inferior by nature. There exists 
 slavery, or the subjection of man to man, in 
 every country under the sun, except, ])erliaps, 
 the most bai'barous and ignorant. In these 
 Southern States we have the slavery of indi- 
 vidual to individtial, and of a naturally infe- 
 rior to a naturally superior race; which, of 
 all, is the condition best for both masters and 
 slaves. In the so-called free countries, in ad- 
 dition to the sometimes most oppressive mle 
 of a despotic and grinding government — or it 
 may be uiHlerfrcecoiistitutioiial govcrnment^T- 
 there is the slavery of class to class — of the 
 starving laborers to the j)aying employers. 
 Hunger and cold are the most exacting of all 
 task-masters. The victims of hunger and cold 
 are always, and of necessity, ^slaves to their 
 wants, and through them, to those who only 
 can sup[)ly their wants. The great argument 
 urged by English and Northern advocates for 
 the abolil ion of our system of slavery, (while 
 totally regardlel^ of their own,) is that liired 
 labor is cliea|ier than slave labor. And this 
 i« unquestionably true, as to both Old Eng- 
 land and New Kngland, and all other coun- 
 tries where the tormerly existing domestic 
 slavery has been ab.olished, because (and only 
 because) it had ceased to be the most jirofita- 
 ble to the slaveholders. Whenever continued 
 severe suffeiing from hunger and cold, and 
 the ntimbcr of the sufferers, compel the desti- 
 tute class to com]>ete eagerly with each other 
 in lowering the wages of their labor to obtain 
 bread, then the payment for such labor of so- 
 called free men necessarily becomes cheaper 
 than would be the support of a domestic slave. 
 Of course, if domestic slavery then remained 
 in that country, the owners of slaves would 
 hasten to get rid of them, and to employ, in- 
 stead, the chea[ier laborers furni.shed and 
 tasked and diiven by huiigi'r and cold. Thus, 
 and for these reasons, acted our I'^nglish ances- 
 tors, when manumitting their white slaves. 
 Thus, and still better for their own interest, 
 did our Northern brethren. For when oon- 
 vinceil that domestic slavery was too costly 
 in their wintry region, the}' first sold their 
 negro slaves to the South, and while thereaf- 
 ter avoiding their costly use, they continued, 
 as long as perinitteil by law. to "steal" new 
 supplies from Africa to sell to the Southern 
 States. If the former Southern demand for 
 Africans still existed, and the African slave- 
 trade was open by law — or if it were safe and 
 profitable to violate the now prohibitory 
 law — enough of our Northern brellireii would 
 be now as reaily as ever to supjjly the demand'. 
 And if their access to the coast of Afi'ica was 
 prevented, they would bo as willing, (if safe 
 
29 
 
 and profitaMe,) to supply nil the South with 
 slaves, by ki(liinpj)iiii!; the Bubjects of their 
 now much desired iilly, the negro Emperor of 
 Hayti. 
 
 Near!}' all of the nuiiiy vessels whioh linve 
 been enijagcd in the African slave-trade, in 
 violation of the prohihitdry laws of the United 
 States, were fitted out fur tliat purpose from 
 Northern ports and by Northern capital, and 
 were manned by Nortliern crews. This trade, 
 since being prohibited and made pirac}' V)y 
 our la\vs, has been carried on to supply slaves 
 to Cu\)a and Brazil, with incomparably more 
 inhumanity and ci-uejty, than attended the 
 formerly legalized and i-egulated trattic. From 
 time to time we have seen announced the de- 
 tection of sundry vessels or persons engaged 
 in this now illegal and atrocious business of 
 torture and murder in the sea voyage; and 
 legal proceedings have often been couunenced 
 against the supposed offenders in the North- 
 ern cities to which they respectively belonged. 
 But in not one such case have 1 ever heard of 
 the conviction, followed by due punishment, 
 of any of these worst of criminals. And when 
 •uch detection of these acts of legal piracy 
 are announced in Northern newspapers, it is 
 usually done in as few words as would serve 
 for any other conmiereial occurrence of inno- 
 cent or legal character. Yet, besides the ille- 
 gality of the trade, anj' one such voyage, 
 made by the order and funds of merchants of 
 a Northern citj", would fui-nish more true facts 
 of suffering, crime, and horror, than could 
 possibl}' occur among all the slaves in the 
 Southern States in the same length of time. 
 No furious, popular, and philanthropic indig- 
 nation has Ijeen aroused against these detected 
 pirates; neither the crews and their ronmian- 
 ders, nor the rich capitalists, who were the 
 owners and real traders, torturers, and mur- 
 derers. The great gain of the trade seems to 
 serve as a veil and excuse for its deep iniquitj-. 
 D'Wolf, who was one of the great slave-trading 
 capitalists of Rhode Island, (while the trade 
 was yet legal,) was not, therefore, the le5s a 
 leading man of that State — as is evident from 
 his having been subsequently elected by its 
 Legislature to the Senate of the United States. 
 If any such African slave-trader had lived in 
 the Southern States, all his wealth would not 
 have lifted him to a respectable position ; and 
 he could not have obtained the lowest office, 
 from either people or Government, as readily 
 as did his compeer of Rhode Island attain the 
 highest official station, and, I suppose, the 
 highest estimation, in slavery-hating and pu- 
 ritanical New England. 
 
