REMARKS ON THE SUBJECT OF THE OWNERSHIP OE SLAVES, DELIVERED BY 11. R. COLLIER OF PETERSBURG, IN THE SENATE OF VIRGINIA, OCTOBER 12, 1863. RICHMOND: PRINTED BY JAMES E. GOODE, 180 MAIN ST. 1863. • » Extract from Va. Senate Journal, October 3, 1863, pp. 90—91. * * Mr. Collier submitted the following preamble and joint resolution : The general assembly of Virginia doth hereby declare, that negroes in slavery in this state and in the whole south, (who are withal m a higher condition of civilization than any of their race has ever been elsewhere), having been a property in their masters for two hundred and forty years, by use and custom at first, and ever since by recognitions of the public law in various forms, ought not to be, and cannot justly be, interfered with in that relation of property by the state, neither by the people in convention assembled to alter an existing constitution or to form one for admission into the Confederacy, nor by the representatives of the people in the state or the confederate legislature, nor by any means or mode which the popular majority might adopt ; and that the state, whilst remaining republican in the structure of its government, can be lawfully got rid of that species of property, if ever, only by the free consent of the individual owners ; it being true as the general assembly doth further declare, that for the state, without the free con- sent of the owner, to deprive him of his identical property, by com- pelling him to accept a substituted value therefor, no matter how ascer- tained, or by the post nati policy, or in any other way, not tor the pub- lic use, but with a view to rid the state of such 'property already resi- dent therein, and so to destroy the right of property m the subject, or to constrain the owner to send his slaves out of the state, or else to ex- patriate himself and carry them with him, would contravene and frus- trate the indispensable principles of free government: and whereas these Confederate States, being now all slaveholdmg, may be disturbed by some act of the majority, in any one of them, in derogation of the rights of the minority, unless this doctrine above declared be interposed: therefore Resolved by the general assembly of Virginia, That the governor of Virginia be, and he is, hereby requested to communicate this proceeding to the several governors of the Confederate States, and to request them to lay the same before their respective legislatures, and to request then- concurrence therein in such way as they may severally deem best calcu- lated to secure stability to the fundamental doctrine of southern civiliza- tion which is hereby declared and proposed to be advanced. m REMARKS BY R. R. COLLIER OF PETERSBURG, DELIVERED IN SUPPORT OF THE PREFIXED PREAMBLE AND RESOLUTION. Mr. Collier Baid the senate could not fail to see and know that the recognition of our independence by foreign countries, is made to turn on a question of the continued existence of negro slavery in these states. He judged it to be both just to other nations, and prudent on our own part, to declare unequivocally, if such is indeed our purpose, that these BtaJtes do not intend to let the condition of the black man amongst us be changed. He would have the emperor of the French and all other crowned heads know that these Confederate States will not ac- cept, much le-s seek, recognition of their independence on the basis of any manner of compromise, to any extent, on this subject. He would Bay to one and all, in this great interest, we do and will insist strenuously on being let alone to manage it in our own way. Mr. Collier Baid he* would anticipate the discussion he intended, by inviting attention at once to one point involved. The chief object of the declaration of principles and policies which he proposed, was to dis- avow and oppose the signal fallacy which has prevailed, that the people •of a republican state can, without violating the republican creed, either destroy any existing property or fail to protect it to its owners. In the politics of the country, for ten years, at least, prior to the dismember- ment of the federal Union, the fallacy was sedulously inculcated, by all parties, that a people intending to establish B republican state, might, in first forming or in afterwards altering their constitution, determine by constitutional provision or authorized legislation, whether slavery should tontinu to exist within the limits of the state. That doctrine is not onlv unsound, but it is an imitation to all mankind to enter the field of competition for free to the exclusion of slave labor. To get rid of that heresy is the prime object of the proposed proceeding. With that much, only, premised. I will proceed. .Mr. President and scna- t »rg, at this time, to submit for your consideration, a succinct exposition of trie grounds on which the main doctrine designed by tne preamble to be advanced in its power on the public mind — on the moral sentiment,. no less than on the intellectual judgment, of the people of these slave- holding states — should find its sure support, and quietly repose. It shall b ■ as succinet as the amplitude of the subject will allow. That main doctrine is that negro slaves are property, and as such, just as much as any other property, is shut up and shielded to the owners of them, so that the enjoyment of this identical property cannot be dis- turbed, except in the way and for the purposes ascertained by and de- fined in the provisions of our written constitutions ; and that those con- stitutional provisions have their source and their shield in the republican creed which is no less the best supply of durable prosperity, than of public freedom. To dispense with or to repudiate those provisions which are limitations for the security of protection to minorities, alike and no less by constraint of principles on the majority in making constitutions, than on the governmental authorities in administering them, would be to convert a free system into some other not free, but arbitrary. I shall deem it unnecessary to cite the adjudications of the federal or state courts to show that negroes in bondage are a property to their owners : that was sufficiently and Well done by Hon. W. N. H. Smith of North Carolina, in the federal house of representatives, and who is now a member of the confederate house. As indicating with sufficient dis- tinctness what kind of property in slaves it is I assert, this question will suffice — Has not the master a property in his apprentice ? The chief difference is that it is for a limited time in one, but for life in the other. I shall deem it unnecessary to take a retrospect of negro slavery, or to survey its favored condition, in this country, as contrasted with others, but a little beyond the allusions in the preamble. The purpose of the proposed proceeding, is not to impress such facts, well known to us, any more unerrably and ineradicably than they are on us and by us already jmpressed to be appreciated. Nor is it the purpose to attempt to reach the outside world. To them I would only say that with us the black slave is subjected to very little of the severity, and enjoys all the ad- vantages, of servitude. I would have them know that ours is the severe design of Napoleon, when in 1802 he said, " Had any of your philan- thropic liberals come out to Egypt to proclaim liberty to the blacks, I would have hung him from the masthead." I would invite them to search the history of the black race. I would have them consider how, for six thousand years, that race has failei to erect a single fabric of civilized freedom, though Central Africa was- in the national neighborhood of Egyptian and Carthaginian greatness. All the aids of the white man have failed to enable the blacks to produce or preserve civilization. No respectable state has risen in that fruitful region on the banks of the Niger or the Congo. Survey the contrast on the Euphrates and the Nile. Remember how, in half a century, the flourishing aspect and agricultural opulence of St. Domingo disappeared and left not a vestige of enterprize or industry. Behold the present condition of the Haytien republic, relapsed into the indolence and gloom of savage life. With that much to all outsiders, and having no other design with them, the purpose of the proceeding I am urging on the adoption of our whole country, is to shove off and to shut out domestic interference, so that the principle of property in respect to our slaves, shall have full practical effect