I had prepared the argument furnished by this letter for my original

essay; I afterward struck it out, because at that time, so little had

the Bible been examined at the North in reference to slavery, that the

abolitionists very generally thought that this was the only scripture

which Southern slaveholders could find, giving any countenance to their

views of slavery. To test the correctness of this opinion, therefore, I

determined to make no allusion to it at that time.

Now, my dear sir, if from the evidence contained in the Bible to prove

slavery a lawful relation among God's people under every dispensation,

the assertion is still made, in the very face of this evidence, that

slavery has _ever been_ the greatest sin--_everywhere, and under all

circumstances_--can you, or can any sane man bring himself to believe,

that the mind capable of such a decision, is not capable of trampling

the word of God under foot upon any subject?

If it were not known to be the fact, we could not admit that a

Bible-reading man could bring himself to believe, with Dr. Wayland, that

a thing made lawful by the God of heaven, was, notwithstanding, the

greatest sin--and that Moses under the law, and Jesus Christ under the

gospel, had sanctioned and regulated in practice, the greatest known sin

on earth--and that Jesus had left his church to find out as best they

might, that the law of God which established slavery under the Old

Testament, and the precepts of the Holy Ghost which regulate the mutual

duty of master and slave under the New Testament, were laws and

precepts, to sanction and regulate among the people of God the greatest

sin which was ever perpetrated.

It is by no means strange that it should have taken seventeen centuries

to make such discoveries as the above, and it is worthy of note, that

these discoveries were made at last by men who did not appear to know,

at the time they made them, what was in the Bible on the subject of

slavery, and who now appear unwilling that the teachings of the Bible

should be spread before the people--this last I take to be the case,

because I have been unable to get the Northern press to give it

publicity.

Many anti-slavery men into whose hands my essays chanced to fall, have

frankly confessed to me, that in their Bible reading, they had

overlooked the plain teaching of the Holy Ghost, by taking what they

read in the Bible about masters and servants, to have reference to hired

servants and their employers.

You ask me for my opinion about the emancipation movement in the State

of Kentucky. I hold that the emancipation of hereditary slaves by a

State is not commanded, or in any way required by the Bible. The Old

Testament and the New, sanction slavery, but under no circumstances

enjoin its abolition, even among saints. Now, if religion, or the duty

we owe our Creator, was inconsistent with slavery, then this could not

be so. If pure religion, therefore, did not require its abolition under

the law of Moses, nor in the church of Christ--we may safely infer, that

our political, moral and social relations do not require it in a State;

unless a State requires higher moral, social, and religious qualities in

its subjects, than a gospel church.

Masters have been left by the Almighty, both under the patriarchal,

legal, and gospel dispensations, to their individual discretion on the

subject of emancipation.

The principle of justice inculcated by the Bible, refuses to sanction,

it seems to me, such an outrage upon the rights of men, as would be

perpetrated by any sovereign State, which, to-day, makes a thing to be

property, and to-morrow, takes it from the lawful owners, _without

political necessity or pecuniary compensation_. Now, if it be morally

right for a majority of the people (and that majority possibly a meagre

one, who may not own a slave) to take, without necessity or

compensation, the property in slaves held by a minority, (and that

minority a large one,) then it would be morally right for a majority,

without property, to take any thing else that may be lawfully owned by

the prudent and care-taking portion of the citizens.

As for intelligent philanthropy, it shudders at the infliction of

certain ruin upon a whole race of helpless beings. If emancipation by

law is philanthropic in Kentucky, it is, for the same reasons,

philanthropic in every State in the Union. But nothing in the future is

more certain, than that such emancipation would begin to work the

degradation and final ruin of the slave race, from the day of its

consummation.

Break the master's sympathy, which is inseparably connected with his

property right in his slave, and that moment the slave race is placed

upon a common level with all other competitors for the rewards of merit;

but as the slaves are inferior in the qualities which give success among

competitors in our country, extreme poverty would be their lot; and for

the want of means to rear families, they would multiply slowly, and die

out by inches, degraded by vice and crime, unpitied by honest and

virtuous men, and heart-broken by sufferings without a parallel.

So long as States let masters alone on this subject, good men among

them, both in the church and out of it, will struggle on, as experience

may dictate and justify, for the benefit of the slave race. And should

the time ever come, when emancipation in its consequences, will comport

with the moral, social, and political obligations of Christianity, then

Christian masters will invest their slaves with freedom, and then will

the good-will of those follow the descendants of Ham, who, without any

agency of their own, have been made in this land of liberty, their

providential guardians.

Yours, with affection,

THORNTON STRINGFELLOW.

[It is or ought to be known to all men, that

African slavery in the United States originated

in, and is perpetuated by a social and political

necessity, and that its continuance is demanded

equally by the highest interests of both races.

All writers on public law, from Drs. Channing and

Wayland, among the abolitionists, up to the

highest authorities on national law, admit the

necessity and propriety of slavery in a social

body, whenever men will not provide for their own

wants, and yield obedience to the law which guards

the rights of others. The guardianship and control

of the black race, by the white, in this Union, is

an indispensable Christian duty, to which we must

as yet look, if we would secure the well-being of

both races.]

FOOTNOTE:

[230] These letters were first published in the _Religious Herald_,

Richmond.

STATISTICAL VIEW OF SLAVERY.

To satisfy the conscientiousness of Christians, I published in the

_Herald_, some years past, Bible evidence, to prove slavery a lawful

relation among men. In a late communication you[231] refer to _this

essay_, and express a wish that it should be republished. Many have

expressed a similar wish.

Some who admit the _legality_ of slavery in the sight of God, question

the _expediency of its expansion_. It is believed by them to be an

element that is hostile to the best interests of society, and therefore,

great efforts have been, and are now being made, to exclude it from all

the new States and Territories which may hereafter be organized upon our

soil.

While the _expediency_ of its _expansion_ or _continuance_, are

questions with which I have not heretofore meddled, yet I hold their

_investigation_ to be within the legitimate range of Christian duty.

If unquestionable _facts_ and _experience_ warrant the _conclusion_,

that while slavery is lawful, yet its _continuance_ or _expansion_ among

us is _inexpedient_, then let us act accordingly.

Being _prompted_ by your request, I propose to examine _facts_, which

are admitted the world over, as evidence of prosperity and happiness

in a community, and to compare the evidence thus furnished in

different sections of our country, where the experiment of freedom,

and the experiment of slavery have been fully and fairly upon trial

since the commencement of our colonial existence, that we may see,

if possible, what is true on this subject. This seems to be the

_unerring_ method of coming at the truth. And if it shall appear, by

such a comparison--fairly made--between States of equal age, where

slavery and freedom have had a fair opportunity to produce their

legitimate results, that in all the elements of prosperity, slaveholding

States suffer nothing in the comparison--but that, in almost every

particular, are decidedly in advance of the non-slaveholding States,

why then we are bound to let the testimony of these facts control our

judgment.

Every man and woman in the United States should not only be willing, but

desirous to know, what is the matter-of-fact evidence on this

all-absorbing question. It is but lately that any method existed, of

coming at _undisputed_ facts, which would throw light upon this subject.

The Congress of the United States seeing this, thought proper to order

that such facts as tend to demonstrate the relative prosperity of the

different States of the Union, in religion--in morals--in the

acquisition of wealth--in the increase of native population--in the

prolongation of life--in the diminution of crime, etc., etc., should be

ascertained, under oath, by competent and responsible agents, and that

these facts should be published at the national expense for the benefit

of the people: so that the people could, understandingly, apply the

corrective for evils that might be found to exist in one locality, and

profit by a knowledge of the greater prosperity that might be found to

exist in another locality.

Up to that time, the non-slaveholding States affirmed, and the

slaveholding States tacitly admitted, that by this test, the

slaveholding States must suffer in the comparison, in some important

items. The facts which belong to the subject, are now before the world,

in the census of 1850.

It is my purpose to compare some of the most important of these facts,

which have a bearing on this subject. I shall take for the most part,

the six New England States, on one side, and the five old slave States,

(extending from, and including Maryland and Georgia,) on the other side,

for the comparison.

I select _these States_, not because they are the richest, (for they are

not,) but because they all lie on the Atlantic side of the

Union--because they were settled at or near the same time--because they

have (within a fraction) an equal free population--and because it has

been constantly affirmed, and almost universally admitted, that the

advantages of freedom, and the disadvantages of slavery, have been more

perfectly developed in these two sections, than they have been anywhere

else in the United States. There have been no controlling circumstances

at any time, since their first settlement, to neutralize the advantages

of freedom on the one side, or to modify the evils of slavery on the

other. Their mutual tendencies, without let or hindrance, have been in

full and free operation for more than two centuries. This is surely a

length of time quite sufficient to test the question now in controversy

between the North and the South, as to the evils of slavery.

The first facts I shall examine are those which throw light on the

progress made in each of these two localities in religion. Of all the

evils ascribed to slavery by the free men of the North, none equals, in

their estimation, its deleterious tendency upon _religion_ and _morals_.

Indeed, such is the _moral character_, ascribed by many at the North,

who call themselves Christians, to a Southern slaveholder, that no

degree of personal piety, of which he can be the subject, will bring

them to admit that he is any thing but a God-abhorred miscreant, utterly

unfit for the association of honorable men, much less Christian men.

In the outset of this examination, let me remark, that it is just and

proper, in a comparative estimate of the tendency of freedom and slavery

upon religion and morals, in these two sections of our country, that due

allowance be made for the moral and religious character of the materials

by which these two sections were originally settled. New England was

settled by Puritans, who were remarkable for orthodox sentiments in

religion--for high-toned religious conscientiousness, and a rigid

personal piety; while these five slave States were either settled, or

received character from Cavaliers, who rather scoffed at pure religion,

and were highly tinged with infidelity.

The stream does not, in its flow onward, carry with more certainty the

characteristics of the fountain, than does progressive society,

_generally_, the moral, social, and religious characteristics of its

origin. The five slave States, in this comparison originated in a people

of loose morals--strongly tinged with infidelity--and subjected, also,

in their onward progress, to all the evil tendencies (if any there be)

that are ascribed to slavery.

At the end of more than two centuries, we are comparing the progress

which these five slave States have made in religion, with the progress

made by six non-slaveholding States, whose subjects, when originally

organized into communities, were in advance, in personal piety and

religious conscientiousness, of any communities that had then been

founded since the days of the apostles--and that have been, in their

onward progress, from that time until this, free from all the supposed

evils of slavery. If infidelity and slavery be antagonistic elements,

almost, if not altogether, too strong for moral control in a community,

it certainly ought not to seem strange, that with this original odds

against them, these five old slave States should be found very far

behind their more highly favoured Northern neighbors in religious

attainments.

Religion being, at present, the subject of comparison, it may be

appropriate to remark further, that the _Christian religion_ is

propagated by God's blessing upon the observance of his laws.

The fundamental law of God, _for its propagation_ requires the gospel to

be preached to every creature; because, in the divine plan, faith in the

gospel was to make men Christians. The gospel was to be made the _power

of God_ unto salvation, to every one that _believeth_. _This faith_ was

to be originated by hearing the gospel, for "faith comes by hearing."

