THE PULPIT AND RO STRUM,
AN ELEGANT PAMPHLET SERIAL,
CONTAINS REPORTS OF THE BEST
SERMONS, LECTURES, ORATIONS, Etc.
ANDREW J. GRAHAM aud CHARLES B. COLLAR, Reporters.
Twelve Numbers, $1.00, in advance; Single Number, 10 cents.
in i ■ . ::i >nt form t
■:n • from tii ii- lips ; thus retaining their fresh i
ity. Great favor bas already been shown the work, and its continuance is certain. The
- s worthy a place in the .Serial can be lound ;
out of the ni ii\ b year.
No. P CHBJ
Sermon by Rev.
N ». 2.— MEN
and Hon. J as. T
No. 3.— gra:
No P— PROi
H. MiLBURN.
No. 6. JESU
No. 6.— TRIB
Tho.m i
No. 7. I
No. 8.— DAM
ation of .tin- st .it
No. 9
Adams, 1 >. D,
No. 10. DEA
Everett and Ber
No. IP GEO
iratioD of
22d, I860.
mis.
No. 12.— TRA
I. tureby J. I tj%«v»%»%«%%%%%%%%%%^
;, ,"'{;} LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, fe
Mucin. i.!.. I »>■ ' £
)I1ED.
HAN AMUSEMENT,
y Rev. H. W. Beelher
-)i. CM. Mitchell.
', Sermon by Rev. Wm.
lev. A. Kixgmax Nott.
tEO. Baxcroft, Rev. Dr.
Scudder. D. D., M. D.
eue'it. at the Inaugur-
[soourse, by Bev. Wm.
ress by Hon. Edward
ii"-. S. Bocock, at the
Washington, February
ND REQUIREMENTS.
/ aud BbECHER,
and Prof. (>. M.
Boston, July A\q
itc, <^
< iarolina in
P' WARD Everett, in
JeCTP in the rjnited
<=krne€I T}. i laMATION to South
/ y
,,. LAJ ,'ITED STATES OF AMERICA. *lZ^'i Ne*
York and I'liil.a'*^^*^*^*,-**^**^^^.^^.^.^,
. orcurrenl numbers are promptly mailed from the office, on receipt of the price.
H. H. LLOYD & CO., Publishers,
25 IIOW A KI> ST., NEW YORK.
THE
AMERICAN QUESTION
NATIONAL ASPECT.
BEING ALSO
AN INCIDENTAL REPLY TO MR. H. R. HELPER'S "COMPENDIUM OF
THE IMPENDING CRISIS OF THE SOUTH."
BY
ELIAS PEISSNER,
PROFESSOR IN UNION COLLEGE.
NEW YORK:
H. H. LLOYD & CO., PUBLISHERS,
25 HOWARD STREET.
1861.
£^°
%
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1SC1, by
ELIAS PEIS3NEE,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern
District of New York.
Davies & E
STEEEOTYPEES AND ELECTROTTPER8,
118 Niuaav Str* '. .v. r.
PREFACE
Slavery, irrespective of its being right or wrong, is a historical
fact, and depends as such, in its rise, growth, and decay, on the
various circumstances of time and place Avhich surround it, and
have surrounded it, in different nations and periods. The soil,
the climate, the geological and geographical congeniality with the
most thickly settled countries of Europe, the large immigration
consequent thei-eupon, the character of the settlers, — in short, land
and people, production and population, made emancipation easier in
our Northern States than in most of the Southern.
Therefore, we must censure those who wantonly throw all blame
and all curses on the slaveholder as such ; but we must also con-
demn the Slave-Politician who, on the natural circumstances unfavor-
able to speedy emancipation in the South, raised a play-ground for
his political ambition and cast new obstacles in the way of freedom.
The imprudent abolitionist and the selfish politician exert a like
influence upon the nation, though it be of different intensity. They
rouse enmity and hatred between two sections of the same country ;
they, intentionally or unawares, render the Union less desirable and
less honorable ; they create fears, and threats, and experiments of
dissolution.
For this their influence on Union and Nationality have we under-
taken to review the course of the deadly antagonists. "Within the
Union, then, alone the question of Slavery can be solved in such
a manner as to bring permanently the greatest benefit to all par-
ties concerned. This is, indeed, the American question, and it will
haunt us whether there be a temporary dissolution of the Union
or not. Slavery, far from being a sufficient reason for breaking
jv PREFACE.
the Union, adds new cause, new interest, new ties to draw us still
more closely together.
To prove this is the object of the present treatise. Consequently,
we have ventured to present in their proper light the two most
famous arguments of the present day — the one taken from Political
Economy, the other weeded out from history — and have endeavored
to prove that they nowhere teach unrelenting hatred and disunion.
Mr. H. R. Helper's collection of figures and testimonies having be-
come more popular than any other, we have taken his production
as a basis for our First Two Books. The seriousness of the subject
seemed at first to exclude all humor ; but Mr. Helper's passion and
folly would, in some instances, have made any other treatment
unfair and altogether unpalatable to the general reader.
In our Third Book we give Slavery its logical place in the pro-
gressive history of the world, and trace its social development within
our own country, while in the Fourth Book we show its relation
to the Union as a political body.
Uxion College, Jan. Sth, 1861.
CONTENTS.
BOOK I.
THE NUMBERS.
(IN REPLY TO CHAPTERS I., IX., X., XI., AND XII. OF MR. HELPER'S COM-
PENDIUM.)
I. The Science of Statistics. — II. False Impressions from True Num-
bers.— III. False Reasoning from True Numbers. — IV. New York
and Norfolk. — V. New York and New Orleans. — VI. Louisiana and
Massachusetts, New Orleans and Boston, Alabama and Maine. — VII.
New York buys Virginia. — VIII. Imports and Exports combined of
all the Principal Ports. — IX. Helper mistaking Years. — X. Helper
ignoring Paupers and Criminals. — XI. Helper on Hay. — XII. Ex-
haustion of Lands and Hands. — XIII. The First Cause and Last
Effect omitted by Helper in all his Arithmetical Reasonings. — XIV.
Population, the Fundamental Cause of Production. — XV. Ratio of
Increase of Population in Different Countries. — XVI. Ratio of the
Natural and the Artificial Increase of the Population of the United
States. — XVII. Ratio of Immigration in the Different States of the
Union.— XVIII. Cause of the Difference.— XIX. Effect of Immi-
gration on the Show-Tables of the South and the North. — XX. The
Ultimate Effect of Production on Population. — XXI. The Negro
Multiplying— his Show-Tables all Right.— XXII. Everybody Living
Longer there where the "Niggers" are. — XXin. The Posterior
Part of Helper's Statistical Body. — XXIV. Conclusion page 9
BOOK II.
THE TESTIMONIES.
(IN REPLY TO CHAPTERS III., IV., V., VI., VII., AND VIII. OF MR. HELPER'S
COMPENDIUM.
I. Single Testimonies.— H. The Chapters HI. to LX. of Mr. Helper's
Compendium.— ni. The Testimony of the Union.— IV. The Testi-
mony of England.— V. The Testimony of France.— VI. The Testi-
Vi CONTENTS.
mony of Germany. — VII. The Testimony of Kussia. — VIII. The
Testimony of Greece and Rome. — IX. The Testimony of the
Churches and of the Bible. — X. The Testimony of Living "Wit-
nesses. — XL General Remarks on the Testimonies.— XII. Mr.
Helper's Bloody Plan 59
book in.
THE DEVELOPMENT.
I. Slavery in History. — II. Negro Slavery in History. — IH. Continu-
ance of Negro Slavery in the Southern States. — IV. The Plea of the
Curse.— V. The Plea of Race Inferiority.— VI. The Plea of Philan-
thropy.— VLL The Plea of Necessity.— Vni. The Plea of Self-in-
terest.—IX. The Plea of the Constitution. — X. Requisites for a
Truly Philanthropic Emancipation : 1. Delicacy; 2. Political Non-
interference with the South ; 3. Prudence. — XI. Actual "Work al-
ready Accomplished in our Land : 1. Prohibition of the Slave-Trade ;
2. Abolition of Slavery ; 3. Spreading of the White Population ; 4.
Amalgamation ; 5. Colonization. — XH. Conclusion 81
BOOK IV.
THE CRISIS.
I. Balance of Power. — H. Secession. — HI. Our Policy. — IV. Integrity
of the Union ; the National Property, Fortifications, Custom-Houses,
etc. ; the Separate States : Texas ; California ; Louisiana ; the Border
Slave States ; Tennessee and Arkansas ; the two Carolinas, and the
Western Gulf States. — V. Prognostic of a Southern Hexarchy. —
VI. A Proposal for a new Compromise. — Conclusion 131
BOOK I
THE NUMBERS.
THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
book: i-
THE NUMBERS.
IN REPLY TO CHAPTERS I., IX., X., XI., AND XII. OF MR.
helper's COMPENDIUM.
I.— THE SCIENCE OF STATISTICS.
We have taken as a basis of this first part of our treatise
Mr. Helper's famous Xumbers, by the aid of which he
attempts to draw a new dividing fine between two sec-
tions of the same country. These Numbers have become
a sort of ground-work for popular reasoning on Union and
Disunion. And this bearing alone is the cause of our
attack. But before entering upon a special review of
them, we will make a few general remarks.
The science of statistics is yet in its swaddling-clothes.
Statistical accounts were kept in ancient times, but they
referred principally to the government, and not to the
nation at large. In the middle ages such accounts were
entirely neglected ; and what there were at any time had
neither system nor order. In most modern times this
science has grown, and especially during the present
century ; though even now the world and its philosophers
are not agreed in respect to its limits or its definition.
1*
jq THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
A regular census of the population, to be repeated at
fixed intervals, was first instituted by the United States,
in the first year of its existence, and only since the begin-
ning of this century have England and France followed
our example. But what confusion reigns in these census
tables, even in our modern times, may easily be seen from
a few glances at their headings and diagrams, not to men-
tion the single blunders which so frequently incur the cen-
sure of the common daily press.
F. B. Hough, the superintendent of the New York
census in 1855, confesses in despair, "that it is, especially
as it regards the wealth and production of the State, a
labyrinth which we can not hope to be able to survey,
unless a change is made in the whole system." What
names shall we give to the censuses of other States, if
that of New York is already seen to be " a labyrinth ?"
But into such labyrinths Mr. Hinton Rowan Helper
went groping for his numbers. No wonder he was lost,
for Ariadne's thread seems not to have fallen to his lot.
H. F. Beachelli (one of those untiring German savans
whose patient toiling remains ever a wonder to us Yankees
as a class), in a recent statistical work on Germany, names
several hundred volumes as his authorities, and adds, then,
humbly : " I, of course, could only give approximate state-
ments, and had to omit many things from want of sufficient
data."
There is, indeed, no writer of any note, nor " any thor-
ough scholar or profound thinker," who is not aware of
the imperfect state of this science. Improvements are
being made continually ; but, as yet, sufficient care is not
taken in collecting the statistics, nor is there system in it,
nor has any system been applied during periods sufficiently
THE NUMBERS,
11
long to warrant all imaginable deductions and generaliza-
tions.
But all sciences, in their infancy, are somewhat presump-
tuous. And this is the -case with the newly-invented sci-
ence of statistics. Everything must now be reduced to
numbers. Virtue, vice, morality, education, misery, hap-
piness, slavery, freedom, love — all these vague and un-
mathematical quantities — must now be expressed in math-
ematical formulas. For there is no more quality : every-
thing is quantity ! This cant has, for a long time, been
ringing in our ears, and Mr. Hinton Rowan Helper seems
to be one of its modern trumpeters, though of the lower
order.
Yet we must take men as they are, and, therefore, we
will now view Mr. Helper in his character as number-
dealer.
II.— FALSE IMPRESSIONS FROM TRUE NUMBERS.
Y^e must take men as they are, and we must also take
numbers as they are. We will now suppose that the num-
bers which Mr. Helper extracts from official reports, and
those which we ourselves will draw from similar sources,
are all true and correct. They are all — let us suppose —
exact numerical expressions of real facts. Now let us
give a few examples, to see what the impressions are which
these true numbers may make on our minds. We take
them from the Official Census of the United States, 1850.
TABLE I. THE DEAF AND DUMB, BLIND, LAME, INSANE, AND
IDIOTIC PERSONS IN NEW YORK AND VIRGINIA.
State of New York 6,630
State of Virginia 3,675
This is a very nice statistical table, and quite character-
12 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
istic of the science of statistics. " The deaf and dumb,
blind, insane, and idiotic persons," like the Living Wit-
nesses, are all huddled together in one company. A happy
family, indeed !
After we had recovered somewhat from the shock the
presence of such a variety of cripples naturally caused, we
looked again at the figures, all told and positive. At first
sight — and this is the only sight men often take — New
York seems to have almost twice as many " deaf and dumb,
blind, insane, and idiotic persons" as Virginia. And we
did, indeed, set ourselves at work to bewail the glorious
Empire State, which, in spite of its freedom, was getting
so distressingly blind and insane, and deaf, and idiotic, and
dumb, while darkened Virginia saw and heard, and thought
and spoke in a ratio so much greater.
Now, there is nothing so very unfair in this example.
We get about the same impression from many of Mr.
Helper's tables, and his bewailings are often not based
on firmer ground. But let us look at one of his exam-
ples:
TABLE II. THE EXPORTS OF NEW YORK AND VIRGINIA.
Mr. Helper states that the exports in 1852 amounted
(in round numbers for popular use),
In New York to ■ i .000
In Virginia to 2,505,000
A common man compares these two numbers and ex-
claims : " Alas ! Virginia has forty times less exports than
Xew York!" Now let us but add the comparative popula-
tion of the two States :
X. w York, 1850 3,097,000
Virginia, 1850 1,421,000
And, without going into any further reasoning, but by
THE NUMBERS. 13
only finding the proportions of the exports to the number
of inhabitants, our wonder and surprise would be reduced
at least fifty per cent. We will soon give more examples ;
but we have first another observation to make, intimately
connected with all these numerical parades.
III.— FALSE REASONING FROM TRUE NUMBERS.
No one doubts that there must be a cause for these
special facts and their representative numbers, and indeed
a cause for just what they are. We mean, they must be
the result of some agent, or the consequence of some prior
principle ; and we must see, too, that the numbers may all
be correct, singly and added, but still we may mistake
their cause or causes, mistake the relations of several such
numerical tables, mistake their consequences, and at last
their effect on man. For man is, after all, the end
of the whole song of numbers and notes. There seem,
then, to be some difficulties in the way of using and
explaining numbers; but Mr. Helper does not think
so. He has an improved camera obscura, a kind of
a dark-lantern or "nigger" glass, which, showing every-
thing in the same swarthy hue, gives at once the
cause for everything, seen or unseen ; and that is, by-
the-by, the only glass he ever uses. While thus we
others, poor mortals, must break our heads, and think,
and compare, and study, and observe, he simply looks
through his mysterious glass and exclaims: "Slavery!"
and all difficulties vanish at once. We envy the man for
his time-and-labor-saving machine, but can not refrain from
giving our curious readers a few examples, to show in what
a peculiar way it works. We are tempted to believe that
its balance-wheel is a little out of order.
14 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
IV.— NEW YORK AND NORFOLK.
The wise Governor of Virginia extols, as Mr. Helper
quotes, the bygone trophies of the harbor of Norfolk, and
laments its present miserable condition, numbers ever being
added to demonstrate and to prove. Xov, there is many
a harbor on the long coast of the Atlantic which has
met with a similar fortune, both South and North. It was
prophesied that New York would become "the center
of trade and great emporium of North America," and
even of the whole Western world, long, long ago — long
before Governor Wise bewailed his country — at a period,
indeed, when the enslaved children of innocent darkness
were still gracing the shores and streets of New Amster-
dam. The James River is no Hudson, and the Alleghanies
are no Palisades. The lakes of the North, too, have some
little influence on commerce. We might as well compare
London with Norwich. But still Mr. Helper uses his dark
machine, looks through the glass, and answers : " Slavery!"'
Now, does Mr. Hintox Rowan Helper really think
that, if Virginia had emancipated her slaves as soon as
New York, the proportion between the commerce of
Norfolk and that of New York would have still been the
same in 1850 as it was in 1790? Or, that "the direct
foreign trade of Norfolk would still exceed that of the city
of New York?" Or, that Virginia would still "stand pre-
eminently the first commercial Siate of the Union?" Or,
" that her commerce would still exceed in amount that of
all the New England States combined ?" No, we can not
think him lacking thus much in judgment. But still, his sta-
tistical exhibitions would lead to such conclusions, and he
himself must have had similar impressions when he turned
THE NUMBERS. 15
away from the picture he had drawn of the two States,
" with feelings mingled with indignation and disgust."
V.— NEW YORK AND NEW ORLEANS.
»
But why did Mr. Helper not take the statistics of
New Orleans and compare them with those of New York ?
This would have been, in every respect, a fairer compari-
son than New York and Norfolk. New Orleans is the
great outlet of the Mississippi, the principal point of attrac-
tion for the South and West ; New York a similar magnet
for the North, East, and Northwest. Now let us see the
exports of the one and of the other, not forgetting, how-
ever, that New York now rules, and will probably rule
for many years to come, over the largest productive area
of the United States.
TABLE ITI. EXPORTS AXD IMPORTS.
[From the " Annunire de VEconomie Politique et de la Statistique," Paris, 1S59.]
[The table refers to the year 1857 — at least we think so, from compar-
ing some of its general items with the report of the Secretary of the
Treasury of the United States for that year.]
Total exports of the United States $338,985,000
Total exports of New York 111,029,000
Total exports of New Orleans 91,536,000
Total exports of Boston and Charlestown. . 24,894,000
Total exports of Mobile 20,575,000
This is the order of the cities in amount of goods ex-
ported. In this table New Orleans is the second, and,
indeed, comes very near to New York. Would not this
give a fairer and more respectable picture than New York
and Norfolk ? Or, let us take the imports, according to
the same document :
Total imports of the United States $360,890,000
Total imports of New York 222,550.000
Total imports of 31 States fexc. New York) 148,340.000
Total imports of Boston and Charlestown. . 44,840,000
Total imports of New Orleans 24,891,000
Total imports of Philadelphia 17,850,000
IQ THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
\Ye see from this table that New York takes two thirds
of all the imports of the United States, and New Orleans
comes immediately after Boston, and before Philadelphia.
At any rate, this would again have been a fairer compari-
son than New York and Virginia, South Carolina and
Pennsylvania, North Carolina and 3Iassachusetts.
But let us imitate Mr. Helper.
VI. — LOUISIANA AXD MASSACHUSETTS — NEW OE-
LEAXS AXD BOSTON— ALABAMA AND MAINE.
TABLE IT. VALUE OF EXPORTS FEOM 1856 TO 1857.
[From the official report of the Treasurer of the United States.']
Exports of Louisiana (Slave State) $91,894,000
Exports of Massachusetts (Free State) 30,146,000
Exports of New Orleans (Slave) 91,536,000
Exports of Boston and Charlestown (Free) . . 24.894,000
Exports of Alabama (Slave) 20,576,000
Exports of Maine (Free) 3,716,000
There is that negro-loving Massachusetts, of good old
Puritan stock, with its manufacturing palaces and its
spacious port! There is Northern Maine, with its im-
measurable natural wealth and its magnificent harbor !
And still the poor Slave States are ahead of them ! Neither
the elevation of modern Athens nor the depth of Portland
can stifle " our indignation and disgust !" But the picture
would become still more alarming if we added some items
of population. We have not the populations of 185 7 at
hand, and therefore we must be content to give those of
1850. The numbers would now be different, but the ratios
would not vary much.
Population of the State of Louisiana 517,000
Population of the State of Massachusetts 994,000
Louisiana had already three times as many dollars of
exports as Massachusetts; but the comparison of their
populations would double the ratio.
THE NUMBEES. tf
Oh, thou unfortunate Massachusetts ! twice three times
below thy Slave sister on the Mississippi ! Thou sunkest
so low probably because, in days of yore, thou burnedst
with Puritan zeal those four innocent Quakers, in rashness
the prototypes of thy Abolitionists !
And thou, thrice unhappy Boston, Charlestown included,
free white and free colored, and still 870,000,000 behind the
Slave city of New Orleans ! Why didst thou emancipate
Mum Bet ? That first free " nigger" girl of the North is
the cause of all thy shortcoming !
But this would be Helper's lo<nc and Hinton Rowan's
o
rhetoric, and we abstain from indulging longer in those
articles.
Let us open his own show-tables again !
VII.— KEW YORK BUYS VIRGINIA.
Mr. Helper had probably his numerical hosts continu-
ally before his eyes, and sometimes accidentally combined
one item with another, and then made a comparison without
" jumping exactly at conclusions." Thus he saw the num-
bers which express the real and £>ersonal wealth of the city
of New York, and somewhere in their vicinity the num-
bers of Virginia. " Well," says he, " what do you think of
that ? The city of New York could buy the whole State
of Virginia!" Now, what is Mr. Helper's purpose?
Why his surprise ? Is that all due to Slavery ? Are there
no other rich cities in the world ? The wealth of a whole
nation often concentrates in a city. There is no Negro
Slavery in England; but they say London could easily buy
one or two provinces of its own — New York and a few
European kingdoms included.
18 THE AMERICAN QUESTION:
VIII.— IMPORTS AND EXPORTS COMBINED OF ALL THE
PRINCIPAL PORTS.
Fighting, with numbers as arms, seems, after all, a pleas-
ant exercise. It fastens the interest, and while it amuses,
it strengthens the Constitution. We must continue this
prelude a little longer.
TABLE Y. TOTAL IMPORTS AND EXPORTS.
[From the " Annuaire" (quoted above).}
Of the United States $723,850,000
New York 346,939,000
New Orleans 116,784,000
Boston and Charlestown 73,167,000
Charleston, S. C 30,023,000
Philadelphia 24,985,000
Baltimore 24,287,000
San Francisco 23,566,000
Mobile 21,485,000
Oswego, Champlain, and Lakes 18,123,000
Savannah 11,450,000
Richmond 6,600,000
There, Mr. Helper, are the principal ports of all our
States, Free and Slave. They stand there, all in order, ac-
cording to their merits — old grandmother New York at
the head. But do you not see that her children follow her
peaceably, one after the other — first a black one and then
a white one ? Do you not see, too, that NTew Orleans has
indeed grown to be rather a big boy, though raised down
South, where the " niggers" are ? "Why will you come
and disturb this order and harmony between children of
the same mother, who walk along dressed in numbers
more harmonious than the planets even ?
But Mr. Helper has somewhat the nature of a comet,
and hence his disturbing influence. Before we lose sight
of him entirely, we may point out a few more of his
eccentricities.
THE NUMBERS. iq
IX.— HELPER MISTAKING YEARS.*
Mr. Helper, in his first comparisons, which were to pre-
pare the way for all "indignation and disgust," chose not
only three Free States which are generally considered as
the most wealthy and populous of the whole Union, and
compared them with three Slave States which show, ac-
cording to the United States census, the least growth ;
but, in order to make the " disparities" still more " de-
grading," he selected just those years which best suited
his " patriotic purpose." Thus, in his comparison of the
imports and exports of New York and Virginia, he saw
fit to give the exports of 1852 instead of 1853 — Virginia's
tables showing, in the former year, $1,000,000 less than in
the latter, and New York $21,000,000 more. Immediately
afterward, in the table of imports, he changed again to
1853, New York having imported in that year $46,000,000
more than in 1852, and Virginia $336,854 less. He draws
quite liberally on the uneven treasures of 1852, 1853, 1854,
and 1855. Sometimes, too, he mistakes States for Cities,
and vice versa. Thus, he does not conrpare the exports of
Pennsylvania and South Carolina, as he does of New
York, Virginia, Massachusetts, and North Carolina ; but
he takes Charleston and Philadelphia. The States, how-
ever, would give the following results :
Pennsylvania. South Carolina.
Imports in 1791 $3,436,000 $2,693,000
Imports in 1853 6,255,000 15,400,000
The strongest Pro-Slavery State would compare too well in
that respect.
° Several tables and estimates were thankfully received by the
author from S. Bakstow, a student in Union College. The numbers
9, 10, 11 are based upon a selection of them.
20 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
But why did the impartial "patriot" not compare
Maine and Georgia, Michigan and Missouri, Connecticut
and Kentucky, which would have given much fairer re-
sults ? They would have been altogether fairer States to
be compared with each other, in regard to extent, natural
advantages, and history. The educational statistics, espe-
cially, would have confounded Mr. Helper's universal
argument.
X.— HELPER IGXOPJXGr PAUPERS AND CRDIIXALS.
But to his six States Mr. Helper might well have added
some statistics about pauperism and criminality, things
which are regarded by some to be as sure an index of the
state of society as the amount of hay and hemp produced.
We may supply here that little oversight.
TABLE VI. WHOLE NUMBER OF PAUPERS SUPPORTED AND
CRIMINALS CONVICTED WITHIN THE VEAE 1850.
PAUPERS.
States. Population. Paupers. Proportion.
New York 3,097.000 39,835 1 in 50
Virginia 1,421,000 5,118 1 in 200
Massachusetts 904,000 15,777 1 in 60
North Carolina 869,000 1.931 1 in 400
Pennsylvania 2,311,000 11.550 1 in 200
South Carolina .... 668,000 1,642 1 in 400
CRIMINALS.
States. Population. Criminals. Proportion.
New York 3,097,000 10,279. . . 1 in 300
Virginia 1,421,000 107. .. 1 in 13,000
Massachusetts 990,000 7,250. .. 1 in 1,200
North Carolina .... 869,000 647 ... 1 in 1,300
Pennsylvania 2,311,000 858 ... 1 in 3,000
South Carolina 668,000 46. . . 1 in 14,000
But we know well that the result of such comparisons
would destroy the symmetry of the artistico-statistical
work of the patriot, and on that ground he may be par-
doned by an art-loving community.
THE NUMBERS. 21
XL— HELPER ON HAY.
" We can now prove," Mr. H. says, " and we shall now
proceed to prove, that the annual hay crop of the Free
States is worth considerable more, in dollars and cents,
than all the cotton, tobacco, rice, hay, hemp, and cane-
sugar annually produced in the fifteen Slave States." He
quite liberally gives $11 as the average value of a ton of
hay, and produces the following recapitulation :
Hay crop of Free States $142,138,998
Sundry products of Slave States 138,605,723
Balance in favor of Free States $3,533,275
Now, the tables and estimates of Prof. De Bow, w the
able and courteous Superintendent," are quite different.
According to his Compendium of the Census of 1850, we
find the average price of hay to be seven dollars, and that
of the other products differing in a similar way from
Helper's " impartial" estimates. (See tables CLXXXYI.
and CXX. of the United States Census.) Our recapitula-
tion would then present the following figures :
Hay crop of Free States $88,836,874
Sundry products of Slave States 141,100,081
Balance in favor of the South $52,263,807
The value of the cotton crop of 1850 alone exceeded,
according to Prof. De Bow's tables, the hay crop of the
North by 82,000,000. In a similar way might other tables
be modified. Bushel Measure Products would appear as
follows :
Free States $276,830,041
Slave States 244,770,070
Balance in favor of the North $32,069,041
Instead of Mr. Helper's 44,782,636
22 THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
And the Pound Measure Products would present the fol-
lowing table :
Free States $151,260,408
Slave States 155.048,222
Balance in favor of the South S4, 387, 814
Instead of Helper's in favor of the North. . 59,199,108
Besides, the agricultural home manufactures show, ac-
cording to Prof. De Bow, a balance in favor of the South
by more than $8,000,000, which might be added to the
bushels or pounds of the South. The District of Colum-
bia, too, is mentioned there as of some little value, while
in the eyes of the tabulating Mr. Helper it is a perfect
nonentity. But we must abstain from further particulars.
XII.— EXHAUSTION" OF LANDS AND HANDS.
We have pointed out some of the modifications of
which Mr. Helper's numbers are susceptible, though we
consider them one by one. These were, however, but a
few sldrmish.es among the outposts, of little advantage
to either side. We now begin to make more wholesale
work of them, though the main battle is not yet on hand.
Mr. Helper speaks of the exhaustion of the South ;
but his words and conclusions might just as well be ap-
plied to the whole Union. We all — Slave States and Free
States, North and South — are exhausting our lands and
our hands, our soil and our labor, our agriculture and out-
general industry. We take all the different branches of
industry together, because they are as intimately and
naturally connected as the members of our physical bodies.