and fruition. There are in the matters closely grouped in the preamble, a few salient angles where I wish to plant a palisade, before I proceed with the more general inspection and fortification. It is not within the range of my intended view, to revive a discussion of "the territorial question," which was as changeful as the moon, and had many moonstruck worshippers. There is, however, one remark looking in that direction, which I think will he by others thought to be not altogether inappropriate. I consider it very pertinent to our present situation. It was conceded by the South, in that discussion, that when a territorial people came to form a state constitution for admission into the federal Union, they might have provided for the expulsion of the negro slavery then and there existing. Such was the concession by Governor Wise in his celebrated Samford letter. He defended with masterly ability our right of property in our slaves, and he fortified that defence both by constitutional analysis and historical research blended in powerful array. He gave, however, unjustified scope to the consti- tutional clause respecting " the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several states," which by fair interpretation, in the light of its his- tory, applies only to the right of the individual's citizenship in the states. Yet he did make that concession, and it was fatal to his argument, and made it worth but little to the Smth. The same concession was insisted on in the memorable debate on the Beven resolutions of Senator (now president) Davis, just before he retired from the United States senate. He gave up the principle of property in our- slaves, at the point of its greatest danger. He left it exposed- to the fury of the dominant ma- jority, when the people are first forming or afterwards altering their constitution. lie surrendered 1 1 1 i - stronghold of republican government in the Oth of that series of resolutions. It was adopted by a vote of 33 to 12; most of the northern senators voting for it, as all of them might. It was in these words : "6th Resolved, That the inhabitants of a territory of the United States, when thev rightfully form a constitution to be admitted as a stat.- into ih- Union, may then, for the first time, like the people of a state when forming a new constitution, decide for themselves, whether slavery, afl a domestic institution, shall he maintained or prohibited within their jurisdiction," &o The surrender involved, which now concerns us as ^laveholding states, is the conces.-imi that •■ the people of a state when forming a new con- stitution." may ex., el Blavery. That doctrine should be killed and buried out of sight. It is a -tench in the nostrils of slaveholders, f deny, but will only remark to defend the denial, that slavery is not an institu- tion ; it is the ownership of the individual citizens. ' If it were an in- stitute of government, then the government might rightfully in point of mere power, either alter or abolish it at pleasure. Such 'is the clear consequence from the concession that the ownership is an institution: and st ill, as soon as yankee cunning suggested that the ownership was an "institution," the southern mind accepted the nomenclature as cor- rect, and at once became burthened with the logical sequence of a power in the government to control it to the extent of removing it. Ever since the concession was made forty years ago, the South has had to combat the consequence, whilst all 'the weary time, she h.s been sus- taining the cause, and as it were begging the question. ..Let us ignore the concession which is the cause, and the consequence w jvj cease to r g8* M 1 result. Let us henceforth cease to concede that it is an institution, as it is not. That ownership existed before the state was formed, and the people of the state in first making or afterwards in altering their organic law, owe it that protection to which they are incontestably constrained by the principles of free government, which chiefly consist in the pro- tection of property to its owners — all their property, except enough for the general charge and expenditure and for the public use. That much only can be taken away by the powers of taxation and impressment, and only to the exact 'extent the inevitable necessities of the government may demand. ' The sound opinion — the logical conclusion — the view of the subject which I had been urging for five years prior to the debate in the senate on the resolutions of the senator from Mississippi, in May 1860, was in that debate expressed by Senator (not then traitor) Crittenden, as fol- lows : "To assert my right," said Mr. C, " to go there" — anywhere in this republican country — " to carry my property there, and to enjoy that property, and then to say there is any body stronger or mightier or more sovereign than the constitution" — and I say than the principle of property — " that can take from me that which the constitution" — and I say its indispensable principle — " says I may have and enjoy, or can expel me from the place where the constitution allows me to go, is ex- ceedingly inconsistent and contradictory." So said Senator Crittenden, when he was a true man. So much, Mr. President, I have thought it proper to present on this topic. I forbear just now to say any more in the support of my view of it, except only the historical allusion in the remark that the concession so made by the South and sanctioned by her foremost defenders, was not less prejudicial and detrimental to the extension of slavery and the en- largement of " the slave power" of the South in the federal Union, than to the existence and security of slavery in the states, was the denial in that congress that negroes were property — a denial in which they, of course, became more eager, when they found we did not resist it as men in earnest to maintain their rights should have resisted it — a denial there first made in 1817, and once or twice thereafter repeated, on the occa- sion of slave-owners seeking by memorials to be paid for their slaves which were injured or lost to them, in Louisiana, in the war of 1812—15, when their slaves were impressed by the authority of the general gov- ernment, chiefly to supply labor in the erection of fortifications at New Orleans. That was the only instance, until the war we are in now, in which that government ever repudiated tfye principle of property in negro slaves, (although some of the co-states did,) and then the South ought to have insisted on reparation and redress, or a dismemberment of that Union. At this other point I wish to put up a defensive fortification. It is this, that the proposed proceeding neither in terms nor by intention trenches on the -rightful powers of all governments to impress private property for "the public use." I particularly invite the attention of the senate, (and of the country, in case the general assembly shall send out the proceeding to this and the other states,) to- that part of the pre- amble in which various plans of emancipation or riddance, and the only 8 ones ihat have ever been proposed as peaceful resorts, are reprobated. The almost unanimous expression of the -world's condemnation, and our undivided detestation, of Lincoln's plan, is enough to repel that impetu- ous and impudent plan for accomplishing the object by military conquest. History has no blacker deed to commemorate. I thus direct attention to the end it may be seen and considered that the plans denounced are such as are not for "the public use" in their ex-appropriation of private property. This proceeding intends in the expression, and craves in the discussion, to avoid and escape the vortex of the vexed questions in- volved in the power of impressment of private property "for public use," and in the modes of the exercise of that power. It desires, as its terms expressly intend, to avoid that gulf-stream in the confluence of politics and legislation. The other angle at which some special defence may, I apprehend, be properly made, is about the post nati policy. It is a legal maxim that the owner of any female animal is entitled to her increase, et alios qui nas- ■■' liter ab illis. Neither authority needs be quoted nor argument urged on this head. It is referred to for the purpose of making another kind of defence — a counterguard. [t is known to the senate that it has been alleged elsewhere, audit may 1. • BupposeVl by some here, that Mr. Jefferson urged the execution of that policy, it is admitted by me that