All those efforts, therefore, in a community, which manifests the

greatest solicitude on the part of the people, that the gospel should be

_heard_, is credible evidence that the people who make these efforts,

are the friends of Christ, and well-wishers to his cause. Now, all those

_means_ which are most likely to secure the ear of the people, are left

by Christ to the _discretion_ of his friends. They may use the

market-place--the highways--the forests--or _any other place_, which in

their judgment is most likely to get the ear of the people when the

gospel is proclaimed. By common consent, however, within the limits of

Christian civilization, they have agreed that suitable houses, in which

the people can meet to hear the gospel, are the most suitable and proper

means for securing the audience of the people, and as a consequence, the

transforming power of the gospel upon the hearts and lives of those who

hear.

With these views to guide us in estimating the value of the facts to be

examined, we proceed to disclosures made by the census of 1850. We there

learn that the free population of New England is two million seven

hundred and twenty-eight thousand and sixteen; and that the free

population of these five slave States is two million seven hundred and

thirty thousand two hundred and fourteen; an excess of only two thousand

one hundred and ninety-eight. This fraction we will drop out, and speak

of them as equals. New England, then, with an equal population, has

erected four thousand six hundred and seven churches; these five slave

States have erected eight thousand and eighty-one churches. These New

England churches will accommodate one million eight hundred and

ninety-three thousand four hundred and fifty hearers; the churches of

the five slave States will accommodate two million eight hundred and

ninety-six thousand four hundred and seventy-two hearers. Thus we see

that these slave States, with an equal free population, have erected

nearly double the number of churches, and furnished accommodation for

upwards of a million more persons, to hear the gospel, than can be

accommodated in New England. In New England, nine hundred and

thirty-four thousand, five hundred and sixty-six of its population

(which is nearly one-third) are excluded from a seat in houses built for

the purpose of enabling people to hear the gospel; while in these five

Southern States, there is room enough for every hearer that could be

crowded into the churches of New England, and then enough left to

accommodate more than a million of slaves.

Including slaves, these five Southern States have a population of seven

hundred and twenty thousand four hundred and ten more than New England;

yet while there are seven hundred and twenty thousand four hundred and

ten persons less in New England to provide for, there are two hundred

thousand more persons in New England who can't find a seat in the house

of God to hear the gospel, than there are in these five slave States.

The next fact set forth in the census, which I will examine, is equally

_suggestive_. These four thousand six hundred and seven churches in New

England are valued at nineteen million three hundred and sixty-two

thousand six hundred and thirty-four dollars. These eight thousand and

eighty-one churches in the five slave States are valued at eleven

million one hundred and forty-nine thousand one hundred and eighteen

dollars. Here is an immense expenditure in New England to erect

churches; yet we see that those New England churches, when erected, will

seat one million three thousand and twenty-two persons less than those

erected by the slave States, at a cost of eight million one hundred and

thirteen thousand five hundred and sixteen dollars less money. What

prompted to such an expenditure as this? Was it worldly pride? or was it

godly humility? Does it exhibit the evidence of humility, and a desire

to glorify God, by a provision that shall enable _all the people_ to

hear the gospel? or does it exhibit the evidence of pride, that seeks to

glorify the wealthy contributors, who occupy these costly temples to the

exclusion of the humble poor? We must all draw our own conclusions. A

mite, given to God from a right spirit, was declared by the Saviour to

be more than all the costly gifts of wealthy pride, which were cast into

the offerings of God. The Saviour informed the messenger of John the

Baptist, that _one of the signs_ by which to decide the _presence_ of

the Messiah, was to be found in the fact that the poor had the gospel

preached to them. When we exclude the poor, we may safely conclude we

exclude Christ.

It is legitimate to conclude, therefore, that all the arrangements found

among a people, which palpably defeat the preaching of the gospel to the

poor, are arrangements which throw a shade of deep suspicion upon the

character of those who make them. _Costly palaces_ were never built for

the poor; they are neither suitable nor proper to secure the preaching

of the gospel to every creature.

There is still another fact revealed in the census, that furnishes

material for reflection when the effects of slavery upon religion are

being tried. The six New England States were originally settled by

_orthodox_ Christians--by men who manifested a very high regard for the

interests of pure religion; the five slave States, by men who scoffed at

religion, and who were subjected, also, to the so-called curse of

slavery; yet, at the end of over two hundred years, we have to deduct

from the four thousand six hundred and seven churches built up by New

England orthodoxy and freedom, the _astonishing number_ of two hundred

and two Unitarian, and two hundred and eighty-five Universalist

churches--while from the five slave States, we have to deduct from the

eight thousand and eighty-one churches which they have built, only one

Unitarian, and seven Universalist churches. New England regards these

four hundred and eighty-seven churches, which she has built, to be the

product of _blind guides_, that are _leaders of the blind_. Is it not

strange (she herself being judge) that New England orthodoxy and

personal freedom should beget this vast amount of infidelity; while

slaveholders and slavery have begotten so little of it in the same

length of time? Is there nothing in all this to render the correctness

of Northern views questionable, as to the deleterious tendency of

slavery? The facts, however, are given to the world in the census of

1850. All are left to draw from these facts their own conclusions. One

of these conclusions must be, that there is something else in the world

to corrupt religion and morals, besides slaveholders and slavery.

It is not improper to refer to some historical facts in this connection,

which are not in the census, but which, nevertheless, we all know to

exist. There are _isms_ at the North whose name is Legion. According to

the universal standard of _orthodoxy_, we are compelled to exclude the

_subjects_ of these isms from the pale of Christianity. What the

relative proportion is, North and South, of such of these isms as have

been nurtured into _organized_ existence, we have no certain means of

knowing--and I do not wish to do injustice, or to be offensive, in

statements which are not susceptible of proof by facts and figures--yet,

I suppose that in the five slave States, a man might wear himself out in

travel, and never find one of these isms with an _organized_ existence.

To find a single individual, would be doing more than most men have

done, with whom I am acquainted. But how is it in New England? The soil

seems to suit them--they grow up like Jonah's gourd. Some are warring

with great zeal against the social, and some against the religious

institutions of society. Why is this? The institution of slavery has not

produced, at the North, the moral obliquity, out of which they grow--a

reverence for the Bible has not produced it. How is their existence,

then, to be accounted for at the North, under institutions, whose

tendency is supposed to be so favorable to moral and religious

prosperity? And how is their utter absence to be accounted for at the

South, where the institution of slavery is supposed to be so fatal to

morality, religion and virtue? I will leave it for others to explain

this fact. It is a mysterious fact, according to the modes of reasoning

at the North. It is assumed by the North, that slavery tends to produce

social, moral, and religious evils. This assumption is flatly

contradicted by the facts of the census. These facts can never be

explained by the _New England theory_. There was an _ancient theory_,

held by men who were righteous in their own eyes, that no good thing

could come out of Nazareth. By that theory Christ himself was condemned.

It is not wonderful, therefore, that his friends should share the same

fate.

The next disclosure of the census, which we will compare, are those

which relate to the social prosperity of a people. Are they wealthy? are

they healthy? are they in conditions to raise families, etc.?

These questions indicate the _elements_ which belong to the item now to

be examined. States are made up of families. Wealth is a blessing in

those States which have it so distributed, as to give the greatest

number of homes to the families which compose them. Wealth, so

distributed in States, as to diminish the number of homes, is a curse to

the families which compose them. Home is the nursery and shield of

virtue. No right-minded man or woman, who had the means, could ever

consent to have a family without a home; and no State should make wealth

her boast, whose families are extensively without homes.

New England has five hundred and eighteen thousand five hundred and

thirty-two families, and four hundred and forty-seven thousand seven

hundred and eighty-nine dwellings. The five slave States have five

hundred and six thousand nine hundred and sixty-eight families, and four

hundred and ninety-six thousand three hundred and sixty-nine dwellings.

Here we see the astonishing fact, that with an equal population, New

England has eleven thousand five hundred and sixty-four more families

than these five slave States, and that these five slave States have

forty-eight thousand five hundred and eighty more dwellings than New

England--so that New England actually has seventy thousand seven hundred

and forty-three families without a home. In New England one family in

every _seven_ is without a home, while in these five old slave States

only one family in every _fifty-two_ is without a home.

According to the average number of persons composing a family, New

England has three hundred and seventy-three thousand seven hundred of

her people thrown upon the world without a place to call home.

It is truly painful to think of the effects upon morals and virtue,

which must flow from this state of things; and it is a pleasure to a

philanthropic heart to think of the superior condition of the

slaveholding people, who so generally have homes, where parents can

throw the shield of protection around their offspring, and guard them

against the dangers and demoralizing tendencies of an unprotected

condition.

There is another class of facts, equally astonishing, disclosed by the

census, and which belong to the comparison we are now making, between

States which were organized originally by Puritan orthodoxy and New

England freedom on one side, and by infidel slaveholders and slavery on

the other. They are facts which relate to natural increase in a State.

One of the boasts of Northern freemen is the _increase_ of their

population. With such a climate as New England, it was to be expected

that the people would increase faster, and live longer, than in the

climate of these five slave States. It is well known that a large

portion of the population of these five Southern States have a fatal

climate to contend with, and that everywhere else on the globe, under

similar circumstances, a diminished increase of births, and an increased

amount of deaths has been the result. But the census, as if disregarding

climate, and slavery, and the universal experience of all ages,

testifies that there is twenty-seven per cent. more of births, and

thirty-three per cent. less of deaths in the five old slave States, than

there is in the six New England States.

New England, with an equal population, and eleven thousand five hundred

and sixty-four more families, has sixteen thousand five hundred and

thirty-four less annual births, and ten thousand one hundred and

fifty-two more annual deaths, than these five sickly old Southern slave

States. The annual births in New England are sixty-one thousand one

hundred and forty-eight; and in the five slave States seventy-seven

thousand six hundred and eighty-three. In New England the annual deaths

are forty-two thousand three hundred and sixty-eight; in the five slave

States thirty-two thousand two hundred and sixteen.

In New England the ratio of births is one to forty-four; in the five

slave States one to thirty-five. In New England the ratio of deaths is

one to sixty-four; in the five slave States it is one to eighty-five.

The slaves are not in this estimate of births and deaths; they are in

the census, however, and that shows that they multiply considerably

faster, and are less liable to die than the freemen of New England.

Here are facts which contradict all history and all experience. In a

sickly Southern climate, among slaveholders, people actually multiply

faster, and die slower, than they do among freemen without slavery, in

one of the purest and healthiest Northern climates in the world. How is

this to be accounted for? Why do people multiply rapidly? Is it because

they live in a healthy climate? Why do they die rapidly? Is it because

they live in a sickly climate? Our census contradicts both suppositions.

Where, then, does the cause lie? Will excluding slavery from a

community cause them to multiply more rapidly and die slower? The

census says, No!