An injury done to one is an injury done to all. The time
is gradually passing away in which party politicians can
further arouse and excite the producer against the manu-
THE NUMBERS. 23
facturer, or the merchant against either. We begin to
understand that their interests are the same. Long before
Bastiat published his Harmonies Economiques, this prin-
ciple was anticipated. The" systematic exposition of it by
modern economists can leave no doubt in the mind of the
impartial student as to its merits. Let us be glad that
the dark times of industrial enmity are coming to an end !
There is no truth in the old saying, " What one gains,
another must lose !" Our earth is not a pandemonium.
Only as long as men are ignorant of their true self-interest,
is there a " helium omnium adversus omnes" — a war of
everybody against everybody. As society advances and
civilization grows, the great principle of harmony is per-
ceived to reign over all that concerns matter or man.
Let us now refer to our own H. C. Carey, and see
some of the applications of this principle to the United
States. We can not do better than to use his own lan-
guage, for he is the acknowledged apostle of this " har-
mony of interests." He has directed all the powers of
his mind toward that one great principle, and has ex-
pounded it with an energy almost bordering on mono-
mania. We have so much the more a right to quote him,
as he, too, has written statistical works, and also a volume
on Slavery. In his Letter X. to President Buchanan,
he says :
" Throughout the larger portion of the Union the market is distant
hundreds and thousands of miles, and the consequences are seen in
the fact that the soil is becoming almost everywhere exhausted —
wealth thus diminishing when it should increase.
"How it diminishes has recently been shown by an eminent agri-
culturist, from whom we learn :
"That the potash and phosphoric acid annually taken from the
land is worth, at the usual market-price of these commodities, nearly
$20.000.000— scarcely any of which is ever returned.
24 THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
" That the ashes of 600,000,000 bushels of corn are annually taken
from the soil — scarcely any of which are ever returned.
' ' That the total annual waste of the mineral constituents of food is
1 equal to 1,500,000,000 bushels of corn.'
" 'To suppose,' says the author of these estimates — 'to suppose that
this state of things can continue, and we, as a nation, remain pros-
perous, is simply ridiculous. We have as yet much virgin soil, but
it will not be long ere we reap the reward of our present improvidence.
It is merely a question of time, and time will solve the problem in a
most unmistakable manner. What with our earth-butchery and prod-
igality, we are each year losing the intrinsic essence of our vitality.
' ' ' Our country has not yet grown feeble from this loss of its life-
blood, but the hour is fixed when, if our present system continue, the last throb
of the natio?i's heart will have ceased, and when America, Greece, and Rome itill
stand together among the ruins of the past.
" 'The question of economy should be, not, How much do we an-
nually produce, but, How much of our annual productions is saved to
the soil ? Labor employed in robbing the earth of its capital stock
of fertilizing matter, is worse than labor thrown away. In the latter
case, it is a loss to the present generation ; in the former, it becomes
an inheritance of poverty for our successors. Man is but a tenant of
the soil, and he is guilty of a crime when he reduces its value for other
tenants who are to come after him.'
"Waste, such as is here described, Mr. President, is a crime, and it
finds its punishment in the natural, moral, and political decline, to
which your attention has now been called. Look almost where the
traveler may, he is struck with the wretched condition of that which,
in this country, is called agriculture, but which, in the civilized coun-
tries of Europe, would be denominated pure and simple robbery of the
great bank given by the Creator for the use of man. Its effects are
shown in the facts that, in New York, where eighty years since twenty-
five to thirty bushels of wheat were an ordinary crop, the average is
now only fourteen, while that of Indian corn is but twenty-live. In
Ohio, a State that but half a century since was a wilderness, the aver-
age of wheat is less than twelve ; and it diminishes when it should in-
crease. Throughout the West the process of exhaustion is everywhere
going on ; the large crops of the early period of a settlement being
followed invariably by smaller ones in later years."
You may call this a dark picture, or a gloomy prophecy.
But it is the same that Liebig but lately pointed to, from
his far-famed laboratory. It is the same that Fe. List has
deduced from history. It is the same that Peoudiiox reads
THE NUMBERS. 25
in Socialism, when he says : " Of what account can all con-
solidations of properly and artificial manurings be against
such a radical exhaustion !" It is the result of that suici-
dal policy " which first exports food and then men" — that
drives the son from his home and sends him to seek his
fortune in distant lands — that scatters a population over ex-
tensive wastes of land and makes it descend in the scale
of civilization — that disregards the value of productive
power, and looks only at momentary production and gain
— a policy which is ever doomed to pant and to reach after
more lands, though the old homesteads might harbor a
hundred millions more. It is, indeed, excusable if our
countrymen, ashamed of their nation's decay, lose their
patience, and write from abroad : " A nation that can not
make its own clothing, its bunting for its flags, and carry
its own letters, deserves to be placed where foreigners
place us — between the Russians and Xegroes in point of
civilization." And in the face of all this living testimony
of all nations, Mr. Helper indifferently takes up his dark-
lantern, and, negrofied all over, exclaims: "Slavery!
Slavery !" And our poor laborers, still suffering from the
dreadful crisis and general insecurity, listen with mingled
feelings of hope and fear to the false prophet.
National independence, diversity of employment, work
for every talent, consolidation of our settlements, human-
ity to our laborers, humanity to the laborers of the world,
real, solid, undisturbed, steady progress ; all point us to a
home market, to home industry, to a home policy, to home
protection, recommended by all our statesmen, from
Washington, Jefferson, and Madison, to Jackson,
Clay, and Webster, while the party tricksters and mis-
taken philanthropists have, these long years, my stifled the
2
26 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
different interests of the people with the question of
Slavery, as if it were the sole point wherein the nation
was sore and suffering.
It is not our present purpose to adduce extensive facts
and reasonings on the subject of the harmony of the dif-
ferent interests. We only ask our countrymen whether
we might not, with equal propriety, use, at least to a con-
siderable extent, Mr. Helper's language about the South,
in reference to our whole Union. Substituting " Europe"
for " the North," who can fail to be struck with the adapt-
edness of his language to our whole common country — to
the Slave States and to the Free States ?
"Europe is the Mecca of our merchants, and to it they must, and
do, make two pilgrimages per annum — one in the spring and one in
the fall. In one way or another, Ave are more or less subservient to
Europe every day of our lives. In infancy we are swaddled in European
muslin; in childhood we are humored with European gewgaws ; in youth
we are instructed out of Northern hooks [by teachers who have learned
from European volumes, we may add] ; at the age of maturity we
sow our ' wild oats' on European soil ; in middle life we exhaust our
wealth, energies, and talents in the dishonorable vocation u( entailing
our dependence on our children, and on our children's children, and to
the neglect of our own interests and the interests of those around us,
in giving aid and succor to every department of European power; in
the decline of life we remedy our eyesight with European spectacles,
and support our infirmities with European canes; in old age we are
drugged with Northern physic [that may he so to some extent] ; and
finally, when we die, our inanimate bodies, shrouded in Northern cam-
bric [or rather in European broadcloth], are stretched upon a bier,
borne to the grave in a Northern carriage, entombed with a Northern
spade [by an Irish grave-digger], and memorized with a European
slab!"
So we go! There is bathos for you! This is what
somebody calls an inverted climax, or the art of sink-
ing! ^Ir. Helper followed bis man up, or rather down,
to the very grave, than which there is nothing lower!
As we are sadly deficient in that sort of genius, his Ian-
THE NUMBEE8. 27
guagc came to us much a prqpos. A peroration charac-
teristic of this subject of exhaustion!
XIII.— THE FIRST CAUSE AND LAST EFFECT.
In all his hosts of numbers and numerical deductions,
Mr. IIintox liowAx Helper has forgotten one great
agent; namely, Population — the very beginning from
which every number and show-table comes, and the very
end in which they all must concentrate again — the very
original cause and the very ultimate effect — the funda-
mental basis and the crowning top of the whole industrial
edifice, with all its manifold figures, Arabic and Roman.
We will start with a fewr facts or principles, the most
of which are self-evident. Whenever there is any explana-
tion needed, we Avill give it, still as concisely as possible in
order not to interrupt the general train of our argument.
XIV.— POPULATION" THE FUNDAMENTAL CAUSE OF
PRODUCTION.
Production depends upon Population. Where there is
not the latter, the former can not be. The larger the
population is, the more extensive must be production, at
least in our civilized communities. Generally one hundred
men can produce more than fifty can. And, indeed, pro-
duction not only keeps pace with population, but even
goes ahead of it.
This question is of too great importance to be lightly
passed over. For there were those, and probably are still
some, who believe that a curse rests upon all increase of
population. Men came to this belief especially from the
fact that certain nations of modern ages could no longer
support their inhabitants, who therefore were forced to
23 THE AMEKICAN QUESTION.
leave their homes and to seek subsistence in countries as
yet more thinly settled. Philosophers have been very
busy trying to find a cause and a law for this phenomenon.
The English economist, Maltiius, at last thought he had
found them. " Population," he says, " tends to outgrow
the production of food ; Population increases in a geomet-
rical progression, while Production increases only in an
arithmetical one." This theory is in immediate connection
with that of Ricaedo hi regard to the course of cultiva-
tion, namely, "that society begins with cultivating the
most fertile soils, and, as population increases, must take
possession of the poorer and less productive ones." Ac-
cording to this compound theory, Production grows more
slowly than Population. A nation must thus continually
expect smaller returns for the labor of its inhabitants ;
they have less to consume, less to live upon, and poverty
and misery must be the end. Sismoxdi, one of this school
of economists, uses, in this respect, the following precious
words : " As soon as population has increased to too large
an extent, that is, as soon as over-population takes place,
the surplus must yield to a dire necessity. The earth
must swallow again the children she can not nourish."
Providence must thus take refuge in pestilence and war,
and thus decimate human society at proper times; else
over-population will take place, with all its horrors of
poverty and starvation. According to this theory, the hu-
man race has the great privilege of choosing between two
evils — war and murder, or famine and starvation, with some
slight variation of pestilence, or expatriation to a country
where the doom, however, is only delayed for a while.
Let us cast away this direful irony on Nature and
Providence! These learned commentators on the plans
THE NUMBERS. 20
of God have misinterpreted the story of Pandora's box.
Hope is still left to man, and left to him until "he enters
hell." Nature is not so gloomy as their theory, and poor
Providence, too indulgent, must not too often bear the
complaint of friend and foe. Ricardo's hypothesis, on
which, to a great extent, the whole bloody theory is based,
has been found entirely false. Men have everywhere, as
IT. C. Carey has proved, begun with the cultivation of the
higher and less productive soils, and descended gradually
to the lower and more fertile ones, to cultivate which the
first settlers had not the requisite capital. But even with-
out this, knowledge, and capital, and production must
necessarily increase with the increase of population. We
will not further discuss this point, but add some statistical
proofs from the " Testimony of the Nations."
McCulloch says about England: "The population of
England, since the eighteenth century, has doubled ; the
production certainly tripled or quadrupled."
Peuchet, one of the most celebrated statisticians of
Europe, says : " The peasant in France, who formerly had
known but very gross food and unhealthy beverage, has
now meat, wine, bread, and beer. If we turn to Germany,
the change for the better is still more striking than in
France; and thus, while the numbers of the population
are continually increasing, their comforts and enjoyments
are increasing still more rapidly."
A writer in one of the agricultural journals of Bavaria,
after a most careful examination and statistical comparison,
says : " The present emigration from Europe is not com-
manded by necessity. Europe itself is an agricultural con-
tinent. The present population is 263,000,000. If order
and quiet would reign, 400,000,000 of people might easily
g0 THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
be supported." The southeastern part of Russia might
alone feed a whole continent.
Production increases, then, faster than population. That
this is the case with the United States, too, writers of
every description have proved, by filling their volumes
with pleasing tables concerning the great increase of our
material happiness.
We do not wish to be misunderstood in this. We said,
that it is population which causes the production and origi-
nates thus the statistical show-tables of exports and imports,
of agriculture and commerce, and of every item of national
wealth and happiness which can be expressed by numbers.
We went further, even, and showed that a hundred persons
produce not only twice as much as fifty, but even more ;
perhaps three or four times as much — for different reasons
to state which we will not interrupt our general argument.
And this is the opening of our labyrinth ! But we will go
slowly, and may, at our pleasure, safely retrace our steps.
XV.— RATIO OF INCREASE OF POPULATION IN DIF-
FERENT COUNTRIES.
We know now, on the whole, the effect of population
on production. Now let us compare the statistics of our
own country with those of other leading nations of mod-
ern civilization, and see at what rate nations generally
increase in population ! Let us find out whether we, the
United States of America, are above or below the com-
mon rate. We will not now ask why or wherefore, but
only see and compare the statistical facts. Their con-
nected thread will gradually lead us to causes and influ-
ences which worked upon Mr. II.'s show-tables of the
South and of the North.
THE NUMBERS. 31
TABLE VII. EATIO OF XATI'IIAI, CNUBEASE OF POPULATION
OF DIFFERENT COUNTRIES I "l> WITH THE U. S.
[From the Camis of the U. S., 1S50.]
States. Tear, Population. Year. Population.
Great Britain, . . L800 15,800,000 1851 . . .27,475,000
England 1801 8,350,000 L851. . .16,921,000
Ireland 1805 5,395,000 1851 . . . 6,516,000
Scotland 1801 1,008,000 1851... 2,888,000
France .... 1801 27,349,000 1851 . . . 35,783,000
Prussia 1816 10,349,000 1849. . .10,331,000
f Whites.. 4,304,000]
| Fr. Col'd. 108,000 |
United States . . 1800 \ Slaves . . . 893,000 j- 1851
19,553,000
434,000
3,204,000
[ Total.. 5, 305,000 J [ 23,191,000
We will add here the table which shows the increase of
the population of the United States from decennium to
decennium.
TABLE VIII. RATIO OF THE INCREASE OF THE POPULATION
OF THE UNITED STATES FROM DECADE TO DECADE.
Years. Whites. Free Colored. Slaves. Total.
L790 3,172,000 59,000 697,000 3,929,000
1800 4.304,000 108,000 893,000 5,305,000
1810 5,862,000 186,000. . . 1,191,000 7.239,000
1820 7,861.000 238,000. . . 1,538,000 9.638.000
1830. . . . 10,537,000 319,000. . . 2,009,000. . . .12,866,000
1840. . . . 14,195.000. . . . 386,000. . . 2,487,000. . . . 17.009,000
1850. . . . 19,553,000 434,000. . . 3,204.000. . . .23,191,000
\Ye see from these tables that Great Britain has not
quite doubled its population in fifty years. England, sep-
arately or with Scotland, has a little more than doubled, in
the same number of years. France has, during that same
half century, increased its numbers by only a little more
than one half, and Prussia has, during- that time, increased
at about the same rate as England. To double the popu-
lation in about fifty years, has been the highest ratio ob-
tained by any of these modern nations, though some sta-
tisticians state that England doubled its population in forty-
five years. Or, as the Census says : " The annual increase
of the United States has been nearly three times as great
32 TnE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
as that of Prussia, notwithstanding the large population
that was added to her by the partition of Poland ; more than
four times as much as Russia ; six times as much as Great
Britain ; nine times as much as Austria ; ten times as much
as France."
But how does it come that the United States is so much
ahead of any other nation ? During the same fifty years
it has increased its population to almost five times its origi-
nal number. It has not doubled in fifty years, but in
twenty-five, nay, almost in twenty, if we compare only the
white tables.
Everybody will, of course, give immigration as the
reason of this extraordinary increase. But let us see how
much this faster increase of our population is due to immi-
gration.
XVI.— RATIO OF THE NATURAL AND ARTIFICIAL
INCREASE OF THE POPULATION OF THE UNITED
STATES.
Should we proud Republicans, modern Israelites, and
modern Romans — as we are often called — measure our-
selves and our natural productiveness by the standard of
other nations, such as England, France, or Prussia — called
the most enlightened nations of old Europe — our numbers
would, at best, have doubled in fifty years ; that is, our
population would have been, in 1850, 10,610,000, instead
of 23,191,000. There would remain an increase of 12,581,-
000 which could not be accounted for otherwise than by
immigration. Or, if we take only the white population,
there would have been, in 1850, 8,G08,000, instead of
19,553,000, and the immigrants and their descendants
would then be 10,945,000.
Let us see another account. An able statistical writer,
THE NUMBERS. 33
from Washington, who took great pains in his calculations,
arrived, after having carefully counted each year's in-
crease, at the following conclusions :
TABLE IX. — THE NATIVE WHITE POPULATION.
[ From Hunt's MerdiariM Magazine, No. G2TCVI.]
The native white population of the United States, in 1850,
would have been, without immigration since L800 8,995,000
" 1810 10,710,000
" 1820 12,318,000
" 1830 14,330,000
" 1840 10,771,000
And the immigrants and their descendants number, in 1850,
since 1840 3,205.000
" 1830 5,656,000
" 1820 8,069,000
" 1810 9,277,000
" 1800 11,032,000
One account ascribes thus to immigration, since 1800,
12,581,000; the other, 10,945,000; and the third account
gives 11,032,000.
What right have we, now, to reject one of these accounts or
an approximate number ? Do we procreate more children
than other nations? Is our ratio of annual births over
deaths more favorable? Do we live longer? And if
some statisticians wish to have it so, have they ever given
full weight to the effects of immigration on the tables of
population ? If they give the ratio of our natural increase
as being 0.13 or 0.30 per cent, in our favor, may they not
have been slightly mistaken in their difficult calculations ?
Did they know, and if so, did they make due allowances
for the fact, that children of foreign parents, though born
but one day after their mother's arrival on this soil, are all
classed among the natives ? But though the result of our
numerical and ethnological comparisons and deductions
can hardly be doubted, still we will fortify it by another
consideration : namely — the fact that the immigrants in
2*
34 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
crease naturally faster than the natives, and, therefore,
help proportionately more than the natives to fill the tables
of pop ulation. We quote from a speech of the author,
delivered some years ago at Albany :
" This fact," he says, "has hut lately attracted public attention. In
the Massachusetts census of 1855, the reporter, summing up his
statistics, finds that the native population of that State is about three
and a half times larger than the foreign one, hut that the births are
almost equal, 48 per cent, native, and 46 per cent, foreign, the rest
unknown. He looks with Avonderment at those numbers, and comes
to the conclusion that the immigrants must propagate themselves
quicker than the natives. Foreign women, he calculates, must produce
children three times faster than American ladies. Yet this greater
fecundity of foreign women is not confirmed, certainly not to that
extent. Newspapers came, then, to the aid of the perplexed reporter,
and stated that there were more foreign females in Massachusetts than
males ; but this also did not explain the proportion of the increase.
The reporter remains puzzled, and he guesses, at last, that if that
increase goes on at the same ratio, the foreigners will yet swallow the
natives.
"Now, this mystery is fully explained by our above observation,
namely, the great proportion of grown-up persons among the immigrants.
This is the fundamental cause of the faster increase. Take on an
average an equal number of foreigners- and natives, and there will be
more grown-up persons among the foreigners, and therefore more
marriages, and then more children. Many foreigners in that number
will be ready to enter the vineyard of the Lord, and extend the
empire of human flesh, while as many natives are yet lying in their
nurses' arms, with hardly flesh enough for their own tender limbs."
But let us see the proportion of grown persons among
the immigrants. We refer to the table of Mr. Edmund
Flagg, the efficient Superintendent of the Statistical
Bureau of the State Department. It is for the year 1855,
but may well be taken as a standard for former years,
for the proportion of grown persons must in those times
have been still larger, as it is but lately that immigrants
have had the conlidence to come, with their whole fmrilies,
to this "far-off land."
THE NUMBEE8. 35
TABLE X. THE AGE OF IMMIGRANTS.
[From the Report of the Superintendent of the Statistical Bureau of the State
Departnu ntt 1S£5.]
Age.
Males.
Females.
Total.
Under 5 years of age. . . .
. . 8.000..
. . 8,000..
. 16,000
Between 5 and 1Q years.
.. 7,000..
. . 6,000..
. 14,000
10 " 15 " .
.. 0.000..
. . 5,000. .
. . 11,000
15 " 20 " .
.. 8,000..
. .16,000..
. . 34,000
20 " 25 " .
..21,000..
..16,000..
. 40,000
25 " 30 " .
. .22.000..
..10,000..
. . 32,000
30 " 35 " .
..1:5,000..
. . 5,000. .
. . 19,000
35 " 40 " .
.. '.1,000..
.. 4,000. .
. . 12,000
Forty years and upward. .
..12,000..
.. 7.000..
. . 19,000
Age not stated
..11,000..
.. 8;ooo..
. . 19,000
Total
.135,000..
..89.000..
. . 224,000
This table shows that three fourths of the immigrants
may be taken as persons between the ages of fifteen and
forty-five. Now, set these two classes of new-comers in our
nation at work — on one hand you have the products of
natural increase by birth, on the other the products
of artificial increase by immigration ; — the former nothing
but frail little children, to be petted and nursed for years
to come ; 75 per cent, of the latter commonly stout and
healthy, and at once ready to work and produce ; — the
former yet exposed to all those decimations by the diseases
and dangers of the young ; the others, already tried and
decimated on land and sea, and only those of them counted
who had stood the trial ! Now, let this process go on
year after year, which will increase proportionately faster ?
But we will be liberal toward ourselves ! We will not
take the twelve millions, or the eleven millions. We will,
on account of the somewhat greater mortality of foreign
children, go still a million or so lower, and say that about
one half of the white population of the United States in
1850 is due to the immigrants and their descendants since
the year 1800.
36
THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
[According to the well-known statistician, F. H. Bea-
chelli, the number of inhabitants of German origin, in 1856,
was 5,250,000, viz., about the fifth of the then population
of the United States. If we now add to this number of
Germans the large Irish immigration, and then that of the
other nations of Europe, our own account will be found
rather too low than too high.]
And if, then, it is true that about one half of the white pop-
ulation of the United States is due to the immigrants and
their descendants since 1800, would it not be a fair con-
clusion, too, that the statistical show-tables of " material"
products — and such are most of those expressed by num-
bers— owe at least half their swellings to the immigrants ?
Which class of inhabitants are chiefly engaged in " mate-
rial" production? We may be allowed to quote once
again from an address of the author :
" Certainly, this Union might have reached its present power — I do
not say without immigration at all (for we are all immigrants), hut
without immigration since 1800 — hut not so soon, not so fast ; it would
have had to toil and to grow yet many years to come. There would
now he less capital here, less cultivated land, less commerce ; there
would he fewer engines, fewer shops, fewer roads, fewer vessels, fewer
houses and palaces, fewer comforts, and fewer luxuries. Your men-of-
war, your fortifications, your public buildings, your power at home.
your power abroad throughout the world, your private and public
treasuries would dwindle, and many of the natives who arc now man-
agers, and conductors, and directors, and merchants, and speculators,
and officers, and reverends, and doctors, and judges, and-senators, most
honorable Senators, many of them, would now be common day-labor-
ers, mechanics, instructors, or canal diggers—professions which arc
most graciously left to the foreigner— prof ssions of less honor, of less
pay, bul of more labor."
The same language may be observed in the columns of
the New York Tribune (March 11, 1859) :
"Our able and ambitious youth arc attracted to trade, to the profes-
sions, to fillibustering of some sort— rarelj to any form of productive
THE NUMBERS. 37
industry. Advertise to-day for a man to manage a farm, and three
fourths of the responses ^ill come from men of European birth. Ad-
vertise for a boy in a lawyer's office, a clerk in a store, a partner in a
venture to Pikes Peak, and two thirds of the responses will come from
native Americans. We arc, as a people, intent on getting suddenly rich
by some kind of speculation, rather than on slowly acquiring a com-
petence by industry."
Thus, should the above number of the foreigners and
their descendants be found even somewhat too large, there
would be no doubt about our final conclusion, that at least
one half of the common production of the country is due
to them.
XVII.— RATIO OF IMMIGRATION IN THE DIFFERENT
STATES OF THE UNION.
"We have thus seen how much of the population and
how much of its more rapid increase, how much of the
production and how much of its larger tables, must be due
to immigration. We now will ascertain what portion of
this immigration fell to the part of the South, and how
much to the part of the Xorth, and then we will try to
find the causes of the difference.
"We take again the Census of the United States f&r
1850. There we will see the proportion of foreigners —
"not born here" — to the natives, "born here, whether
from native or foreign parents." For the official census is
liberal toward the children created abroad but born here ;
they are all called " natives." Our tables, however, do not
suffer in this case, since all States are treated alike liberally.
[We expressly give our statistical tables in round num-
bers, in order to impress more strongly their general
character, and the proportion of their difference when
compared with one another.]
38 TnE AMERICAN QUESTION.
TABLE XI. THE RATIO OF FOREIGNERS IN THE FREE STATES.
[From the Official Census of the United States, 1850.]
Free States. Total Inhabitants. Foreigners.
California 92.000 21,000
Connecticut 370.000 38,000
Illinois 851,000 111,000
Indiana 988,000 55,000
Iowa 192,000 20.000
Maine 583,000 31.000
Massachusetts 994,000 163,000
Michigan 397.000 54.000
New Hampshire 317,000 14.000
New Jersey 489,000 59,000
New York 3,092.000 G55.000
Ohio 1,980,000 218,000
Pennsylvania 2,311,000 303.000
Rhode Island 147,000 23.000
Vermont 314,000 33,000
Wisconsin 305,000 110,000
Total 13,434,000 1,908,000
THE RATIO OF FOREIGNERS IN THE SLAVE STATES.
Slave States. Total Inhabitants. Foreigners.
Alabama 771,000 7,000
Arkansas 209,000 1,000
Delaware 92,000 5,000
Florida 87,000 2,000
Georgia 906,000 6,000
Kentucky 982,000 31,000
Louisiana 517,000 67.000
.Mai viand 583,000 51,000
Mississippi 606,000 4,000
Missouri 682,000 76,000
North Carolina 869,000 2,000
South Carolina 668,000 8,000
Tennessee 1,002,000 5,000
Texas 212,000 17.000
Virginia 1,421,000 22,000
Total 9,612,000 304,000
XVIII.— CAUSE OF TnE DIFFERENCE IN THE PROPOR-
TION OF IMMIGRANTS IN THE DIFFERENT STATES
OF THE UNION.
During our whole argument we heard frequent whispers
of: "Slavery! all due to Slavery!" We will now make
some " excerpts" from the above statistical tables, in order
to see whether those whispers were oraculous.
THE NUMBERS. 39
TABLE XII. DIFFBEENCE IX THE PBOPOBTTON OF IMMI-
GRAXTS IN PBEE STATES.
gTATE8 Square Miles. Foreigners.
New York 47,000 665,000
Pennsylvania 46,000 303,000
Massachusetts 7,000 l63»595
V-ermoni 8,000 33,000
New Hampshire 8,000 H,000
Wisconsin 53,000 110,000
Michigan 50,000 54,000
TABLE XIII. DIFFERENCE IN THE PBOPOBTION OF IMMI-
GRANTS IN SLAVE STATES.
States Square Miles. Foreigner?.
South Carolina 28,000 8,000
Georgia 58,000 0,000
Kentucky' 37,000 31,000
Louisiana 41,000 07,000
Tennessee 44,000 5,000
Florida 59,000 2,000
Alabama 50,000 7,000
TABLE XIV. DIFFERENCE IN THE PROPORTION OF IMMI-
GRANTS IN SLAVE AND FREE STATES COMPARED.
Stvtes Square Miles. Foreigners.
Maryland (Slave) 11,000 51,000
Maine (Free) 35,000 31,000
Louisiana (Slave) 41,000 07,000
Iowa (Free) 50,000 20,000
California (Free) 188,000 21,000
Missouri (Slave) 65,000 76,000
Michigan (Free) 50,000 54,000
TABLE XV. SOME ADDITIONAL DIFFERENCES IRRESPECTIVE
OF SQUARE MILES.
Free and Slave States.
States. Foreigners.
Mississippi (Slave) 70,000
[owa (Free) 20,000
Maryland (Slave) 51,000
Free States.
States. Foreigners.