he was "a philanthropic lib- eral" in his philosophic meditations on this Bubject : but 1 am yet to find that he advocated the execution of this policy, under our written con- stitutions, as they then were and now arc and as I think they must ever be, whilst we are a free people, enjoying the republican creed. In his celebrated letter to Jared Sparks, in 18z4, (Jefferson's works, vol. 4th, pa L r >' 388,) Mr. J. says, in parenthesis, "actual property has been law- fully vested in that form, ami who can lawfully take it from the posses- sors?" Iii the same letter, suggesting what he could in support of this policy, lie says: "I am aware that this subject involves some constitu- tional scruples. But a liberal construction, justified by the object, may go far, ami an amendment of tie- constitution, the whole length neces- sary." Thus, whilst he advocated the abstract policy, he conceded it could not be executed under the constitution as it then was. The pro- posed proceeding denies that the policy can be executed under the con- stitution as-it still is; and it as-erts in the spirit of Mr. Jefferson's ques- tion, that the increase of the female slaves are a vested property of which no earthly power can rightfully divest the lawful possessors. I admit he had a de-ire at heart to have the policy executed,' if it could have been done consistently with the constitution, or if the constitution could have been made to compass the object consistently with republican- ism. He did not tell us how (because he did not see) it could be done without subverting the principle of property and undermining our free system.. I dissent from his heart's desire, and so do these slavcholding states solemnly protest, unless they are justly chargeable with hypocrisy. These states do adhere, and I do not doubt they will express their devotion, to the sounder philanthrophy and clearer wisdom of Napoleon, as ut- tered in 1802, when he said: "In the West Indies, enthusiasts have de- livered over the whites to the ferocity of the blacks, and yet they com- 9 plain of the victims of such madness, that they are discontented. How give liberty to the Africans, when they are destitute of any species of civilization. * * * The feelings of humanity are ever powerful with excited imaginations. But now after the experience. we have had, to maintain the same policy can be the result only of overweening. self- confidence or hypocrisy." And I am justified in appealing to the wis- dom of that great man, because in his civil code he showed himself to be a Solon legislating for a distracted people, and a Justinian codifying the treasures, of all existing and foregone jurisprudence. I will only add on this head, that though negroes with us are in a higher state of civilization, they are still unfit for self-government, if indeed by any culture they are capable of being made fit for it ; that by color they are unfit to mingle with the whites as equals ; that Providence has not opened the way for their deportation, and if He had, this war has very largely reduced, our means to accomplish it for a century to come. To set them free and not send them away, would be grosser error than it would have been in the Carthaginians to have suffered the Romans to fortify on their shore, or in the English to have allowed the French to entrench on the coast of Kent. Though the negroes would not be as formidable warriors, they would be, perhaps, as thievish as the outlandish soldiers of the yankee armies in this war. Mr. President, with that limited defence of those points on which it occurred to me attacks might be made from misapprehension, I come now to explain, fortify and defend, if I may be fortunate to do so, the more general ground plot of the proposed proceeding. There can cer- tainly be no doubt that it is appropriate, if the preamble shall be adopted by this general assembly, that we shall invite the concurrence of the other states. The manner in which they may elect to concur, is purposely left unadvised and unsuggested. Whilst it is not proposed or left to be fairly implied, that no state shall be admitted into the Con- federacy that is not slaveholding, the notion is positively excluded that any one of the states now T in the Confederacy, or that any one being slaveholding that may hereafter be admitted, shall ever be made non- slaveholding by any means other than by the " free consent of the indi- vidual owners." That is not a declaration that a state non-slaveholding may not of right prohibit the introduction of slaves, nor is it a denial that a slaveholding state may prohibit the introduction of any more slaves than are already owned in it. It is conceded that it was not the duty of the late federal Union to deny admission of a state from the territorial condition, because the constitution under which they applied for admission, inhibited the migration or importation of more* persons of color, the same with those who were 'there, to become, or continue to be, slaves of African nativity or descent. That is a rightful power, sponta- neous and inherent, in every independent state or people on earth, if it be' not abnegated" by the organism of the state, or by treaty stipula- tion ; and the one would be unwise, the other humiliating. It is a. power which the people of the states by severally ratifying the federal constitution and so forming the late federal Union, did not relinquish. If they did, by what clause was it done ? • It is a right that was reser- ved to each state, I apprehend, unimpaired by any clause in that con- 2 10 stitution, except by that one which reduced the powor of the general government to execute or iuitiate such a prohibition, prior to 1808, in the states then in the Union, or to come in before that period. Whether the foreign slave trade was prohibited by the clause to regulate com- merce with foreign nations, or by that to define offences against the law of nations, or by any other, or was not prohibited at all by express grant or by necessary implication in any grant, it was never material to determine or to consider. If the power was- not so granted, it never- theless existed in the federal Union after it was formed, in virtue of the international principle that each nation has the right to regulate its for- eign policy, whilst unrestricted by treaty or oy self-imposed stipulations. If it was granted, the grant was cumulative only, for it would have existed as an element of an independent nation, without the grant. If it was not granted and did not exist inherently in nationality, then the framers of that constitution are exhibited in the ridiculous aspect of having re- stricted for a time, up to 1808, the exercise of the power to prohibit, when they did not possess the power. It has always seemed tome to be most respectful to the framers of that constitution, and only just to all the parties to it, to suppose, and so to interpret it, that in the contem- plation of the framers of it, as it did not clearly contain a grant of power to prohibit the slave trade, the power existed without the grant. In this sovereign power, inherent in and accorded to every independent nation, did reside unquestionably, I apprehend, the right of the old Union to prohibit the foreign slave trade. It was precisely the same power, as it was not prohibited to the states by the federal constitution, which each state nad, to keep out of its limits such persons as a prop- erty, as well as it might have kept out every other kind of property which its citizens did not already possess there as a property entitled to the protection of law. In the .-mllicicncy of the strength of that na- tional power and international right of the federal government, irre- spectively of any express or implied constitutional authority, together with the reserved right of each state to prohibit the introduction of any slaves or a larger number, the "free" States need not have had, as some of their politicians professed to have, a fear that if they tolerated slavery in the incoming state-, it might be introduced into the "free" states. In the strength of the same principle of property and of that forbearing policy of the nations, the slaveholding states in the federal Union, were frep from any rightful interference by that government with the inter-states slave trade. The point thus explained is that the doc- trine inculcated by the proposed proceeding, and which point as a po- litical tenet, denies the power to the people of the state — any of the slaveholding states, by any legislation, conventional in forming the organ- ic law, or by the ordinary legislature in giving practical effect to the organic law, to expel pre-existing slave property, or to compel its own- ers to retire with it beyond the limits of the state, has not the^emerity or novelty of coming in conflict with that sublime policy of the civilized nations that each for itself, none for another, shall regulate its foreign relations involving its internal policy, unhindered by any other or by all others combined. I have always thought that such was the reserved right of each of the late United States, and certainly it is so in these Confederate States. 