The census testifies that the proportion of births is twenty-seven per

cent. greater, and the proportion of deaths thirty-three per cent. less,

among slaveholders, in a community where slavery has existed for more

than two hundred years, under all the disadvantages of a sickly climate,

than among free men in the pure climate of New England. A man, in his

right mind, will demand an explanation of these astonishing facts. They

are easily explained. The census discloses a degree of _poverty_ in New

England, which scatters seventy thousand families to the four winds of

heaven, and _feeds_ (as we shall presently see) the _poor-house_, with

one hundred and thirty-five per cent. more of paupers than is found in

these slave States. This is no condition of things to increase births,

or diminish deaths, unless brothels give _increase_, and squalid poverty

the requisite sympathy and aid, to recover the sick and dying, from the

period of infancy to that of old age.

We proceed to compare other facts, which have a bearing upon the

relative merits of different institutions in securing social prosperity.

In every country there is a class to be found in such utter destitution,

that they must either be supported by charity, or perish of want. This

destitution arises, generally, from oppressive exactions or excessive

vice, and is evidence of the tendency of social institutions, and the

superiority of one over another, in securing the greatest amount of

individual prosperity and comfort.

With these views to aid us, we will compare some facts belonging to New

England and these five old slave States. With an equal population, New

England has thirty-three thousand four hundred and thirty-one paupers;

these five slave States have fourteen thousand two hundred and

twenty-one. Here is an excess of paupers in New England, notwithstanding

her boasted prosperity, of one hundred and thirty-five per cent. over

these five slave States. And if to these _continual paupers_ we were to

add the number (as given in State returns) that are partially aided in

New England, the addition would be awful. But I suppose New England will

strive to wipe off this stain of regular pauperism, by throwing the

blame of it upon the _foreigners_ among them. It should be remembered,

however, as an offset to this, that these foreigners are all from

non-slaveholding countries. From their infancy they have shared the

blessings of freedom and free institutions; therefore they ought to be

admitted, as homogeneous materials, in the social organizations of New

England, which we are now comparing with Southern slaveholding

communities.

But as foreign paupers are distinguished in the census from native born

citizens, we will now (in the comparison) exclude them in both sections.

The number of paupers will then be, for New England, eighteen thousand

nine hundred and sixty-six; for the five slave States, eleven thousand

seven hundred and twenty-eight--leaving to New England, which is

considered the model section of the world in all that is lovely in

religious and social prosperity, seven thousand two hundred and

thirty-eight more of her native sons in the poor-house, (or nearly

seventy per cent.,) than are to be found in this condition in an equal

population in these five Southern States.

The ratio of New England's _native sons_ in the poor-house is one to one

hundred and forty-three; of these five slave States one to two hundred

and thirty-four. The ratio of New England's _entire population_ in the

poor-house is one to eighty-one; the ratio of the entire population of

these five slave States is one to one hundred and seventy-one.

The Saviour asks if a good tree can bring forth evil fruit, or an evil

tree good fruit. Here is an exhibition of the _fruit_ borne by _New

England freedom_ and _Southern slavery_. The Saviour gives every man a

right to judge the tree by the fruit, and declares such to be righteous

judgment.

There is another item in the census which throws much light on the

comparative comfort and happiness of the people in these two localities.

It is neither physical destitution, criminal degradation, nor mental

suffering; but it is an effect which is known to flow from one, or the

other, or all three of these _conditions_ as causes; therefore it is an

important item in determining the amount of destitution, degradation,

and suffering, which exist in a community.

When we see effects which are known to flow from certain causes--the

causes may be concealed--yet we know that they exist by the effects we

see. With these remarks I proceed to state a fact disclosed in the

census, as it exists in New England, and as it exists in these five old

slave States.

In New England, with an equal population, we find that three thousand

eight hundred and twenty-nine of her white children have been crushed by

sufferings _of some sort_, to the condition of insanity, while in these

five old slave States there are only two thousand three hundred and

twenty-six of her white children who have been called to suffer, in

their earthly pilgrimage, a degree of anguish beyond mental endurance.

Here is a difference of more than sixty per cent. in favor of these five

States, as to conditions of suffering that are beyond endurance among

men. Very poor evidence this, of the superior happiness and comfort of

New England.

But while her white children are called to suffer over sixty per cent.

more of these crushing sorrows than those of these five States, how is

it with her black children in freedom, compared with the family here in

slavery, from which the most of them have fled, that they might enjoy

the blessings of liberty? It is exceedingly interesting to see the

benefits and blessings which New England freedom and Puritan sympathy

have conferred upon them.

Here are the facts of the census upon this subject:

Among the free negroes of New England, one is deaf or dumb for every

three thousand and five; while among the slaves of these States there is

only one for every six thousand five hundred and fifty-two. In New

England one free negro is blind for every eight hundred and seventy;

while in these States there is only one blind slave for every two

thousand six hundred and forty-five. In New England there is one free

negro insane or an idiot for every nine hundred and eighty; while in

these States there is but one slave for every three thousand and eighty.

Can any man bring himself to believe, with these facts before him, that

freedom in New England has proved a blessing to this race of people, or

that slavery is to them a curse in the Southern States? In

non-slaveholding States, _money_ will be the _master of poverty_. These

facts enumerated show the fruits of such a relation the world over. The

slave of money, while nominally free, has none to care for him at those

periods, and in those conditions of his life, when he is not able to

render service or labor. Childhood, old age, and sickness, are

conditions which make sympathy indispensable. Nominal freedom, combined

with poverty, can not secure it in those conditions, because it can not

render service or labor. The slave of the South enjoys this sympathy in

all conditions from birth till death. There is a spontaneous heart-felt

flow of it, to soothe his sorrows, to supply his wants, and smooth his

passage to the grave. Interest, honor, humanity, public opinion, and the

law, all _combine_ to awaken it, and to promote its activity.

Many facts of the character here examined have been disclosed in State

statistics, and others in the Federal census; some of which I shall

hereafter notice, that show with the most unquestionable certainty, that

freedom to this race, in our country, is a curse.

The facts which we have now examined, if they prove any thing, prove

that religion has prospered more among slaveholders at the South, than

it has among free men in New England. Slaveholders have made a much more

extensive and suitable provision for the people of all classes to hear

the gospel, than has been made by the freemen of New England.

Slaveholders have almost entirely frowned down the attempts of

blind-guides to corrupt the gospel, or mislead the people. Among them

organized bodies to overthrow the moral, social, and religious

institutions of society, are unknown.

If the facts already examined prove any thing, they prove that wealth,

among slaveholders, is much more equally distributed--so that very few,

compared with New England, are without homes.

The facts examined prove also, beyond question, that the unbearable

miseries which have their source in the heartless exactions of excessive

wealth, or extreme poverty, are more than sixty per cent. greater in New

England than in these States, and that one hundred and thirty-five per

cent. more of New England's toiling millions have to bear the

degradation of the poor-house, or die of want, than are to be found in

this condition in these five slave States.

The facts we have examined, prove also, that under all the disadvantages

of climate, the natural increase of the slave States is sixty per cent.

greater than it is in New England--twenty-seven per cent. of it by

increased annual births, and thirty-three per cent. of it by diminished

annual deaths. These are the most astonishing facts ever presented to

the world. They speak a language that ought to be read and studied by

all men. In the present state of our country, they ought to be

prayerfully pondered and not disregarded.

But notwithstanding all this, the aggregate wealth of New England is a

source of exultation and pride among her sons. They believe, with a

blind and stubborn tenacity, that slavery tends to poverty, and freedom

to wealth.

It cannot be denied that the aggregate earnings of the toiling

millions--when _hoarded_ by a _few_--may grow faster than it will when

these millions are allowed to take from it a daily supply, equal to

their reasonable wants. And it cannot be denied that New England has

great aggregate wealth.

The facts of the census show, however, that it is very unequally divided

among her people. The question now to be tried is, whether the _few_ in

New England have _hoarded_ this wealth, and can now _show it_, or

whether they have squandered it upon their lusts, and are unable to

_show it_.

This last and prominent boast of increased aggregate wealth in New

England, over that accumulated by slaveholders, we will now test by the

census of 1850. This is the standard adopted by our National Legislature

for its decision.

Before we examine the facts, however, let a few reflections which belong

to the subject be weighed.

The people of these five slave States are now, and ever have been, an

agricultural people. The people of the New England States are a

commercial and manufacturing people. New England has, in proportion to

numbers, the richest and most extensive commerce in the world. In

manufacturing skill and enterprise, they have no superiors on the globe.

They have ever reproached the South for investing their income in

slavelabor, in preference to commerce and manufactures. It has been the

settled conviction among nations, that investments in commerce and

manufactures give the greatest, and those in agriculture the smallest

profits. It is the settled conviction of the non-slaveholding States

that investments in slave labor, for agricultural purposes, is the worst

of all investments, and tends greatly to lessen its profits. This has

been proclaimed to the South so long by our Northern neighbors, that

many here have been brought to believe it, and to regret the existence

of slavery among us on that account, if on no other. With these

observations we turn to the census.

The census of 1850 tells us that New England, with a population now

numbering two million seven hundred, and twenty-eight thousand and

sixteen, with all the advantages of a commercial and manufacturing

investment, and with the most energetic and enterprising free men on

earth, to give that investment its greatest productiveness, has

accumulated wealth, in something over two hundred years, to the amount

of one billion three million four hundred and sixty-six thousand one

hundred and eighty-one dollars; while these five slave States, with an

equal population, have, in the same time, accumulated wealth to the

amount of one billion four hundred and twenty million nine hundred and

eighty-nine thousand five hundred and seventy-three dollars.

Here we see the indisputable fact that these five agricultural States,

with slavery, have accumulated an excess of aggregate wealth over the

amount accumulated in New England in the same time, of four hundred and

seventeen million five hundred and twenty-three thousand three hundred

and two dollars--so that the property belonging to New England, if

equally divided, would give to each citizen but three hundred and

sixty-seven dollars, while that belonging to the five slave States, if

equally divided, would give to each citizen the sum of five hundred and

twenty dollars--a difference in favor of each citizen in these five

slave States of one hundred and fifty-three dollars.

I am aware, however, of an opinion that some other non-slaveholding

States, have been much more successful in the accumulation of wealth,

than the six New England States, and that New York, Pennsylvania, and

Ohio, are of this favored number. Lest a design to deceive, by

concealing this supposed fact, should be attributed to the writer, we

will see what the census says as to these three more favored States. By

the census of 1850 we learn that New York, instead of being able to

divide three hundred and sixty-seven dollars with her citizens, as New

England could with hers, is only able to divide two hundred and

thirty-one dollars; Pennsylvania two hundred and fourteen, and Ohio two

hundred and nineteen. These several averages among freemen at the North,

and in New England, stand against the average of five hundred and twenty

dollars, which these five old impoverished Southern slave States could

divide with their citizens.

These facts must astonish our Northern neighbors, so long accustomed to

believe that slavery was the fruitful source of poverty, with all its

imagined evils; and these facts will astonish many at the South, so

long accustomed to hear it affirmed that slavery had produced these

evils, and while they were without the means of knowing, of course they

feared that it was so.