Connecticut 88,000
Khode Island 23,000
Massachusetts 163,000
Illinois 111,000
New Jersey 59,000
Wisconsin 710,000
Indiana 55,000
Vermont (Free) 33,000
New Hampshire (Free) ... 14,000
Kentucky (Slave) 31,000
Maine (Free) 31,000
There are four tables as simple as the multiplication
table. In the first of them there are seven Free States. In
none of these is there any Negro Slavery. Why, then, is
there such a difference in their share of immigrants ? N ew
York and Pennsylvania have about the same number of
40 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
square miles ; but the former has about twice as mauy im-
migrants. Vermont and New Hampshire, too, have about
the same area ; but the former, again, has o*ver one half
more foreigners than the latter. Massachusetts, with
about 1,000 square miles less than either, has still more
than ten times as many foreigners as the one, and five
times as many as the other. Wisconsin, with about the
same number of square miles as Michigan, has more than
twice as many foreigners. Has Southern Negro Slavery ex-
erted its whimsical influence even on the Northern States ?
But look at the second table. There, again, are seven
States. Ah Slave States ! And still, South Carolina, with
an area half that of Georgia, has one fourth more immi-
grants. Louisiana has only one seventh more square miles
than Kentucky, and still has more than double the num-
ber of immigrants. It has fewer square miles than Ten-
nessee, but twelve times as many foreigners. Florida and
Alabama have about the same area, but the latter has two
thirds more foreigners. What is the reason of this differ-
ence ? Negro Slavery again ? Is Negro Slavery blacker
in Florida than in Alabama ? Is the Nesn'O less a Neoro
in Louisiana than in Tennessee ?
Let us pass on to the third table. Another seven States,
some Free, some Slave. There is Maryland with its Slavery,
and Maine with its Freedom. And still Maryland, with
only one third of the area of Maine, has 20,000 more immi-
grants. Louisiana has one fifth less square miles than
Iowa, and still the Slave State has three times as many
foreign inhabitants as the Free. California, with more
than four times as many square miles as Louisiana, has
three times less foreigners. Missouri, with one seventh
more square miles than Michigan, has two sevenths more
THE NUMBERS. 41
foreigners. Has, in these cases, Negro Slavery been an
attractive force ?
Or, let ns take Northern and Southern States without
reference to square miles, as in the fourth table ; for there
is, both South and North, plenty of room for a hundred
times more immigrants. Has Negro Slavery caused Con-
necticut to have more foreign inhabitants than Rhode
Island ? Massachusetts more than Illinois or New Jersey ?
Wisconsin more than Indiana? Mississippi more than
Iowa ? Maryland more than Vermont or New Hampshire ?
Kentucky the same number as Maine ?
Or, compare the number of foreigners in each State with
its native population ; or the number of foreigners to the
square mile with all the inhabitants to the square mile ;
the different States will most stubbornly resist a common
ride or law, but especially will they object to such quack
barometers as the deus ex machina invented by Mr. Hix-
ton Rowan Helpek.
From the facts and numbers presented by us, any im-
partial reader must see that there were other causes at
work besides Slavery to direct the waves of emigration,
and to produce such a difference in the numbers of foreign-
ers in the different States. From the earliest period of our
Union, the emigrants have chosen certain ports, which were
not pointed out to them by the white or black color of some
of the inhabitants, but by the great order of Nature. Places
like Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, or New
Orleans were the great and tried harbors to receive the
emigrants. They were the great starting-points selected
by Nature as the principal thoroughfares of the Western
Continent. Many of the emigrants, then, when once ar-
rived on the shores of their "Promised Land," would
42 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
not, could not, wander far into the interior, and only a
small minority went out of the regular course to States
and places on the left or on the right.
As the inland routes were gradually opened, they moved
in larger numbers farther to the West. This was in ac-
cordance with the country's policy, which, on the whole,
was to scatter the population over an area as large as pos-
sible, to form new Territories and new States, to get new
agricultural products to exchange for foreign fabrics, in-
stead of building up the home market, and consolidating
and developing the old lands and States. But when the
emigrants saw their plans thwarted in the East, and new
hopes and "free homesteads" held out in more distant
regions, whither should they move ? Neither was cotton the
article of growth which they were acquainted with, nor had
the South the climate which they were accustomed to
in the countries from which most of them came. They,
therefore, went North and West! Says the celebrated
statistician, G. F. Kolb : " It is the climate similar to that
of Central Europe which attracts the emigrants to the
North (Did West of the United States, in preference to
any other land." We add here a table which shows which
climate sends the most emigrants, and which might thus
expect the most :
TABLE XVI. PLACES OF BIRTH OF THE FOREIGN POTT J. A-
TION OF THE UNITED STATES.
{From the Ce?isus of the United States, 1950.]
States. Number.
England 278,000
Ireland 901,000
Scotland 70,000
Wales 29,000
Germany 573,000
Belgium 1 ,000
Holland 9.000
Switzerland 13,000
Total 2,110,000
Static.
A.ub1 ria
Number.
900
1 000
Norway
12,000
1 Vninark.
1,000
Sweden
3,000
Prussia
10,000
British America
.... 147,000
THE NUMBEES 43
2,116,200 emigrants come from the Northern and Middle
States of Europe, and the total number is only 2,212,000 !
How many remain to be counted to the southern parts of
the world ? France, Italy, Spain, Greece, Mexico, and the
whole of Asia, have only about 90,000 to be divided among
them.
There is, then, the climate, the geographical position,
the river-beds, the bays and the harbors, the lakes, the
mountains and valleys, the soils and the zones, and many
other natural facts, which determined the future of this
whole continent and of the different States long before the
first foot of civilized man touched this soil. The Tiber and
the Thames, the Nile and the Rhine, had their histories
predicted by the Book of Nature long before a Rome or a
London, before pyramids or castles, were dreamt of. And
so the St. Lawrences, the Hudsons, and the Mississippis
of this continent had their future marked out long before
31r. Helpee came, trying to negrofy our understandings.
XIX.— EFFECT OF IMMIGRATION ON TIIE SIIOW-TABLES
OF THE SOUTH AND OF THE NORTH.
Let us now sum up this whole matter of immigration.
We have stated and proved that population is the funda-
mental cause of all production ;
That if the population increases, the production must
increase at a still higher ratio; or that, if there are twice
as many persons at work, they will " manufacture" thrice
or four times as large and as plentiful show-tables of every
sort and material ;
That population in our land increases at a most enor-
mous rate, and that neither England nor France can keep
up with it ;
44 • THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
That this extra glory is, however, not due to any natu-
ral privilege, but to the immigrants, of whom seventy-five
per cent, are, like Melchisedek, already grown up when
they are born ; or — what is the same for all practical con-
siderations— when they are borne to this country ;
That at least one half of the population of the United
States iii 1850 is due to the immigrants and their descend-
ants since 1800 ;
That the different States, whether Free or Slave, had
different proportions of these immigrants ;
That this difference can not be explained alone by Mr.
Helper's universal cause of everything under creation :
namely, Negro Slavery ;
That nature has marked out the course of empires, and
that Providence does not first make cities and then rivers
to flow by them, and at last shores and banks to keep them
in proper limits.
And now, if we take another look at the tables we
have presented, we see that the whole number of foreign-
ers— foreign-born inhabitants — in these United States is
2,212,000, of which the Free States take about six sevenths,
and the Slave States only one seventh.
If, now, we take this as a general ratio — and we may,
according to other tables, fairly do so — of the whole im-
migration and descendants since 1800, and call this whole
immigration only 10,000,000, we find that 8,500,000 of
these artificial helps were allotted to the North, while the
South received only 1,500,000.
Now, set two countries, or two sections of a country, at
work, the one receiving annually a fresh supply of men
and women at the rate of 7,000 to every 1,000 of the
other — continue this process for a period of fifty years,
THE NUMBERS. 45
these foreign men and women continually digging and
toiling, producing matter and men with eagerness, in-
creasing in numbers at rates so astonishing, cultivating
lands, working day, and even night, in the sweat of their
faces, with bodies stout and hands accustomed to labor,
bringing millions of dollars into the country, saving old
and laying up new stock, increasing and thriving lustily
on a fresh and grateful soil, in a free land, in the very
midst of industrial progress, in an era to which none pre-
vious in history can be compared as to swiftness of pro-
duction and effective means and instruments to assist the
hand of man — let these proportions (seven to one), under
such most favorable circumstances, and under influences
never dreamed of before, work on for a period of fifty
years — add then to this, if you please, the difference be-
tween the Northern and the Southern laborer — take the
Negro as he is, wholly barbarous, half barbarous, or half
civilized, unskillful at least, for many years, causing for a
long period a heavy draft on Southern treasure for the
purchase-money (mostly paid to Northern traders) — a
slave, too, and, as such, ready and willing to work only
because and when he must — a slave noic, to be a slave
forever, as far as he knows, without hope of position or
of gain ; while the immigrant brings, at least, traces of
the civilization of the world with him, is a free man,
works for himself, appropriates whatever wages he may
make and whatever his wife and children may earn — the
master of his hands, of his family, of his property, with
considerable chances for honor and position even — let the
two sections under such different influences work on for
a period of fifty years, and at the end of this period com-
pare the numbers and figures, the statistical tables of
4Q THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
wealth and of products, of commerce, agriculture, and
manufactures of the one section and the other, aside from
all the various natural causes favorable to the one and
disadvantageous to the other — will you be surprised to
find the tables of the one much lower than those of the
other ?
We are not surprised that the statistical tables of the
North are so much larger than those of the South, but
we are surprised that they are as large in the South as
they are. The South has done more than we should have
expected, under existing circumstances.
But, let none imagine that should the South at once
liberate all its slaves, there would be such a rush of immi-
grants as Mr. Helper would like to see, by the aid of his
dark-lantern. It will take many generations to accustom
the Northern-born native, or foreigner, to more Southern
climes, and only a slow and steady advance will, or can,
give the South the artificial aid which will enable it
to increase more rapidly in numbers and men. And this
slow and steady advance, as far as destined by Nature,
has been going on this long time, in spite of Negro
Slavery, which, to be sure, has lessened the pressure, but
could not stem the flood. But that rush of foreign-
ers can not, even in the North, always remain the
same. It has probably reached its crisis. It will, and
d.oes sink, and in the same manner the Northern show-
tables will and do sink, while the South, less accustomed
to artificial aid, will feel less the growing want. There is
not total darkness in the future of the South ! Let
it manage its powers well! Let it give a willing ear
to the teachings of history ! Perhaps De Soto's dreams
about the Valley of the Mississippi may yet be realized,
THE NUMBERS. 47
and in that great central empire of the continent of North
America, the South " will not be the least among the
children of Israel."
XX.— THE ULTIMATE EFFECT OF PRODUCTION ON
POPULATION.
It is a question, after all, whether the greater amount of
production in a country is a sure index of a corresponding
degree of happiness and welfare among its people. Al-
ready the Italian economist, Fuoco, said: "Not produc-
tion, but distribution, is the first and principal question in
economy."
And Blaxqxji, in his " History of Political Economy,"
called this same idea " the great motto of the social science
of the nineteenth century."
One nation may, indeed, produce a vast amount of ma-
terial products, and still keep the producers, especially
the laborers, in a miserable condition, by giving them but
a small share in the common produce. Another nation
with a smaller amount of products may distribute this
amount more equally and proportionately, and thereby
procure a greater amount of common happiness. Just as
in the case of families. One father may gain twice the
amount that another does, but use proportionately six times
as much to gratify his own selfish appetites. The family
of the latter will be the better off; there will be a greater
amount of happiness caused by a smaller amount of
means. In a nation, the fathers with the depraved appe-
tites are the rich and privileged squanderers. The whole
principle may be stated thus : A nation is well off, not in
proportion to the amount, but to the equal distribution
4g THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
and the rational use of its wealth and products — a field as
yet little explored by the science of statistics !
Without now going further into an elaborate discussion
and explanation of this question, however important it
may be, we will merely state that the natural increase of a
people, their quality remaining unimpaired, is generally
taken as an index of the degree of their happiness. But
we repeat, this increase shows less the amount of the
production of wealth, than the proportion of its distribu-
tion. The principle itself, however, is unassailable in its
general bearing.
We now apply this to the population of the South.
XXI— THE NEGRO MULTIPLYING— HIS SHOW-TABLES
ALL RIGHT.
We will compare the Negroes under different masters.
H. C. Caeey, in his work, " The Slave Trade, Domestic
and Foreign," Chapter II., shows that in all the British
Islands where there was Negro Slavery, the Slaves
universally decreased in number. He first takes up Jamai-
ca, and shows that the number of Negroes imported into
that island can not have been less than 700,000. "If
to these," he continues, " we were to add the children
that must have been born on that island in the long period
of 1*78 years, and then to reflect that all who remained for
emancipation amounted to only 311,000, we should find
ourselves forced to the conclusion that Slavery was here
attended with a destruction of life without a parallel in the
history of any civilzed nation." In St. Vincent, the
births steadily diminished in number. In British Guiana,
there was a decrease of 12,000 from 77,000 in fifteen
years ! and a similar decrease in other colonial posses-
THE NUMBERS. 49
sions. The number emancipated in the West Indies
was 660,000, while the number imported and retained for
home consumption had certainly amounted to 1,700,000.
Had Mr. Helper known this, or spoken of it, how " the
chevaliers of the lash, and the robbers and the murderers,"
would have again flown from his lips ! But let us see
what the statesman and economist Carey says, who
has certainly as much philanthropy as the showman,
Helper :
11 While thus exhibiting the terrific waste of life in the British
Colonies, it is not intended either to assert or deny any voluntary
severity on the part of the land-holders. They were, themselves, as
will hereafter be shown, to a great extent, the slaves of circumstances,
over which they had no control, and it can not be doubted that much, very
much, of the responsibility must rest on other shoulders !"
This is the same H. C. Carey whom Mr. Helper brings
up among his Testimonies of Living Witnesses ! Might there
not, in the South of our country, too, some such extenu-
ating circumstances have been found which should have
tempered somewhat Mr. H.'s wrath and bridled his bloody
tongue ? We will see !
Mr. Carey passes on to Negro Slavery in the Union, and
after a most careful examination and comparison of statis-
tical tables, gives us what he calls " a tolerable approxi-
mation to the number of Slaves imported into the territory
now constituting the Union, namely, on the Avhole,
333,500."
" The number," he says, " now in the Union exceeds
3,800,000 ; and even if we estimate the import as high as
380,000, we then have more than ten for one ; whereas in
the British Islands we can find not more than two for five,
and perhaps even not more than one for three. Had the
Slaves of the latter been as well fed, clothed, lodged, and
3
5Q THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
otherwise cared for, as were those of these Provinces and
States, their numbers would have reached seventeen or
twenty millions. Had the blacks among the people of
these States experienced the same treatment as did their
fellows of the islands, we should now have among us less
than one hundred and fifty thousand Slaves !"
Has not Mr. Helper been " too hasty in making up his
mind on the subject," though he says the contrary ? Has
he not "jumped at conclusions," though he denies it?
Has he acted with " perfect calmness and deliberation," as
he so naively asserts ? He says, that " the non-slavehold-
ing white of the second degree of Slavery is treated by
the slaveholders as if he were a loathsome beast." How
must the Negro of the first degree of Slavery have been
treated ? Who or what stands a degree lower than " a
loathsome beast?" Mr. Helper's dictionary of Vile
Words not being at hand, the question must remain un-
answered for the present.
And still, the Negro lived, his cheeks grew fat, his body
plump, he multiplied and replenished the earth, and we
have seen as jolly a crowd of darkies down in Richmond,
as ever on Boston Common or in the Wilds of Africa !
Now, who tells a falsehood, Mr. Helper or his Num-
bers? It is the old story again! The Numbers are all
well. But Mr. H. sees " through a glass darkly."
XXIL— EVERYBODY LIVING LONGER THERE WHERE
THE " NIGGERS" ARE.
Those Southerners, in spite of their Negro Slavery,
have still produced something. They have, as Mr. Hel-
per indirectly proves, sorm agriculture, some manufacture,
some cotton, some banks, some railroads ; they write, or
THE NUMBERS. 51
at least send, through the post-office some letters, found some
schools and libraries, publish some newspapers, give some
votes, build some churches, get out some patents, some Bibles
and some tracts, harbor some foreigners, send out some mis-
sionaries, and do something for colonization and civilization.
But not only this : we find at the end that these people
" down South" do, after all, not suffer a great deal from
their producing only some rye, and some wheat, and some
newspapers, and some lot cabbage, for : Tliey do not only
not die faster than the Northern people, hut, on the contrary,
they are healthier and live longer. We add a table to
prove :
TABLE XVII. — RATIO OF DEATHS TO LIVING POPULATION.
{From the Official Compendium of Mr. Helper's Crisis.]
Motto of his Title-page.— " The liberal deviseth liberal things, and by
liberal things shall he stand."— Isaiah.
States. Percentage.
Southern States (Slave) 1 in 74.60
Northern States (Free) 1 in 72.39
TABLE XVIII. AMERICAN LONGEVITY.
[From a recent edition of Blake's Biographical Dictionary.']
States. Number of Deceased Centenarians.
Southern States (Slave) 68
Northern States (Free) 59
The reason for this greater Mortality and shorter Lon-
gevity in the Northern States must lie somewhere hidden
among " the Potatoes, the Clover-Seeds, the Brood Mares,
the Beans and Peas, the Stall-fed Beef, and other Produce,"
from which Mr. Helper so scientifically draws his argu-
ments.
Now, which is the better of the two? To produce
fast and die fast, or to produce slower and live longer?
Of what use is all our digging out, and heaping up, and
gathering in, when during all the trouble necessary in this
52 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
process of production and reproduction, our heads grow
light, our hearts gloomy, and our bodies lank, and at the
end of the whole affaire, when at last the time for enjoy-
ment should have arrived, Pale Death comes to give us
kindly the last stroke, that sends us beyond the reach of
the dunghills of our material wealth ?
While the reader is left for a moment to himself to de-
cide which part to choose, we will gather up whatever is
left of Mr. H.'s statistical existence.
XXIII.— THE POSTERIOR PART OF MR. HELPER'S STA-
TISTICAL BODY.
The main body of Mr. H.'s statistics is contained in
that part of his Compendium which precedes the Dead
and Living Testimony. We are through with that. There
remains now nothing but the Appendix, which, by-the-by,
has all the characteristics of appendixes in general. It is
protracted, unmeaning, and winds up in a curl.
There is a whole sea of mysterious numbers, all care-
fully labeled with " Negro Slavery," and any amount of
Northern gewgaws, strewn around like Yankee notions,
interspersed with sundry rhetorical nourishes " excerped"
and repeated from the Body of his Statistics. It is a kind
of deluge after the Testimony of the " Wiser and Better''
men.
But, unconsciously or with his wonted impartiality, Mr.
Helper puts, at times, some seasoning in, which makes
the surface a little more palatable. Such is his innocent
slur on the number-filled North. To be sure, he does not
spare the Southern " breeder, buyer, and seller of bipedal
black cattle, who withal professes to be a Christian," but
he speaks also of " Northern quacks, Northern lashes for
THE NUMBERS. 53
Southern slaves, Northern gimcracks and haberdashery."
This is quite a relief. But the Northern pianos, Northern
knives, and Northern apparel are carefully repeated. We
at first thought, in seeing these old faces again : " Hero
beginneth the second" edition of the same book !
But the most attractive part in this appendix of several
chapters, is the grand display of Mr. Helper's logic, un-
assisted by the dark-lantern. For it must not be ex-
pected that he again brings forth but one reason — namely,
his old cherished Negro Slavery. Not at all ! The ap-
pendix hangs rather loose from the body and plays its
capers with wanton individuality.
We will now give the curious reader a few examples
of that caudal logic :
He says that the South has contributed but little
to the cause of Negro Slavery in Kansas, and the reason
of it is, not Negro Slavery this time, but the poverty
and the niggardliness of the Southerners. This exceptio
hi principiis would be admissible were it not for the deli-
cacy of its terminology.
In his chapter on offices, he proves that the Southern-
ers have, in most cases, the majority, all on account of
Negro Slavery ; but when he accidentally finds an office
where the Northerners happen to have the majority, he
does not give Negro Slavery as the reason, but superior
or special talent which can only be grown up North. (Mr.
Helper is from North Carolina.)
He shows, then, the comparative literary character of
the North and of the South, by giving the number of
newspapers, and especially the circulation of the New
York Tribune and the New York Herald in the Free and
Slave States. We think, of course, highly of the news-
54 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
paper, but that would be stretching its influence ultra
modum et decorum.
He also measured the physical and mental activity of
the members of the United States Senate, by the number
of public documents they frank. According to this calcu-
lation, Chandler, of Michigan, has over twenty times as
much of that article as Crittenden, from Kentucky. And
Douglas, of Illinois, has three hundred times as much as
Sumner, of Massachusetts. "This shows, also," Mr. H.
says, "that the people of the South are not a reading
people; but tobacco, politics, and especially fine-looking
wenches, constitute the warp and woof of their conversa-
tion." Mr. Douglas sent 345,000 documents, that is, more
than all the Free States Senators together (Mr. Chandler
excepted). He is not one of "the lazy pro-slavery offi-
cials," we suppose, " who perpetuate the ignorance and
degradation of their constitutents."
He complains that he was not able to publish his book
in the South, when he had just given extracts from the
Charleston Standard, which in strong terms criticised the
condition of the South. This is called by logicians a con-
tradictio in adjecto.
He thinks, too, that the city which publishes the most
books and papers must, eo ipso, be also the most literary.
Poor " country folks," like Mr. Helper and his reviewer,
must renounce their fame to the glory of New York, Bos-
ton, or Philadelphia. And then lie adds, that the execu-
tors and agents of Calhoun, Benton, Simms, and other
Southern writers, send their works to be published in New
York. The reason for this strange phenomenon is Negro
Slavery, and, therefore, all right !
These examples are all nicely set up in copious num-
THE NUMBERS. 55
bers, and surrounded with occasional winnings, such as
about the poor women working in the field, whom he
would like to advance into the frying-pans of factories.
But at last he proves that the non-slaveholding whites
are very illiterate, and thus, we humbly think, that they
can not read, much less understand, his book ! Now, this
crowns the whole ! Poor Mr. Helper can neither reach
his subject nor his object. He is no agitator ! He only
addresses the non-slaveholding whites, and for them he
wrote his book ! and, now, on the very last pages of his
volume, he proves that his clients can not read! Why
did he not first write a "Webster's Spelling-Book" for
the non-slaveholding whites of the South ?
And thus he winds himself through, until, on the last
page, hi " indignation and disgust" over what he wrote,
he curls up in the following graceful style :
" Southern Literature is a travesty on the profession of
letters" and " Southern Religion is a stench in the nostrils
of Christendom."
Negro-nursed Washington ! first son of the South and
of the Union! ward off the heartless curses of a per-
verted man, whose motive may be good, but whose
tongue runs loose and wild. There is now a dearth of
great men, North and South ! Send us whole-souled men,
no matter what zone or section may produce them ! We
do not need, as yet, "American Platos, Homers, Shak-
speares, and Humboldts," but send us a few more States-
men, who, dispassionate but unflinching in their princi-
ples, are able to lead our great empire safely through the
storms that overhang it !
56 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
XXIV.— CONCLUSION.
We think we have thus proved, in this Book, that the
famous Numbers, or, in other words, the Statistical Dispari-
ties between the Free and the Slave States, do not justify
our resorting to violent words and violent measures,
whereby we increase the enmity between the two sec-
tions, and make the Union appear less desirable and less
honorable.
They give us no reason why we should be ashamed of
the South, and throw heartless curses on its land and
people.
But we must here abstain from any general remarks on
the great question. In this first Book we have strictly
confined ourselves to the Numbers ; in the second, we will
treat, in a similar way, the Testimonies. After having,
then, overthrown these two separate arguments, we will
face the whole question.
BOOK II
THE TESTIMONIES.
book: ii.
THE TESTIMONIES.
IK EEPLT TO CHAPTERS II., III., IV., V., VI., VII., AND VIII.
OF MR. HELPER'S COMPENDIUM.
I.— SINGLE TESTIMONIES.
We will now show that the Testimonies of single men
and nations, taken from their historical connections, have
no better claim than the Numbers.
"Were we to follow separate testimonies, we would for-
ever be tossed around as on a stormy sea, knowing not
whither to go. But there is a steady progress of human-
ity— a progress which gradually corrects or overrides all
individual fancies and theories, and teaches us, in the
plastic forms of real events, the ways and measures for
our future course.
But before we lay before the reader the mark-stones of
this progress, and give Slavery its relative place therein,
we will first pass in review the Testimonies as they are
presented by Mr. Helper. We take him again, because
he has classified them better than any one before him.
We may seemingly aid Mr. O'Conor, but we do this
only in order to overthrow, once for all, that double-faced
sophistry which draws its arguments from single and dis-
connected Testimonies.
60 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
II.— THE CHAPTERS III. TO IX. OF MR. HELPER'S
COMPENDIUM.
At the beginning of ChajDter m., Mr. Helper advises
the people " to forget for a moment what he has written
on the subject of Slavery, and to ignore all that he may
write hereafter." Though it be difficult for us to forget or
to ignore what he has not yet said, the object of the advice
is highly commendable. For, after having given his own
opinion, he now appeals to the "sayings of wiser and
better men," to collect which has cost him " much time,
labor, and money." Our indebted coimtry has probably,
by this time, repaid him amply for his trouble. Trouble
it must, indeed, have been to collect such an array of
opinions, and all of them well assorted, in Mr. Helper's
style — first Southern Testimony, then Northern, afterward
the Testimony of the Nations, then that of the Churches,
three pages of Bible Testimony, and, at last, thirty pages
of Living Witnesses to bring up the rear ! A formidable
array, forsooth ! But though his course differs sadly from
that which he promises in his introductory chapter, where
he says, " It is not our purpose to draw a broad line of
distinction between right and wrong, to point out the
propriety of morality and its advantages over immorality,
nor to waste time in pressing a universally-admitted truism,
that virtue is preferable to vice," still we take his issue,
and put these abstract opinions in their proper light.
Should we, perhaps, at times, throw too much shadow
upon the picture, we must be excused ; for Mr. Helper,
has certainly been too light, and airy, and spiritual in this
part of the work. Wherever his heavy and dark brush
appears, we will not fail to supply the necessary light.
THE TESTIMONIES.
61
III.— THE TESTIMONY OF THE UNION.
Mr. Helper seems, at first, to know the way Ave ought
to follow. But when we think ourselves near the longed-
for aim, we perceive that he, like an ignis fatuus, has led
us astray. We seem, indeed, to be in duty bound, in
these moments of danger, to wander religiously to the
graves of our noble forefathers who have made us one and
united, and to seek at their shrine light and knowlege for
our fear-beset ways. But when, with Helper's help, we
are at the sacred spot hallowed by the memories of com-
mon struggles and the time-honored compact of our Union,
what does Mr. H. show us ? Naught but mangled bones,
torn with sacrilegious hand from venerable bodies ! For
such are his " excerpts" and " extracts."
We can not and we will not deny the noble sentiments
of the founders of our republic. We know that Freedom,
in the abstract, finds more sympathizers among the great
and noble of this world, than Tyranny and Slavery. We
know that our forefathers, almost to a man, thought our
Slavery to be an evil, and we honor them for it. But did
they ever use such language as Mr. Helper ? Did they
ever propose such schemes and measures ? He has shown
in what respect our common forefathers agreed with
his own sentiments, why did he not show, too, in what
they disagreed with him ? Washington, " the father of
our country," an example to us in all that is really good and
great — though he had such ardent wishes for the gradual
abolition of Slavery, what measures did he propose ?
What plans did he favor ? Or, was Lafayette's scheme,
in form or spirit, anything like that of our modern philan-
thropist ? Or, was Franklin's Society for Promoting the
g2 THE AMEEICAX QUESTION.
Abolition of Slavery anything like that corporation of
Non-Conformists which he proposes among the non-slave-
holding whites of the South ? Or, where are the rebel-
lious harangues of Jefferson, who yet called the Slaves
" citizens and brethren ?" Where the great stratagems and
proposals of Madison, who yet opposed the introduction
of the term " Slave" or "Slavery" into the Constitution?