11 But, Mr. President, that is the right of an independent isolated state — that is, a state untrammeled by any compact or treaty with any other. It is not the right of a state in the act of being formed out of terri- tory belonging in common to states already in a federal Union, under a compact ratified by them. The federal compact was supreme over the settlers of such territory, and in our system it was obligatory upon them, to the extent and intendment that they who inhabited the terri- tory should establish the republican system. That was the federal guar- antee to the territorial people. That was the idea, and not that the con- stitution of the federal Union carried slavery into the territories, be- yond the power of the people to control it, as they might control other property. The owners of the slaves, having equal privileges of citizen- ship with the owners of other proper-ty from any other states, carried them there, and the republican principle protected the ownership of that property, equally with that of any other property — no more or less ; and the inference of Mr. Lincoln, in the discussion with Mr. Douglas, that if the constitution carried slavery into the territories, it also might carry it into the free states, was an absurdity, though it was so put, and not exposed, as to deceive thousands. It is further claimed, Mr., president, and I ask the senate to consider it so, that the individual citizens of every state, who are slaveholders within its borders lawfully, are protected by the same principles against all the governments, foreign, federal, confederate and state, so as that their property shall not be interfered with, beyond constitutional exer- cises of the power of taxation, for the defined purposes, and of that other still more delicate power of impressment, regulated by law, "for the public use." This tenet, reposes in the negative of the proposition that the people have surrendered to their state -government the original right of property which was in the individual owners before they became an organized state. It exfects, by its philosophy and its logic, that a state in remodeling its constitution on the republican standard, has no more power to expel any species of property, than the people had to do that odious act when they first formed the republican state. It holds that such right is not given up, and cannot consistently with principle be parted with, so that the individual citizens can be molested by con- fiscation, or by that other tyranny next of kin to it, 'and which is called a substitution of value in lieu of the identical property. There is in the veritable thing itself which one owns, no matter what it is, a pro- perty — a mystic charm — which no other thing, though of greater value, does or can wear under constraint to accept it instead. I am well aware that confiscatian strictly applies to the ex-appropriation of the estate of a public enemy; and that when the property of a subject or citizen is taken from him by his government, for the benefit of the public treasury, it is properly called a forfeiture : and I instance confiscation as one of the ways in which title to property may be divested, because I hold that it is founded in the same policy of violence in which a substitution of value' is founded! The one is intended to weaken the belligerent power of the public enemy, the estate of whose citizens is confiscated, while the other weakens the power of the citizens, humbles them, as against their own government which is a belligerent power over them, in 12 the sense that government, though necessary, is an evil. It seems to me that every principle of free government, that -can be ap- pealed to and calmly consulted, will respond that it is incom- patible with it; that the collective power of the community to re- sist the encroachments of their government, shall in detail and by parts, be crippled by a substitution of value for their identical property, by their own government. A citizen so coerced, is humbled. All that is the more manifest when it is taken into the account that the substitu- tion cannot be effected without paying the individuals for their property, out of the public fund which, by them equally with others, has been contributed to be used in the general charge and expenditure. I am aware it is supposed by some intelligent men, who have not thoroughly investigated the subject with a view to act on it, that a negation of the right of substitution in the relation 1 am proposing it, is a novelty. But the mistake is theirs and not mine, even if it were a mistake to urge a novelty. Any thing that is novel, is not apt to be embraced at once ; but wisdom will not refuse t<» investigate a proposal because it is some- thing novel, ilow but "by novelties has one age improved on another? The right of government, and it matters not in the principle, whether it js the citizen's own government or another with which his is negotia- ting — the right of govemnu 'it. i say. to put oft* the owner who is de- prived of his Blave proverty, with a restitution in the form of a price in money paid for it as an equivalent, came up to be considered in Jay's treaty. The controversy arose on the clause relating to captured negro slaves, in the seventh article of that treaty with Great Britain. In the United Stat.- it wa I to mean that the slaves in kind ought to be restored : whilst in the Oth Br country it was contended that such con- struction could not be ai'ow, d. because it would throw back into servi- tude men once made free. There was another hitch, that the'/ had not been rightfully made free. It was maintained by Alexander Hamilton that " it does not remove the difficulty to say that compensation for the negroes might have been a sufficient substitute for them. When one party promises a specific thing to another, nothing but the thing itself will satisfy the promise. The party to whom 'it is made cannot be re- quired to accept in lieu of it an equivalent," even where it is, as to the price paid, a fair equivalent. It is the identical property in slaves which our constitutions promise to.protect. I hold that the transaction of a substitution without the owner's consent, is not relieved of the injustice ami odium attaching to it, when it is hi; own and not another govern- ment that subjects him to it. Indeed, it is but the more odious for his own government to do it. In the other ease, he will not have contrib- uted to the fund out of which he is paid ; and in this case, he is not only paid out of his own public treasury, but it is further the more odi- ous because he is deprived by the government which is promising him security of life, liberty and property — not one species and not another, nor one species in place of another — but his property, and that equally with his life and liberty. "Life, liberty and property" are nestled in the same sentence iii the constitution — it cherishes them alike, as the old bird her young one-. Let it be observed thai n is in subjection to that constitution, which 13 promises security of property to the owner, that a state in our system act.s, when she is altering her constitution, and it cannot fail to be seen and felt that this proceeding, which I ask to be adopted, is no attack on state rights. No surrender of power to the confederate government, is invited from the .state. No larger surrender than the states made in coming under that government. The invocation is that the state shall abide by the principle which itself has ratified in joining the confede- racy. The invocation is in behalf of the rights of the individual citi- zens, as "against the power of the state. That's all. No question of state sights, in confederate relations, arises on the doctrine. It touches only and proposes to protect vested rights of private property, which it contends are reserved