That every thing may appear, however, which will throw additional light

on the subject, I will state that Massachusetts, which is the _richest_

non-slaveholding State, could divide with each of her citizens five

hundred and forty-eight dollars. But on the other hand, South Carolina

could divide one thousand and one dollars, Louisiana eight hundred and

six dollars, Mississippi seven hundred and two dollars, and Georgia six

hundred and thirty-eight dollars, with their citizens.

Rhode Island, which is the next _richest_ non-slaveholding State to that

of Massachusetts, could divide with her citizens five hundred and

twenty-six dollars; one other non-slaveholding State (Connecticut) could

divide with her citizens three hundred and twenty-one dollars. After

this, the next _highest_ non-slaveholding State could divide two hundred

and eighty; the next highest two hundred and thirty-one; the next

highest two hundred and twenty-eight; the next highest two hundred and

nineteen; the next highest two hundred and fourteen dollars. After this,

the division ranges, among the non-slaveholding States, from one hundred

and sixty-six down to one hundred and thirty-four dollars--which last

sum is the amount that the so-called rich and prosperous Illinois could

divide with her population.

In the slaveholding States that are _less wealthy_ than South Carolina,

Louisiana, Mississippi, and Georgia, already noticed; Alabama could

divide with her citizens five hundred and eleven dollars; Maryland four

hundred and twenty-three; Virginia four hundred and three; Kentucky

three hundred and seventy-seven; and North Carolina three hundred and

sixty-seven. All these States are much _richer_ than the _third richest_

non-slaveholding State of the Union, viz: Connecticut. After this,

Tennessee could divide two hundred and forty-eight dollars, and

Missouri, which is the poorest of all the slave States, one hundred and

sixty-six dollars.

We will now give the _general average_ of the _non-slaveholding States_,

(California excepted, which in 1850 had not had time to exhibit any

fixed character,) and then the _general average_ of the _slaveholding

States_ of the _whole Union_.

The population of all the free States is thirteen million two hundred

and fourteen thousand three hundred and eighty; the free population of

all the slave States is six million three hundred and twelve thousand

eight hundred and ninety-nine. These thirteen million two hundred and

fourteen thousand three hundred and eighty of freemen have accumulated

an aggregate of property estimated at three billion one hundred and

eighty-six million six hundred and eighty-three thousand eight hundred

and twenty four dollars; while these six million three hundred and

twelve thousand eight hundred and ninety-nine of slaveholders have

accumulated an aggregate of two billion seven hundred and seventy-five

million one hundred and twenty-one thousand, six hundred and forty-four

dollars' worth of property.

Here we see that a population of Northern freemen, one hundred and nine

_per cent._ greater than the number of Southern freemen in the slave

States, have accumulated but sixteen _per cent._ _more_ of property.

In a division of the property accumulated by all the non-slaveholding

States, it will give to each citizen two hundred and thirty-three

dollars; while all accumulated by the various slave States, will give to

each citizen four hundred and thirty-nine dollars--nearly double. Were

we to give the slaves an equal share with the whites, in an average

division of aggregate wealth, the slaveholding States, with their slaves

included, would then be able to give each person two hundred and

ninety-one dollars instead of two hundred and thirty-three dollars,

which is all the free States have to divide with their people.

Is it possible, with these facts before us, to believe that slavery

tends to poverty. Such is the testimony of the census on the relative

wealth of these two sections of our country. It proves that slavery, as

an agricultural investment, is more profitable than an investment in

commerce and manufactures. The facts which have been reviewed prove with

equal clearness, that where slavery exists, the white race, and the

black, have prospered more in their religious, social and moral

condition, than either race has prospered, where slavery has been

excluded. We see that an increased amount of poverty and wretchedness

has to be borne in New England by both races. Ecclesiastical statistics

will show an increased amount of prosperity in religion that is

overwhelming.

Such is the prostration of moral restraint at the North, that, in their

cities, standing armies are necessary to guard the persons and property

of unoffending citizens, and to execute the laws upon reckless

offenders. This state of things is unknown in the slave States.

The census shows that slavery has been a blessing to the white race in

these slave States. They have prospered more in religion, they have more

homes, are wealthier, multiply faster, and live longer than in New

England, and they are exempt from the curse of organized infidelity and

lawless violence.

A comparison of the slave's condition at the South, with that of his own

race in freedom at the South, shows with equal clearness, that slavery,

in these States, has been, and now is, a blessing to this race of people

in all the essentials of human happiness and comfort. Our slaves all

have homes, are bountifully provided for in health, cared for and kindly

nursed in childhood, sickness, and old age; multiply faster, live

longer, are free from all the corroding ills of poverty and anxious

care, labor moderately, enjoy the blessings of the gospel, and let alone

by wicked men, are contented and happy.

Ex-Governor Smith, a few years past, in his message to the Legislature

of this State, showed, if I remember correctly, that seven-tenths more

of crime was chargeable to free negroes than to the whites and slaves.

By the census of 1850, the ratio of whites in the Penitentiary of

Virginia, for ten years, was one to twenty-three thousand and three,

while the ratio for the free negroes was one to three thousand and one.

For the same length of time, in the Penitentiary of Massachusetts, the

average of whites was one to seven thousand five hundred and

eighty-seven, instead of one to twenty-three thousand and three, as in

Virginia; and in Massachusetts the average of free negroes in the

Penitentiary, for this length of time, was one to two hundred and fifty,

instead of one to three thousand and one, as in Virginia. Here we see

that for an average of ten years, two hundred and fifty free negroes at

the North, commit annually as much crime as twenty-three thousand and

three white persons at the South; and that two hundred and fifty free

negroes, in a non-slaveholding State, commit annually as much crime as

three thousand and one free negroes in a slaveholding State. We see,

also, that seven thousand five hundred and eighty-seven white persons at

the North, commit annually as much crime as twenty-three thousand and

three white persons commit at the South. In the cities, criminal

degradation at the North is from three to five times greater with the

whites than at the South, and from ten to ninety-three times greater

with the free negroes at the North, than with the whites at the South,

and about twelve times greater than with the free negroes at the South.

The Federal census, and the State records, show not very far from this

proportion of criminal degradation, chargeable to this race of people

when invested with _the freedom of New England_. Can we, with these

facts before us, think that freedom to this race, in our country, is a

blessing to them?

In Africa, the condition of the aborigines in freedom is now, and ever

has been, as much below that of their enslaved sons in these States, as

the condition of a brute, is beneath that of a man. Slavery is becoming,

to this people, so manifestly a blessing in our country, that fugitives

from labor are constantly returning to their masters again, after

tasting the blessings, or rather the awful curse to them, of freedom in

non-slaveholding States; and while I write, those who are lawfully free

in this State, are praying our Legislature for a law that will allow

them to become slaves.

But before I dismiss the subject of wealth entirely, let me remark, that

while the census testifies that an agricultural people, with African

slave labor, increases wealth faster than free labor, employed in

agriculture, manufactures and commerce, yet reason demands that it

should be satisfactorily accounted for. It is well known that laboring

freemen at the North are more skillful, work longer in a day, labor

harder while at it, live on cheaper food, and less of it, than laborers

at the South.

How, then, is it to be accounted for that the aggregate increase of

wealth is less with them than it is with Southern slaveholders? Among

many reasons that might be assigned, I will mention three. The first is,

that half the people at the North (this is ascertained to be about the

amount) live in villages, towns and cities. The second reason is, that

the cost of living in cities (as has been ascertained) is about double

what it is in the country--to this _cost_ we must _add_, for the

_imprudent_ indulgences of _pride_ and _fashion_; and to _this_ we must

_add_, for a thousand _indulgences_, in violation of _moral propriety_,

all of which are almost unknown in country life. The third reason is to

be found in the great amount of pauperism and crime produced by city

life. In the city of New York, for instance, according to the American

Almanac, there were received in 1847, at the principal alms-houses of

the city, twenty-eight thousand six hundred and ninety-two persons, and

_out-door relief_ was given _from the public funds_ to thirty-four

thousand five hundred and seventy-two more--making in all seventy-three

thousand two hundred and sixty-four persons, or one out of every five,

in the city of New York, dependent, more or less, on _public charity_.

The total cost of this, to the city, was three hundred and nineteen

thousand two hundred and ninety-three dollars and eighty-eight cents. In

1849, in the Mayor's message, the estimate for the same thing is four

hundred thousand dollars. In Massachusetts, according to the report of

the Secretary of State in 1848, the number of constant and occasional

paupers, in the _whole State_, was one to every twenty of the whole

population. The proportion in the cities, I suppose, would equal New

York, which, as we have seen, is one to five. To this _public burden_ in

cities, we must add an immense _unknown amount_ of _private charity_,

which is not needed in country life.

_Crime_ in Northern cities keeps pace with _pauperism_. In _Boston_,

according to official State reports a few years past, one person out of

every fourteen males, and one out of every twenty-eight females, was

arraigned for criminal offenses. According to the census of 1850, there

were in the _State_ of Massachusetts, in a population of nine hundred

and ninety-four thousand five hundred and fourteen, the number of seven

thousand two hundred and fifty convictions for crime. In Virginia, the

same year, in a population of one million four hundred and twenty-one

thousand six hundred and sixty-one, there were one hundred and seven

convictions for crime.

In the _State_ of New York the proportion of crime is about the same as

in Massachusetts. In the _city_ of New York, in 1848 or 1849, there were

sentenced to the _State Prison_ one hundred and nineteen men and

seventeen women; to the _Penitentiary_ seven hundred men and one hundred

and seventy women; to the _City Prison_ one hundred and sixty-two men

and sixty-seven women--making a total of one thousand two hundred and

thirty-five criminals. Here is an amount of crime in a single city, that

equals all in the fifteen slave States together. In the _State_ of New

York, according to the census of 1850, there was, in a population of

three million and ninety-seven thousand three hundred and four, the

number of ten thousand two hundred and seventy-nine convictions for

crime; while in South Carolina, in a population of six hundred and

sixty-eight thousand five hundred and seven, (which is considerably over

one-fifth) there were only forty-six convictions for crime.

To live in cities filled with such an amount of poverty and criminal

degradation, as the census discloses, at the North, standing armies of

policemen, firemen, etc., are absolutely necessary to secure the people

against lawless violence. Now subtract from the products of labor the

_cost_ of city life--the cost of vain and criminal indulgences, the

_support_ of _paupers_, and the _machinery_ to guard innocence and

punish crime--and the wonder ceases that wealth accumulates slowly--the

wonder is that it accumulates at all. What is accumulated, must be

principally from commerce and manufactures. The system of abandoning the

country and congregating in cities, tends directly to concentrate wealth

into the hands of a few, and to diffuse poverty and crime among the

masses of the people.

These facts of poverty and crime at the North, which are exhibited by

the census, will help to explain the seeming mystery that the South

multiplies by natural increase faster than the North. In 1845, according

to her statistical report, Massachusetts had seven-eighths of her

marriageable young women working in factories under male overseers. The

census of 1840 shows that, with fewer adults, Virginia had one hundred

thousand more children than Massachusetts. In the census of 1850 the

proportion in favor of Virginia is still greater.

Pauperism, in Massachusetts and New York, according to the State census,

increased between 1836 and 1848 ten times faster than wealth or

population.

