These were, want of popular educational facilities, lack of internal
improvements, and the existence of slavery.[192] The author says:
"The last and most important cause unfavorably affecting Virginia
which we shall mention is the existence of slavery within her
bounds. We have already seen the origin and progress of this
institution. As to its evils, we have nothing new to offer; they
have long been felt and acknowledged by the most sagacious minds in
our state."[193]
Bishop Meade, in a note to his history, _Old Churches, Ministers and
Families in Virginia_, published in 1857, referring to the injurious
effects of slavery upon Virginia's agricultural development, says:
"That the agriculture of Virginia has suffered in times past from the
use of slaves, we think most evident from the deserted fields,
impoverished estates and emigrating population."[194]
In 1852, the Virginia Agricultural Society was organized, having among
its membership and founders, the foremost planters and citizens of the
state. From an address issued at the time, we make the following
compilations and extracts:
After reciting that Virginia was a community of farmers—eight-tenths
of her industry being expended upon the soil, the address proceeds to
point out that out of thirty-nine millions of acres she tills only a
little over ten millions; that New York, on the other hand, with
twenty-nine and a half millions, has subdued to the plough twelve and
a quarter; while Massachusetts has reclaimed from the forests, quarry
and marsh, two and one-tenth out of her little territory of five
millions of acres; that the live stock of Virginia was worth only
$3.31 for every arable acre; the live stock of New York, $6.07; and
the live stock of Massachusetts, $4.52; that the proportion of hay for
the same quantity of land was eighty-one pounds for Virginia, six
hundred and seventy-nine pounds for New York, and six hundred and
eighty-four pounds for Massachusetts; that whilst the population of
Virginia had increased during the previous ten years in a ratio of
eleven to sixty-six, New York had increased twenty-seven to fifty-two,
and Massachusetts thirty-four to eighty-one. The address then
proceeds:
"In the above figures, carefully selected from the data of authentic
documents, we find no cause for self-gratulation, but some food for
meditation. They are not without use to those who would improve the
future by the past. They show that we have not done our part in the
bringing of land into cultivation; that notwithstanding natural
advantages which greatly exceed those of the two states drawn into
parallel with Virginia, we are yet behind them both....
"When we contemplate our field of labor and the work we have done in
it, we cannot but observe the sad contrast between capacity and
achievement. With a widespread domain, with a kindly soil, with a
climate whose sun radiates fertility and whose very dews distill
abundance, we find our inheritance so wasted that the eye aches to
behold the prospect."[195]
Henry A. Wise, in the canvass of 1856, preliminary to his election to
the office of Governor, depicted the financial and industrial
conditions then existing in Virginia.
"Commerce," said he, "has long ago spread her sails and sailed away
from you. You have not, as yet, dug more than coal enough to warm
yourselves at your own hearths; you have not yet spun more than
coarse cotton enough in the way of manufacture to clothe your own
slaves. You have no commerce, no mining, no manufactures. You have
relied alone upon the single power of agriculture—and such
agriculture! Your sedge patches outshine the sun. Your inattention
to your only source of wealth has scarred the very bosom of mother
earth."[196]
It will be observed that neither the authors of the address issued by
the Agricultural Society of Virginia, nor Governor Wise, attribute the
poverty and backwardness of Virginia to the institution of slavery.
Their statements, however, are none the less valuable as showing the
status—financial and industrial—to which Virginia had been reduced.
-----
Footnote 183:
_History of United States_, Bancroft, Vol. VI, p. 179.
Footnote 184:
_Idem_, p. 262.
Footnote 185:
_Causes of Civil War_, Chadwick, p. 35.
Footnote 186:
_Niles' Register_, Vol. XXXVI, No. 932, p. 356.
Footnote 187:
_Virginia Slavery Debate_, 1832, White, Speech of Thomas Marshall,
p. 6.
Footnote 188:
_Idem_, Speech of Charles J. Faulkner, p. 7.
Footnote 189:
_Virginia Slavery Debate_, 1832, White, Speech of Philip A. Bolling,
p. 14.
Footnote 190:
_Idem_, Speech of James McDowell, p. 18.
Footnote 191:
_The Ruffner Pamphlet._
Footnote 192:
_History of Virginia_, Howison, Vol. II, pp. 510-511.
Footnote 193:
_History of Virginia_, Howison, Vol. II, p. 517.
Footnote 194:
_Old Churches, Ministers and Families of Virginia_, Meade, Vol. I,
p. 90.
Footnote 195:
_A Journey in the Seaboard Slave States_, Olmstead, Vol. I, pp.
187-189.
Footnote 196:
_The Impending Crisis in the South_, Helper, p. 90.