against all our governments, and mus-t be, else our system will cease to be republican. I desire to add a few words to 'exclude a possible misconception. It may probably be supposed by some that the doctrine inculcated would in its practical results perpetuate slavery. Such, I think, is not the tendency of the doctrine, nor lik^rj to be its result ; and I know that such is not its design. Its effect would be simply to stop all govern- mental interference with' the existence of negro slavery. It would com- mit the whole subject to the peaceful influences of correct social prin- ciples. The myriad appliances that aggregate individual views and con- stitute the intertexture of public opinion, would work out the result de- sired by society. Under the prevalence of the doctrine, the obstinacy of a few men could not long stand out against the will and desire of all others. A real cause, taking stronger hold than mere sickly sentiment, and adequate to induce one owner to emancipate his slaves, would not fail to control others ; nor under its prevalence could the tyranny of a majority deprive the minority of their property in making new consti- tutions ; nor in administering them, do the same acts of tyranny in that other form of substituting a compulsory and unsatisfactory equivalent in price. Mr. President, if error unperceived by me has crept into the argu- ment, I desire it shall be freely pointed out plainly. I invite searching but candid consideration. I believe that unless the doctrine proposed for adoption shall prevail, it will not be twenty years before this Con- federacy will fail in the agitations of the same subject in which the fede- ral Union found the rock on which it split. This Confederacy is kept together on this subject by no stronger cement than that was bound to- gether by, originally. The principles on which it is founded, must be respected and complied with, or it will encounter ere long the same dis- aster — not peaceable secession, but terrible Avar. To secure observance of these principles, the doctrine inculcated by the proposed proceeding must be impressed on the popular judgment and heart. I would gladly espouse any better mode of making that impression, if any better than the one proposed, can be produced. Surely I need not detain the senate to enlarge on the importance of the permanency of this Confederacy. I will only say that it seems to me, for reasons which I will point to in a few words, that it is pre-emi- nently important that it shall stand unconquered by force, undiscour- aged by privations, undivided by treason, unchanged in the principles of 14 its constitution, unsullied in honor — the citadel of law and order, the fortress of freedom, the sanctuary of po/e and undefiled religion. Such it is now, proudly self-pleasing and defiantly conciliating the world. It i- the only ark, freighted with the rich. fortunes of human freedom, that is afloat on the deluge of man's mad ambition. Its framing timbers — its principles — if observed and preserved, are strong enough to buffet the raging billows of that deluge, when its fury is the wildest. It is the only polar star to which the eye of humanity in hope is turned from the oppressed nationalities, now that the federal Union has, failed, and all that is left of ir has fallen into a military despotism — a military des- potism that is wielding the vagabonds of the population it rules, and the expatriated vagrants of other countries, who come to find in these states opportunities of plunder and murder ; and as they look ahead, all is beau- tiful and cheering to behold, and as they look back, they see a track of desolation at which a devil would shudder. It is because we have the ark of freedom, the 'monarchies of the old world have not interposed to arrest the atrocities of this savage wir. It is now with all the crowned he ids as ir was in the end of the last century, when the enmity of old England was energized by Pitt, not against Prance, but against repub- lican France. Even under the strong stimulus to supply her looms with cotton — not so strung as her desire to see democratic government de- stroyed — old England fails to he influenced by the nobie sentiments con- tained in the energetic note, under date of October 10th, 1M52, of her minister to tin- French government. This was her' language then: 4b Ris Magesty most Bincerely laments. the convulsions to which the Swiss can- tons have for some time been exposed ; but he can consider their late ex- ertions in no other light than as the lawful effort of a brave and gener- ous people to recover their ancient law. and government, and to procure the re-eBtabli8hment of a system, which experience has demonstrated, not only to be favorable to their domestic happiness, but perfectly con- s is ten I with tin- tranquility and security of other powers. "The cantons of Switzerland unquestionably possess.in the same de- gree a- any other powers, the right of regulating their own internal com- in-; :md t!r- right has, in the present instance, been expressly guarantied f>> the Swiss nation by the treaty of Luneville, by the French government, conjointly with the other powers who were parties to that en- gagement. His majesty has no other desire than that the people of Switz- erhnd. who now appear to be so generally united, should be left at lib- erty to Bettle their own internal government, without the interposition of any foreign powers." And his majesty expressly deprecated French interference " with their undoubted rights."' That right was no less clearly and incontrovertibly guarantied to these now Confede : ktes, by the federal constitution, than it was to Switz- erland by the treaty # of Luneville. Bui England sees a, difference of value to royalty. The influence of Switzerland, against monarchy, was not formidable enough then to repress the just impulses of England in her behalf. Tin- light of our federal republic had begun to throw its dazzling beams inio the transatlantic abodes of absolutism. It is true that England, then, finding her remonstrances unsupported by the other power-, desisted ; but in our pase, and against her every interest, except 15 that of monarchy, she has rejected the offer of France to seek conjointly in generous mood to initiate a friendly and just mediation. But as if to confess there is no mistake in the opinion I am supporting, that the crowned sovereigns of Europe stand off in our struggle against oppres- sion, from fear of the influence of the American example of political freedom, the emperor of France is reported to have recently declared that their subjects see in this American war that " republics or the men who administer their governments, have the same pride, passions and lust of empire that influence sovereigns." He rejoices that republican- ism has never been so dead in Europe as now, and says : " We can -af- ford to suffer much in our material interests, while this revolutionary drama of the republicans is dissolving in blood." That was the secret cause of England's declining the offer from which the emperor himself turned his face, wreathed with royalty, as soon as he could stifle his first generous impulse. We ought not to grow any more cotton, during this war, than necessary for home consumption, and so demonstrate that our love of republican constitutional freedom, is stronger than our love of "material interests."