In the slaveholding States there is less than a tenth of the people in

cities--pauperism is almost unknown--the people are on farms--the style

of living is less costly by half, but greatly superior in quality and

comfort--according to the census, there is but little crime--almost all

have homes--the amount of agricultural labor does not fluctuate--the

farms are not cultivated by the spade and hoe, but are large enough to

justify a system of enlarged agricultural operations by the aid of horse

power. The result is that more is saved, and the proceeds more equally

distributed between capital and labor, or the rich and the poor.

The South did not seek or desire the responsibility, and the onerous

burden, of civilizing and christianizing these degraded savages; but

God, in his mysterious providence, brought it about. He allowed England,

and her Puritan sons at the North, from the love of gain, to become the

willing instruments, to force African slaves upon the Cavaliers of the

South. These Cavaliers were a noble race of men. They remonstrated

against this outrage to the last. They preferred indented labor from the

mother country, which they were securing as they needed it. A descendant

of theirs, in drafting the Declaration of Independence, made this

outrage one of the prominent causes for dissolving all political

connection with the mother country. But God intended (as we now see) to

bless these savages, by forcing us against our wills, to become their

masters and guardians; and he has abundantly blessed us, also, (as we

now see) for allowing his word to be our counselor in this relation. We

were forced by his word to admit the relation to be lawful, and he

enabled us to admit and feel the great responsibility devolved upon us

as their divinely appointed protectors.

The North, after pocketing the price of these savages, refused to bear

any part of the burden of training and elevating them; and finally, with

France and England, turned them loose by emancipation, and ignored the

word of God in justification of the deed, by declaring that to hold them

in slavery was sinful. The result is, that the portion they held of this

degraded race, is immersed in poverty, wretchedness and crime, without a

parallel in civilized communities, and are less in number now, than the

original importations from Africa, (so says the Superintendent of the

census;) while the portion held by us is in high comfort, regularly

improving in morals and intellect, and multiplying more rapidly than the

white race at the North. It does seem, from the facts of the census,

that this (so-called) philanthropy has been a curse to _both races, at

the North, and in the West Indies_, and that it is displeasing in the

sight of God. The census exhibits unmistakable evidence that, without a

change, the emancipated portion of the race, _in these localities_, will

ultimately perish, and that this catastrophe is to be hastened by

poverty and criminal degradation. The census shows that those who are

_responsible_ for this deed are subjected _in our country_, by annual

_births_ and _deaths_, to a _decrease_ of sixty per cent., and to a much

_heavier per cent._ than this, _of poverty and crime_.

But while these are the results to both races at the North, prosperity,

unequaled in the annals of the world, has attended us (as the census

shows) in almost every thing we have put our hands to, both for this

life and that which is to come. The _satisfaction_ is ours, also, of

_knowing_ that these degraded outcasts, which were thrown upon our

hands, have not only been _cared for_, but _elevated in the scale of

being_, and brought to share largely in the blessings of intellectual,

social, and religious culture.

But for their _enslaved condition_ here, they would have remained until

this hour in their _original degradation_.

_In view of all the facts compared_, I would ask all who feel interested

in the great question now agitating our country, to let these facts be

their guide and counselor in deciding the issue. Are the people of the

North warranted from these facts, in believing they would honor God and

benefit men by overthrowing the institution of slavery, if they could.

These facts testify plainly, that where African slavery has existed in

our country for more than two hundred years, the social and religious

condition of men has improved more rapidly than it has under the best

arrangements of exclusive freedom.

These facts show that, with the advantages of the best location and

climate upon the globe, and a high degree of moral, religious, and

social intelligence to commence with, those communities at the North who

excluded this element from their organizations, are actually behind

slaveholding communities, in religion, in wealth, in the increase of

their race, and in the comforts of their condition. If this be so, (and

the census testifies that it is,) what will justify the North in efforts

to involve both sections of our country in civil war and disunion,

because slavery exists in one section of it? And if the institution of

African slavery has certainly improved the condition of both races in

our country, (and the census testifies that it has,) why should they

hazard all the blessings vouchsafed to the North and the South sooner

than suffer its expansion over new territory?

The expansion of African slavery (according to the test by which we are

now trying it) has never yet done injury in this Union. In Texas

slaveholders were called to organize a State, (not in this Union at the

time,) which in 1850 had a population of two hundred and twelve thousand

five hundred and ninety-two. The individuals composing it originally,

were the most lawless set of adventurers that ever lived. Did slavery

disqualify slaveholders from organizing a social body, even out of these

materials, that could secure the highest results in human progress? What

is now the social, moral, and religious complexion of Texas? In the

essentials of prosperity it is ahead, under equal circumstances, of any

portion of the Union. Slaveholders, in the providence of God, had to

organize States on the Gulf of Mexico, and on the banks of the

Mississippi, after the acquisition of Louisiana from France, and Florida

from Spain. The original materials (numbering upwards of seventy

thousand) of which these States were composed, had been trained under

the most pernicious system of morals that ever existed among a civilized

people. The result in this case, also, will testify that slavery does

not paralyze communities in the accumulation of wealth, or in the

correction of moral, social, and religious evils. The census shows that

in all these items these new slave States which have been added to our

Union, have greatly outstripped their non-slaveholding equals in age.

The temples of the Lord are now seen studding these slaveholding

localities over, and are vocal with his praise--the moral majesty of the

law is a paramount power. The amount of paupers and criminals, in some

of them, is less than one-seventieth part that is chargeable to some of

their twin sisters of equal age, (who are free[232]) nurseries of

literature and science are multiplying rapidly, and promising the

highest results--prosperity, in these slaveholding communities, in

crowning the efforts of good men to arrest vice, to promote virtue, to

diminish want, to create plenty, and to arrange the elements of progress

for the highest social, moral, and religious results.

There is another historical fact which deserves to be weighed, in making

up a judgment on the expansion of slavery. Within the present century,

the colonies of Mexico and South America, in imitation of our example,

threw off the colonial yoke, and established independent governments.

All of these States, except one, preferred the non-slaveholding model,

and _excluded_ the element of _slavery_: that one, which is Brazil,

preferred the model adopted by the Southern States of this Union, and

_retained_ African _slavery_.

All of those States, which _excluded slavery_, have been visited, in

rapid succession, with _insurrection, revolution, and fearful anarchy_;

while Brazil has enjoyed tranquillity, from the commencement of her

independent political existence until the present hour. This remarkable

fact has occurred, too, in a State where the slaves are two to one of

the other race. The slaves in the United States are one to two of the

other race. Is not this fact, like all those examined, _God's

providential voice_? and does He not, in these facts, speak a language

that we can _read and understand_?

Now, shall we, in view of these facts, rebel against the teachings of

His providence, as it is now made known to us in the census, and claim

for ourselves more wisdom than he has displayed, in _allowing such

results_ to be the product of _slaveholding communities_?

We cannot put an end to African slavery, if we would--and we ought not,

if we could--until God opens a door to _make its termination a blessing,

and not a curse_. When He does that, slavery in this Union will end.

With Christian affection, yours,

THORNTON STRINGFELLOW.

FOOTNOTES:

[231] This letter was addressed to ELDER JAMES FIFE.

[232] Texas and Michigan; see also, Arkansas and Indiana, Florida and

Wisconsin.

SLAVERY

IN THE LIGHT OF SOCIAL ETHICS.

BY

CHANCELLOR HARPER,

OF SOUTH CAROLINA.

SLAVERY

IN

THE LIGHT OF SOCIAL ETHICS.

INFLUENCE OF SLAVERY ON SOCIAL LIFE.

Necessity of Investigation--Vindicators of

Slavery--Slavery a means of

Civilization--Prejudices of

Abolitionism--Discussion of the Declaration of

Independence--Rights of

Society--Self-Preservation--The greatest good to

the greatest number--Ambiguity in moral

Investigation--Influence of Slavery on

Civilization--The Slavery of England's

Civilization--How Slavery retards the evils of

Civilization--Servitude Inevitable--Abuses of

Slavery and of Free Labor--Social ties, master and

slave--Intellectual advancement--Morals of

Slavery, and of Free Labor--Marriage relation and

licentiousness--Virtues of Slavery--Security from

Evils--Insecurity of Free Labor--Menial

occupations necessary--Utopianism--Slavery and the

servitude of Civilization contrasted--The African

an inferior variety of the human race--Elevating

influence of Slavery on the slave, on the master,

on statesmen--Duties of master--Elevation of

female character--Necessity of Slavery in tropical

climates--Examples from history--Southern

States--Insurrections impossible--Military

strength of Slavery--Advantageous consequences of

the increase of slaves--Destructive consequences

of Emancipation to our country, and to the

world--Kakistocracy--White

emigration--Amalgamation--Deplorable results of

Fanaticism.

THE institution of domestic slavery exists over far the greater portion

of the inhabited earth. Until within a very few centuries, it may be

said to have existed over the whole earth--at least in all those

portions of it which had made any advances toward civilization. We might

safely conclude then, that it is deeply founded in the nature of man and

the exigencies of human society. Yet, in the few countries in which it

has been abolished--claiming, perhaps justly, to be furthest advanced in

civilization and intelligence, but which have had the smallest

opportunity of observing its true character and effects--it is

denounced as the most intolerable of social and political evils. Its

existence, and every hour of its continuance, is regarded as the crime

of the communities in which it is found. Even by those in the countries

alluded to, who regard it with the most indulgence or the least

abhorrence--who attribute no criminality to the present generation--who

found it in existence, and have not yet been able to devise the means of

abolishing it,--it is pronounced a misfortune and a curse injurious and

dangerous always, and which must be finally fatal to the societies which

admit it. This is no longer regarded as a subject of argument and

investigation. The opinions referred to are assumed as settled, or the

truth of them as self-evident. If any voice is raised among ourselves to

extenuate or to vindicate, it is unheard. The judgment is made up. We

can have no hearing before the tribunal of the civilized world. Yet, on

this very account, it is more important that we, the inhabitants of the

slaveholding States of America, insulated as we are, by this

institution, and cut off, in some degree, from the communion and

sympathies of the world by which we are surrounded, or with which we

have intercourse, and exposed continually to their animadversions and

attacks, should thoroughly understand this subject, and our strength and

weakness in relation to it. If it be thus criminal, dangerous, and

fatal; and if it be possible to devise means of freeing ourselves from

it, we ought at once to set about the employing of those means. It would

be the most wretched and imbecile fatuity, to shut our eyes to the

impending dangers and horrors, and "drive darkling down the current of

our fate," till we are overwhelmed in the final destruction. If we are

tyrants, cruel, unjust, oppressive, let us humble ourselves and repent

in the sight of heaven, that the foul stain may be cleansed, and we

enabled to stand erect as having common claims to humanity with our

fellow-men.

But if we are nothing of all this; if we commit no injustice or cruelty;

if the maintenance of our institutions be essential to our prosperity,

our character, our safety, and the safety of all that is dear to us, let

us enlighten our minds and fortify our hearts to defend them.