Or, has Mr. Helper more greatness of soul than Washing-
ton, more stern republicanism than Jefferson, more wis-
dom than Franklin, or more virtue then Madison ? Or,
take the representative men of a second generation ! Are
the Websters, the Clays, knaves and fools compared
with him ? Has it not been, heretofore, a well-understood
principle among all the statesmen of our republic, to look
upon Slavery as upon an undeniable historical fact, what-
ever our abstract opinions may be about its right or
wrong ? And, is this course of action of our noble
ancestors not as certain, not as frank, not as important as
their abstract opinions ? Was it not always their policy,
instead of putting forth their opinions about Slavery,
rather to think of means and ways to get along with it,
and to harmonize, as far as it was possible, Union and
Reform? In all their endeavors to abolish Slavery, did
they not always carefully appeal to the slaveholders them-
selves, and this, indeed, privately, and not through the
organs of an excited populace ? And did all those great
men of other times — our foremost pride, our greatest honor
in the eyes of the world — did they, by suppressing over
and over again the temptings of their " abstract opinions,"
and by continually contriving new ways of peaceful reform,
did they, the noblest men of our entire history, by yield-
ing thus, defame their character or pollute their manhood ?
THE TESTIMONIES. (33
There never fell from their unstained lips, words like
these :
"Peevish, — Sulky, — Mean, — Boors of Vandalic hearts and minds,
— Irreverent Distorters of the Truth,— Savage, Barbarous Kid-
nappers,— Chevaliers of the Lash and Lords of the Shackle !"
Are these, words of a friend and brother ? Are they
words of an enemy, even ? Are they words of a man ?
Or, have the insulted shades of our common forefathers
already smitten the intemperate one with insanity ? These
are not words to soothe! These are not the means
to heal ! This is not the language of Peace and Union !
IV.— THE TESTIMONY OF ENGLAND.
Mr. Helper is an unrelenting foe. His collective indus-
try is inexhaustible. He is not content with appealing
to our own noble ancestors. After having " excerped"
testimony in favor of his opinion from the wise men of the
South and of the North of his own land, he introduces, or
uses in a similar way, the Testimony of the Nations. He
begins with England. Now, we do not think that Locke,
Fox, Pitt, and Burke would have acted more nobly, more
liberally, and more prudently than Washington, Frank-
lin, Hamilton, and Webster, if they had been placed in
similar circumstances. But still, we can not and will
not question England's philanthropy.
To be sure, the condition of depopulated Ireland is still
pitiful to behold. Says a recent writer on Ireland : " An
Irishman has nothing national about him except his rags."
Or another: "Let an Englishman exchange his bread and
beer, and beef and mutton, for no breakfast, for a luke-
warm lumper at dinner, and no supper. With such diet,
Q4. THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
how much better is he than an Irishman? — a Celt, as
he calls him. No, the truth is, that the misery of Ireland
is not from the human nature that grows there — it is from
England's perverse legislation, past and present." Or, let
us look at our own shores ! How often we find the brave
and warlike Celt of former days, crippled and degraded
by ages of tyranny and oppression ! But, England is
philanthrojric, and the Irish are not Negroes, nor are they
Slaves !
Or, let us turn our eyes away from Ireland across the
ocean, toward that happy land of emancipation. Says a
recent writer : " A short term and cupidity strain the
lash over the poor Coolie, and he dies ; is secreted if he
lives, and advantage taken of his ignorance for extended
time when once merged in plantation-service, where inves-
tigation can be avoided." But again, the Coolies are no
Slaves ; they are but hired servants, and England's jmilan-
thropy is safe !
We are not yet through with the Testimony of En-
gland, who is always loudest in condemning our Slavery.
We will give her a fair hearing. How closely she watches
those poor Hindoos ! How effectually she keeps them down,
whenever they express any dissatisfaction with the happi-
ness she forces upon them! She has instituted among
those " half-naked barbarians" an awful solidarity, by which
the province is responsible for the labor of all its men and
women. But still, England is philanthropic! She has
carried rails and Bibles, free-schools and steamboats, tele-
graphs and libraries to India, all for the benefit of those
half-naked barbarians ! And should telegraphs and Bibles
not have the requisite effect of happifying, opium will be
administered to them, and to " all the world, and to the
THE TESTIMONIES.
65
rest of mankind." She will no longer permit those savage
Hindoos to roast as witches wrinkled old women, for she
knows too well, from her own experience, the unfairness
of such proceedings ; nor does she, in these days, allow any-
where the Hand of Justice to cut the ears of those who speak
against State or Church. Now, this is decided progress !
England is the civilizer and Christianizer of the world!
To be sure, there is still robbing and flogging, murdering
and starving enough in the " dominions of the Gracious
Queen, where the sun never setteth ;" but England, never-
theless, dislikes Slavery in general, and Negro Slavery in
the United States in particular, and her lords and ladies
are ever ready to eat and drink with the poor common-
ers of the West, eager of philanthropic royalty! There
are similar laurels waiting for Mr. Helper, and we are
glad, for his sake and our own, that he has appealed to the
Testimony of our Cousins!
But England emancipated her slaves in the West India
Islands! She expended £20,000,000, we suppose, from
sheer philanthropy, and may we ask: Whom did her
philanthropic measure benefit? Jamaica, that brilliant
island, saw her land and people degenerate, says H. C.
Caeey ; the planter sold cheaply and left, the slave did
not work. Such must be the effect of all revolutionary or
sudden abolition ; and, though the emancipated lands may
gradually recover from the ill-devised blow, they can only
do so with loss of much property and at the cost of much
human misery.
V.— THE TESTIMONY OF FRANCE.
After England comes France, as usual. But this Testi-
mony comes at rather a peculiar time. Not many years, or
qq THE AMERICAN QUESTION
even months, ago, France was concerting a plan to intro-
duce " voluntary Negro labor" into her tropical colonies,
the demand for whose products was so rapidly increasing
everywhere. It was said that England herself, at first, had
favored the plan, but after having looked somewhat deeper
into the scheme, her philanthropy, or some other hidden vir-
tue, got frightened, and she dissuaded her noble ally from
accomplishing the voluntary Slave-trade. For, what was it
but a second edition of the Slave-trade, perhaps in some
improved style, a la Fran$aise or a la Coolie?
But Mr. Helper speaks of Rousseau and Montes-
quieu! Does he think that the "constitutional" Mon-
tesquieu would have acted differently from our "con-
stitutional" Madison? Or, did Lafayette act differ-
ently from Jefferson, the renowned pupil of Rous-
seau and Voltaire? But, then, has Mr. H. any idea
of the gloomy age in which those philosophers lived
and wrote? There were in that century thirty-seven
famines, more or less severe, in France. Rousseau
wrote his Contrat Social to starving millions, and Mon-
tesquieu's Esprit des Lois was but a futile remedy for a
dying generation. Alas ! what misery was brooding at
that time, unheeded, by the side of reckless extravagance !
France was approaching her revolutionary crisis ! But
the blood of a hundred thousand, slain on the altar of
Liberty, could not wash away her tyranny! And the
blood of other hundreds of thousands, slain to the idol
of Glory, could not wash away her crimes ! And in the
face of this self-condemnation, Mr. Helfer brings up the
Testimony of France ! Let France sweep at her own
doors ! There is, as yet, as much dust and dirt in her
precincts, as there was in the twelve stables of Augias !
THE TESTIMONIES. 67
VI.— THE TESTIMONY OF GERMANY.
Germany, thou famous land of thought and theory!
Where are thy radical statesmen, to teach us systems like
those of Mr. Helper? Thou land of slow movements,
thou land of forty tyrants ex officio, and forty hundred times
forty hundred assistant masters with pens and lashes, with
anathemas and jails ! Oh, unfortunate collector ! More
unfortunate still in your individual citations !
"We pass by the aristocratic Goethe, who, in his love of
humanity, had scarcely time to think a moment of his
country's weal or woe, and venture a few remarks on
Luther, better known in this land.
We must be aware that the people of Luther's time,
like our own " good folks," were not eager after reforms
in matters of religion only. In their articles of demands,
the religious and worldly elements were always mixed and
blended with each other. " Priests chosen by the com-
munity," they asked for, and " No more Serfdom ;" " Free-
dom of Belief — and Abolition of unjust Taxes." The spir-
itual and temporal always went together. And they had
reason enough to think of this world also ; for, " they
were badly clothed, dwelt in houses without floors or
pavements, slept on straw, lived on ' black' bread, apples,
and water, saw meat but rarely, and many never at all, and
had often no bread, even."
The conservative Niebuhr, even, had to confess that the
right was, at first, on the side of the poor people, But
how did Luther feel and act toward the despairing
wretches? When he heard about their rebellion, he
wrote: " Let the balls fly among them ; else they do -till
worse things. There is no need of pity. Obey they
68 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
must! God, surely, will save the innocent, as He did
Jeremiah and Lot. If He does not, they surely are not
innocent !" Rather harsh language ! Or, in his letter to
Baron Einsiedeln, who had asked him whether he should
liberate his slaves: "The common man," he answered,
"must be loaded with burdens, else he will grow too
wanton." And loaded and burdened he was ! The revenge
taken on those poor peasants was horrible. Those who
had saved their lives and fled home to their families were
hunted out and cruelly murdered or blinded, mutilated, and
disgraced. Barefooted were they forced to beg forgiveness
from the hand of their oppressors, and fines were laid upon
them, to pay which it took generations and generations.
Luther, even, was at last moved to pity ; for, " cruelty
seemed to have gone too far."
But this would lead us beyond the limits of our present
undertaking. We only think that Mr. Helper could
hardly have made good Abolitionists of Luther and
Goethe.
VII.— THE TESTIMONY OF RUSSIA.
Mr. Hinton Rowan Helper does not know much of
the political condition of the Russian people, we suspect.
The privileged noblemen themselves are not very free.
Says a Russian : " Their privileges are, to take office if
they can get any; to leave it when they are dismissed; to
go abroad if they get passports ; and to buy real estate if
they have money." And these are the "upper-ten" of
Russia. There are, then, some twenty or thirty classes of
other subjects, partly slaves and partly free, and wholly
unfree and completely slaves, amounting to an indefinite
number of millions. Among them, there is a continuous
THE TESTIMONIES. (59
emancipation, in the Russian sense of the word, and the
most modern coup d'ttat of Alexander III. is not without
precedents among the former Alexanders. It is a difficult
thing to emancipate those people of thirty or forty differ-
ent races and of as many different customs, duties, and
languages ; and a wholesale emancipation, though sounded
with the roaring voice of the Northern Bear, is a sheer
impossibility. Nor does the present emperor mean it so,
though Mr. Heifer may have read his itkas so. More-
over, if the emancipation is to be intrusted to the same
worthy officials who had the supervision of oppression and
taxation, then woe to the new-made Russian freeman !
He will have to pay dearly for what they call liberty. So
much for the Home Department. Now a word about
Foreign Affairs.
We do not generally take Russia as a model of freedom,
nor do we expect much from her in this line. Nor does
she herself much believe in the liberty of the races. She
has helped Austria in subduing Hungary, and has just
finished a hundred years' war against Circassia. The last
Will of Peter the Great is her Bible, and her Czar is her
God. Freedom can be hoped for only as far as it does not
conflict with the one or the other. The prospects of lib-
erty are, then, not very fair, and we think even a Russian
edition of the " Compendium of the Crisis" would change
matters but little.
VIII.— THE TESTIMONY OF GREECE AND ROME.
This Testimony is simply absurd ; for one needs not to
be a scholar to know the theories and practices of Greece
and Rome in regard to Slavery. Slavery was a fixed and
acknowledged institution among all the states of antiquity.
70 THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
They went still further. Xexophon calls all manual occu-
pations dishonorable and unworthy of a citizen. Plato
says that such occupations degrade those who exercise
them. Solox, the oil-merchant, made some allowances
for the trader only, probably from an esprit de corps.
Aristotle calls the slave a part of the family property.
That good old philosopher has some ugly passages, which
do not savor much of Abolitionism. "Nature herself,"
says he, " has made Slavery," and he reasons thus on it :
" The animals (man included) are divided into male and
female. The male is more perfect, and therefore com-
mands. The female is less perfect, and thus obeys!"
(Aristotle does not seem to be very soimd on the
Punctum JTanthippicum, or Women's Rights question.)
" But, well," continues the philosopher, " there are among
men those who stand as much below others as the body
below the soul, or the beast below man. And these indi-
viduals, fit for physical labor only and incapable of doing
anything more perfect, are destined by Nature for Slavery,
because there is nothing better for them than to obey.
But what great difference is there, after all, between a
slave and a beast ?" Singular Abolition doctrines these !
Yet one glance at Rome. Juvexal says : " The Romans
consume the nations to their very bones." They had
temples erected to Jupiter, the Plunderer, and disliked
commerce, "because it has made others their slaves."
But why should we waste time about something which
schoolboys can teach ? Mr. Helper, the Blunderer, alone
can quote such examples from History ! The domain of
antiquity and classical antiquarianism belongs entirely to
Mynheer Van Dyke and to your Honor Mr. O'Conor.
THE TESTIMONIES. fa
IX.— THE TESTIMONY OF THE CHURCHES AND OF THE
BIBLE.
Mr. Helper writes two chapters on this subject. But
we think the Churches — or, rather, Mr. H.'s clergymen —
may just as well be omitted. For they either teach the
Bible, on which all churches are more or less based — in
which case they are superfluous — or they do not teach
what the Bible does, and then Mr. H. must have already
included them under his " wiser and better men" of each
nation and section.
But our collector has again stepped on dangerous ground.
We will quote for him a few verses from the Old and a
few from the New Laws. He must try to get along with
them the best he cau.
"We read in Leviticus xxv. 44, 45, 46 : " Both thy bond-
men, and thy bondmaids, which thou shalt have, shall be
of the heathen that are round about you ; of them shall
ye buy bondmen and bondmaids. Moreover, of the chil-
dren of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them
shall ye buy, and of their families that are with you, which
they begat in your land ; and they shall be your possession.
And ye shall take them as an inheritance for your children
after you, to inherit them for a possession ; they shall be
your bondmen forever: but over your brethren the chil-
dren of Israel, ye shall not rule one over another witk
rigor."
In 1 Timothy vi. 1, 2 we read: "Let as many servants
as are under the yoke count their own masters worthy of
all honor, that the name of God and his doctrine be not
blasphemed."
The venerable Thomas Scott adds, in his " Comment-
72 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
aries on the Holy Bible," in the one case : " The Israelites
were thus permitted to keep slaves of other nations."
And in the other case : " This shows that Christian mas-
ters were not required to set their slaves at liberty."
Now, we are generally called a Christian nation, and are
often compared to the Israelites of old. But neither in
the one character nor in the other are we forbidden to
keep slaves, nor could we as a Joint Stock Company of
Christian Israelites derive, in any way, such a prohibition.
But why refer to a book — and especially now — which
has been used, and turned, and interpreted, and falsified
in so many different ways, to serve any sect, or party, or
fancy, or ambition in the history of social tyranny and
freedom ? Why refer to a book whose " Kingdom is not
of this earth, but of the Life to come ?"
Let us never mention it in settling or discussing our
Slavery question ! There is inflammatory matter enough
between us! We do not want to call still more the
odium theologicitm, that most odious of church-feelings,
to our aid ! We are a progressing humanity ! Our
heavenly wants may, in all these phases of development,
remain the same ! The forms of worship, even, may be
unchanged ! But our worldly wants certainly do change,
and with them the forms of social and political life.
Therefore, let the Bible no more interfere, lest we put the
Good Book into a false position.
X.— THE TESTIMONY OF LIVING WITNESSES.
We are now, happily, over the opinions of the " wiser
and better men," and are prepared to judge upon the
Testimony of the Living Witnesses. Thirty long pages
of Living Witnesses ! A formidable phalanx, which Mr.
THE TESTIMONIES.
73
Helper might — as lie says — increase ad infinitum. Now,
we do not undervalue the testimonies he has thus col-
lected, nor even those which he might have collected,
or may yet collect in times to come. Nor yet do, or tan
we refute them as they are. They are all very good in
their proper places. But one thing pleased us considera-
bly, namely, the fact of such a motley crowd of Living
Witnesses all being thrown pell-mell on one and the same
platform. Seward and Snodgrass, Sumner and Phil-
lips, Gerrit Smith and Burling ame, Carey and Par-
ker, Greeley and Raymond, Beecher and Bellows,
Chase and Tappan, and forty or fifty others, all huddled
together in one common groivp ! Has any human mortal
ever seen such a number of so different characters brought
together so peacefully on any previous thirty pages of
cotemporary history ? No, not in a directory, even !
They all have nearly the same opinions about Slavery in the
abstract, but how different are their actions ! Some of
them act just as Washington or Jefferson did. But
there are others whose consciences require, in addition, the
establishment of Underground Railroads ; others, again,
may be called practical men, they use the abstractions as
party capital ; there is a class, too, who, being of the
catholic cast, think — " Faith without works is dead !"
and therefore furnish pikes and money for others to battle
and to die in the cause of human liberty ; there is, indeed,
a small number — abstract opinions always being equal —
who really fight, and fear neither death nor the gallows ;
there is also quite a number who think most bravely, but
" take it out" in talking, and some fewr go even further
than the rest, and try to induce the Negroes to rise in
rebellion against their masters, and achieve, with blood
4
74 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
and murder, their inborn African liberties ! And all these
different characters stand on Mr. Helper's pages firmly
knit together ! Must these Living Witnesses not be sur-
prised at the company they are forced to keep ? At any
natural occasion of contact, they would fly to the four
winds on discovering such neighbors as Mr. H. gives
them ! But what humanity and patriotism could not do,
Mr. Helper's jugglery has accomplished. They are all in
apparent harmony. This is certainly a " curiosity in
literature."
XL— GENERAL REMARKS ON THE TESTIMONIES.
These are the Testimonies. We did not add to each
class of them their counterparts, which might easily have
been found in the History of Opinions, or might have
been gleaned, without much trouble, from the writings
of the Pro-Slavery apostles, but we confined ourselves to
a few illustrations. What is true of them, is true with
respect to all others which the Helpers and the O'Coxors
may, jointly or separately, with limited or unlimited re-
sponsibility, hereafter collect and classify. By reasoning
from single opinions, or even from single facts, Ave may
at our pleasure successfully prove or disprove the same
thing.
We are, in this connection, spontaneously reminded of
the famous dialecticians of old Greece. They were mas-
ters in casuistry, and they knew that they were when they
went to Rome to display their power. There they dis-
proved, before astonished crowds, in the afternoon, what
they had proved in the morning, and carried conviction
at both times. The Roman people were at that time but
little skilled in rhetorical tactics, and they applauded alto-
THE TESTIMONIES. 75
gether too liberally. Such is the popular heart, often
yielding too generously to momentary impressions. Tout
com/me chez nous! Such arguments are, therefore, very
useful on occasions when momentary excitement is all that
is aimed for. But they are valueless when we want a
sound and solid basis for our course of action.
But before taking leave entirely of Mr. Helper, we will
yet look a moment at the bloody Plan with which Num-
bers and Testimonies, collectively, have inspired him. It
is a proposal for a wondrous coup d'etat, which would at
once rid us of all our difficulties.
XII.— MR. HELPER'S BLOODY PLAK
Long before Mr. H.'s great chapter on Abolition ar-
rives, its approach is perceived by the more intemperate
rhetoric. The beginning of the chapter itself is, however,
in quite a humorous and pleasant strain. It is like the
deceitful smile of sunshine while the thunder-clouds are
already towering over the hills that gird the horizon. So
we take it, at least. "The non-slaveholding whites,"
says Mr. H., " ought to demand from the slaveholders
any number of millions of dollars for the decrease in
value of their (the non-slaveholders) lands, during the
dark period of Slavery in the South." Well, these non-
slaveholding whites might just as well protest against their
having been born, and sue their parents for the damages
sustained thereby. For, their fathers or grandfathers, or
somebody higher up in that transcendental line that leads to
Adam, must be responsible for those brawny " members
from Africa," who are the cause of all the mischief. But
Mr. H. must intend this whole compensation matter
merely for fun; else he would not, shortly after, have
76 THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
adduced testimony to prove " that the non-slaveholders
possess the poorest lands, and the slaveholders own the
most fertile soils." We let it, therefore, pass as a little
fun, and will look again into the angry lace of the threat-
ening storm-cloud.
Like distant thunder, the famous Plan for Abolishing
Slavery gradually draws nearer. It has an ugly look at
the outset, and seems to promise hard weather. Some
excuses, pressed out by an overburdened conscience, fall
like rain-drops through the sky. But the thunder-cloud is
unrelenting. Nearer and nearer it draws, until at last it
stands, mad and roaring, over our heads, and, raging, un-
furls its blood-red banner of Destruction and Desolation.
"1st. Thorough Organization and Independent Political
Action on the part of the Non-Slav eholding Whites.
" 2d. Ineligibility of Pro-Slavery Politicians — Never any
other Vote to any one who Advocates the Retention and
Perpetuation of Human Slavery.
" 3d. No Co-operation with Pro-Slavery Politicians — No
Fellowship with them in Religion — No Affiliation with
them in Society.
"4th. No Patronage to Pro-Slavery Merchants — Xo
Guestship in Slave-waiting Hotels — No Fees to Pro-Slav-
ery Lawyers — No Employment of Pro-Slavery Physicians
— No Audience to Pro-Slavery Parsons.
u 5th. No more Hiring of Slaves by Non-Slaveholders.
"6th. Abrupt Discontinuance of Subscription to Pro-
Slavery Newspapers.
'"7th. The Greatest Possible Encouragement to Free
White Labor."
A few rain-drops, sprinkling excuses on the Bottses
and Stanleys, Browns and Blairs, proved that the
THE TESTIMONIES.
77
storm had passed away. Some more little thundering in
the distance, and all was over. The sky was clear, the
sun shone bright, and nobody was hurt, " frankly, fairly,
squarely."
But, earnestly, has anybody ever seen more moonshine
and madness put into the sacred Number VII. ? What a
horrible and ridiculous heptade ! what an awful slaughter-
house i:>latform ! what a septuple nonsense ! And all this
language Mr. H. addresses to the non-slaveholding whites,
" who are," as he says, " cajoled into the notion that they
are the freest, happiest, and most intelligent people in the
world, and believe what the slaveholder tells them." Mr.
Helper addresses this murderous heptalogue to these
" illiterate" non-slaveholding whites, " who are but one
step in advance of the Indians of the forest, who are de-
plorably ignorant, three fourths of the adults not being
able to read or to write their own names" [the other
fourth being probably comprised in the nattering term
" white sycophants who have negroes around"]. Now,
add to this such language as — " Haughty cavaliers of
shackles and handcuffs, and lords of the lash," while the
Northerners are the "liberty-loving patriots," then you
have all the elementary ingredients, not of a common
Abolitionist of old Noah's or Webster's stamp, but of
the Helper caste, " whose line of duty is clearly defined,
and whose intention it is to follow it faithfully or die in
the attempt."
Now, we humbly think that in Kansas, at Harper's
Ferry, and in Charleston, there have been shooting and
murdering, hanging and dying, enough. We do not
exactly mean by this to dissuade Mr. Helper altogether
from dying, if he thinks he would help the cause more
fg THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
by his death ; but still we believe that for " common
folks," and for the great majority of people in general,
it would be better " to do one's duty faithfully" and live
in the attempt. But in order to work and live, a different
plan is needed from that of Mr. Helper. His is, indeed,
a dying effort, scented with the cold air of the grave and
the unfriendly fragrance of corpses.
"We attenrpt to oppose to this war, blood, and death
scheme, a Living Plan — a work of friendship and peace, a
proposal of union and harmony, not drawn from the heated
crucible of our own individual fancies, hopes, and passions,
but from the great workshop of nature, which lies open
to all faithful students of history. It may not be covered
with the smiles of sunshine and the pleasing light of flat-
tered prejudices, but it leads not to perpetual war and
final destruction.
BOOK III
THE DEVELOPMENT.
book: in,
THE DEVELOPMENT
T.— SLAVERY IX HISTORY.
Let us smother for a moment the angry feelings which
long disputes have aroused within us ; let us lay aside all
artificial issues to which enmity and exasperation have
forced us ; let us ignore all arguments and theories which
ambition, self-interest, and pride have created; let us for-
get all hostile acts, on one side and on the other, to which
our blind passions and false issues and arguments have car-
ried us ; let us then look at Slavery as it aj>pears in History,
not from the narrow platform of American party politics,
but from the broad family circle of humanity, of which
our nation is a member. Let us cast away all polemical
spirit and look at Slavery objectively as a historical fact,
and trace it back in the different periods of the Story
of Man, so that we may see its development and divine
from the Past the prospects of the Future ; for this is
the spirit in which we must study History.
We will, however, not give a learned treatise, but only
sketch its course, until we arrive at our own doors, and
see our own Slavery and the circumstances which sur-
round it.
Though the generous minds of the whole civilized world
4*
82 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
may deem it inhuman in principle for a man to own his
fellow-man, still History, on all its pages, declares itself
decidedly in favor of the fact. From the remotest ages,
man has been owned and Slavery has existed, though
names and forms may have differed. War seems to have
been everywhere the origin of it — at least, in the earlier
stages of human society — -just as war was then the sum
total of all international intercourse. If, in civilized ages,
war is the exception — or, at least, ought to be — and peace
the rule, so, in barbarous periods, war is the rule and
peace the exception. In these struggles of barbarous
tribes, the prisoners of war were considered the property
of the victors, who held this property by no common law,
but by force. The victors held unlimited authority over
their prisoners ; they could destroy or keep them, just as
any other kind of j>roperty which had in some way become
their own. In times or cases in which these live prisoners
were of no use, they were killed ; and they were not killed
only when they could serve the victors to some purpose,
in which latter case they became slaves. This is the
origin of Slavery in the times of barbarism of any nation
or tribe — in the primitive phases of human society, where
"Might is Right." The slave himself had his right to
become free whenever there was not enough might or
force to keep him longer in subjection.
The word "slave" is of modern origin, as it first ap-
peared in the long struggles between the Slavonic tribes
of the East and the Western Europeans of Germanic
origin, in which the former were generally overcome and
subdued.
Let us now see how it has been with Slavery in the na-
tions and ages which have heretofore claimed some right
.
THE DEVELOPMENT. g3
•
to the title of civilization. There have, as yet, been but
three great civilizations in the world : the old Asiatic, in
its manifold branches, the Greco-Roman, and the Modern
European, in which latter, also, this continent, as a great
European colony, must be reckoned. In the two former
civilizations, thai is, among the so-called ancient nations,
Slavery was a conditio sine qua non — the fundamental
condition of their system of social economy. It was the
great characteristic of all ancient national compacts, and
wherever we cast our eyes we find it. It came to them
from the times of their barbarism, and was sustained and
increased by many accidental causes in their history. It
was a punishment for crime at one time, a payment for
debt at another. It was the last disgrace to which the
gambler was to submit among some nations ; it was the
last means to shield the poor and weak from hunger and
danger among others.
But as these nations advanced in culture and civilization,
the condition of the slaves became modified. They were
still the principal laborers in all the branches of rising in-
dustry (for " man" seemed not to have been made for
labor, but only for war and the chase, and labor was only
worthy of a slave, of a low-bred man, or, in some nations,
of woman) ; but they were treated more gently, and ob-
tained some rights and privileges. Though these nations
never abolished Slavery entirely, still we know the friendly
intercourse between master and slave, especially among
the Greeks and the Romans. Thus, could the slave, among
the Athenians, sue his master for cruel treatment. Beating
a slave or killing him was reserved to the public authorities.
A slave was allowed to gain and to own property, and to
buy his liberty. Similar was the condition of the slave in
84 THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
the Roman Empire. Though the Justinian Code still
granted to the master the vitce necisque potestas — the
right to pummel and to slay — still the whole tenet had
become obsolete in practice. The master was often satis-
fied with a certain tithe or daily payment, as is the case
in our own Southern cities, and he frequently promised his
slave entire freedom as soon as he (the slave) had gathered
a certain amount of property. There were many manu-
missions for various other causes, such as extraordinary
fidelity, or self-sacrificing services of any kind. Slavery
must, indeed, have changed considerably in character,
since even most skillful artists and men of superior edu-
cation and refinement were foimd in its ranks, and great
poets, generals, and statesmen were born in Slavery, or of
slave parents.