- Although, Mr. President, I have thus finished all it occurred to me at the beginning of this exposition, I would put forth in support of the plan proposed for impressing right views of the subject on the mind and heart of these states holding the African race, amongst us by descent, in bondage, I crave to be allowed to linger longer. I repeat that I do not intend to discuss the territorial question, because it has been shut out from our Confederacy for the present and probably forever. There is, however, a principle, I have already alluded to, which did underlie that question — .which survives, and must be effective, or else a failure of the property-principle will be apt to ensue in any one of these states, on any occasion of its being ascertained that the non-slaveholding voters are in the majority in the state. • It will be remembered by senators, that the South, and the foremost friends of this great southern right — a right by recognition of law in many and unequivocal forms — yielded, in the discussions of that ques- tion, and made the concession in every conceivable form, by legislation and in state conventions of parties, and in primary assemblages of the people, that the territorial people having amongst them slaveholders resident, and composing however large a part, less than a majority of slaveholders, might, when they came to form their constitution to become a state invthe Union, by regular or irregular admission as such, provide in that instrument that slavery should no longer exist in the incoming state. That is, it was yielded by the South that the territorial" people consisting (I will say, to illustrate) of five hundred voters, 251 for and 249 against the continued existence of slavery, might provide by their proposed constitution, and that congress should admit the state so pro- viding, that the minority should cease to be slaveholding in the new state. On the score of policy, had policy alone been consulted, that was exceed- ingly unselfish and unwise. Nay, it was fatal to the interest of the slaveholding states in the matter especially of extending the area of slavery. The North, with the much larger population, and more crowded, was likely and almost certain to send out into the territories a majority 16 of settlors who might, that point being yielded by the slaveholding states, have made all the new states non-slaveholding. Why did not that satisfy them ' But it was the principle which was so fatally smoth- ered by the South, that is now most valuable, because it extends itself, with clear applicability, into the question of the continuance of slavery in the Btates where it has been long cherished. It cannot be unobserved, on a moment's inspection of the subject, that if a people in forming their first constitution, can expel any species of property from within their. territorial extent, already existing lawfully there at the time, they can also expel the same species — and if one, equally any other — when- ever they alter that constitution by subsequent conventional action. It is alone the republican creed which respects no less the essential rights of property than those of persons, that prevents the expulsion of an existing property, when the Btate alters its constitution, no less than when the Btate was first organized on the republican creed for the model. It is true I repeat the idea, whilst republican constitutions are moulded by circumstances, and most be modified to conform to the results of ex- perience, that when the modifications dispense with the essential princi- ples of freedom, as when the mutilation of the tribunate was reserved for the time Napoleon was to be elected first consul for life, the republic is thereby converted into a monarchy or other government that is not free. So clear is it. that if a territorial people in forming their constitution in conformity to republican principles, might have expelled slave pro- perty, the people of the Btate might do the Bame violence in altering a constitution which did proteel tie- existing property from such expul- sion. I pray to be informed what it was but this principle of vested property, that prevented our fathers from expelling slaves when the colo- nies bad accomplished their independence, and were constituted repub- lican Btatea ' They deplored, what was then thought to be, the evil of slavery. I pray to be informed what it is but this principle of property, thai c;tn prevent agrarianism and anarchy. The republican form was and is the foregone conclusion to be abided by. Andyel wonderful to be told for true, that these slaveholding states yielded in the discussion of the territorial question, this great principle which is the only stay and Bupport of Blavery in these states — the only breakwater against the flood of fanaticism on the Bubject of negro-emancipation. More wonderful it is that • lected for their first president, the man who as senator was mosl conspicuous in yielding up the great principle which in all it.> vigor is indispensable to the safety and stability of our slave sys- tem. So deeply was the error driven into the popular mind. The won- der i> that the people did not detect and reject the radical error of the politicians. I make that observation, let it he understood, in the tenor and BtrictneSS of the argument, and not with any design, much tyss de- sire, to disparage the president. Did i intend an}' attack on hisyalmin- istration, it would not be made indirectly or equivocally. My desire is coincident with the scope of the proposed proceeding on its face, to rein- state in the greal heart of this Confederacy, the great principle which for ;i time was losl sight of. Incidentally to demonstrate that no want of respect for the president 17 is intended to be displayed by that observation on his election, but with the broader purpose to show the deep political dissent from his view which the doctrine proposed is intended to advance, I will refer to another series of resolutions presented twelve years before, (in 1847) by no less true and firm a man in support of our rights than John C. Calhoun himself. It is the fallacy, not to say heresy, that, in our sys- tem, the majority in making constitutions, may adjust or readjust, or jostle the principle of private property, I am dealing with, and which the doctrine I am urging contradicts and will never admit. This doc- trine confronts and seeks to frustrate the idea that the Mexican law, for instance, prohibiting slavery, had any efficacy to expel or exclude negro slavery, after New Mexico and California were acquired by the United States. That soil with all upon it, after the aquisition, was un- der the American law — under the dominion of the federal constitution which recognized this slavery. My doctrine is the opposite of the policy of the Wilmot proviso, which was the watchword of party organ- izations and the synonyme of sectional agitation. That policy was that no part of the territory to be acquired, should be open to the introduc- tion of slavery, and that it should be excluded by federal legislation. My doctrine is that neither the federal government had, nor" the con- federate has, any authority over the subject to destroy or impair the ex- istence or the extension of the ownership. It denies that the slavery of negroes with us is an "institution," and contends that where it law- fully is, it is an ownership by individuals — not an institute by govern- ment — and that where it was pre-existing, the government must be con- stituted to protect it to its owners. It maintains that the rights to and in this property, so ancient that their origin is lost in the dim haze of the most distant antiquity,, should be acknowledged, respected and guarded by human governments, and that the unholy hand of human legislation shall not touch them to destroy or impair. They have their source and authenticity in the munificent ordinance of the divine gov- ernment over society. Not an instance can be found in the word of God, in which such rights were ever withdrawn or intermitted under His government ; for, whilst hired servants might be emancipated, bond slaves could not be. The doctrine maintains that such existing rights should be respected at all times and in all places, and that all human government should, and that republican ones must, bow before them, even is the sheaves of his brethren bowed before the sheaf of Joseph. Yet the doctrine admits that where negro slavery is not already, the government of the state may be constituted to keep it out. So it is, and in such sanctions, the proposed doctrine denies what senator Calhoun's resolution asserted, to wit: that "it is a fundamental principle of our political creed," that a people, the people of a territory or state under the fede- ral government, or of a state under the confederate, "in forming a con- stitution had (or have) the constitutional right to form and adopt the government which they may think best calculated to secure their liberty, prosperity and happiness," &c. It is true it adds truly that the condi- tion is imposed that "the constitution shall be republican." Notwith- standing this addition to the thought first expressed, as I have recited it verbatim, the resolution evidently allows the concession to be plainly 3 18 implied, that the majority in first forming and afterwards in altering their constitution, might expel (what in debating the resolution he ad- mitted was) our "peculiar institution," although it was a pre-existing property — might expel it, if in the judgment and by the decision of that majority, it was deemed "best calculated to secure their liberty, pros- perity and