It is a somewhat singular evidence of the indisposition of the rest of

the world to hear any thing more on this subject, that perhaps the most

profound, original, and truly philosophical treatise, which has

appeared within the time of my recollection,[233] seems not to have

attracted the slightest attention out of the limits of the slaveholding

States themselves. If truth, reason, and conclusive argument, propounded

with admirable temper and perfect candor, might be supposed to have an

effect on the minds of men, we should think this work would have put an

end to agitation on the subject. The author has rendered inappreciable

service to the South in enlightening them on the subject of their own

institutions, and turning back that monstrous tide of folly and madness

which, if it had rolled on, would have involved his own great State

along with the rest of the slaveholding States in a common ruin. But

beyond these, he seems to have produced no effect whatever. The

denouncers of slavery, with whose production the press groans, seems to

be unaware of his existence--unaware that there is a reason to be

encountered or argument to be answered. They assume that the truth is

known and settled, and only requires to be enforced by denunciation.

Another vindicator of the South has appeared in an individual who is

among those that have done honor to American literature.[234] With

conclusive argument, and great force of expression, he has defended

slavery from the charge of injustice or immorality, and shown clearly

the unspeakable cruelty and mischief which must result from any scheme

of abolition. He does not live among slaveholders, and it can not be

said of him, as of others, that his mind is warped by interest, or his

moral sense blunted by habit and familiarity with abuse. These

circumstances, it might be supposed, would have secured him hearing and

consideration. He seems to be equally unheeded, and the work of

denunciation, disdaining argument, still goes on.

President Dew has shown that the institution of slavery is a principal

cause of civilization. Perhaps nothing can be more evident than that it

is the sole cause. If any thing can be predicated as universally true of

uncultivated man, it is that he will not labor beyond what is absolutely

necessary to maintain his existence. Labor is pain to those who are

unaccustomed to it, and the nature of man is averse to pain. Even with

all the training, the helps, and motives of civilization, we find that

this aversion can not be overcome in many individuals of the most

cultivated societies. The coercion of slavery alone is adequate to form

man to habits of labor. Without it, there can be no accumulation of

property, no providence for the future, no tastes for comfort or

elegancies, which are the characteristics and essentials of

civilization. He who has obtained the command of another's labor, first

begins to accumulate and provide for the future, and the foundations of

civilization are laid. We find confirmed by experience that which is so

evident in theory. Since the existence of man upon the earth, with no

exception whatever, either of ancient or modern times, every society

which has attained civilization, has advanced to it through this

process.

Will those who regard slavery as immoral, or crime in itself, tell us

that man was not intended for civilization, but to roam the earth as a

biped brute? That he was not to raise his eyes to Heaven, or be

conformed in his nobler faculties to the image of his Maker? Or will

they say that the Judge of all the earth has done wrong in ordaining the

means by which alone that end can be obtained? It is true that the

Creator can make the wickedness as well as the wrath of man to praise

him, and bring forth the most benevolent results from the most atrocious

actions. But in such cases, it is the motive of the actor alone which

condemns the action. The act itself is good, if it promotes the good

purposes of God, and would be approved by him, if that result only were

intended. Do they not blaspheme the providence of God who denounce as

wickedness and outrage, that which is rendered indispensable to his

purposes in the government of the world? Or at what stage of the

progress of society will they say that slavery ceases to be necessary,

and its very existence becomes sin and crime? I am aware that such

argument would have little effect on those with whom it would be

degrading to contend--who pervert the inspired writings--which in some

parts expressly sanction slavery, and throughout indicate most clearly

that it is a civil institution, with which religion has no concern--with

a shallowness and presumption not less flagrant and shameless than his,

who would justify murder from the text, "and Phineas arose and executed

judgment."

There seems to be something in this subject which blunts the

preceptions, and darkens and confuses the understandings and moral

feelings of men. Tell them that, of necessity, in every civilized

society, there must be an infinite variety of conditions and

employments, from the most eminent and intellectual, to the most servile

and laborious; that the negro race, from their temperament and capacity,

are peculiarly suited to the situation which they occupy, and not less

happy in it than any corresponding class to be found in the world; prove

incontestably that no scheme of emancipation could be carried into

effect without the most intolerable mischiefs and calamities to both

master and slave, or without probably throwing a large and fertile

portion of the earth's surface out of the pale of civilization--and you

have done nothing. They reply, that whatever may be the consequence, you

are bound to do _right_; that man has a right to himself, and man cannot

have property in man; that if the negro race be naturally inferior in

mind and character, they are not less entitled to the rights of

humanity; that if they are happy in their condition, it affords but the

stronger evidence of their degradation, and renders them still more

objects of commiseration. They repeat, as the fundamental maxim of our

civil policy, that all men are born free and equal, and quote from our

Declaration of Independence, "that men are endowed by their Creator with

certain inalienable _rights_, among which are life, liberty, and the

pursuit of happiness."

It is not the first time that I have had occasion to observe that men

may repeat with the utmost confidence, some maxim or sentimental phrase,

as self-evident or admitted truth, which is either palpably false, or to

which, upon examination, it will be found that they attach no definite

idea. Notwithstanding our respect for the important document which

declared our independence, yet if any thing be found in it, and

especially in what may be regarded rather as its ornament than its

substance--false, sophistical or unmeaning, that respect should not

screen it from the freest examination.

_All men are born free and equal._ Is it not palpably nearer the truth

to say that no man was ever born free, and that no two men were ever

born equal? Man is born in a state of the most helpless dependence on

others. He continues subject to the absolute control of others, and

remains without many of the civil and all of the political privileges of

his society, until the period which the laws have fixed as that at which

he is supposed to have attained the maturity of his faculties. Then

inequality is further developed, and becomes infinite in every society,

and under whatever form of government. Wealth and poverty, fame or

obscurity, strength or weakness, knowledge or ignorance, ease or labor,

power or subjection, mark the endless diversity in the condition of men.

But we have not arrived at the profundity of the maxim. This inequality

is, in a great measure, the result of abuses in the institutions of

society. They do not speak of what exists, but of what ought to exist.

Every one should be left at liberty to obtain all the advantages of

society which he can compass, by the free exertion of his faculties,

unimpeded by civil restraints. It may be said that this would not remedy

the evils of society which are complained of. The inequalities to which

I have referred, with the misery resulting from them, would exist in

fact under the freest and most popular form of government that man could

devise. But what is the foundation of the bold dogma so confidently

announced? Females are human and rational beings. They may be found of

better faculties, and better qualified to exercise political privileges,

and to attain the distinctions of society, than many men; yet who

complains of the order of society by which they are excluded from them?

For I do not speak of the few who would desecrate them; do violence to

the nature which their Creator has impressed upon them; drag them from

the position which they necessarily occupy for the existence of

civilized society, and in which they constitute its blessing and

ornament--the only position which they have ever occupied in any human

society--to place them in a situation in which they would be alike

miserable and degraded. Low as we descend in combating the theories of

presumptuous dogmatists, it cannot be necessary to stoop to this. A

youth of eighteen may have powers which cast into the shade those of any

of his more advanced cotemporaries. He may be capable of serving or

saving his country, and if not permitted to do so now, the occasion may

have been lost forever. But he can exercise no political privilege, or

aspire to any political distinction. It is said that, of necessity,

society must exclude from some civil and political privileges those who

are unfitted to exercise them, by infirmity, unsuitableness of

character, or defect of discretion; that of necessity there must be some

general rule on the subject, and that any rule which can be devised will

operate with hardship and injustice on individuals. This is all that can

be said, and all that need be said. It is saying, in other words, that

the privileges in question are no matter of natural right, but to be

settled by convention, as the good and safety of society may require. If

society should disfranchise individuals convicted of infamous crimes,

would this be an invasion of natural right? Yet this would not be

justified on the score of their moral guilt, but that the good of

society required or would be promoted by it. We admit the existence of a

moral law, binding on societies as on individuals. Society must act in

good faith. No man, or body of men, has a right to inflict pain or

privation on others, unless with a view, after full and impartial

deliberation, to prevent a greater evil. If this deliberation be had,

and the decision made in good faith, there can be no imputation of moral

guilt. Has any politician contended that the very existence of

governments in which there are orders privileged by law, constitutes a

violation of morality; that their continuance is a crime, which men are

bound to put an end to, without any consideration of the good or evil to

result from the change? Yet this is the natural inference from the dogma

of the natural equality of men as applied to our institution of

slavery--an equality not to be invaded without injustice and wrong, and

requiring to be restored instantly, unqualifiedly, and without reference

to consequences.

This is sufficiently common-place, but we are sometimes driven to

common-place. It is no less a false and shallow, than a presumptuous

philosophy, which theorizes on the affairs of men as a problem to be

solved by some unerring rule of human reason, without reference to the

designs of a superior intelligence, so far as he has been placed to

indicate them, in their creation and destiny. Man is born to subjection.

Not only during infancy is he dependent, and under the control of

others; at all ages, it is the very bias of his nature, that the strong

and the wise should control the weak and the ignorant. So it has been

since the days of Nimrod. The existence of some form of slavery in all

ages and countries, is proof enough of this. He is born to subjection as

he is born in sin and ignorance. To make any considerable progress in

knowledge, the continued efforts of successive generations, and the

diligent training and unwearied exertions of the individual, are

requisite. To make progress in moral virtue, not less time and effort,

aided by superior help, are necessary; and it is only by the matured

exercise of his knowledge and his virtue, that he can attain to civil

freedom. Of all things, the existence of civil liberty is most the

result of artificial institution. The proclivity of the natural man is

to domineer or to be subservient. A noble result, indeed, but in the

attaining of which, as in the instances of knowledge and virtue, the

Creator, for his own purposes, has set a limit beyond which we cannot

go.

But he who is most advanced in knowledge, is most sensible of his own

ignorance, and how much must forever be unknown to man in his present

condition. As I have heard it expressed, the further you extend the

circle of light, the wider is the horizon of darkness. He who has made

the greatest progress in moral purity, is most sensible of the

depravity, not only of the world around him, but of his own heart, and

the imperfection of his best motives; and this he knows that men must

feel and lament so long as they continue men. So when the greatest

progress in civil liberty has been made, the enlightened lover of

liberty will know that there must remain much inequality, much

injustice, much _slavery_, which no human wisdom or virtue will ever be

able wholly to prevent or redress. As I have before had the honor to say

to this Society, the condition of our whole existence is but to struggle

with evils--to compare them--to choose between them, and, so far as we

can, to mitigate them. To say that there is evil in any institution, is

only to say that it is human.

And can we doubt but that this long discipline and laborious process, by

which men are required to work out the elevation and improvement of

their individual nature and their social condition, is imposed for a

great and benevolent end? Our faculties are not adequate to the solution

of the mystery, why it should be so; but the truth is clear, that the

world was not intended for the seat of universal knowledge, or goodness,

or happiness, or freedom.