Modern civilization may be said to have begun with the
appearance of the Germanic nations upon the theater of
Europe, especially since the time of the overthrow of the
Western Roman Empire. As long as they were in a
barbarous or semi-civilized state, they obtained and held
slaves in the same manner as other tribes and nations.
During the eighth, ninth, and tenth centuries, even, there
were, according to the best authorities, as many slaves in
Germany as there were free men. Among the Anglo-
Saxons, the per-centage of slaves was even still greater.
But in the Slavery of the different modern nations
that rose on the ruins of the old Roman Empire, similar
changes took place, as in Greece and Rome. The sale of
slaves to a foreign land was forbidden at an early time,
and their general condition, mostly by reason of the in-
fluence of the Christian Church, was gradually so much
improved that it deserved even another name. The slave,
THE DEVELOPMENT. 85
during the so-called period of chivalry and feudalism, be-
came a " serf," and Slavery became serfdom, not unlike
the Roman colonate in the latter times of the empire.
The serf was less owned as to his life than as to his serv-
ice. Serfdom may thus be regarded as the great stepping-
stone to freedom, just as, vice versa, the poor free man, in
those feudal times, often sank to the state of serfdom.
We do not mean by this that Slavery was changed into
serfdom by a positive law. But that intermediate and
mitigated condition of the Slave Avas none the less a real-
ity. Thus, in England, " Villany" originally meant Slav-
ery ; but it was a different thing in the middle ages.
This, again, was similar in Rome and modern Europe.
But there the Romans stopped. This milder form of
Slavery continued as long as the empire itself, and even
survived its fall. This was not so with the modern na-
tions. There arose, in spite of old systems and old theo-
ries, a new element, a new principle, with the advance of
industry. It was " Honor to Labor," the characteristic
element of the triumphant civilization of the modern
nations. It is this principle which prolongs the lives of
modern empires, and will finally bring about the civiliza-
tion of the world. It is the want of this principle which
brought decay upon the ancient nations before the foot of
the barbarian had even yet trodden upon their soil. It is
" Honor to Labor" which brought the man of labor at last
to honor and freedom. Gradually his burdens grew less.
Instead of all the labor of his whole day, the serf owed
only part of his labor to his master, and then only certain
services at certain seasons or in certain contingencies.
What formerly was unrewarded service, gratuitously de-
manded and offered, received some remuneration, though
86 THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
small it may have been. Such remunerations became, with
the increased productiveness of labor and the increased
value of the laborer himself, more adequate, until forced
service became voluntary service, since the lord held up
as high rewards or wages for labor as any other person.
These are some of the ways in which serfdom passed
away, though the extinction of its last forms required
some legislative enactment. Such enactments were made
in most nations of Europe during the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries ; and after many ages of struggles,
the enslaved man became at last free.
II.— NEGRO SLAVERY IX HISTORY.
Negro Slavery is as old as any other Slavery, and its
origin is war, as among any other tribes, nations, or races,
be they white, yellow, or red. Prisoners of war were slain
or made slaves, in the continent of Africa, long before
European and American slave-traders appeared on its
shores — long before Baeth, the learned traveler, saw
black slaves owned by black masters — long before the
interests of African industry "tied the Negroes to the
plows and drove them like oxen."
Among modern nations, the Spaniards were the first
who made and owned African slaves. It was during
their long wars with the Moors or Arabs, who, in their
western stream, had spread over the whole northern part
of Africa, even to the Pyrenean Peninsula, and had taken,
for many centuries, a firm footing on Spanish soil, at the
very dawn of modern European civilization. During these
struggles and wars with the Mohammedan intruders of
Asia, who once threatened to subdue all Europe, the Span-
iards at last drove them away to Africa, and followed them
THE DEVELOPMENT. 37
in their turn to that continent. The wars continued there,
and the so-called "Black Moors," the real Africans by birth
and race, had often to expiate for the wrongs committed
by the " Arabian Moors."
But after the discovery of America, when the Industrial
Period of Modem Civilization began, this kind of Slavery,
namely, Negro Slavery, changed radically its character.
While among all nations, in China even, and on all con-
tinents, Slavery became milder, and was slowly passing
from every country where there were but the faintest rays
of civilization, Xegro Slavery took a new and powerful
start. Let us view, a moment, the relative position of this
fact in the history of the world's progress.
The continent of Africa, the land of the Negro — if we
take Xegro as the general term for those manifold tribes
that inhabit Africa — was the last which appeared on the
great theater of the civilization of the world.
Asia had its time the first of all the continents. It was
the cradle of human progress. It had grown, lived, and
decayed, before our present nations and their civilization,
their lands and continents even, were dreamed of. Their
social life was, indeed, confined to one continent, and on
this continent, again, the Chinese were separated by insur-
mountable barriers from the land and civilization of the
Hindoos, and these again from the civilization of Western
Asia, which itself stretched only to the Mediterranean and
its shores. Egypt was but a small part of Africa, and
may as well be counted to Asia, and the Phenicians and
Carthagenians pierced but little into the continent of
Africa. The great Sahara was the Western and Southern
limit of their empires. Thus the Asiatic colonies on the
one side, and the young rising kingdoms of Media and
88 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
Persia on the other, extended but little the area of this
civilization, which remained truly Asiatic in origin, form,
and character.
Then came the Greco-Roman civilization. This, too,
stretched, in spite of its extensive wars and glorious
achievements, over only a comparatively small area, in
which the shores of the Mediterranean and the adjacent
lands were, and played the principal parts. We know,
indeed, that the great empire of Rome, in its period of
highest splendor, stretched over the totus orbis terrarum —
over the whole world ; but we know, too, how large this
" whole world" was — with no America, with almost no
Africa, with little of Asia, and but the Southern part and
some of the Northern territory of Europe ; in all, about
one half the territory of the United States.
But now came the Modern European civilization. Its
area wras at first- Europe. The new nations of Italy,
Spain, France, Germany, and England arose and stretched
their influence farther and farther over the then known
countries. The " Straits of Gibraltar" were no longer
honored as the termini mundi — the ends of the world.
The seats of ancient civilization were sought again. The
new world of America was discovered, conquered, and
colonized. The islands of the South Sea became known.
The sea route to India was found, and expedition followed
expedition, until at last the whole earth was known, and
the ancient seats of glory, as well as the heretofore un-
known and untrodden soils, were drawn into this general
and cosmopolitan life of the human family. Civilization
was no longer confined to the shores of the Midland sea,
but it was girded by all the shores of all the seas. "What
were formerly the branches of the Midland sea became
THE DEVELOPMENT. 89
now the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, and those island
kingdoms of former times became empires of whole con-
tinents. Such is Modern European civilization.
The last continent that joined this universal cycle, and the
last race that took active part in this universal life, were
Africa and the African. The Northern shores of that
continent, as Ave have seen, were but small belts of land,
colonized by foreign races. The Arabs, even, knew com-
paratively but little of the great heart of Africa. It was
left to the most modern missionaries of Selfishness and
Civilization, of Trade and Religion, of Curiosity and
Science, to open some insight into the life of the main-
land. Untouched by the rise and fall of empires and
civilizations, it had followed an isolated life. But unlike
the Australians, the Africans had preserved a physical
strength, which caused surprise to civilized man ; and un-
like the Indians of America, they had learned some agri-
culture and some industry, had some state life, and had
reached some degree of culture, the most, even, in those
parts which were least exposed to the inroads of the
modern colonizer and trader. And this is the land — this
is the race which was to furnish the modern slaves. "While
the Chinese were lingering along a half-civilized life, and
the Hindoos were degenerating from their early culture ;
while Western Asia decked her soils with the broken
ruins of former glory, and the Greek, even, grew in body
and mind unworthy of their noble forefathers ; while
"Western Europe, under the influence of the Germanic
race, was rising to be the lawgiver of the world, and sent
its colonists to all the distant lands on a mission of regen-
eration ; while the Red Man of the New World was bat-
tled with until " he had to go toward the setting sun,"
90 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
Africa was destined to furnish the Slave of the day, the
Slave of modern nations, the Slave par excellence, the
Slave of the new, industrial, cosmopolitan, and Christian
civilization !
This modern Negro Slavery is, therefore, indeed, a
" peculiar institution." It arose not in times of barbarism,
nor through accidental warfare of fighting tribes. It was,
in this respect, unique, isolated, one by itself in time,
place, and circumstances. When Slavery was everywhere
passing away, this peculiar modern Negro Slavery first
began. The slave was no longer the accidental captive in
fierce battles, waged for glory, power, and fame, the
delights of the ambitious barbarian. But in place of
" glorious" wars, there came inglorious slave-hunts, for no
other object than to make captives, to sell these captives
as slaves to the civilized man of modern times, who was to
take these slaves to distant lands and continents, to sell
them again to others, where they, with all their descend-
ants, are bound to labor and to toil during their lives.
Slavery thus became industrial, like the whole world and
its civilization, and lost all its romantic features of old.
The continent last discovered was to serve as the principal
theater for this. Slavery, and the race last found was to be
the Slave race.
The Spaniards introduced this Slavery very soon after
the discovery of this Western World, whose virgin soil
needed the labor of whole races. Hayti, the first free black
land, was also the first slave land. Four months before
the Mayflower arrived, slaves were already in Virginia,
through the kind aid of Dutch sailors. Since that time,
the merchants of the North and of the South, of the East
and of the West, of this and of other lands and conti-
THE DEVELOPMENT. gj
nents, have been zealously competing with each other in
this once honored traffic in human flesh, and whatever
stain and curse are connected with it rest alike on this
whole land and on the whole modern world. White men
soon accustomed themselves to own black men. The
Spaniards, French, Dutch, English, Americans, all and
everybody, owned Negroes, and sold and bought them,
and used them as their slaves. Laws of discipline, and
systems to regulate the relations of master and slave, soon
engaged the statesmen of all nations, and filled volumes of
their codes.
III.— XEGRO SLAVERY IX TIIE SOUTHERN STATES.
Though modern Negro Slavery has some peculiarities,
it is still Slavery in all its cardinal points. Some may say
that, in our days, a distinct race is set aside to be slaves ;
but this, even, can be found in other periods. The Greeks
regarded the Scythian race as born for Slavery. Similar
were the ideas of the old Germans in respect to the
Sclavonians, and "barbarous" and "slave" were almost
synonymous terms among the "civilized" nations of an-
tiquity. These civilized nations, however, were sadly
undeceived in after-times. If we thus would judge from
the history of other kinds of Slavery to the future of our
own, we should be forced to the conclusion that Neoro
Slavery, too, must have its growth, its modifications, and
its end. The peculiar features which distinguish onr
Slavery from others, such as its mercenary origin, its
industrial character, its growth in a period of great
achievements in science and politics, which seemed to
promise hope, and freedom, and happiness to the whole
human race, these peculiar features would speak more in
92 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
favor of modifications and a gradual abolition than in
favor of a perpetual continuance. But why should we
longer urge the argument of history ? The whole ques-
tion has already been decided in principle, and to a great
extent in fact, too. For all civilized nations — whatever
their other sore spots may be — and half of our States
have emancipated the former Negro Slaves — the whole
modern civilized world has long acknowledged that it is
unjust and inhuman to receive, with chains and fetters in
our hands, a new race, neglected and isolated. To re-
open the slave-trade, and put again a degrading stamp
upon all Africa, to doom the whole race and continent to
be a perpetual and entire Slave race and Slave continent,
none but a rash, thoughtless, and misguided politician can
think or hope. The people of the whole civilized world
stand ready with the weapons of the world to repel any
further outrage on a shamefully treated continent. The
question is, therefore, not whether Africa shall be a slave
continent, and the African a slave per se, nor even that all
the Negroes transported into our land shall be slaves for-
ever, but the issue is only whether those Negroes who
ARE STILL OWNED AS SLAVES BY THE SOUTHERN STATES OF
our Union shall be slaves forever, or pass gradually into
freedom, as it happened in ninety-nine other parts of the
civilized world where Slavery had formerly existed. The
question as to. the continuance of Negro Slavery is, there-
fore, strictly an American — and, indeed, a Southern —
question only.
Without solely relying, however, on our general argu-
ment, we will now shortly review the different special
pleas which are here raised in favor of the continuance of
Negro Slavery in the South.
THE DEVELOPMENT. 93
IV.— THE PLEA OF THE CURSE.
God, or rather Noah, cursed the descendants of Ham,
the father of C a n a a n . W e read in Genesis ix. 25 : " And he
said: Cursed be Canaan ; a servant of servants shall he be
unto his brethren." There are a great many hermcneuti-
cal difficulties connected with this text. " Noah drank of
wine and was drunken. * * * And Noah awoke from
his wine, and knew what his younger son had done unto
him." And then he cursed him. Now, this is quite natu-
ral ; but it shows, as the venerable Thomas Scott says,
" human imperfection in Noah" to drink wine ; and espe-
cially, we may add, to drink too much of it, so as to get
drunk. But, then — in all due reverence be it said — it
would be quite natural, too, that Noah, awakening in or
from his drunkenness, should use " imperfect" and intem-
perate language.
But, be this as it may, Ham showed a vile character in
doing what, he did, and he deserved strong punishment.
Yet, why not only Ham, but also his young and thought-
less son, should be cursed, and not only he, but all the
descendants of Ham — after the whole human race having
been once most radically cursed in Adam — this remains a
mystery.
Nor is it certain that God heard Noah's curse. To
conclude a posteriori, from the misery and oppression of
Africa, that God did hear this curse, such an argument we
may object to in many ways. The African is by no means
the most cursed of this earth. There is the history of the
Aztecs, of the Australians, of the Fejeeans, and of many
isolated tribes and races toward the North and South
poles, with whom the African can fairly be compared to
94 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
his advantage. With the exception of modern Negro
Slavery, he has surely endured less misery than millions
of Chinese and Pariahs. His numbers compare well with
most of the half-civilized races, especially if quality is not
overlooked. The men in the interior of Africa are intel-
ligent, too, and mild, says Livingstone ; and their peculi-
arly modern curse has been passing away this long time.
There are, too, some ethnological difficulties in this
question. Some say the curse does not refer to the Afri-
can Negroes at all. The Egyptians, the Phenicians, and
the Carthaginians certainly were not of one and the same
race with the Negroes. If Egypt is meant, there is cer-
tainly as much misery on the Nile as in the Soudan, or on
the Mountains of the Moon.
But why should we endeavor to deduce our principles
of social and physical action from the Book of the Soul-
Life. The Good Book, we must repeat, has nothing to do
with the outward forms of this life. And did it even
curse the Negro, who among us Christians is ready to
serve as the executor of this curse ? But, especially we,
the great Republicans and Free men of the modern world
— shall we be the hangmen of Liberty ? There is nowhere
in the Good Book an express order given to us for that
purpose, and there are but few who, on their own respon-
sibility, would undertake the work on the ground of
" drunken" Noah's curse !
Y.— THE PLEA OF RACE INFERIORITY.
There is, at least, no longer any dispute among the
lovers of Southern Negro Slavery, whether the Negro is a
man or a monkey ; and the comparison of the Negro slaves
to horses and alligators, or to any domestic or wild cattle,
THE DEVELOPMENT. 95
has become insipid, though it may come from the lips of
clowns and punsters. The Xegro is now generally re-
garded as a man, though an inferior man; and nobody will
doubt that he is an inferior man if we compare him with
the favored Caucasian of the present day. We will now
examine somewhat the causes of this inferiority of races.
When we look attentively into the history of mankind,
our eyes meet three great facts — we may call them Facts
of Difference. There is first, at all periods, in all places,
and at all stages of human culture, a Difference among
Individuals, though they may belong to the same race, or
nation, or family, even. It is a physical and moral differ-
ence as distinct as that of our faces. This is one of the
great obstacles to those theories of communistic equality.
No Spartan law of education, no Free-School system, no
Forced education, no Democracy, no Religion, no Philan-
thropy has ever yet succeeded to make men equal, be it
physically, morally, or socially.
This same difference appears when different individuals
are connected and formed into associations, be they fami-
lies, tribes, nations, or races. And this is the second fact.
Just as the development of an individual depends upon
his genetic structure, and upon the circumstances in which
he is placed — or, in Comte's language, upon the character
of the organism and of the medium which surrounds it —
so do, also, associations of any kind depend upon their
inward genetic power and upon the outward influences.
Among these outward influences are the geographical and
physical condition of the respective lands, the degree of
isolation from other tribes and nations, or of communica-
tion with them, the state of culture of these tribes at the
time of contact, and the interest the more advanced soci-
gg THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
eties take in lower and less advanced organisms. Should
even the inward endowments of two tribes be the same,
the difference of the circumstances that surround them
misrht chancre their whole character.
The third fact is, that associations, like individuals, are
born, grow, decay, and die at different periods and have
different durations of life. This fact depends directly
upon the second.
The workings of these three great facts have ever made
the picture of the human world-life greatly variegated.
Now nations arose, then they fell. One race was still
lying in barbarism, while another was in the very zenith,
of its civilization. This same civilized race became weak
and decrepit, while the barbarous one rose to strength and
power. One people grew to the greatest perfection ; an-
other was arrested in the midst of its course. In the
great history of the races and nations, we see, indeed,
the same phenomena continually repeating themselves as
in the history of the individuals of one and the same
nation. But this is the necessary principle of all human
development. Difference, indeed, is the element of all
harmony. There have been, and there will ever be, dif-
ferent individuals in the same nation destined to fulfill
different tasks and duties. Some will grow earlier, faster,
and higher ; others will ever remain in the lower walks
of life. And exactly thus it is with the tribes, nations,
and races of the whole human family. Different nations
and different ages have different tasks to perform. Some
will rise to magnificent dimensions, as their literature and
art will bear witness in all generations to come. Such
were the Greeks. Others will grow, too, but some gro-
tesque temples and broken idols will be all that remains to
THE DEVELOPMENT,
97
speak of their former glory. -Such , Mexicans.
Some will remain barbarous during long periods, and be
subjected and subdued at one time, but at length will
gradually rise and set their feet upon the necks of their
former victors. Such is the story of the Germans and
the Romans. Some races will be interrupted in their
long childhood ; a more civilized race will fall upon them,
and whatever germ there may have been in them, the
more powerful race will destroy it. Such we learn from
the history of the conquest of America and the " sinking
away" of the Indians. Some will be entirely neglected and
isolated, until they are so degenerate that they are forever
lost, like the Australians. Others, again, have once had
some civilization, but have sunk gradually to a lower level
until they were aided by more advanced nations to rise
again to higher life, though this be often a cruel process.
Such is the story of the Hindoos and the English. There
have been tribes, and even cultivated ones, of whom now
the names even have passed away. Such are the Goths.
There are others whose countries were decked with pal-
aces of unheard-of luxury and splendor, which now are
deserts and wastes for " wolves to howl in." Look to
Asia for examples ! Where are the proud Assyrians ?
The Northern temperate zone, the largest habitable land,
must naturally remain the principal theater or the central
part of all human culture. But has this favored zone ever
saved from decay the tribes and nations that poured in
upon it ? Xo ; the principle of degeneracy depends upon
no clime or sun ! It gnaws in the heart of the privileged
Caucasian, who dwells near the center, as well as in the
Patagonian's breast, who is hurled far off to the outer end
of the radius.
gg THE AME III CAN QUESTION.
Such has been, heretofore, the strange history of the
world — a continuous up and down, and still a progress.
And is history now to stop ? Are there no more tribes,
and nations, and races to come ? Do not Asia, Northern
Europe, and Africa yet harbor millions who seem to be
waiting for their time to play some more conspicuous part
m the world's history? Or, are we blind to the new
comers who, from year to year, vindicate with greater
emphasis their right to be among the nations ?
In the face of these historical facts, what place can we
ascribe to the African ? He is among the latest comers.
What prospect has he in this turmoil of human progress ?
The people of Africa seem certainly not lost beyond
the hope of recovery. They do not look like a decrepit,
wasted, and ruined race. Nobody can look at the mus-
cular strength of the Negro, and call him the offspring
of a dying race. Let us view him in Africa ! They say
he is inferior to us. Well ; but is it impossible to raise
him to any higher degree of culture ? Who can affirm
that, in the face of the most modern developments of our
heroic travelers, Vogel, Barth, and Livingstone? There
seems to be a difference in tribes among them, just as any-
where else. But, on the whole, they are not a people of
the lowest character. Though they were isolated so many
centuries, they did not remain mere hunters. They
reached, by themselves, some agriculture, some manufac-
ture, some commerce, some civilization. Or, if we view
them in their contact witli more civilized nations, they cer-
tainly are not void of the power of imitating. In Africa
itself they have manufactures of iron slave-chains — the
best that are made, they say. And here, our own experi-
ence does certainly not show that the Xegro, North or
THE DEVELOPMENT. 99
South, is incapable of progress. But how can we expect
much from him in this our land ? In the South he is a slave,
all direct means of progress being withheld from him. In
the North he was emancipated rashly, cast upon a world
whose ways he did not know, generally unaccustomed to
managing his own business or owning property; in a word,
untaught in the lessons of liberty. Besides, he was thrown
among a crowd of Yankees, Dutchmen, Irishmen, and
Germans, all of them descendants of a race long civil-
zed, all eager after gain, and all skillful in obtaining it.
How disadvantageous was the Negro's position here!
How long, indeed, will and must it take him to rise to a
level with us, who have the start of him by centuries of
culture ? Perhaps he will never reach us. But, that he
is capable of some degree of civilization, who can deny,
whether he may look upon the toils and feasts of the planta-
tion, or upon the schools and huts of the North ? And
are there not many Negroes who have reached a higher
intellectual standing in our community than ever can be
reached by many of our own native or foreign population
of Caucasian blood ? No impartial man can look at the
Negro here, and declare him incapable by nature of any
progress. The Negro is a progressive being — a man, and
not a brute.
But, suppose he can never reach the degree of the civil-
ization of the Caucasian ! Suppose he will ever remain as
inferior to him as he now is ! How can we arrive, from
the fact of relative inferiority, at the necessity of Slavery ?
By what train of logic can we come to the conclusion that
inferior races must be made slaves, and not only this — for
Slavery may at first be best for them if we abstract from the
manner of their coming here — but that they must be kept
100 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
slaves in perpetuum? Must, then, all inferior races, and
nations, and tribes be likewise made slaves ? Well, then,
we have plenty on our hands, and filibustering will not
cease until all Mexico, all China, all the Indies, all Pata-
gonia, all Africa, all Asia, and a good part of Europe is
enslaved ! For such inferior tribes and nations are found
everywhere — a little higher, a little lower. Where is the
line beyond which there is no more freedom, but only eter-
nal Slavery ?
No, we Americans, a small portion of the civilized people
of this world, and a portion of this small portion again,
all lovers of liberty, we, the nation of the "happy and the
free" above others, we can not oppose effectually the ways
of the world, the voice of civilization, the lessons of His-
tory. The Negro is inferior, at least now ; he may ever
be so ; but he is not therefore necessarily to be a slave, or,
rather, the slave of the American cotton-field, forever, and
with all his descendants !
VI.— THE PLEA OF PHILANTHROPY.
No man will ever plead philanthropy for the slave-trade.
A heartless trader in human flesh presents himself, with
an appropriate vessel, on the coast of Africa. There he
meets a misled, barbarous chief. Excitement for gain
prompts them both — the trader and the chief— to make a
bargain. The trader lays down a heap <>t* tin- good things
of this world, Avhich flatters the senses of the savage.
The savage chief, in his turn, arranges a man-hunt, catches
as many descendants of his race as he can get, and gives
those who are alive and well to the trader in fulfillment of
his bargain. The trader packs them, like so many beasts,
into the infected hull of the slave-ship, carries them to a
THE DEVELOPMENT. 101
foreign land, and there again are sold as many as are
alive after this second process. The man, who first was
free, is then a slave, owned by another race, in another
land, forever. Is that philanthropy? Is that love of
mankind ?
But let us abstract from the dark origin of Negro
Slavery. Let us forget the millions who were transported
before the foundation of our Free Republic and after it !
Let us forget the demoralization which civilized man has
thus thrown upon the newest comer among the races!
Let us forget the demoralization which he has, to some
degree, unconsciously loaded upon himself! Let us forget
Humanity! Let us take Slavery as it is in our own
Southern States ! Suppose even the slave-ship, with all its
horrors, is the messenger of philanthropy ; suppose it was
and is philanthropy to fetch the Negro from his native
land, and make him a slave — is it philanthropy to keep
him a slave after he has once quitted the ship, entered our
land, unlearned his barbarism, taken upon himself the
work of civilized man, and imitated his ways? Is it
philanthropy to keep him down, or to destroy any little
ray of progress that may indirectly strike the poor wretch ?
No, Philanthropy, above all, would teach us — after such
great wrongs on our side and such favorable experiences
on the other — to help the poor man, to give him the
means of culture, to teach him the rudiments of civilized
life, and to try, at least, like all nations heretofore, to
make him an intelligent slave, whether this process may
lead him to freedom or whether it may never break the
chains of bondage. To treat him as a man, as an anthro-
pos, Philanthropy certainly must demand of a man.
102 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
YII.— THE PLEA OF NECESSITY.
But who will work our cotton-fields ? We now abstract
from all philanthropy or humanity ! Who will work under
our burning sun ? Agassiz says the white man can as well
as the black man,, or he may, we think, at least accustom
himself to it. And Livingstone writes from Africa even :
" I have never had a day of illness since my return. We
find, too, that, so far from Europeans being unable to
work in a hot climate, it is the want of work that kills
them. The Portuguese all know that as long as they are
moving about, they enjoy good health ; but let them settle
down and smoke all day, and drink brandy, then — not a
word about brandy in the fever that follows — the blame is
all put on the climate." The Germans, too, seem to get
along, in every kind of thrift, very comfortably in Texas.
But suppose, even, that we need the Negro — and we,
too, think we do — would Ave lose him by raising him to
liberty? Not at all. If we teach him the ways of self-
reliance and freedom, and treat him as other laborers, he
will never leave what has become to him his native ooun-
try. He will not come North, for he will prefer the
warmer sun of the South, better adapted to his nature,
and prefer the soil where he has learned to be free. He will
prefer the work which he has learned to do, and the
society which surrounded and aided him during his re-
generation. For, that he can be grateful and is capable
of patriotism the war of the Revolution bears ample tes-
timony. Nor could he long to go back to Africa, which,
indeed, has become to him a strange land. As little would
he leave as the descendant of the European leaves his
adopted fatherland to recross the ocean and settle in the
THE DEVELOPMENT. 103
old world, which now is as new to him as the Western
world was to his ancestors. If the Negro were free, he
would voluntarily stay here, where often force alone now
keeps him. lie would perform the lower duties of social
life for generations to come, and in these lower walks he
would remain, should he be incapable of ever competing
with the old Caucasians. Surely, we want the Negro,
and we shall have him, whether Free or Slave.
Yin.— THE PLEA OF SELF-INTEREST.
"We find that everywhere in history where emancipation
was gradually prepared and finally accomplished, the
estates of the masters became many times more valuable
than before. Examples are frequently given by the many
writers on Slave and Free labor. The Count of Beexs-
tokff is said to have lost one hundred thousand dollars by
emancipation ; but his annual income from his estates rose
from three thousand to twenty-seven thousand dollars.
The Slave, as long as he works for his master, will gen-
erally be as lazy as the circumstances and the lash will
permit. From this principle there arose those manifold
computations of the economists and the various estimates
of the comparative cost of Free and of Slave labor. But
on the whole, they all agree that Slave labor is the more
expensive of the two. And this is just what the South
needs. Make the Xegro more intelligent and skillful, and
give him the hope of his future emancipation, then will his
ambition soon tell upon the estates of the master. During
this gradual process of emancipation, the master can only
be the gainer.
Tuckee thinks that Nature seems to demand a certain
ratio of the population of a country to its square miles
104 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
before a master can emancipate bis slaves with gain to
himself. To apply the rule of an arithmetical means to a
dozen examples of emancipation is rather venturesome.
The principal and decisive condition of the master's pre-
serving his self-interest in emancipation, is that it be
gradual. In such a case it has never brought loss on any
master in any example from history, whatever the above-
mentioned ratio may have been.
IX.— THE PLEA OF THE CONSTITUTION.