 There are still other kinds of slavery besides 
 those produced by force, and by want and 
 suffering. General ignorance leads to the 
 corruption of a people,, and of subjection of 
 mind to mind. And this kind of slavery, as 
 it is in effect, tending to the most awful polit- 
 ical and national evils, is already growing rap- 
 idly in the so-called free Northern States. It 
 is in their circumstances — of the land culti- 
 Tated and owned by an unenlightened and 
 still deteriorating rural population — of large 
 eities, in which, with a few men of highest 
 
 intellectual powers, or popular inlliience, 
 there is collected an enormou.sly jiredominn- 
 ting number of ignorant, needy, and unprin- 
 cipled men — when a very large proportion 
 of the pojiulation of these cities is com]>osed 
 of newly arrived foreigners, often vicious and 
 turbulent, and necessarily unaequainted with 
 the i)rinciple.'? of free government, and unused 
 to freedom in an}^ form — I say, it is certain, 
 in such circumstances as these, that the body 
 of the people will be directed, governed, and 
 in effect enslaved by a few njaster-ndnd.s — and 
 these miinls generally acting solely for the 
 pi'omotion of base self-interest and jter-onal 
 aggiandizement. No safe-guards in written 
 constitutions can preserve such a ])eople from 
 being made the tools and slaves of able politi- 
 cal knaves and unscrupulous demagogue?. 
 With such population of both towns and c<iui;- 
 try — with such influences at work, and their 
 j tendencies — Avith such unprincipled leaders 
 and managers, and such followei-s — in tlie 
 great State of New York, political libei'fy, in 
 effect, is already at an end; and individual 
 property, and even life, are unsafe. If the 
 doors of every dwelling-house in the Southern 
 country were left nightly without locks, or 
 bolts, and if everj- slave on each farm had 
 full command of deadly weapor.s, (and both 
 such circumstances, in effect, are real in innu- 
 merable and continuing cases,) our projierty 
 and our lives would be much safer from any 
 attempts thereon by our slave.s, than soon 
 will be the property' and lives of the rich 
 people of New York from their destitute fel- 
 low-citizens, notwithstaniling all the protec- 
 tion afforded by the constitution and laws of 
 their nominal free government. Indeed, the 
 beginning of this terrible consummation is 
 already clearly indicated in the successful pro- 
 gi'ess of the anti-rent-paying cwmbination and 
 movement of the State of New York. For 
 many years, numerous occupiers of rented 
 lands have openly and avowedly ]eague<l to 
 withhold the payment of the rents due to the 
 proprietors, and yet hold to the land. The 
 laws have been trampled upon by this feloni- 
 ous league, and the decrees of courts frus- 
 trated or silenced. The agents of the pro- 
 prietors and creditoi-s have been outrageously 
 nialti'eatcd, (as would have been the princi- 
 pals, had they dared to appear,) and the offi- 
 cers of justice, when attempting to enforce 
 legal processes, have been re.sisted by ar 'g, 
 and in some cases have been murdered by 
 these defiers of the laws. Growing more 
 powerful and bold with time and success, 
 these anti-renters have assumed a political 
 position and organization, and thus e.vercise 
 great influence in state elections. And as a 
 crowning act of triumph, they were enabled 
 to secure the election of a candidate for the 
 Chief Magistracy, upon the understood en- 
 gasrement of that candidate that he would 
 prostitute his pardoning power as governor, 
 to discharge from the State's prison some of 
 the most desperate felons of the anti-rent 
 pai'ty, who by rare chance had been convicted 
 and sentenced to punishment in that confine- 
 ment. Whether this corrupt and most vile 
 