_Man has been endowed by his Creator with certain inalienable rights,

among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness._ What is

meant by the _inalienable_ right of liberty? Has any one who has used

the words ever asked himself this question? Does it mean that a man has

no right to alienate his own liberty--to sell himself and his posterity

for slaves? This would seem to be the more obvious meaning. When the

word _right_ is used, it has reference to some law which sanctions it,

and would be violated by its invasion. It must refer either to the

general law of morality, or the law of the country--the law of God or

the law of man. If the law of any country permitted it, it would of

course be absurd to say that the law of that country was violated by

such alienation. If it have any meaning in this respect, it must mean

that though the law of the country permitted it, the man would be guilty

of an immoral act who should thus alienate his liberty. A fit question

for schoolmen to discuss, and the consequences resulting from its

decision as important as from any of theirs. Yet who will say that the

man pressed by famine, and in prospect of death, would be criminal for

such an act? Self-preservation, as is truly said, is the first law of

nature. High and peculiar characters, by elaborate cultivation, may be

taught to prefer death to slavery, but it would be folly to prescribe

this as a duty to the mass of mankind.

If any rational meaning can be attributed to the sentence I have quoted,

it is this:--That the society, or the individuals who exercise the

powers of government, are guilty of a violation of the law of God or of

morality, when, by any law or public act, they deprive men of life or

liberty, or restrain them in the pursuit of happiness. Yet every

government does, and of necessity must, deprive men of life and liberty

for offenses against society. Restrain them in the pursuit of happiness!

Why all the laws of society are intended for nothing else but to

restrain men from the pursuit of happiness, according to their own ideas

of happiness or advantage--which the phrase must mean if it means any

thing. And by what right does society punish by the loss of life or

liberty? Not on account of the moral guilt of the criminal--not by

impiously and arrogantly assuming the prerogative of the Almighty, to

dispense justice or suffering, according to moral desert. It is for its

own protection--it is the right of self-defense. If there existed the

blackest moral turpitude, which by its example or consequences, could be

of no evil to society, government would have nothing to do with that. If

an action, the most harmless in its moral character, could be dangerous

to the security of society, society would have the perfect right to

punish it. If the possession of a black skin would be otherwise

dangerous to society, society has the same right to protect itself by

disfranchising the possessor of civil privilege, and to continue the

disability to his posterity, if the same danger would be incurred by its

removal. Society inflicts these forfeitures for the security of the

lives of its members; it inflicts them for the security of their

property, the great essential of civilization; it inflicts them also for

the protection of its political institutions, the forcible attempt to

overturn which, has always been justly regarded as the greatest crime;

and who has questioned its right so to inflict? "Man can not have

property in man"--a phrase as full of meaning as, "who slays fat oxen

should himself be fat." Certainly he may, if the laws of society allow

it, and if it be on sufficient grounds, neither he nor society do wrong.

And is it by this--as we must call it, however recommended to our higher

feelings by its associations--well-sounding, but unmeaning verbiage of

natural equality and inalienable rights, that our lives are to be put in

jeopardy, our property destroyed, and our political institutions

overturned or endangered? If a people had on its borders a tribe of

barbarians, whom no treaties or faith could bind, and by whose attacks

they were constantly endangered, against whom they could devise no

security, but that they should be exterminated or enslaved; would they

not have the right to enslave them, and keep them in slavery so long as

the same danger would be incurred by their manumission? If a civilized

man and a savage were by chance placed together on a desolate island,

and the former, by the superior power of civilization, would reduce the

latter to subjection, would he not have the same right? Would this not

be the strictest self-defense? I do not now consider, how far we can

make out a similar case to justify our enslaving of the negroes. I speak

to those who contend for inalienable rights, and that the existence of

slavery always, and under all circumstances, involves injustice and

crime.

As I have said, we acknowledge the existence of a moral law. It is not

necessary for us to resort to the theory which resolves all right into

force. The existence of such a law is imprinted on the hearts of all

human beings. But though its existence be acknowledged, the mind of man

has hitherto been tasked in vain to discover an unerring standard of

morality. It is a common and undoubted maxim of morality, that you shall

not do evil that good may come. You shall not do injustice or commit an

invasion of the rights of others, for the sake of a greater ulterior

good. But what is injustice, and what are the rights of others? And why

are we not to commit the one or invade the other? It is because it

inflicts pain or suffering, present or prospective, or cuts them off

from enjoyment which they might otherwise attain. The Creator has

sufficiently revealed to us that _happiness_ is the great end of

existence, the sole object of all animated and sentient beings. To this

he has directed their aspirations and efforts, and we feel that we

thwart his benevolent purposes when we destroy or impede that happiness.

This is the only _natural_ right of man. All other rights result from

the conventions of society, and these, to be sure, we are not to invade,

whatever good may appear to us likely to follow. Yet are we in no

instance to inflict pain or suffering, or disturb enjoyment, for the

sake of producing a greater good? Is the madman not to be restrained who

would bring destruction on himself or others? Is pain not to be

inflicted on the child, when it is the only means by which he can be

effectually instructed to provide for his own future happiness? Is the

surgeon guilty of wrong who amputates a limb to preserve life? Is not

the object of all penal legislation, to inflict suffering for the sake

of greater good to be secured to society?

By what right is it that man exercises dominion over the beasts of the

field; subdues them to painful labor, or deprives them of life for his

sustenance or enjoyment? They are not rational beings. No, but they are

the creatures of God, sentient beings, capable of suffering and

enjoyment, and entitled to enjoy according to the measure of their

capacities. Does not the voice of nature inform every one, that he is

guilty of wrong when he inflicts on them pain without necessity or

object? If their existence be limited to the present life, it affords

the stronger argument for affording them the brief enjoyment of which it

is capable. It is because the greater good is effected; not only to man

but to the inferior animals themselves. The care of man gives the boon

of existence to myriads who would never otherwise have enjoyed it, and

the enjoyment of their existence is better provided for while it lasts.

It belongs to the being of superior faculties to judge of the relations

which shall subsist between himself and inferior animals, and the use he

shall make of them; and he may justly consider himself, who has the

greater capacity of enjoyment, in the first instance. Yet he must do

this conscientiously, and no doubt, moral guilt has been incurred by the

infliction of pain on these animals, with no adequate benefit to be

expected. I do no disparagement to the dignity of human nature, even in

its humblest form, when I say that on the very same foundation, with the

difference only of circumstance and degree, rests the right of the

civilized and cultivated man, over the savage and ignorant. It is the

order of nature and of God, that the being of superior faculties and

knowledge, and therefore of superior power, should control and dispose

of those who are inferior. It is as much in the order of nature, that

men should enslave each other, as that other animals should prey upon

each other. I admit that he does this under the highest moral

responsibility, and is most guilty if he wantonly inflicts misery or

privation on beings more capable of enjoyment or suffering than brutes,

without necessity or any view to the greater good which is to result. If

we conceive of society existing without government, and that one man by

his superior strength, courage or wisdom, could obtain the mastery of

his fellows, he would have a perfect right to do so. He would be morally

responsible for the use of his power, and guilty if he failed to direct

them so as to promote their happiness as well as his own. Moralists have

denounced the injustice and cruelty which have been practiced towards

our aboriginal Indians, by which they have been driven from their native

seats and exterminated, and no doubt with much justice. No doubt, much

fraud and injustice has been practiced in the circumstances and the

manner of their removal. Yet who has contended that civilized man had no

moral right to possess himself of the country? That he was bound to

leave this wide and fertile continent, which is capable of sustaining

uncounted myriads of a civilized race, to a few roving and ignorant

barbarians? Yet if any thing is certain, it is certain that there were

no means by which he could possess the country, without exterminating or

enslaving them. Savage and civilized man cannot live together, and the

savage can be tamed only by being enslaved or by having slaves. By

enslaving alone could he have preserved them.[235] And who shall take

upon himself to decide that the more benevolent course, and more

pleasing to God, was pursued towards them, or that it would not have

been better that they had been enslaved generally, as they were in

particular instances? It is a refined philosophy, and utterly false in

its application to general nature, or the mass of human kind, which

teaches that existence is not the greatest of all boons, and worthy of

being preserved even under the most adverse circumstances. The strongest

instinct of all animated beings sufficiently proclaims this. When the

last red man shall have vanished from our forests, the sole remaining

traces of his blood will be found among our enslaved population.[236]

The African slave trade has given, and will give, the boon of existence

to millions and millions in our country, who would otherwise never have

enjoyed it, and the enjoyment of their existence is better provided for

while it lasts. Or if, for the rights of man over inferior animals, we

are referred to revelation, which pronounces--"ye shall have dominion

over the beasts of the field, and over the fowls of the air," we refer

to the same, which declares not the less explicitly--

"Both the bond-men and bond-maids which thou shalt have, shall be of the

heathen that are among you. Of them shall you buy bond-men and

bond-maids."

"Moreover of the children of strangers that do sojourn among you, of

them shall ye buy, and of their families that are with you, which they

begot 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 by

possession. They shall be your bond-men forever."

In moral investigations, ambiguity is often occasioned by confounding

the intrinsic nature of an action, as determined by its consequence,

with the motives of the actor, involving moral guilt or innocence. If

poison be given with a view to destroy another, and it cures him of

disease, the poisoner is guilty, but the act is beneficent in its

results. If medicine be given with a view to heal, and it happens to

kill, he who administered it is innocent, but the act is a noxious one.

If they who begun and prosecuted the slave trade, practiced horrible

cruelties and inflicted much suffering--as no doubt they did, though

these have been much exaggerated--for merely selfish purposes, and with

no view to future good, they were morally most guilty. So far as

unnecessary cruelty was practiced, the motive and the act were alike

bad. But if we could be sure that the entire effect of the trade has

been to produce more happiness than would otherwise have existed, we

must pronounce it good, and that it has happened in the ordering of

God's providence, to whom evil cannot be imputed. Moral guilt has not

been imputed to Las Casas, and if the importation of African slaves into

America, had the effect of preventing more suffering than it inflicted,

it was good, both in the motive and the result. I freely admit that, it

is hardly possible to justify morally, those who begun and carried on

the slave trade. No speculation of future good to be brought about,

could compensate the enormous amount of evil it occasioned.

If we should refer to the common moral sense of mankind, as determined

by their conduct in all ages and countries, for a standard of morality,

it would seem to be in favor of slavery. The will of God, as determined

by utility, would be an infallible standard, if we had an unerring

measure of utility. The utilitarian philosophy, as it is commonly

understood, referring only to the animal wants and employments, and

physical condition of man, is utterly false and degrading. If a

sufficiently extended definition be given to utility, so as to include

every thing that may be a source of enjoyment or suffering, it is for

the most part useless. How can you compare the pleasures resulting from

the exercise of the understanding, the taste and the imagination, with

the animal enjoyments of the senses--the gratification derived from a

fine poem with that from a rich banquet? How are we to weigh the pains

and enjoyments of one man highly cultivated and of great sensibility,

against those of many men of blunter capacity for enjoyment or

suffering? And if we could determine with certainty in what utility

consists, we are so short-sighted with respect to consequences--the

remote results of our best considered actions are so often wide of our

anticipations, or contrary to them, that we should still be very much in

the dark. But though we cannot arrive at absolute certainty with respect

to the utility of actions, it is always fairly matter of argument.