happiness." If the riddance would be apt to produce such effects* the individual owners would be apt to see and secure the benefit without being compelled to it by law. The doctrine proposed oppungs that proposition — indignantly rejects and disallows that concession to any sort of compulsory emancipationists. Whence, I desire to be in- formed, did or do any people, under our system, federal or confederate, desire such "constitutional right?" I need not say no more than I have already, to show -that the abstract right does not exist, and that the claim that it does, contravenes the manifest ordinances of the gov- ernment of God. To the contrary of the existence of the "constitu- tional" right, my whole argument is that the fundamental policy of our tern, founded on and fenced in by the republican creed, essentially is that the Btate must b fco^protect pre-existing rights of pro- perty. If the majority in constituting the government, or if that when cons'tituted, may seize on the property of its owners — on any species of property — the right to which it did not create, but was instituted to pro- tect — nay, Beize on it. not for public use. but to get rid of it — there can be no safety in society. Thus government would beeome a sword of subsequent destruction, instead of ansagis to protect pie-existing rights, :i- it Bhould be. t-» the full extenl they have not been parted with in or- ganising the state by the constitutional contract for the public good. That contract, in our of written consitutions, defines the extent to which those pre-e: rights are parted with or impaired for the p UD ] i denned] d to be promoted. That be theory, and if in practice it turns out otherwise, the only alterna- te Ht with the theory, is to amend the form., and supply the deficiency, of thecon titutional provisions; but always and at oil />oints conformity with the republican mod I Especially should so extensiv% :in BBgifl he thrown around the property pre-existing in our .slaves, and be tightened in all i ■■ now thai the outside world, not knowing as we know, the nature and condition of our slaves, are blindly or perver ely hostile to tl mch property, but still more hostile to the existence of our republican system. They forget the u- pernal lesson of the Apostle Paul, to learn first to show piety at home. Mr. President a- that my strength is not ade- quate (much less in the suitable limits of a speech) to the weight of this mighty subject. 1 trust that others will a beauty and a power in the doctrine, which 1 have not been able to exhibit in their exceeding fullness. -I'M lei its ample riches fertilize our country, and this con- federate republic will be stabilitated ami glorified. Then the patriot and the philanthropist alike shall walk about with pride and in safety within the folds of the gorgeous curtains of our country's grandeur. Then the philosopher and the historian shall heboid the towers of her strength, and survey her palaces, and inspect her bulwarks, and tell it to the generation following, and thai to the next, and this to # anpther, 19 that human freedom regulated by liberal laws, as liberal as nature's God allows, was her mission, and the living God is her guide and shield. It was the mistaken concession by the South, that this doctrine was in theory and practice absent from the councils of the federal Union, jthat let in the territorial question, in the deep, protracted and angry agitation of which that Union went down — to be rebuilt no more, I desire and predict. The doctrine I desire to. advance, Mr. President and Senators, gives the* lie to the alleged justness of this war on the part of our enemy, and confronts the aim, to wit, a restoration of the Union, which the urgers on of the war proposed. Senator Sumner, in the federal senate, in 1862, with much parade of verbal elaboration, depicted how these "slave states" were urging on a war " with criminal eminence to overthrow the constitution of the United States." This doctrine proposed for your sanction, asserts that we are struggling to defend the most distinguishing characteristic of that constitution, to wit, its recognitions (amongst us) of certain human beings, namely, negroes, as persons participating to a large extent in their peculiar condition and relations, the element of property .^ By that constitution five of them, with equality of qualifica- tions in age and residence, were made to count in apportioning repre- sentation, only as much as three of the white race. 'By that con- titution which was ratified by .the states, when all of them but one, had that population* resident in them, those creatures were allowed to be imported for nineteen years from their native country, to be made slaves of in this, and so to be made a property. So far from striving to over- throw that constitution, our desire and struggle are to maintain its chief characteristics. That is our aim — to maintain, not to destroy ; and the proposed proceeding defines and defends that aim. It directly confronts and resists the opposing aim of Senator Sumner and his compeers who are waging a war with criminal pre-eminence and disgraceful ill success, to obliterate that peculiar feature in that federal constitution, which is retained and fortified in the confederate. They are striving to sink the element of property in those creatures whom they will not quite receive as equals, and whom it is our duty and desire to elevate in the scale of being. If that element be sunk in them, we cannot take care of them, as we do,- as the wards of civilization, subjected to discipline, if under Providence their character may be found so corrigible that they may be made vessels to bear from this country the lights of christian culture here received, to chase away the night of barbarism from their father- land. Success by the false philanthropists to sink that element, will be a subversion of that federal constitution which they with us solemnly ratified when the existence of that property in the states was more their fault than ours, if indeed it was at all our fault. He and they contend, and hence this war, that negroes are known to that constitution only as persons, and therefore that there is a difference between (he says) " the ■pretended property in slaves and all other property." He and they are not mindful of the memorials sent up from this section to the United States senate in 1850, which Senator Seward, now their secretary of state, supported by his votes, to the effect that on account of the exist- ence of "property claimed in man" to exist constitutionally in this sec- tion, their congress, and then ours also as much as theirs, " should frame 20 some plan for the immediate and peaceful dissolution of the American Union." Then, verily then, we ought to have acceded to the prayer of their memorialists. We ought not to have waited until he and they pretended not to-be influenced by the fact that the laws of the states where the negro is a property in man owned by man, treat him only as a property in every relation in whioh he is not by exceptional stipula- tion required to be dealt by and with, and mostly in behalf of himself, as a person, in penal legislation. (So- slow were we, as he says, to " overthrow that constitution,") But he and they are influenced by that fact, and it is to them a stumbling-block ; and hence their eager desire to obliterate state lines. He and they pretend not to see that to treat the negro, by federal law, as wholly a person, would defeat the state law, enshrined in state-rights, which treats him chiefly as a property. Why, but to get rid of that difficulty, do they desire to get rid of state lines ? Thus it is, he and they seek to overthrow the constitution, the chief peculiarity of which we arc struggling to maintain; whilst it is the vicious administration of the government that constitution ordained, displaying itself now in habitual and persistent exercises of usurped extra-constitutional power, which we resist. And we resist, in virtue of that high right of revolution that docs not fail to move the arms of the hearts it inspires, to win congenial and glorious success. It is the great right wlii; ' i forget he said iit the United States senate in 184' . to liberate the world.' 