We have here the last of the pleas generally heard in
favor of the continuance of Negro Slavery in our Southern
States. The plea of the Constitution ! And, indeed, the
Constitution alone can and does, in our eyes, recognize
Slavery ! But there it stands, that noble instrument, with
the name " slave" carefully avoided. There stands at its
side another cherished document — the Declaration of In-
dependence— with its startling principle : " That all men
are created equal ; that they are endowed by their Creator
with certain inalienable rights ; and that among these are
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Neither of
these, our Primitive Laws, stamp the Negro to be a lower
being than a man. This man may be your property, slave-
holder ! But — aside from any humanity — you still do not
own him as you do " your horse or your ass." You know
that you indirectly vote for him ; you know that you can
not kill him when he gets old, as you do " your horse or
your ass !" You know that there is some little difference
between owning him and owning "any other cattle!"
You can not make him out a beast or a brute : not from
the Constitution, not from any law of man, be it written
or onlv secretlv engraved in the human breast. You know
THE DEVELOPMENT. 105
that the Negro is a man! for this is, after all, the ques-
tion. Man or Beast — this is the final issue ! But our ooble
Constitution, in letter and spirit, abhors an interpretation
which ambitious politicians would like to force upon it.
Nol "beast," or "brute," or "cattle," not even "slave,"
is the term given to the Negro ! "Bound to service" is
all thai expresses the relation of slave and master.
Wherever provisions are made respecting slaves, they
are so worded as not to stigmatize them as even a distinct
caste or class. In Art. I., Sec. 2, persons " bound to serv-
ice for a term of years" are classed with the free persons ;
and " all other persons" — meaning, in the language of the
Constitution, "persons bound to service" without any
qualification of time, or, in common language, slaves — are
put on the same footing as the " Indians not taxed." Art.
IV., Sec. 2, from which the Fugitive Slave Law is derived,
is a provision against " persons held to service or labor in
one State, under the laws thereof, escaping into another,"
and comprises obviously all persons, black or white, held
to service for any period of time, however short or long.
This provision includes slaves, but it is not made for them
alone. The Constitution recognizes Slavery, to be sure,
but not as a general, national, and hereditary institution,
authorized by the laws of the United States as such, but
as a local relation between master and slave, calling it
expressly " service or labor in one State, under the laws
thereof:'
But let us not with conscious willfulness misunderstand
and distort the suggestions, hopes, wishes, and intentions
of those "noble men who framed our Constitution and
founded our Union," lest their desecrated memory pervert
and crush us.
206 THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
X.— REQUISITES FOR A TRULY PHILANTHROPIC
EMANCIPATION.
Though our minds may now have given up all prejudices,
and we may look with impartial eyes upon the fact of our
Negro Slavery and its gradual emancipation as taught by
history, still there are yet heavy obstacles in our way.
May we be allowed to state what, in our opinion, are the
primary requisites of a peaceful solution of this difficult
question ?
i. — DELICACY.
Negro Slavery exists only in some of our States. No
earthly power can force it again on the Free States or on
the world. Its local character is therefore a reality. But
just on account of this local character of Slavery, the
greater delicacy is needed. If Negro Slavery still ex-
isted in all our States, and under similar circumstances, no
party or section could be charged with ignorance of facts
or intentional distortions and selfish interests. It would
then be regarded as a common good, or as a common evil,
or as a common necessity, and be discussed freely, like any
other question, independent of locality. It Mould not
rouse a whole section against another, and divide our
country geographically as it does politically. It would be
an easier work to get rid of a common enemy, and would
need less care and delicacy in words and actions.
England was in a very different position from what
we are. Slavery existed in one of her distant colonies or
dependencies, which was but a small part of her empire.
But our Slavery exists in our very midst; in sixteen
co-equal States of our confederate republic. It is thus
cherished in a considerable portion of our land, and
THE DEVELOPMENT. jq^
it therefore needs greal delicacy of treatment, ai
we give up the idea of regarding ourselves as equal mem-
bers of the same Union, and citizens of the same nation.
II. — POLITICAL NON-INTERFERED E WITH THE SOUTH.
There is no doubt thai the present Slave States once
knew what a dubious guest they harbored in the Negro
Slave. They had men as liberal, as wise, as noble, and as
energetic as the men of the Xorth, in whose words and
teachings the policy best for their country was expressed,
distinctly and unmistakably. Again and again did they
publicly denounce Slavery, in language strong and de-
cided : but the spirit of which could not be misinterpreted
or suspected. They even contrived ways and means to
gradually get rid of Slavery, and they had associations for
that purpose.
The Southern States were fairly on their way toward a
final abolition, just as the Northern. The latter were,
however, their predecessors in this work from many other
reasons than mere philanthropy. Climate, the character of
their products, and immigration, made, from the wry
beginning, the negro slave less desirable and less neces-
sary there than in the South. Still, the Southern States,
too, thought of emancipation, though they were naturally
to come last, and their work was to be slower, in the same
degree that their peculiar geographical position, and their
climate, soil, and production had allotted to them a larger
number of slaves.
We will quote here some well-known passages from
Southern writers, to see what the state of feeling on this
subject was as late as 1832. Said the elder Ritchie, in
the Richmond JEhquirer: "Means sure but gradual, sys-
IQg THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
tematic but discreet, ought to be adopted for reducing the
mass of evil which is pressing upon the South, and will
still more press upon her, the longer it is put off." He
was referring to Xegro Slavery. Faulxxee, too, said, at
that time, in the Virginia House of Delegates : " Sir, I am
gratified to perceive that no gentleman has yet risen in
this Hall, the avowed advocate of Slavery. The day has
gone by when such a voice could be listened to with
patience, or even with forbearance." This was in 1832.
Why did all these free words about "withering and
blasting effects of Slavery" stop soon afterward ? It can
be proved with almost mathematical certainty what share
the rash interference of Abolitionism had in delaying the
work of the Free labor movement in the South. Let us
here quote a memorable passage from Daxiel Webster,
whose clear-sightedness none will question. Referring to
that same matter, he said :
"Let any gentleman who doubts of that recur to the debates in the
Virginia House of Delegates, in 1832, and he will see with what free-
dom a proposition made by Mr. Randolph for the gradual abolition of
Slavery was discussed in that body. Every one spoke of Slavery as he
thought ; very ignominious and disparaging names and epithets were
applied to it. The debates in the House of Delegates on that occasion,
I believe, were all published. They were read by every colored man
who could read, and to those who could not read, those debates were
read by others. At that time Virginia was not unwilling nor afraid
to discuss this question, and to let that part of her population know
as much of the discussion as they could learn. That was in L832. As
has been said by the honorable member from South Carolina.
Abolition societies commenced their course of action in 1835. It is
said—] know how true it may be— that they sent incendiary
publications into the Slave States; at any event, they attempted to
ar-.nse, and did . • >ry strong feeling; in other words, they
■ !■• ited greal agitation in the North against Southern Slavery. Veil,
what was the resuU ? The bonds of the slaves were bound more
firmly than before ; their rivets were more strongly fastened. Public
opinion, which in Virginia had begun to be exhibited against Slavery,
THE DEVELOPMENT. 109
and was opening out for the discussion of the question, drew back and
shut itself up in its castle. I wish to know whether anybody in Vir-
ginia can now talk as Mr. Rakdolph, Governor McDowell, and others
talked, openly, and sent their remarks to the press, in 1832 ? We all
know the fact, and we all know the cause ; and everything that this
agitating people have done has been, not to enlarge, but to restrain,
not to set free, but to bind faster the slave population of the South."
There can not be any doubl that Northern Abolitionism
was one of the causes of the change of feeling in the
South.
Abolition of Slavery can never be effected by a hostile
political party in States in which there is no Slavery. For
the South will never, can never, be forced into abolition.
We abolished our Slavery in the North without any inter-
ference on the part of the South or the West, and the
same privileges must be granted to the other States.
Abolition of Slavery was heretofore effected by the action
of separate States, and they consulted neither in regard to
time nor manner with any other State. Each State acted
by itself, and excluded all interference of others. They
may have been influenced by the example of other States
or nations, still they surely excluded all political interfer-
ence either from the Federal Government or from single
States. And such— State by State — will be the course
of emancipation until the whole work is accomplished.
The question of abolition ought, therefore, never to
enter the mind of any Northern man as far as he is a
member of a political party. In the abstract, everybody
has a right to his opinion, but a political party is no agent
for abstract schemes and wishes, but for such meastjk
are best fitted for immediate political action. In belong-
ing to a party, a man does not thereby become a traitor to
his opinion; he only subscribes to the rationality and
120 THE AMEEICAX QUESTION.
justice of certain political measures proposed. But abo-
lition of Slavery can never appear as such a measure on
the programme of any political party in the Xorth.
Besides the impracticability of such an undertaking, it
is against the Constitution, to which a political party, as a
medium of political action, owes strict adherence. If we
are dissatisfied with the Constitution, we ought not to
cover our intention with false issues, but we ought openly
to confess our plans, and employ all means prescribed for
changes or amendments in that instrument.
Abolition of Slavery, as a political measure, belongs
chiefly to the South. There are still, as in former times,
fearless champions of freedom there to start the work
again, and the initiative comes with better grace from
their own men. The South will recover from its excite-
ment. This very process of secession will be the means
of opening its eyes again to the righteous claims of Free-
dom. There are now, in several Slave States, parties
which dare to attack Slavery in some shape or other, and
in some States their final object, abolition, is openly
avowed. There, agitation is proper. It may have been
silenced in these days of over-excitement. But this state
can not last long. Times of prudence and peace will re-
turn, and the former work, though now interrupted, wiH
be taken up again with renewed vigor.
Thus delicacy, reason, and the Constitution oppose alike
all political interference of the Xorth with the question of
abolition in the South.
III. PRUDENCE.
English emancipation, as we have above stated, can not
serve as a model for us. But we have a warning example
THE DEVELOPMENT. HI
nearer at hand, in the abolition of Slavery in our own
Northern States.
Though the lands, in the care of a numerous crowd of
skillful and energetic colonists, did not sutler so much as
in the West Indies, still the small minority of colored
people found themselves in a condition \ cry similar to
that of the Negroes of the English colonies. Suddenly
they passed from Slavery to a state in which they had to
unlearn, or learn otherwise, what ;is slaves they had learned.
They were like helpless children. They wandered around
uncared for and homeless; they struggled with dis-
eases, and lived, and still live, in poverty, being often
in want of the necessaries of life. Liberty was, to many,
a curse. It will take much more time, and cost many
more sacrifices, before they are in a condition to profit by
the advantages of freedom. Thence arose those facts
which Calhoun used in his Defense of North American
Slavery, addressed to Lord Aberdeen, though he mistook
entirely the cause, for it is the manner of emancipation
only which did the injury.
The only beneficial and satisfactory way of emancipation
is the slow and gradual change and reform of the condition
of the slave. We must instruct him in the elements of
common and practical knowledge. This is the fundamental
reform. Then we must, in the language of .Mr. Caret,
accustom him " to possess and manage property" — reforms
already partially introduced into some of our Slave States.
The slave may be hired out by tin- master, as in sonic of
our Southern cities. The field-slave may be allowed to
cultivate, under the master's control, some acres of land
for himself. As in Rome, the slave may be allowed to
buy his liberty — reforms already applied to some extent.
112 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
Other aids in this slow work of emancipation might be
suggested in different places ; for true and beneficial
emancipation can only be partial, local, individual,
and gradual. We can not do it by one stroke ! It is
a complicated work, to which we all may lend our feeble
hands. Some slaves would thus soon be made free ; others
would have to serve a longer apprentice shij) for liberty.
The Abolitionists and philanthropic men of all creeds and
platforms may hasten on this work of love. They are
liberal ; let them, therefore, send their money to procure
liberty for those who are deemed to deserve it. Let them
then take care of them, and supply whatever the new-born
freeman may afterward need. Let the Colonization So-
ciety, too, be aided in its work. Help to send to Africa
those civilized Xegroes who wish to aid their race in its
progress ! Let all who know new remedies and plans of
peace be listened to, and all who can materially help, send
their portions; while the slaveholding States themselves
concert and advise and reform, until at last, this voluntary
emancipation being nearly completed, State after State
may seal, by a legal enactment, the fact of the ISTegro's
freedom !
Should, then, any financial consideration delay the work
of Humanity, or in any way thwart its purposes, there
will be millions in the Union who will readily adopt our
reading of Webster's language when he says :
"There have been received into the treasury of the
United States eighty millions of dollars, the proceeds of the
sales of the public lands ceded by Virginia. If the residue
should be sold at the same rate, the whole aggregate will
exceed two hundred millions of dollars. If Virginia and
the South see fit to adopt any proposition to relieve them-
THE DEVELOPMENT. U3
selves from '■Slavery,'' they have my free consent that the
government shall pay them any sum of money out of its
proceeds which may be adequate to the purpose."
XL— ACTUAL WOKK ALREADY ACCOMPLISHED IX OUR
OWN LAND.
On reading the wholesale denunciations which are so
liberally thrown upon our republic, both by foreign and
native writers and orators, it would, at first, seem as if our
land and people had not yet done anything at all toward
"gradual" abolition of Slavery.
Says G. F. Kolb, in his new work, " The Statistics of
the World:" "There is no reason why we should accuse
the American republic for the existence of Slavery; for
Negro Slavery is a relic from the time when the land was
under a monarchical government. But still, the guilt of
not having limited that baneful institution, which is a dis-
grace to humanity, and of not having worked toward its
gradual abolition, rests heavily on the modern republicans
of America."
"Done nothing toward gradual abolition of Slavery!"
We arc accustomed to such language from the lips of
high-souled theorizers, but we hardly expected to find it
on the scientific pages of the " cool and calculating" sta-
tistician. Still, such seems to be the general language of
the present day, to be mechanically repeated by each new
self-appointed judge hi the High Court of Universal
Justice.
Has our national development really been so exceptional
as to deserve the maledictions of the whole civilized
world ? Have we, indeed, not progressed at all toward
greater freedom ? Have we been steadily descending in
214 TnE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
the scale of civilization ? Are we an anomaly in the his-
tory of modern nations ? Or, can we show the same
slow and gradual work of emancipation as they? We
confess that our country might have done more if it had
been more prudent and less selfish. But we have done
sometJiing, and this something is worthy of the consid-
eration of the world, before our final judgment is pro-
nounced.
Let us look into our actual history !
I. PROIIIBITIOX OF THE SLAVE-TEADE.
The United States was the first nation to abolish the
slave-trade. We take from the learned charge of Judge
James M. Wayxe the following data:
"The first act was passed on the 22d of March. 1794, when General
Washington was President. It was intended to prevent any citizen or
resident of the United States from equipping vessels within the United
States, to carry on trade or traffic in slaves, to any foreign country.
(Brig Triphenia vs. Harrison, W. C. C, 522.) That is, though slaves
might he brought into the United States until the year 1808, in vessels
fitted out in our ports for that purpose, they could not he carried by
our citizens or residents in the United States in such vessels, into any
foreign country.
" The next act of Congress was passed on the 2d March, 1807, when
Mr. Jefferson was President. The act of 1807 begins by subjecting
any vessel to forfeiture which shall be found in any river, bay, or har-
bor, or on the high seas, within the jurisdictional limits of the United
States, <>r which may be hovering on the coast, having on board any
negro, mulatto, or person of color, for the purpose of selling them as
slaves, or with the intent to land them in any port or place within the
United States.
"The act of 1818 prohibits the importation of negroes altogether
into the United States, from any foreign kingdom, place, or country,
without excluding the return to it of such slaves as might leave the
United States ;is servants of their owners, comprehending such as have
been employed as seamen on a foreign voyage.
"The act of 1819 authorizes the President, in a more particular
manner than had been done before, to use the naval force for the
prevention of the slave-trade, points out the circumstances and the
TIIE DEVELOPMENT. H5
localities in which seizures of vessels may be made, directs the dis-
tribution of the proceeds of them aftei condemnation, requires that
negroes found on board of them shall be delivered to the marshal,
what that officer's duty tbt'ii is, and again commands that the
officer making the seizure shall take into his custody every persoD
found on board, being of the crew or officers of the vessels seized,
and that they are to be turned over to the civil authority for prosecu-
tion.
" This brings us to the last act upon the subject, that of the 15th
May, 1820. It denounces any citizen of the United States as a
pirate, and that he shall suffer death, who shall become one of the
crew or ship's company of any foreign [slave] ship ; and that any per-
son whatever becomes a pirate, and shall suffer death, who shall be-
come one of the crew or ship's company of any vessel owned, in the
whole or in part, or which shall be navigated for or in behalf of
any citizen of the United States, or who shall land from such ves-
sel on any foreign shore, and shall seize any negro or mulatto not
held to service or labor by the laws of either of the States or Terri-
tories of the United States, with intent to make such negro or mulatto
a slave, or who shall decoy, or forcibly bring or carry, or who shall
receive en board of such ship, any negro or mulatto with intent to
make them slaves.
"In the year 1823, the House of Representatives of Congress
adopted a resolution to request the President to prosecute, from time
to time, negotiations with the several maritime powers of Europe and
of America, for the effectual abolition of the African slave-trade, and its
ultimate denunciation as piracy under the laws of nations, by the con-
sent of the civilized world.
■ All the nations of Europe, as well as of America, have followed
in the same legislation, and the object of the resolution of 1823 seems
to be near its accomplishment.
"Upon three occasions since 1824, the subject has been under the
consideration of Congress, and at each time has a determination been
fully expressed to maintain the principles that have been incorporated
into the legislation of the country.
There were several occasions, before and after these
legal enactments, when the Congress of the United States
expressed their abhorrence of the slave-trade. And this
was and is a sentiment common to the great majority of
people both North and South.
116 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
II. ABOLITION OF SLAVERY.
At the beginning of our existence as an independent
nation, in 1776, there were slaves in each of the thirteen
original States.
TABLE XIX. NUMBER OF SLAVES IN 1776.
[Census Report of 1850.]
States. Number of Slaves.
Massachusetts . . 3,500
Rhode Island 4,373
Connecticut 6,000
New Hampshire 629
New York 15,000
New Jersey 7,600
Pennsylvania. 10,000
Delaware 9,000
Maryland 80,000
Virginia 165.000
North Carolina 75,000
South Carolina 110,000
Georgia 16,000
Total 502,132
Other accounts give the number at 479,000.
Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, New
York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, all, at an early date,
abolished Slavery within their jurisdiction.
Then, out of territory ceded to the United States by
Virginia — the State which had at that time by far the
greatest number of slaves, about one third of the total
slave population of the Union, — we have formed the fol-
lowing States :
Kentucky 1792 (Slave)
Ohio 1802 (Free)
Indiana 1816 ( " )
Illinois 1818 ( " )
Michigan 1837 (Free)
And from Michigan —
Iowa 1846 ( " )
Wisconsin 1818 ( " )
Thus, six of the thirteen original States have abolished
Slavery within their territories, and six new Free States
were formed from the territory of the Slave State of
Virginia.
THE DEVELOPMENT. Hf
Vermont, too, was formed from New York in 1791, and
Maine from Massachusetts in 1820. California, Minnesota,
Oregon, and Kansas are new Free States.
To be sure, seven of the original thirteen States have
not yet abolished Slavery, and nine new Slave States have
been added.
But nobody can deny that we have done something
"toward the gradual abolition of Slavery." For in 1776
we had nothing but Slave States, and now the majority of
the States are Free.
Or, let ns take the oldest and the newest Census of the
United States, and compare the increase of the Free with
that of the Slave.
Vear. Free. Slaves.
1790 3,231,900 697,800
1850 19,987,500 3,204,300
The increase of the Free is thus 518 per cent., while
that of the Slave is only 359 per cent. Freedom has thus
increased at a greater ratio than Slavery, should we even
take the above number unconditionally.
" But," says Mr. Kolb, " the proportion is reverse in the
South ; the slaveholders have succeeded there in bringing
about an enormous increase of these unfortunates." To
this we must decidedly object. The increase of the slave
population is the greatest argument for the South. For
it proves, on the whole, the good treatment of the slaves
by their Southern masters. It sIioavs, indeed — as we have
had occasion to remark — the greater humanity of the
Southerners when compared with other masters. But,
however that may be, this can never be used as an argu-
ment against the South.
The work of emancipation, or gradual abolition, has
llg THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
been steadily going on since the very beginning of our
national existence. It commenced East and North, and
gradually pressed farther toward the South and West. Nor
did it halt at the boundaries of the present Slave States.
It has already entered them, and is progressing there in spite
of political and financial interruptions and disturbances.
III. THE SPREADING OF THE WHITE POPULATION.
The present border Slave States are now the principal
theater of action in this work of Freedom. We will first
give a few tables showing the relation of the White to the
Slave Population, and the increase of the former over the
latter.
TABLE XX. POPULATION OF THE BORDER STATES IN 1850.
[From the United States Census.]
States. Whites. Free Col'd. Slaves. Total Col'd. Total Pop.
Delaware 71,100 18,000 2,200 20,200 91,500
Maryland 417,900 74.700 90,300 165,000 583,000
Virginia 894,800 54,300 472,500 526,800 1,421,600
Kentucky 761,413 10,000 210,900 220,900 982,400
Missouri .... 592,004 2,600 87,400 90,000 682,000
2,737,217 159,600 863,300 1,022,900 3,260,500
TABLE XXI. PROPORTION OF WHITE TO TOTAL POPULATION
in 1850. (in fer cents.)
States. 1790. 1S00. 1310. Is20. 1830. 1840. 1S50.
Delaware 78.36 77.56 76.18 75.99 75.05 75.00 77.75
Maryland 65.26 63.34 61.78 63.88 65.12 67.70 71.68
Virginia : 59.08 58.43 56.59 56.61 57.31 59.76 62.94
Kentucky 83.66 81.41 79.76 77.02 75.27 75.69 77.50
Missouri." — — 82.64 84.08 81.73 84.41 86.79
TABLE XXII. PROPORTION OF FREE COLORED TO TOTAL
POPULATION. (iN PEE CENTS.)
States. 1790. 1S00. 1S10. 1820. 1S30. 1840. 1S50.
Delaware 6.60 12.86 18.08 17.81 20.66 21.66 19.75
Maryland 2.51 5.73 8.92 9.75 11.84 13.21 12.82
Virginia 1.71 2.29 3.14 3.48 3.91 4.02 3.82
Kentucky 0.15 0.33 0.42 0.52 0.71 0.92 1.02
Missouri — — 2.91 0.56 0.41 0.41 0.38
THE DEVELOPMENT. H9
TABLE XXIII. — .MAM M ITTK I) AND FUGITIVE SLATES IX 1850.
BORDER STATES.
States. Slaves. Manumitted. Fugitives.
Delaware 2.200 277 20
Maryland 90.300 493 279
Virginia 472,600 218 83
Kentucky 210.900 152 90
Missouri 87,000 50 GO
863,300 1,190 544
These four tables are intimately connected with each
other.
The proportion of the White population had in 1850
risen, in per cent., in —
Delaware.
Maryland.
Virginia.
Kentucky.
Missouri.
Since 1S20.
Since 1810.
Since 1810.
Since 1830.
Since 1810.
1.74
9.90
6.45
2.23
4.15
The proportion of Free Colored persons had in 1850
risen, in per cent., in —
Delaware. Maryland. Virginia. Kentucky. Missouri.
13.15 10.31 2.11 0.87 2.53 (dec.)
Thus, the proportion of the White and Free Colored pop-
ulation was steadily increasing in the Border States ; or,
in other words, the Border Slave States are thus slowly and
peacefully being transformed into Free States, and in some
of them the work of Freedom is almost completed. The
relative decrease of the proportion of the Free Colored
population of Missouri is but a seeming exception. It
was the effect of the extraordinary immigration of whites.
Missouri rose in forty years, from the 22d to the 13th place
among the States, Slave and Free.
The more extreme Southern States have as yet been less
affected by the invigorating breath of Freedom which
blows from the North. But, still, Tennessee seems to
follow somewhat in the track of Kentucky, and Xorth
Carolina in that of Virginia, while Louisiana, by reason of
120 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
its geographical position, its river, and its intimate con-
nection with the Northwest, presents about the same
features as the border Slave States.
POPULATION OF LOUISIANA IN 1850.
Whites. Free Colored. Slaves. Total Colored. Total Pop.
255,400 17,400 244,800 262,200 517,700
PROPORTION OF WHITE TO TOTAL POPULATION. (iN PER CENTS.)
1810. 1320. 1830. 1S40. 1850.
44.82 47.83 41.46 44.96 49.35
PROPORTION OF FREE COLORED TO TOTAL POPULATION.
1810.
1820.
1S30.
1840.
1350.
9.91
7.15
7.74
7.24
3.37
MAUMITTED AND FUGITIVE SLAVES.
Slaves. Manumitted. Fugitives.
244,800 159 90
Thus the proportion of the white population in Louisi-
ana increased 7.89 per cent. The cause of the decrease in
the proportion of the colored population is, as in the case
of Missouri, due to the extraordinary immigration of
whites. Missouri and Louisiana are the two Slave
States which receive the greatest share of foreign and
native immigrants. The five BorderJStates and Louisiana
together receive about 80 per cent, of the immigration to
the whole South.
TABLE XXIV. NATIVES OF THE FREE STATES AND IMMI
GRANTS IN THE SLAVE STATES. 1850.
THE BORDER SLAVE STATES.
Natives of Free States. Foreign Immigrants.
Delaware 6 900 5,600
Maryland 23,800 51,300
Virginia 29,000 22,500
Kentucky 31,300 31,800
Missouri 55,600 76,200
THE WESTERN GULF STATES AND THE MISSISSIPPI.
Louisiana 14.567 67,200
Texas 9,900 7,400 .
Tennessee 6,500 5,300
Arkansas 7,900 1,300
THE DEVELOPMENT.
THE CAROLINA* AND THE EASTERN GUJJ •
121
Natives of Free States. Foreign Immigrants.
North Carolina 2,100 . 2,500
South Carolina 2.400 8,200
Georgia 4.200 6,500
Florida 1,700 2,600
Alabama 4,900 7,400
Mississippi 4,500 4,800
The flesh and spirit of the free white population of the
North and of Europe seem thus to act as leaven in the
work of emancipation in the Border States. The forma-
tion of a solid middle class of laborers, who neither are
slaves nor keep slaves — the increase of the free colored
population — the greater number of manumissions there
than in other Slave States, in spite of the greater losses
from fugitives — are facts intimately interwoven with each
other. These States have thereby undergone such a
change, and present such peculiar features, that it would
be unfair to class them with the other Southern States.
They are in a state of transition which makes them a
class by themselves.
IV. AMALGAMATION*".
There is another force at work in the cause of Freedom.
It is a physical force, but it acts as unconsciously as the
social one we have just mentioned. It is the amalgama-
tion of the white and the black races. The African and the
Caucasian have never been connected so intimately as
here. This country is in reality cosmopolite. Not only
do the different branches of the same race — the Indo-Ger-
manic — freely mingle with one another, but even two
distinct races, in different stages of civilization, are here
violently thrown into mutual embrace.
We will not now examine into the ethnological or the
moral merits of such a mixture, but only state the influence
6
122 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
it has on the social condition of the black race. And
here one great fact stares us in the face, and that is : Amalga-
mation breeds freedom. It is as if the drop of blood
from the ruling Caucasian, in the veins of the mongrel off-
spring, would never rest until the creature is as free as the
creator. Let us see the general statistics referring to this
matter !
There were, in 1775, about 479,000 slaves in this coun-
try. We were not able to find anywhere how many of
them were Mulattoes. Still, according to the statistics of
other years, they must have been proportionately but a
small number.
Things have greatly changed since 1775. The Xegroes
must have freely mixed with the white population.
NUMBER OF BLACKS AXD MULATTOES.
Tear. Blacks. Mulattoes. Total.
1850.' ........ 3,233,000 .......... 405,700 '.'.'.'.'.... 3,638',700
There were, thus, about as many Mulattoes in 1850 as
there were slaves in 1775 ; and eleven per cent, of the col-
ored population have a tincture of white blood,
NUMBER OF FREE BLACKS AND FEEE MULATTOES. 1850.
Total. Slaves. „J™e-n
Blacks 3,233,000 2,957,000 2,o,400
Mulattoes .... 405,700 216.600 159,100
As, in the North, both Blacks and Mulattoes are free,
we add a table of the Slave States only.
TABLE XXV. — PTXJMBEE OF FREE BLACKS AM) FEEE MULAT-
TOES IN THE SLAVE STATES. — 1850.
THE BORDEB STATES.