30 
 
 pleJge had l>een expressly given or not, it . thetie Soutliern States, it ■will not only be the 
 wus charged as beiug uu«.ier*Vood, and was utter ruin of these States, but one of the 
 acted ujiou by the anti-ieuters — and was heaviest blows to the well-being of the world, 
 faithfully redeemed by the governor so | the most powerful obstacle to the settlement, 
 elected, by his speedy jiiUilou of the villain- Iculture, civilization, and ilighe^^t improvement 
 ous criiiilnuls, for whom liis aid iiad been thus : of all this western continent, and the exten- 
 sought to be purchased. j sion of free government and the true princi- 
 
 Faris it from my intention to stigmatize any | pics of fieedom among all the superior races 
 of our piii>uhition upon the ground of foii-ign icajiable of appreciating and preserving those 
 birtii. \\ e siiuuld value men for their known i bles^ing9. And even the Northern States, all 
 merits, and not for their places of nativity, of which are now desirous, if not striving for 
 "W'e ought to feel evcu the more indebted to a tiie abolition of slavery in the South, would 
 good eiti.'.en, or a public benefactor, if a for- | be, next to the Soulhern States, the greatest 
 eigner, who liad souglit our land and Govern- : los^ers by that result, botii ia their pecuniary 
 meilt iVoiii preference, than if the mere accident , interests and political safety. 
 of native birtli had jilaced him in ourcounti-^-. If there is any existing institution of divine 
 lleuee we are the more indebted for the ser- origin, and manifestl}- designed and used by 
 vices and talent and the patriotism of ilout- the all- wise and all-good Creator to forward 
 gomery, Charles Lee, Hamilton, Lafayette, j his benctieent purpose:^, slavery, and especially 
 Kosciutko, Pulaski, and Gallatin, as foreigners, I African domestic slavery, is such an institu- 
 than if they had been aniong us by birth, in- | tion. Personal slavery has existed from the 
 stead of by preference. To hundreds of thou- 1 earliest known existence of society. Slaves 
 sands of immigrants from Kiirope our country | were held by the niost virtuous and the most 
 lias been greatly indebted lor their useful pri- 1 favored of God's ancient worshipiters and ser- 
 vate or public lives. iJut 1 speak of classes, vants. Slavery has ever been the means, if it 
 and not of individuals — of the general rule, | is not the only possible means, of civilizing 
 and not of its exceptions. Taken altogether, [ barbarous tribes and regions, spreading the 
 the recent and present immigration from Eu- 1 culture of the earth, and instrucli-iig the most 
 rope is lower in intelligence than the lowest ignorant and degraded races of men. Still 
 
 class of native citizens, and immeasurably in 
 ferior ia knowledge and appreciation of the 
 principles of free government. An infusion of 
 BUch new population, amounting to a small 
 miiiorily only, could do no political harm. 
 But the danger of prosjiective evil iseiiormous, 
 when this new population can control entire 
 States; and, if not able to elect a President, 
 
 better and peculiar features belong to African 
 slavery, under civilized and white masters. 
 By this, a race made inferior b}' nature, and 
 alwaj's enslaved to barbarous and cruel mas- 
 ters, was raised greatly in the scale of comfort 
 and happiness, as well as of improvement. 
 Civilization and Christianity have thus been 
 communicated to millions, who otherwise 
 
 is so powerful as to be ottered biibes for that j would never have heard of either. By aid of 
 purpose by every ambitious and unprincipled negro slavery only, could these Southern 
 seeker of the office, who can so influence i States, and still more the tropical regions of 
 
 the legislation of the Congress of the United 
 States. 
 