1 It is not surprising that the trans-atlantic press, being advocates of royalty, are Avilling that that grand did Anglo-Saxon right shall be whittled down to the puling privi- lege of peaceful secession, for it docs not apply to them, and it is revo- lution that must throttle royalty and throw down its thrones. Ours is, indeed, a fierce conflict, worthy of the noble idea of revolution, in which there is much to rejoice a1 and much to deplore. Our strength is in this, that thrice armed is he who hath his quarrel just. They forget that their system waB, as our.- is, one of opinion, and not of the sword. The philosophic beholder of the disgraceful spectacle, will not fail to discern with as, a een in England in Cromwell's time, an unconquered spirit destined proudly to restore, as the doctrine pro- posed. . .in its full vigor, in the popular affections, the constitution in that its most distinguishing feature; whilst with them who seek its overthrow, as in France under the empire of Napoleon, is as clearly seen the well-known features of Asiatic servility that has been the grave in every age, of free goi rnm ot. We rejoice at what is seen here, whilst we deplore their self-willed downfall. May the Almighty, in his infinite wisdom, educe much good even for them out of the wicked war tiny have waged, and bring them to practice his scriptures given by inspiration for p< irth and g 1 will amongst men. Let the doctrine proposed be adopted, Mr. President and senators, to wit: that the existing negro slavery in these states, is a property enti- tled, just as other properties are, to the protection of the encircling re- publican creed, from the rude touch of the numerical majority in mak- ing constitutions; let that doctrine be adhered to with undeviating fidelity and firmness by these concurrent sovereign Confederate States, and by such others as may join in with them, so that it shall not be 21 overcome by the temporary views and yielding policy of politicians seek- ing office, until it shall become a national sentiment — not the sentiment of a consolidated empire, but the unanimous sentiment of the Confede- rate States — and we will be let alone, more and more, until the advent of the time, if such time be indeed in the contemplation of the Divine mind, when the black man shall cease to be the slave of fhe white. In this event we will be let alone altogether, and be troubled with holding them no longer, because the angel of the Lord will then require no Hagar to return to her mistress, and the teachings of Paul w.ll then have an end, that servant-; under the yoke shall count their masters worthy of all honors of obedience. Then, if that time shall ever come, onerous as the pecuniary burden of slavery on the owners is, and which in the interim we should patiently bear, the relief by the riddance will be as durable as the process by which the creative Disposer of events on the earth, can accomplish it, will be peaceful. Then it will be ac- quiesced in by all, and not be drenched in blood, as it will be, and still fail, foundering in a heaving sea of human gore, if attempted by man before the way is- opened and made clear by the Son of God who reigneth with power according to the spirit of holiness. Then the emancipated owners from the ponderous pecuniary burden, will see, as other beholders, that the time has really been reached, when all shall be free, no matter what color the pilgrim shall bear on his brow and wear in all his skin. But I do not believe that time will soon come. Though not a prophet or the son of one, I venture to predict that the slavery of the colored race will remain after yet other attempts to abolish it, rising on the fleeting ascendant of ambition and crime, will have been extinguished in blood. I hope for and expect, Mr. President and Senators, a more enlightened result of the vote of this general assembly of Virginia, on the proposed declaration of doctrine, than the Grecian philosopher expected from the Athenians, who chiding a man who had addressed them, said to him : " If you had spoken wisely, they would have given no signs of appro- bation." I trust I have spoken wisely, (though feebly,) and I expect that, therefore, you will approve. Now, senators, is the accepted time— the very nick of time — to put forth this declaration of doctrine. Our right of property in our slaves has been muddled in the pool of politics. Our right and .its sure de- fences should now be made clear and put on the right foundations, when we are just starting on a new career, and our true character and conduct on the subject are being made better known ; so that all men everywhere may understand that we can have a clean conscience, and that if other nations will candidly examine the greater wrongs, (in the less lurid light of this they impute to us,) to which human beings in their midst are subjected, it behooves them most urgently to take heed to the doctrine of inspired wisdom, "to learn first to show piety atjsome." Let the wise lessons of virtue be so inculcated as to take hold on the famiiy circle, and the neighbors will be apt to come under the influence, and will be more impressible, because they will not have been intruded upon. It is by pride and vanity that men are led to believe that domestic mis- sions are an humbler sphere, than the operations of foreign missions. It 22 is real humility and pious sincerity that find the greater delight in spreading helps in all their vicinity. The spark will not fire the edifice, if it o-oes out when it falls: nor will a coal not burning kindle a fire in the surrounding materials. And that lesson is no less applicable to nations, than it is to individu- als. They of Europe might, in their false sympathy for the blacks in ameliorated condition with us, be reminded of the treatment of that once most powerful nation in her north, Poland, the country of Sobi- eski, who.se descendants now " want a country," whose dominions stretch- ed from jkoto Swabia, and from the Baltic to the Euxine, whose frontiers, for five hundred year-, in spite of gigantic displays of resist- ing valor, were contracted more and more, until struck down by hostile armies and swept by spoliations, she was partitioned out-by neighboring potentates amongst themselves made powerful by territorial acquisitions ior to the partition) wrested from herself. And old England might be reminded of the catholics of Ireland, to whom "no talents or virtues could give any hope of advancement." Those nations might be remind- ed ,,f Russia's serf, and of abject subjects of despotic sw»y in all their borders. When the passions have cooled, by which the powerful people in the north of this continent have been plunged injo this war onus, the sign*] scandal of the age, they may be reminded of some of their na- tional traits and transactions which do not rai>e them above reproach. Old England and New England might be reminded, as capping the cli- max of inconsistent atrocities, how they encouraged the capturing and bringing from their Dative home, and subjecting to servitude in this hemis- the original stock of Africans whose descendants, old England D after v. '. - New England now is, against our solemn p^o- ii ;I , ],,, . siting to escape from the far less severe servitude than that th brought from, and to do it "by rising in arms and nmrderii n whom they obtruded them" by a piratical commerce. n England m minded that it was at tic insta ice of her rep- , M.nt remonstrance against that ''execrable commen "ken from our Declaration of Independence, as it v , :i : ,!s author, a southern slave-holder. Old England might be reminded that ' of her parliament, in the first of char- Ulted by her, tho British West India islands, for a long time, were supplied with • from Africa, who were captives in war, wn0 le for her colonies. She might be re- minded that the late United under the lead of these southern ided her in the "race of humanity," as Wilberforce urged foi her imitation, by fixing a period, in L808, when, as he called it, "the infamous traffic" should come to an end. She and all other for- eign intermeddlers, and their coadjutors in the United States, ought to member thai Mr. Hibbert, in parliament, asked what are the few Tied across the Atlantic, to the multitudes who are driven across the :t', or descend into Egypt ior the vast markets of the mus- Iman world: and that he told them then, as 1 tell them now: Go, if ; bave not benevolent work enough at home — go, civilize central Af- rioa — abolish, if you can. thatcmel practice there of selling or putting to death ali captives taken in tribal wars, an 1 you will have made a move 23 of some wisdom and power in checking the increase of negro slavery. This wpuld not be a more difficult enterprize for her with the ai