States Total Blacks. Free Blacks. Total Mulattoes. F. Mulattoes.
Delaware 18.000 16,400 1,700 1,000
Maryland 143,800 61.100 21,500 13,600
Virginia 447,000 ls.sOO 79.700 13,400
Kentucky 188,600 7,300 32,300 2,000
Missouri: 75,800 1,600 11,100 931
THE DEVELOPMENT. 123
THE CAKOLIXAS AND THE EASTERN CELF STATES.
States. Total Blacks. Free Blacks. Total Mulattoes. F. Mulattoes.
North Carolina. 281,900 1.0,200 34,000 17,200
South Carolina. 377,000 4,500 10,800 4,300
Georgia 300,400 1,400 24,100 1,500
Florida 30,500 229 3,700 703
Alabama 321.800 567 23.300 1,700
Mississippi.... 290,400 295 20,300 600
THE OTHER SLAVE STATES.
Louisiana 228,300 200 33,900 14,000
Texas 50,600 2,600 7,900 257
Tennessee 221,700 3,300 24,100 3,700
Arkansas 40,900 140 6,700 400
Still it is difficult to give each State its proper share in
this kind of Freedom's working, because there are no sta-
tistics respecting the emigration of Mulattoes to other
States. We give, therefore, the general ratio only, which
is sufficient for our present purpose. Nine per cent, of the
Blacks — but sixty-four per cent, of the Mulattoes, are
free. It matters little how and through whose agency so
many Mulattoes became free, though there is 1 Mulatto to
every 234 white inhabitants of the North, while there is
1 to every 18 of the South; but 64 per cent, of the Mulat-
toes are free.
Thus amalgamation breeds freedom. There is no mis-
take in those simple figures. The black color, too, of
the Negro bids fair gradually to pass away, and in
some hundred years a genuine Negro will be a curiosity
in this land of ours, especially a Negro slave. Still, as
the Mulatto is more attractive than the Negro, amalga-
mation with the latter might stop. But nature has well
provided in this regard. The Mulatto, as we have proved
above, becomes free, and leaves his place to the Negro.
V. COLONIZATION.
This is another agency in the cause of Freedom. The
first American Colonization Society was organized Janu-
ary 1st, 1817 — nine years after the abolition of the slave-
124
THE AMERICAN QUESTION
trade. Since that time similar societies have been founded
in many States. They all have the same purpose in view,
and act with each other in harmonious concert. Some
statistical tables will show how much has been done by
colonization toward the " gradual abolition" of Slavery.
In order to get a little insight into the details of its
working, we take the following table from the "Annual
Report of the American Colonization Society," 1858.
FIRST VOYAGE, DECEMBER, 1856.
State.
Born
free.
Slave.
By whom Emancipated.
Massachusetts . . .
Pennsylvania ....
Maryland
Virginia
Do
6
1
1
1
11
68
6
5
4
8
1
12
1
1
1
54
3
1
19
4
• )
7
Emancipated by will of T. Shearman,
of Fauquier County.
Emancipated by will of James H.
Terrell, of Albemarle County.
Purchased by the executors of J. H.
Tyrrell.
Given by their owners.
Purchased their freedom.
Do
Do
Do
Do
Emancipated by persons in Kentucky.
Emancipated by S. K. Houston, of
Union, Va.
Emancipated by will of Mrs. M. L.
Gordon, of Hartford.
Emancipated by Miss Charity Jones,
Bladen County.
Emancipated by Mrs. M. A. Williams,
Savannah.
Emancipated by will of J. B. Tafts,
of Savannah.
Emancipated by Richard Hoff, of Eg-
bert County.
Purchased their freedom.
Emancipated by C. C. West, of Wood-
ville.
Emancipated by Harvey Berry, of
Bath County."
Emancipated by will of Elizabeth Yan-
derson, o( McMinnville.
Emancipated by John Jipson, Sparta.
Do. by Peter and Nancy
Do
North Carolina . .
Do
Georgia
Do
Do
Alabama
Mississippi
Kentucky
Tennessee
Do
Do
California
Burum, of "White County.
Total
9
208
THE DEVELOPMENT.
125
From the same Report we made the following general
table :
TABLE XXVI. NUMBER OF EMIGRANTS SENT TO LIBERIA BY
THE AMERICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY AND ITS AUXILI-
ARIES, FROM 1820 TO 1857, INCLUSIVE.
Year.
1820
No.
86
33
37
65
103
66
182
222
163
205
259
83
1,131
— NU1
I STAr
Year.
1833
No.
270
Year.
1846
No.
. 89
1821
L822
1834.
1835
127
. 146
1847
1848
1849
1850
1851
1852
1853
. 51
. 441
1823
1824
1825
1826
1827 .
is:;.;
1837.
1838
1839
1840.
1841
1842
1843
1844.
1845
IBER
rE, F
OF I
ROM
34
36
46
205
35
179
5
543
104
3.442
1,283
415
1,030
105
536
261
697
637
55
243
138
109
47
115
85
248
85
140
187
EMIGRANTS
1820 TO '
Indiana. . .
. 422
. 500
. 675
. 640
. 783
1828
1829
1830
1831
1832
TABLE XXVII.
FROM EAC]
Massachusetts .
1854
1855
1856
1857
; SENT TO
1857, INCL
LIB
usn
. 553
. 207
. 538
. 370
ERIA,
E.
78
Illinois
Missouri . .
34
83
Michigan .
Iowa
Texas
Choctaw N
Cherokee >
California .
Total i
Number be
Number
freedom
Number
view of <
beria . . .
1
New Jersey . . .
Pennsylvania. .
ation
3
10
7
ration
1
District of Columbia. .
lumber ....
1
9,872
rn free ....
Georgia
Alabama
Mississippi ....
Louisiana
Tennessee
Kentucky
Ohio
3,730
purchased their
3mancipated in
emigrating to Li-
332
5,810
The above does not include the number (about 1,000) that have been
sent by the Maryland Colonization Society to the Colony of ' ' Maryland
in Liberia."
This is a work in which all States are co-operators, and
all individuals may lend their assistance. It is wonderful
what this American Colonization Society has accomplished
126 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
with comparatively small means. It would only need
greater liberality on the part of the United States, the
States, and individuals to prosper the noble work still
more, and make the little Republic of Liberia " one of the
brightest hopes" of modern philanthropy.
The forty-third Annual Eeport of the American Colon-
ization Society for 1860 refers to the "pressure of the
monetary difficulties of the country," which the Society
has felt considerably. But there is a little paragraph
showing the effect of our political difficulties on the work
of colonization, which we can not help giving in full :
" Emigration of Free colored persons has, from several
causes, been retarded ; but in the Northern and Middle
States, during the last year, their thoughts have been
directed to Africa, and they have sought knowledge of its
advantages for their future home. In the South, this
class, in consequence of agitations on the Slavery question,
are exposed to new trials ; in some cases compelled to
leave the places of their residence, and we trust Divine
Providence will direct their way to Liberia, where alone,
at present, their highest interests can most certainly be
secured and perpetuated. And surely common humanity
(to say nothing of the spirit of the religion of Christ) de-
mauds, while these people are expelled from some districts
of the South to seek in vain for comfortable homes at the
North, that their friends should encourage and assist them
to take possession of the great inheritance prepared for
them by Providence in the land of their fathers."
CONCLUSION.
We have now passed over the whole ground of the
social development of our question in all its principal
THE DEVELOPMENT. 127
phases, down to the present day. The general progress
of humanity — the spirit of modern religion — the common
origin of man descending from the same ancestral parents,
and made after a common type — philanthropy, love of man
in a narrower sense of the word, or love of everything
created — the physical and the moral interests of the slave-
holder— the spirit of the Constitution, and the incontro-
vertible "logic of facts" in our own history — all point
toward protection and assistance of our brethren in bond-
age, toward a mitigation of their condition, and a gradual
abolition. History has not spoken in vain for us, and
Humanity is not an empty sound. "We are no exception,
no anomaly in modern progress. We have prohibited the
slave-trade; we have directly abolished Slavery in some
States ; we have sent our missionaries of white flesh and
free spirit all over our land ; we have condescended to a
generous amalgamation with the black man; we have
civilized and colonized. These are certainly unmistakable
symptoms of our passing, like other modern nations, on-
ward toward greater freedom and gradual abolition.
Thus, everything points toward the gradual abolition of
Slavery, and Slavery must and will vanish from our soil.
except the infamous slave-trade be re-opened, or a new race
be enslaved. But neither part of this alternative can be
realized. We can not, in the face of almost unanimous
resolutions in Congress, passed from the earliest beginning
of our nation down to the present time, re-establish that
world-desired traffic in human flesh. We can not so much
despair in our present era as to believe that a gang of wily
politicians might be found who would dare to undo, in
a disgraceful moment, what a hundred noble years have
done. Xo! no new slave will ever be imported by the
128 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
consent of the United States, nor will ever a new slave be
made, be he of African or other blood, through war or
conquest. The time "for the repeal of the laws in the
way of importation of bond-servants from Africa, and for
the passage of proper laws to protect the same," will
never come ! That unsophisticated merchant who, from
his retirement in Tivoli or Paphos, sent forth such words
as the above to an "ignorant" North, will never be able
to ship or see shipped a cargo of African flesh into the
United States, nor will his children or children's children
ever have that innocent pleasure.
But why is there now, in the face of all this irrefutable
testimony of progressive history, so much struggling and
battling on the part of some of us against this work of
Freedom? Why is there such a violent stemming against
Liberty, that most precious gift to man, so tenderly cher-
ished by everything living ? Is Freedom a curse, and
Slavery bliss ? Is Freedom weakness, and Slavery power?
And has not all this work been done within the Union?
Why are there now cries and Ordinances of disunion and
secession? "What is the disturbing element which troubles
the waters of peace and interrupts the work of Freedom ?
But this will lead us to the political aspect of the ques-
tion, which requires, indeed, our special and separate
attention.
BOOK IV.
THE CRISIS.
book: tv„
THE CRISIS
L— THE BALANCE OF POWER.
The new product of cotton, "which in 1794 was
scarcely an item of export," gradually increased and made
the slave more valuable to the South. This increase of
cotton created a new interest, not known to the Xorth, and
even unimagined by the framers of the Constitution ; and
on it a new political machinery was founded ; it was the
so-called Balance of Power, into which all the Slave States
were gradually drawn.
Whenever this force or interest appears in one and the
same nation, the term " Union" has almost lost its power,
and " Harmony" alone can take its place. Balance of
Power is the sign of the existence of a " diremptive" or
centrifugal force somewhere. Common attraction has
ceased, and Balance of Power is only the artificial glue to
keep together heterogeneous elements. But this struggle
for Balance of Power became a definite historical fact in
the same measure that the geographical sections became
more distinct and separated. The South required now for
every new Free State a new Slave State, and the old Con-
stitution was " squeezed," and bent, and interpreted to suit
the new wants. The noble founders of our Union, and
232 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
the framers of our Constitution, did not foresee such a
state of things. They did not suspect the so speedy ar-
rival of King Cotton and Queen Balance with their re-
spective suites. But these royal guests have arrived !
They have been here a long time, managing and develop-
ing their forces ! They are of a grasping stock, too !
They have a Manifest Destiny to help them along. They
hold a brilliant court, and their followers and armies are
well fed and well rewarded with offices and honors ! They
have the Spread-Eagle for their colors, though, in their
enlarged patriotism, they never forget themselves entirely.
They have procured Texas " for the Union." They have
obliterated that awkward line drawn across " a common
country." They have endeavored to carry their ideas into
all the new States and Territories. They are liberal
enough to carry their " property" there, too, in all its
different shapes, and work it for the more rapid progress
of those new lands. They see, themselves, the wrong of
Balance of Power in a Union, and therefore do their best
to make this vast empire one, united, and common in
everything ; in hearts, in hands, and in all sorts of prop-
erty, landed and personal, immovable and movable, black
and white. That they are earnest in their purposes,
they have lately shown in Kansas, though they may have,
at times, met with failures. That they have pluck and do
things thoroughly, they have most recently proved by hang-
ing all they could procure, or keep alive, of the Harper's
Ferrymen. But, t) not things that grow over-night,
or reach to swli dimensions by inward strength only.
They needed the care of outsiders, and they had it,
indeed, most effectually. The North, with hot-house ten-
derness, kindly kept off all the cold blasts, and thus aided
THE CRISIS. 133
the growth of the Political Power of the South. "The North,
for some reason," says Daniel Webster, " never exercised
their majority efficiently live times in the history of the gov-
ernment, when a division or trial, of strength arose." Among
the courtiers around the new-born throne, we saw, there-
fore, representatives of all the States of the Union, South
and North, East and West, and the royal couple never
rejected outlandish applicants. It gave the court a more
cosmopolitan air when all the climates of this Western
World, those where the " colored people" dwell, and those
where the " Niggers" grow, sent their pale sons to join in
doing homage.
But the whole court has for some time been growing
old and feeble. Its usurpation in obliterating the political
compromise line of Freedom and Slavery was the culmi-
nating point of its power. It violated the humble Magna
Charta of Freedom, and then commenced the days of
trouble and dissension, as was prophesied even by South-
ern Statesmen.
The feeling of indignation soon gave itself vent in bit-
ter words. The halls of our legislatures resounded with
the most passionate language. At last it came to bloody
acts. The most cowardly assaults were hailed as deeds
of valor. Threats of disimion were soon everywhere ut-
tered, as indifferently as if there was no such word as
Treason in the laws of our land. Northerners were driven
from the South, and Southern youths were eager to flee
from the " pestilential air of Northern Abolitionism." The
frontiers of the two sections were strewn with the bone3
of murdered citizens, slain by brother-hand. The gallows
of John Brown was gloomily towering over the once
sacred Mason and Dixon's line ; and now, shooting, lynch-
134 THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
ing, and hanging are the regular order of the day. But
Kansas is free, and the party raised on account of Southern
usurpation has at last gained the victory.
" One evil never comes alone." King Cotton lost, at
the same time, his monarchical privileges all over the
world. There are now many lands rising which dare
to compete with his universal power. Thus, disappointed
in his hopes and thwarted in his plans, King Cotton
lost his temper, began a family quarrel, dismissed his
cherished old queen, Lady Balance, and allied himself to
Dame Secession, young and sprightly in appearance, but
treacherous and rotten at the core. In anger he leaves
his old mother Union, builds a new home, a new capital,
and a new throne, where he can, undisturbed by the
groans of Freedom, feast alone and forsaken on the halle-
lujahs of Slavery.
In order to reach his object and satisfy his ruling ten-
dency, he is ready to nullify, to secede, to separate, to
break the Union ; to fight, and slay, and be slain — all for
the sake of Power and Rule. lie wants to draw into his
modern hexarchy all cis-Masonic States, from which even
the Albino courtiers of the North shall henceforth be ex-
cluded.
But let us dismiss all personifications and figures, and
face the present trouble in all its gravity.
The American question has gradually become one of
nationality. The establishment of the Missouri line, drawn
through the midst of a common country, was one of the
first great political onslaughts against our nationality. It
was, indeed, the first step toward denationalization. Un-
der the protection of that line, that unnatural element of
Balance of Power grew until it was forced to turn either
TIIE CRISIS
135
into Supremacy or Secession. Thwarted in the former,
the South had only the latter to rely upon. Had it not
been for that political interference, the American question
would never have assumed the present character.
II.— SECESSION.
Since the Constitution of the United States contains no
special provision for the case of a State wishing to secede
from the Union, the inference might be fair that States
have no constitutional right of secession. The Constitution
seems even positively to prohibit secession. We read in
Art. II., Sec. 10 : "Xo State shall, without the consent of
Congress, lay any duty of tonnage, keep troo})s, or ships
of war, in time of peace, enter into any agreement or
compact with another State, or with a foreign power."
Even the preparatory steps necessary for secession seem
thus to be forbidden by the Constitution. But should the
South seek to evade the letter of the Constitution by a
separate secession, it would undoubtedly violate its spirit.
Madison's words : " The Constitution requires an adoption
in toto and forever !" are generally acknowledged to be the
fair interpretation of that instrument.
But we will leave the question of the constitutionality
of secession undecided. We will even suppose that the
Constitution does not prohibit secession. In such a case
we must have recourse to general political reasoning and to
arguments from history. We will take the popular view
of " State," for otherwise the question would be decided
in a moment.
If this Union is a mere compact for an indefinite number
of years, its end, as its beginning, must depend upon some
act of mutual agreement between the parties concerned.
136 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
In making the original compact, certain conditions were en-
tered into by the parties, and certain duties -were im-
posed upon them, expressly or by the very nature of the
compact. Should even all these duties and conditions have
been complied with on the side of the party wishing to
secede, an unceremonious withdrawal would be illegal and
cause a total forfeiture of all claims on the common prop-
erty. In any case, then, a consultation with the different
members of the compact seems to be necessary, previously
to a positive act of open secession.
Such cases are nothing novel in the history of states,
and they were long since formalized by writers on Public
Law. Grotius, thus, agreeably to the above reasoning,
sums up the whole matter by saying : " A state which had
been one, may be divided, either consensu miituo, or vi
beUica." " Mutual Consent" or " Force of War" is thus the
alternative given by the " Father of the Law of Xations,"
the first authority in Public Law, even to the present day.
"Mutual Consent" is, however, the first clause of that
alternative, and " Force of War" is consequent only upon
a failure of the first.
Almost all cases of a similar nature in modern history
verify the above alternative and the order of its succession.
The way by " Mutual Consent" was first tried, and only
when all peaceable means were found futile, was " Force
of War" resorted to.
Such is the history of the Xctherlanders, of world-wide
fame. For many years they had endured the blighting
breath of the Spanish tyrant. They had felt each new
wrong, each new insult, each new disgrace thrown upon
them by a fiendish power. They protested, they peti-
tioned, they prayed for justice, they remonstrated, they
THE CRISIS. 121
sent delegates to the King, they opened negotiations, they
sued for redress ; and only when petitions and remon-
strances, conventions and negotiations, brought about no
definite result, they raised their arms to fight for their
rights, they seceded and declared their independence of an
unfriendly government.
Such, too, was the history of our own United States two
hundred years later. We were similarly circumstanced
and acted similarly. We, too, petitioned and protested,
convened and negotiated, and only when remonstrances
and threats proved futile, was war declared and independ-
ence achieved.
These are the two most brilliant examples of secession
in modern history. There are others, memorable, too, but
less successful. Poland could not recover its independence.
Hungary was ruthlessly delivered to Austria. In others still,
secession was less bloody, as in the separation of Belgium
from Holland ; and Neufchatel, the Swiss canton, went, in-
deed, quite peaceably out of the guardianship of Prussia.
But there is an example of secessionary character in
a country which bears great resemblance to our own.
It is in Switzerland, a republican confederacy like ours,
only growing less slowly into a united nationality. In
1846, several cantons or states resolved upon setting up a
" Sonder-bund," a separate league. But the federal au-
thorities, backed by the patriotic masses of the other can-
tons, tarried not long in deciding which policy to choose —
that of coercion or that of " laissez faire." A federal
army was sent against the rebels, and in spite of Austrian
arms and Catholic money, the secessionists were conquered,
and Jesuitism, the bone of contest in that case, was hurled
from the territory of united Switzerland. What Jesuitism
138 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
was there, Slavery is here. We will examine whether such
a " Jacksonian" policy would suit the present circumstances.
III.— OUR POLICY.
Which policy will now be expected on one side and on
the other ? What will the South do, and what the United
States ?
These Southern States which are eager after revolution-
ary fame, might undoubtedly profit by the two great mod-
els we cited. We can not expect so much humility as in
the early days of the Xetherland struggles, nor so much
patience as in our own American revolution. But the
chivalric Southerners ought not to be behind the sturdy
Dutchmen, or the valiant Americans of old, in the ways
of gallantry and manliness. They ought, certainly, to
show as much frankness and forbearance toward a free
republic as those early heroes showed toward despotic
kings. They ought first to endeavor to obtain retrievance
for their injuries, real or imaginary ; and even in the case
of a temporary refusal of their requests, they ought, as
freemen and republicans of the nineteenth century, try
again all peaceable means to avoid a violent disrupture of
the once cherished empire. It can only be lamented that
some of the Southern States have taken a different course,
a course unwise and fatal to their best interests.
And what might we reasonably expect from the central
power of tire United States, from the Union as such?
She would listen to the grievances which are given as
cause for secession; she would endeavor to remove this
cause, should those grievances be found to rest on real
injustice done to the respective parties by the republic ;
she would construe and interpret the Constitution, the
THE CRISIS. • ]39
principal and fundamental bond of our Union, in the
liberal spirit of this enlightened age; and should those
grievances be found to be mere fancies, she would try to
convince the rebellious States of their unjust and injurious
policy; and, lastly, if negotiations and persuasions should
be of no avail, she would be tempted, from love of peace,
rather to let a State go than to incur the responsibility of
the horrors of a civil war.
And still such a yielding policy would awaken some fear
for the future of the empire even in the most peace-loving
breast. Where and when would secession then stop ? If
the " sovereign" States have a right to secede, what would
hinder us from breaking into thirty-four separate and in-
dependent republics ? Further still, we, the " sovereign''
people of these United States, have established this Con-
stitution ! Would not the "sovereigns" of each State,
then, have the same right of breaking it as the States, or
even more than they ? What would hinder the city of
New York from seceding ? What, other cities, and coun-
ties, and islands, and townships ? Whither would this
"separatism," "this disorganizing individualism," lead us?
" Would not," in the words of Taylee Lewis, "a polit-
ical death come over what before was full of social life,
and society be decomposed in its individual elements, and
no longer be a Body, but a Jtfase — a mass of putrescent
and fermenting atoms ?"
We are not yet near such a stage of perfect disorgaiiiza-
tion. But it is clear that a yielding policy would n<>t save
us from that danger.
This consideration will be weighed in the minds of
patriotic statesmen Xorth and South, and will influence
their action.
140 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
It would have been much easier to secede in the
earliest days of the republic and of the new Constitution.
There were, at that time, thirteen little colonies scattered
over a large surface. Each little colony formed a prov-
ince or State by itself. Each had a small population,
and was often separated from the others by large
wastes and impassable woods, or alienating prejudices.
A single glance into the history of those thirteen different
settlements, a mere look at a geographical map of that
time, must disclose the secret. They were as yet but
loosely connected, and their principal bond of Union
was at first merely a common opposition to a common
enemy.
But what a different aspect the country has now, after a
united growth of nearly a century ! The frontiers between
the different States are obliterated. The enlightened pop-
ulation increased and spread over woods and wastes. The
once separated States blended and grew into each other, and
had we now to form a new Confederacy, a new Constitution,
a new State, a new Nation, would it ever enter our minds
now to make a dividing line between Connecticut and
Rhode Island, between New Hampshire and Massachu-
setts, between Delaware and Pennsylvania and Maryland ?
What need would there be of such a number of Governors
and Capitals and separate Legislatures and other political
machinery in the New England States? And we might
multiply our examples. But it is sufficient for the present
purpose to point out the undeniable fact that Ave have all, land
and people, grown more and more into a better, united, and
more compact body, whose period of epiphysis is almost
over, and has thus caused such an intimate connection that
any separation of its members would leave an open, if not a
THE CRISIS. 141
fatal wound. Several Southern States, carried away by
the first excitement, and aided by a wavering policy of
the federal government, may make secession a fait ac-
compli on paper. It seems highly probable that this will
be the face the matter will take. But this very non-
opposition will allay the passion of the seceders, and they
will soon awake to a consciousness of the fearful posi-
tion in which they have placed themselves ; for the people
can not, for any long period of time, remain blind to
the immeasurable advantages of a common Union, and
the unavoidable injuries and calamities arising from Dis-
union.
This growing together, this united national life, is even
the very distinguishing characteristic of our present won-
derful civilization. Germany is panting for unity, and has
made the preparatory steps for its accomplishment. Italy
has inaugurated a more poetical and radical method of
reaching the same end. The republics of Central America
are laboring under the same process, and South America
appreciates slowly the merits of union.
History clearly shows that Disunion of parts that prop-
erly belong together, is fatal in the end. There is Holland,
formerly so powerful, and Belgium, and the Hanse towns,
and the Italian republics. " Individuals," says the famous
Fe. List, " owe the greatest part of m their productive
power to the political organization and to the power
of the country in which they reside. A considerable
population, and a vast territory, with varied resources,
are essential elements of normal nationality, fundamental
conditions of moral culture, as well as of material develop-
ment of political power."
There is among a united people less fear and insecurity,
142 TnE AMERICAN QUESTION.
and, consequently, less waste of labor ; a more steady in-
dustry, and a more reliable market. The policy of even
friendly foreign states changes often unawares, and causes
disappointment and loss beyond their own limits. There
are no fortresses needed to protect the many boundaries,
no troops or vessels to watch possible encroachments, no
turnpikes or custom-houses to guard against foreign com-
petition. There is free communication, free commerce,
free trade, in the largest and most essential acceptation of
the word ; unfettered exchange of products, unfettered in-
tercourse of men. This is the free trade for which the
greatest statesmen and economists were laboring through
so many centuries against that self-splitting system of feudal
seclusiveness and dismemberment. Those heroes are now
ignorantly thrown in the category of the narrow-minded
modern free-traders, who, in their eagerness after foreign
trade, forget the labor, freedom, and consolidation of their
own country. Free trade is, indeed, a vital principle of a
nation's life, if it means free commerce of men and pro-
duce, not on principles of privileges inherited or newly
granted, but on principles of the equal interests of all
individual members and states, of common sympathy, of a
common policy, and a common destiny. Free trade in this
sense creates fresh stimulus, new thrift and enjoyment,
security and reliance, peace and power, an accumulated and
multiplied force, and leads a nation, as a compact body,
toward one common object.
This is Avhat is meant by Union ; this is what is meant
by Nationality ; and these advantages are either already
at our command, or they are growing upon us so much
the more exuberantly as we diligently watch our Union,
ward off its dangers, reform its abuses, regulate its gov-
THE CRISIS. 143
eminent, and understand our mission. AW' have, indeed,
already become one of the Great Powers of the world,
with the duties and privileges incumbent upon Mich a
glorious rank. We, the people, have labored together
this long time for a common destiny, in spite of political
disturbances. The world has learned to know American
industry, American commerce, American art, American
civilization. We have perceived more clearly from day
to day that we have a common destiny, a common mission
to ourselves, to America, and to the world. And such
a united growth has, in spite of the invectives and mis-
representations of political parties, laid the foundation for
a solid Love of the Union, which needs but a moment of
unbiased self-consciousness to rouse it to unheard-of deeds
of patriotic valor.
Xow, such thoughts will bear upon the minds of the
people in all parts of our common land, and forebode a bet-
ter future. But, in view of these undeniable facts, the
country will also wake up to a true sense of its responsibili-
ties. For we may, in the end, reach our common object,
pointed out to us by Xature ; but wavering counsels and
lack of decision may make us pass through years of unne-
cessary suffering and misfortune. It is the best policy to
face at once the whole danger. There is more at stake
than the welfare of the Negro Slave. A nationality, a
republic, a Great Power of the world, American civiliza-
tion, the progress of the whole world, are in question, and
the United States can not allow herself to be split or give
up any part of her territory which is positively necessary
for the accomplishment of her fundamental plan and the
realization of the original idea which called her into
being.
144 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
IV.— INTEGRITY OF THE UNION.
There are certain parts of a nation's territory which are
positively necessary for the nation's existence. These may
be called its integral parts. Other districts, provinces, or
states may be less necessary, and the nation's destiny may
be reached without them. Xow, no integral part can be
allowed to secede if the nation is true to itself, to its
original plan, and to its mission. Xo failure, be it from
lack of patriotism or from downright treason, can ever
alter this political axiom.
The only question will, then, be : What are to be regard-
ed as integral parts of the United States ? Under this
name we must first comprise all national property — viz.,
property held by the United States for the purpose of
protecting and defending itself against any encroachments,
political or commercial. Such are all national " forts,
magazines, arsenals, dock-yards, and other needful build-
ings," thus specified in the Constitution. They are neces-
sary for two purposes — namely, for repelling the attacks
of a hostile power, and for collecting the revenue. And
they will remain to be necessary, whatever the policy of
the United States may be during the long internal process
of secession. We say " long," because actual and total
secession is not the work of an Ordinance ; it would take
a State months, and probably years, to break entirely
loose from the Union and reconstruct a separate and in-
dependent government.