 Tlie [pretended philanthropists of the North- 
 ern Slates are well aware of the effects which 
 the success of their eiforts lor the abolition of 
 Southern slavery would produce. The Wil- 
 berforces andClarksous and Beuezets of former 
 times doubtless were deceived, and believed 
 all they professed as to the expected beneticial 
 fesulld of negro emanci[ialiou. But since the 
 e.vperiuieiit uf llayti, now of more than sixty 
 yeaiV ^lauding, and of others of later date, m 
 tlie Brili.-h West Indies, and all the latter made 
 
 America, have been settled and cultivated by 
 the white race. All that has been done in the 
 South, and much of all done even in the 
 Northern States, for industrial and moral im- 
 l)rovement, refinement, and even religion, has 
 been more or less due to the existence of 
 African slavery. For even all the older North- 
 ern Stales had the benefit of this insti'.ution 
 at first, when it was most needed, and retained 
 it as long as it continued to be beneticial, and 
 until the now fast growing slavery to want 
 began to operate as a substitute. 
 
 It is true that ihe institution of slavery ia 
 
 •with the utmost core, and under the most attended by many and great particular evils, 
 favorable auspices, no abolitionists of good And where is the great social institution which 
 sense and information can believe in the bene- is not? Even in the blessed lelatitms of hus- 
 fits of emancipation even to the slaves them- band and wife, and of parent and child, there 
 Bilves, or in the litness of the negro race for are cases of great unhappiness and evil, and 
 freedom and self-government. The present | crime, growing out of these very relations. 
 leadero in this Northern warfare aguinst.South- 1 Vet, because there are husbands and wives, 
 •ru slavery are aetuateil much less b^- love for and parents and children, who are monsters 
 the slaves than by lialred for iheir masters. | in human shape, and who can avail themselves 
 Their lust for political power is u still stronger ; of these respeeli ve characters to perpetrate the 
 operating motive than either. They know j most horrible crimes, and inllict the direst 
 thul the complete fruition "f their inachina- 1 ealaniities on helpless and innocent sull'erers, 
 tions Would be to reduce .- ."southern .States! who Would, therelnre, condemn, and strive to 
 to the coinliliiJii of Jamaica, if not to the still i abolish, the institution of marriage, or the sub- 
 Worse htale of llayti. If ihej, or other as jeetioii of children to parent* f The legal in- 
 malignant and more powerful enemies, should siitution of apprenliee-hip, prevailing among 
 ever succeed in uboliehing this institution in [every civilized aud refined people, is precisely 
 
31 
 
 slavery, only limited in the time of duration. 
 In this generally beneficial relation of master 
 and apprentice — and not less among the North- 
 ern philanthropists than elsewhere — there oc- 
 cur numerous cases of great injustice and 
 cruelty, and of extreme and unmerited sufler- 
 ing. Yet, Avho, among these even sincere wor- 
 shippers of a sickly ])iiiianthropy, has proposed 
 as the proper safeguard against such particular 
 cases of oppression and crime, the abolition 
 of the entire system of apprentii'cship. 
 
 Judging from the early existence and con- 
 tinued duration of the institution of domestic 
 slavery — its almost universal extension — its 
 beneficial intluence in subduing barbaiism an<l 
 savage indolence and ignorance — in iiuhieing 
 the culture and improvement of the eartli, and 
 promotingtheindustry, civilization, refinement 
 and general well-being of mankind — it seems 
 to me an inevitable deduction, that the insti- 
 tution of slavery is as surely and manifestly 
 established by the wise and benevolent design 
 
 of God, as the institution of marriage and of 
 parelital rule — and it is next to these, and in- 
 ferior to these only, in producing iiti])ortant 
 benefits to mankind. To the direct aid of do- 
 mestic .slavery, every cultivated portion of the 
 earth, owes its first improvement, and every 
 civilized people their first emerging from bar- 
 barism. The only exceptions to the existence 
 (past or present) and operation of t]ii.s great 
 elemcnlof improvenioMt, are to be fo\uid among 
 the most rude anil ignorant of savage tribes, 
 such as the aboriginal inhabitants of North 
 America and Australia. And if it had ever 
 Vici'ii, since the creation of man, that all man- 
 kind had been sunk in that lowest depth of 
 barbarism, they would have so continud to 
 this<lay, if without the aid of the institution 
 of domestic slavery, for their improvement, or 
 otherwise, the still more direct exercise of the 
 miraculous, as well as benevolent power of 
 Almighty God. 
 
Q 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
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CoDMWirtioD Kesomcei 
 
LiBRftRY OF CONGRPc:c 
 
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