Especially must those forts and buildings and magazines
be kept (during that whole process) which protect the
United States boundaries. For if certain States should
even be allowed to secede, and should actually secede, the
THE CPwISIS. 145
United States would, by such separation, receive a new
boundary line, and this boundary line would be entirely
exposed. In case of war, she would be entirely unguard-
ed on that whole line, and be open there to any surprise ;
and even in peace she could not protect her commercial
policy against smuggling and other foreign encroachments.
There could thus, even in case of a yielding policy, not be
the faintest doubt about the right and duly and present
policy of the United States in regard to her national prop-
erty. She would be obliged to keep her old forts and posts
of revenue, whatever her final policy in regard to secession
mio-ht be, until a new cordon of fortifications and custom-
houses could be established along the new boundary, and
all other national works, made necessary by a separation
of States, could be completed. She must keep them,, de-
fend them, and in case of treason or defeat, retake them.
Anything short of this would be cowardice and treason,
and would bring the curses of the nation and of the world
on the head of the Executive.
Let us now examine the character of the States them-
selves that think of secession, or have passed secession
ordinances. We begin with Texas.
"Without entering into the political history of that State,
it will need no argument to prove that its annexation was
entirely unnecessary for the preservation, or growth, or
position, or power of the United States. Its conquest
may have been a necessity by reason of Balance of Pow< r,
but neither its climate nor its soil, neither its geograph-
ical position nor its people, made its annexation a neces-
sity for the Union as such. To be sure, it cosl us heavy
sacrifices of blood and money. But Texas would not be
7
140 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
worth a civil war, for the Union can and would stand
without it. Texas may, therefore, be allowed to " slide
off" South, East, or West, and become an independent
State or a joint member of others.
We must, once for all, dismiss the common popular
belief that we can prosper only by spreading over a larger
area. We have enough territory, or rather more than is
needed for centuries to come. We have no superfluous
force to send off into foreign states or lands. We have
plenty to do in what is already ours. There is yet an
immense amount of our own land to be settled, cultivated,
and watched over. We have not now, nor had we ever
need of any part of Mexico, foreign to us in everything.
We have no force to spare for its colonization. What we
did: in that regard, we did at the cost of our own peace
and prosperity, without any benefit to us. As a Xation,
we have no need of Mexico. As a Great Power of the
world, the duty of guarding her does not devolve upon
us alone. An American policy, strictly American, with
the United States as Supreme Judge over all matters con-
cerning the continent of America, is an anachronism and
an absurdity. The world is no longer disconnected or
inaccessible in its different parts. There are Great Powers
of the world to whose surveillance no quarter of the
globe is a stranger. And they have as much right here as
anywhere else, and we have as much right anywhere else
as here, or would have, if our narrow foreign policy
allowed us to see our true position in the world.*
To California the same reasoning would apply as to
o This will be the subject of a work by the author, now in course
of preparation. Title: "The Five Great Powers of Europe and the
United States of America."
THE CRISIS. !47
Texas, were it not for its gold. But thifl exception is, after
all, but imaginary. We needed California just as little as
we needed Texas. The same amount of labor and capital
invested in any one of our older States or Territories
would have done much more to increase the wealth and to
consolidate the power of the United States. We were
spreading over our older lands with a sjjeed greater than
was beneficial to us individually or as a nation, and terri-
ble were, and are still, the sufferings of those thrown to
the outskirts of the inhabited and civilized part of our
empire. They j:>ass through years of misery and famine
before they attain the most necessary comforts of a civil-
ized life. Imaginary cities and paper railroads allure the
weary laborer, eager to obtain a free homestead. The com-
mercial policy of the nation and political speculations con-
spire with each other to send new crowds of emigrants to
the West. And, indeed, the sparse lands of the first pio-
neers could be aided in no other way than by sending out
new men and new money : otherwise they would have per-
ished. The only difficulty was, and is yet, that, though
Europe sends annually hundreds and hundreds of thousands
to aid the spreading of cultivation and the extending of our
area of active power, still the flood is too feeble, the num-
ber of immigrants too small; for speculation is ever paving
a new "West, whose end seems never to be reached.
While, then, this process of wasting dispersion was
going on in the older part of our empire, a dispersion
which only the superhuman exertion of the emigrants from
the East and from Europe could keep from becoming an
entire dissolution, California, on the extremest point of our
national surface, was, with golden cords, violently drawn
into the same system of diverging. Still more distant,
14o THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
and less connected with the older part of the nation, it
required new waste of labor and capital to keep up a com-
mercial and political connection. It once retarded a finan-
cial crisis, but it could not prevent it. We imported from
Europe, at a fabulous rate, the fabrics of foreign labor ;
we paid with the agricultural products of the South and of
the West ; we spread over new lands to wrest from our vir-
gin soil new products for foreign exports ; we sent stocks
of every description and name, public and private, to our
creditors beyond the ocean ; but all our exertions to keep
up some show of balance were in vain ; we needed the
costly erection of a far-off workshop in the mines of Cali-
fornia, to delay the final crash. The chance of gaining
wealth with little labor, to be sure, gave an extraordinary
impulse to human adventure ; and life, labor, and capital
were recklessly thrown away to feed the Golden Calf.
But, had we kept our hands and capital at home, had we
built up our own industry, melted our own iron ore, and
fabricated our cloth, we would now be less dependent
upon our own and foreign merchant princes ; we would be
richer, and stronger, and happier, and more civilized,
though we had never known of the gold mountains of
California. Gold is a product like others. It can not be
obtained without labor. Labor is the measure of its value
as it is the measure of the value of any other product.
Nor is it a more necessary article of wealth than cloth or
iron. There is no need of gold as a circulating medium.
The world could at least have done without California or
Australia. Then, as an article of manufacture, it is a
luxury, and has its substitutes.
Still we have California, and we must do our duty
toward her. The Pacific coast would naturally have been
THE CRISIS. 149
the last of all the lands of the United States to be drawn
into a common national life. The commerce with Asia
would scarcely have necessitated an exceptional course.
A Pacific Railroad, to have benefited at once the whole
empire, must have led through a chain of settled lands.
But the extraordinary history of California requires ex-
traordinary measures, and therefore the Road is a na-
tional necessity. However, should California wish to se-
cede, the nation would save new expenses, and probably
new struggles, and soon recover from a momentary dis-
turbance of its commercial and industrial life. But the
Gold State knows its advantages too well to desire
secession.
Our relations with Louisiana are far different. The
whole old territory of Louisiana wras bought from France.
It was bought by the United States, not by one particular
State, or for one State, but by the whole and for the
whole — for a common national purpose. It was bought,
not for its people alone, but especially for its land and its
river. In the earliest days of our republic, the Missis-
sippi, down to its very mouth, was considered as neces-
sary for the development of our Western Territories. The
Western people, even in those early times, saw plainly that
they could not do without a permanent and undisturbed
right of freely navigating the Mississippi. Such a right,
however, could be "undisturbed and permanent" only
when the whole river was in their possession. They knew
this; it wTas a general Western thought — nay, more, a
common national thought, shared by all people and all
statesmen. The Western people, therefore, laid plans for
seizing New Orleans, even while it was yet Spanish. No
wonder, indeed, that Jefferson used such decided language
150 THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
about its acquisition, and that Bonaparte, from whom it
was at last purchased, said : " This accession of territory
strengthens forever the power of the United States."
The Mississippi Valley, drained by the Mississippi and
its tributaries, contains an area of over a million square
miles. It is nearly as large as the slopes of the Pacific
and the Atlantic together, and one third larger than the
whole domain of the republic upon the adoption of the
present Constitution. (Census, 1850.) In future centuries
it may be a great republic by itself— the Great Republic
of the Valley of the Mississippi, a friendly sister of a
Great Pacific and of a Great Atlantic Republic. But at
present, and probably for some centuries to come, such
a separation will not be necessitated by any demands
of self-interest, of executive expediency, or of economy.
Now, the mouth of the Mississippi is to the West, and
thus to the United States, the same as the mouth of the
Thames is to England, or that of the Rhone to France, or
that of the Volga to Russia, and it will be claimed as a
national river, and be defended as such.
Therefore, we must expect many and earnest efforts on
the part of the United States to keep the extensive terri-
tory of old Louisiana and the present State in harmonious
connection with the main body. It is, beyond the faintest
doubt, an integral part of the Union, and will regard itself
as such, and be so regarded. Patriotic counsels and com-
mon interests will tend to suppress undue excitement and
re-establish peace and harmony.
We now come to the Bokdek Slave States. Looking
at their position between the number-filled North and the
more thinly-settled South, we might conclude a priori
that their greatest attraction lies Northward. The force
THE CRISIS. 151
of attraction is in proportion to the force of production,
and this again is so much the greater as the population is
the larger.
This theory is proved by practice. The principal ex-
changes of the Border States are with the States north of
them. Moreover, the chief product of their Southern
neighbors is not carried to them directly. It is taken to
the far-off seaports, and then it is shipped to Europe, and
thence again to their Northern neighbors, until at last,
after a long and costly circumambulation, it arrives at
their homes from the side exactly opposite the one from
which it started. (And this is probably the way vrhich
cotton is to go for a long period of years, whether there
be secession or not.) Thus this very Southern staple rivets
still closer the Border States to their Northern friends.
Their population, too, and their whole progress show, in
spite of Slavery, unmistakable signs of sympathy with the
North. (See Tables on page 118.)
Under the regis of a common nationality, the white
population gradually pressed down into the Border Slave
States, which were thus — we repeat — slowly and peace-
ably being transformed into Free States. Had it not been
for political disturbances, this process would have gone on
still more rapidly. It is the way prescribed by nature for
freeing States, and the work is done unconsciously on the
part of the immigrants from Europe and the North, but it
is none the less surely done. There was thus a living
and lasting tie forming between the Border Slave States
and the Free North, and all boundary lines were vanishing.
And this was undoubtedly the cause of the steady in-
crease of free colored persons in those States. In 1850,
one seventh of their total colored population was free.
152 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
This peaceable progress of Freedom may also be seen
in the number of manumissions. The Border States suffer
the most from the loss of fugitive slaves ; still, in them
the number of manumissions is far larger than the number
of fugitives.
The Border States seem thus to be very intimately con-
nected with their Northern neighbors. Their commerce,
their population, their history, their geographical position,
and their whole progress point to the North and to Union.
Ambitious politicians may, perhaps, for a while misguide
the people of some of those States, but they can not blind
them, for any considerable time, to their real interests.
They know, too, that should they remain in the Union,
the greatest delicacy would be shown to them. As Slave
States they would then be in a small minority ; but this
very fact would obliterate Slavery as a basis of party dis-
tinction. There would be one common country, and all
its parts would faithfully do their duty toward one another,
in strict conformance to the dictates of the Constitution.
There are then the States of Tennessee and Arkansas.
They show in everything their close connection with
Kentucky and Missouri, and with the great Valley of
the Mississippi, whose fate they must share. The free
West and two nourishing Border States on their North,
Louisiana, with its increasing white population, on their
South, and the unbroken Mississippi, will, we hope, be
fetters strong enough to keep those two States also from
violently leaving the Union.
And now there are six States left, the two Carolinas
and the Eastern Gulf States ! Why should they wish
to secede ? Are there not in their history additional
reasons which should make them both wise and grateful ?
THE CRISIS. 153
Has it not been demonstrated over and over again that
the South, both in peace and in war, lias ever derived the
greatest material advantages from being in the Union?
What is the injury which they have now received a1 the
bands of the North? The election of a Republican Presi-
dent? No; this accidental occasion, selected for seces-
sion, can not be called even the near cause. It is of im-
portance duly insomuch as it fixes the date of the event.
The President-elect has repeatedly declared himself in
favor of a strict adherence to a constitutional Fugitive
Slave Law. He has gone still further, and frankly ex-
pressed his opinion to be that the United States, as Buch,
has nothhig to do with Slavery where it exists. He, then,
stands on a platform which contains not the faintest whis-
per of Abolition sentiments. He is the standard-bearer
of a party which— in order to show the South that they
were no Abolitionists — committed the indelicacy of drag-
ging Joiia Bnowx, who had duly been caught, tried,
sentenced, hung, and buried, from an "honorable" soli-
tude into a public platform. The only crime of the Presi-
dent-elect is that he does not subscribe to a policy which
would perpetuate civil war on the outskirts of our empire,
and drench every new inch of ground, gained for civiliz ;-
tion, with the blood of murdered citizens. And as for his
party, it has not the ascendancy in Congress, nor in the
Supreme Court of the United States. What hurt could
it do, even if it wished to do hurt ? Or has it not as much
right to extend Freedom as other parties have to extend
Slavery ? But is it not ready to submit to all the demands
of the Constitution? Or if this displeasure with the Re-
publican party is a mere pretext, is the South angry be-
cause she can no longer keep up the abnormal balance be-
7*
154 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
tween Slavery and Freedom ? What power can check the
natural and constitutional growth of the latter ? Are the
Border States worse off on account of the increase of their
free population ? No ; this whole question of Freedom
and Slavery has its warlike features only through political
interference. Let the policy of the United States in re-
spect to it be once firmly settled, then an enlightened and
dispassionate South will no more growl because of the
fruits of Freedom. It will understand that the very power
of the United States which it now tries to overthrow, is
the guardian of its peaceable development.
V.— PROGNOSTIC OF A SOUTHERN HEXARCHY.
To secede and to recede are the self-same thing.
Slavery can no longer continue the struggle against Free-
dom. It leaves the battle-field, and its arms are hence-
forth turned no more against the North, but against its
own self. For secession is a suicidal policy. Where
is the wealth, where the labor, to build up a separate
Confederacy ? Where are their bread and their clothes ?
Who will work in their manufactories? Who will be
their sailors? White laborers will shun their land. The
free colored people will flee from fear of being enslaved.
And what an industrial independence that would be !
They have cotton and some minor products to exchange ;
but woe to a nation that raises but one principal product !
It will be Free in nothing, and Slave in everything. Still,
these things might gradually be changed ; but where and
who are the men who will make this change under a sep-
arate empire ?
We will add a few tables.
THE CRISIS.
155
TABLE XXTIII. POPULATION OF THE TWO CAROLENA8 AND
OF THE EASTERN GULF STATES W 1850.
States. Whites. Free Colored. Slaves. Total Colored. Total.
N.Carolina.. 563,000 27,400 288,500 315.90Q, 869,000
S.Carolina... 274,500 8,900 384,900 393,800 008,500
Geore^a 521,500 2,900 381,000 384,500 906,100
Florida 47,200 900 39,300 40,200 87,400
Alabama.... 426,500 2,200 342,800 345,000 771,600
ippi... 295,700 900 300,800 410,700
Total 2,118,600 43,200 1,746,900 1,790,100 3,908,000
TABLE XXIX. PROPORTION OF WHITE TO TOTAL POPULA-
TION.
(IN
PEE CENTS.]
1
States.
1790.
1800.
1810.
1320.
1880.
1840.
1S50.
North Carolina. .
. . 73.19
70.65
67.76
64.07
64.36
63.64
South Carolina. .
.. 56.28
56.79
51.60
47.33
43.59
41.07
■Georgia
. . 64.07
62.73
57.60
55.59
57.43
58.97
Florida
—
—
—
—
52.93
51.29
53.98
Alabama
—
58.52
57.00
66.81
55.90
61.52
51.56
56.74
47.67
55.27
Mississippi
18.76
TABLE XXX. PROPORTION OF FREE COLORED TO TOTAL
• POPULATION.
State?.
North Carolina
South Carolina.
1790.
1.26
0.72
Georgia 0.48
Florida —
Alabama —
1S00.
1.47
0.92
0.63
1810.
1.85
1.10
0.71
1S20.
2.29
1.36
0.51
— 0.45
1S30.
2.65
1.36
0 48
2.43
0.51
1S40.
3.01
1.39
0.40
1.50
0.34
1 850.
3.16
1.34
0.32
1.07
0.29
Mississippi
— 2.06 0.59 0.61 0.38 0.36 0.15
TABLE XXXI. MANUMITTED AND FUGITYE SLAVES IN 1850.
Stales. Slaves. Manumitted.
North Carolina 288,500 2 ...
South Carolina 384,400 2 ...
Georgia 381,600 19 ...
Florida .
39.300 22
Alabama 342,800
29
Mississippi .
309,800 6
Fugitives.
.. 64
.. 16
.. 89
.. 18
.. 16
.. 41
1,746,900
67
These tables show that the six States together had, in
1850, a population about equal in number to that of the
United States when they were first founded. The inge-
nious Superintendent of the Census of 1850 makes the
whole Gulf States a rather dubious compliment when he
156 THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
says, " that while the Atlantic States have increased more
than threefold since 1790, the Gulf States, which had then
scarcely any existence, have now a population of nearly
one half as great as the population of all the States together
at that time." But that " whole population of all the States
at that time" was indeed very small, and one half of that
is scarcely large enough to build up a separate nation.
The rate of increase, too, is not so very favorable. The
Gulfj east of the Mississippi, increased, on the whole, only
6.1 per cent., while the Atlantic Slope increased 54.8
per cent., and the Mississippi Valley 37.2 per cent. If
we add to the Gulf States, east of the Mississippi, the two
Carolinas, the proportions will change but little. For the
ratio of the decennial increase steadily and rapidly dimin-
ished in North Carolina from 21.42 per cent, in 1800 to
15.35 in 1850; and in South Carolina, from 38.75 per cent,
in 1800 to 12.47 in 1850. Now, should those six States
even grow at the same ratio as they have done heretofore,
and the colored people be counted as regular population,
it would take them at least six times as long as it did the
Valley of the Mississippi and the Atlantic Slope to grow
to their number and strength. They would thus reach, in
about 300 or 400 years, the present power of the United
States, of which they are now already a part, and whose
influence, and glory, and position in the world they now
share as coequal members. To say the least, secession on
their part is exceedingly impolitic. They would at once
sink from being a great power in the world to a fourth-
rate little State, with no voice or influence in the life of
nations.
But there is another aspect to these tables. It appears
that the proportion of the white population in these States
THE CRISIS. 157
is continually growing smaller, a phenomenon very differ-
ent from what was seen in the Border States.
From the first year of computation to 1850 that propor-
tion decreased in
N. Carolina. S. Carolina. Georgia. Florida. Alabama. Mlssisefppi.
0.5-5 per cent. 15.21 6.51 (incr.) 1.05 11.54. 9.76
The mean decrease of the proportion of white to total
population in the six States together is thus 8.43 per cent.
The proportion of free colored persons to total population
is also steadily decreasing, except in North Carolina ; nor
are there any manumissions worth mentioning. The slaves
will thus be in a majority long before the Confederacy
reaches any considerable power in the world. And what
will be the residt of such an increase ?
The news of a separation from the original republic of
the United States can not even now be kept a secret from
the slave population. It has reached them through the
patriotic speeches of indignant Southerners, through the
misrepresentations of an enraged party press, through the
whispers of their free colored brethren. Though they are
at present but partially informed, they would soon better
appreciate their position. The United States would be to
them a second England. No fugitive slave law would
help the slaveholder of a Southern republic to obtain his
runaway Negroes from the then foreign soil of the United
States. Nor would the loss of Negroes be their only
disadvantage. The slaves would soon awaken to a con-
sciousness of their power, and break out in open rebellion.
No United States would then be the guardian of the slave
power. No United States posse would be found to subdue
the insurrection.
And should this be false prophecy, and the Negroes
158 THE AMERICAN" QUESTION.
remain peaceable, and increase in number, what will the
South do with that increased number ? There would be
no more new territory for the slave power to conquer and
colonize. The United States, England, and France would
then go hand in hand, and no Walker would ever again
dare to think of putting Slavery where formerly Freedom
was. The world has hitherto appreciated the difficult
position of the United States, and its committal to Slavery.
The world has been forced to respect the United States as
a Great Power, and has feared its strength. The world en-
dured much from it, in order to avoid collisions detri-
mental to all. But things would look differently in case
of a permanent secession. The Great Powers of the
world, and especially England and the United States,
would then be united, and jointly watch over the fortunes
of races and nations.
But a Southern Confederacy would not so long exist,
even should it be joined by several more or by all the
Slave States. Fr. List's words would soon be applicable to
them : " The debt which so greatly oppresses them is the
result of a series of excessive exertions to maintain their
independence, and it is in the nature of things that the
evil should reach a point where it may be intolerable,
and when their incorporation into a greater nationality
would appear as acceptable as it will be necessary.*'
Troubles from within and troubles from without would
soon prove to them the fatality of secession. The poeti-
cal excitement of the first days would soon pass away,
and prosy misery take its place. Long before a dreaded
slave insurrection would strike horror into the breast
of the South and of the whole world — long before the
Southern republic would wage war against a world in
THE CRISIS. 159
arms — parties woxdd arise within their own precincts, and
the cry of Union, no more fearing to be choked as treason,
would be again heard from the Gulf of Mexico to the
borders of Old Virginia, from the Mississippi to the
mighty oceans ; and the glorious Republic of the United
States of America would be one again and forever.
VI.— A NEW PROPOSAL FOR A COMPROMISE.
Experiments of Disunion with their different contin-
gencies are costly and unfortunate. They bring distress
on all sections. It would take years to recover from such
a violent disrupture of a country — of its industry, of its
commerce, and of its government. But still, in the end,
the South would lose the most ; for there is, even in the
worst case of secession — a secession of all the Slave States
■ — more wealth and more productive labor, more strength
and more power to rely upon in the North than in the
South.
TABLE XXXII. PROGRESS OF POPULATION.
SLAVE STATES.
1790 1,271,500
1800 1.703,000
1810 2,208,800
1820 2,831,600
1830 3,662,600
1840 4,634,500
1850 6,222,400
FREE STATES.
1790 1.901,000
1800 2,601,500
1810 3,653,200
1820 5,030,400
1830 0,874,800
1840 9,561,200
1850 13,330,000
The difference between the numbers of whites in the
Slave and in the Free States was thus about 700,000 in
1790. The difference in 1S50 was about 7,000,000, and
it must be still greater in 1860; for the rate of increase
of the Slave States was in the last decade 34.26 per cent. ;
of the Free States 39.42. Thus the whites in the South
will number, in 1860, about 8,338,000, and those in the
16q THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
North about 18,529,500. Moreover, in ease of Disunion, that
gradual and peaceable pressing down into the Southern
States would cease ; the North would keep its full num-
bers and spread on its own soil, and thus increase at a still
higher ratio, while all emancipation would at once stop,
and be replaced by violent insurrection.
We confined ourselves in our last reasonings, about pop-
ulation to white men ; for in case of Disunion there would
but little reliance be placed on the colored persons, be it in
peace or in war.
But we think so highly of the Union, we are so well
aware of the advantages accruing from it to the whole
country and to the world, we feel so keenly the evils
from Disunion (though it be but partial and momentary),
that, should our old Constitution not suffice, we would be
wining, at any time, to submit to a new compromise.
Nay, further, we would be ready, for the sake of union
and peace, to yield our whole point respecting Slavery, and
to look henceforth at the slave, politically, or rather inter-
nationally, as a mere beast or other property, such as an
ass or horse is. But, in subscribing thus to the opinions
of the South, we would ask in return for a rigid adherence
to this Southern principle in all its logical consequences.
We would therefore propose the following amendment to
the Constitution, short, simple, and radical :
Whereas, The present provisions in the Constitution, as
far as they refer to slaves, viz., " persons bound to serv-
ice," have, during an experience of seventy years, proved
to be inadequate for preventing dissension and violence
consequent on the question of Slavery in these United
States ;
Whereas, Those provisions even now prove insufficient
THE CRISIS. IQI
longer to satisfy the Xorth and the South in such manner
as that they may remain united ;
Resolved, That, in Art. I., See. 2, ^ 3, beginning thus :
"Representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned
among the several States which may be included within
this Union, according to their respective numbers," the
following words be stricken out, namely : " which shall
be determined by adding to the whole number of free
persons, including those bound to service for a term of
years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all
other persons."
Resolved, That, Art. IV., Sec. 2, f 3, reading thus:
" No person held to service or labor in one State, under
the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in conse-
quence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged
from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on
claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be
due," be likewise stricken out.
Resolved, That in lieu of the last-named paragraph
(namely, Art. IV., Sec. 2, T 3), the following be substi-
tuted :
" % 3. Whatever is regarded as property under the laws
of one State, shall also be regarded as such in all the
other States."
This would be in perfect accordance with Mr. Davis'
resolutions in the Senate Committee of Thirteen.
"Mr. Davis offered the following resolution, which lies over with
the others :
"That it shall he declared by amendment of the Constitution that
property in slaves, recognized as such by the local law of any of the
States of the Union, shall stand upon the same footing in all consti-
tutional and federal relations as any other species of property so
recognized ; and, like other property, shall not be subject to be
IQ2 THE AMEEICAN QUESTION.
divested or impaired by the local law of any other State either in
escape thereto, or by the transit or sojourn of the owner therein.
And in no case whatever shall such property be subject to be divested
or impaired by any legislative act of the United States, or any of the
territories thereof."
The Fugitive Slave Law, which is based on Art. IV.,
Sec. 2, 1" 3, would then be invalid. The North would no
more be called upon to fulfill the unpleasant duty of catch-
ing fugitive slaves. The owner alone would be responsible
for all possible losses of horses, asses, or slaves.
The Southerner, on the other side, might henceforth,
undisturbed by any Personal Liberty Bill or " erroneous"
interpretation of the Constitution, go with his property —
ass, horse, or slave — wherever he chose — to any State or
Territory, settled or unsettled. But he himself must hence-
forth take care of his property. If it be stolen or injured,
he can apply to the proper authorities ; but if it runs away,
from its own free wish and will, he himself must run after
it, and catch it, and drive it home again. His neighbors
may lend him kind assistance if they choose, but they will
not legally or constitutionally be bound to do it.
The number of Southern representatives to Congress
would also be somewhat diminished by carrying out the
Southern doctrine in all its logical consequences. This
would be unpleasant ; but there would be no help for it.
Other deductions might be made from the same principle ;
but as they would chiefly refer to the internal affairs of
each State, they are omitted in this general compromise.
Nor would it be to the disadvantage of the Negro slave ;
for the chances of freedom would be, by fir, greater for
him in the Free States than in the Slave States. This po-
litical nationalization of Slavery would even hasten the
work of emancipation ; for the influence of the free white
THE CKISIS. 163
population would thereby become more direct. Suppose
the State of New York should in such a way receive some
10,000 slaves. They would certainly be prepared for
freedom and become free in a shorter time here than if
they had remained in South Carolina.
Nor would this dispersion of -laves over the whole
national territory add anything to our disgrace, if such it
be to own slaves. We have the same responsibility, and
deserve the same epithets, whether our Slavery is in six-
teen States only or in thirty-four : for we are one common
nation. The question is only, how we can best secure its
gradual abolition.
CONCLUSION.
So much for compromises. But until it is decided
whether the original Constitution or the amended one
shall henceforth be the Supreme Law of the land, the
proper policy of the United States Government is as
clear and distinct as its right and duty.
Whatever the future may bring, peace or war, the
United States must —
1. Keep, defend, and in case of treason or defeat, retake,
at any cost, all national fortifications necessary for the pro-
tection of all her old boundaries, and for common national
safety.
2. She must keep, defend, and, in case of necessity, retake,
at any cost, the Mississippi from its source to its mouth.
3. She must, in all other respects, leave the States un-
disturbed in their internal process of secession, unless they
attack national property.
4. She must give the secessionary States time to recover
from their excitement, and leave to them the same initiatory
jg^ THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
step in returning to the Union that they assumed in
seceding from it.
This must be the present course of action on the part
of the United States. It follows from the constitutional
principle of Protection to National Interest and Non-
Interference toith local Matters, and will probably cover
all future contingencies.
Should, however, the present force of the United States
army, from any reason, be inadequate to the above task,
there would be enough patriotism left in the land to call,
at the shortest notice, a million of men to arms, who,
without distinction of party, would be ready to fight for
this common country, and rout the rebels, from whatever
section they might come.
THE END.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
III '
III
0 012 026 447 3
Mg%F&.\
M
l\V»fi
.•vh v*V vsSM
VyHEMWMS
*^&
1>J
UBHIB1
.