Though an imperfect standard, it is the best we have, and perhaps the

Creator did not intend that we should arrive at perfect certainty with

regard to the morality of many actions. If, after the most careful

examination of consequences that we are able to make, with due distrust

of ourselves, we impartially, and in good faith, decide for that which

appears likely to produce the greatest good, we are free from moral

guilt. And I would impress most earnestly, that with our imperfect and

limited faculties, and short-sighted as we are to the future, we can

rarely, very rarely indeed, be justified in producing considerable

present evil or suffering, in the expectation of remote future good--if

indeed this can ever be justified.

In considering this subject, I shall not regard it in the first instance

in reference to the present position of the slaveholding States, or the

difficulties which lie in the way of their emancipating their slaves,

but as a naked, abstract question--whether it is better that the

institution of praedial and domestic slavery should, or should not,

exist in civilized society. And though some of my remarks may seem to

have such a tendency, let me not be understood as taking upon myself to

determine that it is better that it should exist. God forbid that the

responsibility of deciding such a question should ever be thrown on me

or my countrymen. But this I will say, and not without confidence, that

it is in the power of no human intellect to establish the contrary

proposition--that it is better it should not exist. This is probably

known but to one being, and concealed from human sagacity.

There have existed in various ages, and we now see existing in the

world, people in every stage of civilization, from the most barbarous to

the most refined. Man, as I have said, is not born to civilization. He

is born rude and ignorant. But it will be, I suppose, admitted that it

is the design of his Creator that he should attain to civilization: that

religion should be known, that the comforts and elegancies of life

should be enjoyed, that letters and arts should be cultivated; in short,

that there should be the greatest possible development of moral and

intellectual excellence. It can hardly be necessary to say any thing of

those who have extolled the superior virtues and enjoyments of savage

life--a life of physical wants and sufferings, of continual insecurity,

of furious passions and depraved vices. Those who have praised savage

life, are those who have known nothing of it, or who have become savages

themselves. But as I have said, so far as reason or universal experience

instruct us, the institution of slavery is an essential process in

emerging from savage life. It must then produce good, and promote the

designs of the Creator.

I add further, _that slavery anticipates the benefits of civilization,

and retards the evils of civilization_. The former part of this

proposition has been so fully established by a writer of great power of

thought--though I fear his practical conclusions will be found of

little value--that it is hardly necessary to urge it.[237] Property--the

accumulation of capital, as it is commonly called--is the first element

of civilization. But to accumulate, or to use capital to any

considerable extent, the combination of labor is necessary. In early

stages of society, when people are thinly scattered over an extensive

territory, the labor necessary to extensive works cannot be commanded.

Men are independent of each other. Having the command of abundance of

land, no one will submit to be employed in the service of his neighbor.

No one, therefore, can employ more capital than he can use with his own

hands, or those of his family, nor have an income much beyond the

necessaries of life. There can, therefore, be little leisure for

intellectual pursuits, or means of acquiring the comforts or elegancies

of life. It is hardly necessary to say, however, that if a man has the

command of slaves, he may combine labor, and use capital to any required

extent, and therefore accumulate wealth. He shows that no colonies have

been successfully planted without some sort of slavery. So we find the

fact to be. It is only in the slaveholding States of our Confederacy,

that wealth can be acquired by agriculture--which is the general

employment of our whole country. Among us, we know that there is no one,

however humble his beginning, who, with persevering industry,

intelligence, and orderly and virtuous habits, may not attain to

considerable opulence. So far as wealth has been accumulated in the

States which do not possess slaves, it has been in cities by the

pursuits of commerce, or lately, by manufactures. But the products of

slave labor furnish more than two-thirds of the materials of our foreign

commerce, which the industry of those States is employed in transporting

and exchanging; and among the slaveholding States is to be found the

great market for all the productions of their industry, of whatever

kind. The prosperity of those States, therefore, and the civilization of

their cities, have been for the most part created by the existence of

slavery. Even in the cities, but for a class of population, which our

institutions have marked as servile, it would be scarcely possible to

preserve the ordinary habitudes of civilized life, by commanding the

necessary menial and domestic service.

Every stage of human society, from the most barbarous to the most

refined, has its own peculiar evils to mark it as the condition of

mortality; and perhaps there is none but omnipotence who can say in

which the scale of good or evil most preponderates. We need say nothing

of the evils of savage life. There is a state of society elevated

somewhat above it, which is to be found in some of the more thinly

peopled portions of our own country--the rudest agricultural

state--which is thus characterized by the author to whom I have

referred: "The American of the back woods has often been described to

the English as grossly ignorant, dirty, unsocial, delighting in rum and

tobacco, attached to nothing but his rifle, adventurous, restless, more

than half savage. Deprived of social enjoyments or excitements, he has

recourse to those of savage life, and becomes (for in this respect the

Americans degenerate) unfit for society." This is no very inviting

picture, which, though exaggerated, we know not to be without likeness.

The evils of such a state, I suppose, will hardly be thought compensated

by unbounded freedom, perfect equality, and ample means of subsistence.

But let us take another stage in the progress--which to many will appear

to offer all that is desirable in existence, and realize another Utopia.

Let us suppose a state of society in which all shall have property, and

there shall be no great inequality of property--in which society shall

be so much condensed as to afford the means of social intercourse,

without being crowded, so as to create difficulty in obtaining the means

of subsistence--in which every family that chooses may have as much land

as will employ its own hands, while others may employ their industry in

forming such products as it may be desirable to exchange with them.

Schools are generally established, and the rudiments of education

universally diffused. Religion is taught, and every village has its

church, neat, though humble, lifting its spire to heaven. Here is a

situation apparently the most favorable to happiness. I say

_apparently_, for the greatest source of human misery is not in external

circumstances, but in men themselves--in their depraved inclinations,

their wayward passions and perverse wills. Here is room for all the

petty competition, the envy, hatred, malice and dissimulation that

torture the heart in what may be supposed the most sophisticated states

of society; and though less marked and offensive, there may be much of

the licentiousness.

But apart from this, in such a condition of society, if there is little

suffering, there is little high enjoyment. The even flow of life forbids

the high excitement which is necessary for it. If there is little vice,

there is little place for the eminent virtues, which employ themselves

in controlling the disorders and remedying the evils of society, which,

like war and revolution, call forth the highest powers of man, whether

for good or for evil. If there is little misery, there is little room

for benevolence. Useful public institutions we may suppose to be

created, but not such as are merely ornamental. Elegant arts can be

little cultivated, for there are no means to reward the artists; nor the

higher literature, for no one will have leisure or means to cultivate it

for its own sake. Those who acquire what may be called liberal

education, will do so in order to employ it as the means of their own

subsistence or advancement in a profession, and literature itself will

partake of the sordidness of trade. In short, it is plain that in such a

state of society, the moral and intellectual faculties cannot be

cultivated to their highest perfection.

But whether that which I have described be the most desirable state of

society or no, it is certain that it can not continue. Mutation and

progress is the condition of human affairs. Though retarded for a time

by extraneous or accidental circumstances, the wheel must roll on. The

tendency of population is to become crowded, increasing the difficulty

of obtaining subsistence. There will be some without any property except

the capacity for labor. This they must sell to those who have the means

of employing them, thereby swelling the amount of their capital, and

increasing inequality. The process still goes on. The number of laborers

increases until there is a difficulty in obtaining employment. Then

competition is established. The remuneration of the laborer becomes

gradually less and less; a larger and larger proportion of the product

of his labor goes to swell the fortune of the capitalist; inequality

becomes still greater and more invidious, until the process ends in the

establishment of just such a state of things, as the same author

describes as now existing in England. After a most imposing picture of

her greatness and resources; of her superabounding capital, and all

pervading industry and enterprise; of her public institutions for

purposes of art, learning and benevolence; her public improvements, by

which intercourse is facilitated, and the convenience of man subserved;

the conveniences and luxuries of life enjoyed by those who are in

possession of fortune, or have profitable employments; of all, in short,

that places her at the head of modern civilization, he proceeds to give

the reverse of the picture. And here I shall use his own words: "The

laboring class compose the bulk of the people; the great body of the

people; the vast majority of the people--these are the terms by which

English writers and speakers usually describe those whose only property

is their labor."

"Of comprehensive words, the two most frequently used in English

politics, are distress and pauperism. After these, of expressions

applied to the state of the poor, the most common are vice and misery,

wretchedness, sufferings, ignorance, degradation, discontent, depravity,

drunkenness, and the increase of crime; with many more of the like

nature."

He goes on to give the details of this inequality and wretchedness, in

terms calculated to sicken and appal one to whom the picture is new.

That he has painted strongly we may suppose; but there is ample

corroborating testimony, if such were needed, that the representation is

substantially just. Where so much misery exists, there must of course be

much discontent, and many have been disposed to trace the sources of the

former in vicious legislation, or the structure of government; and the

author gives the various schemes, sometimes contradictory, sometimes

ludicrous, which projectors have devised as a remedy for all this evil

to which flesh is heir. That ill-judged legislation may have sometimes

aggravated the general suffering, or that its extremity may be mitigated

by the well-directed efforts of the wise and virtuous, there can be no

doubt. One purpose for which it has been permitted to exist is, that it

may call forth such efforts, and awaken powers and virtues which would

otherwise have slumbered for want of object. But remedy there is none,

unless it be to abandon their civilization. This inequality, this vice,

this misery, this _slavery_, is the price of England's civilization.

They suffer the lot of humanity. But perhaps we may be permitted humbly

to hope, that great, intense and widely spread as this misery

undoubtedly is in reality, it may yet be less so than in appearance. We

can estimate but very, very imperfectly the good and evil of individual

condition, as of different states of society. Some unexpected solace

arises to alleviate the severest calamity. Wonderful is the power of

custom, in making the hardest condition tolerable; the most generally

wretched life has circumstances of mitigation, and moments of vivid

enjoyment, of which the more seemingly happy can scarcely conceive;

though the lives of individuals be shortened, the aggregate of existence

is increased; even the various forms of death accelerated by want,

familiarized to the contemplation, like death to the soldier on the

field of battle, may become scarcely more formidable than what we are

accustomed to regard as nature's ordinary outlets of existence. If we

could perfectly analyze the enjoyments and sufferings of the most happy,

and the most miserable man, we should perhaps be startled to find the

difference so much less than our previous impressions had led us to

conceive. But it is not for us to assume the province of omniscience.

The particular theory of the author quoted, seems to be founded on an

assumption of this sort--that there is a certain stage in the progress,

when there is a certain balance between the demand for labor, and the

supply of it, which is more desirable than any other--when the territory

is so thickly peopled that all can not own land and cultivate the soil

for themselves, but a portion will be compelled to sell their labor to

others; still leaving, however, the wages of labor high, and the laborer

independent. It is plain, however, that this would in like manner

partake of the good and the evil of other states of society. There would

be less of equality and less rudeness, than in the early stages; less

civilization, and less suffering, than in the latter.

It is the competition for employment, which is the source of this misery

of society, that gives rise to all excellence in art and knowledge. When

the demand for labor exceeds the supply, the services of the most

ordinarily qualified laborer will be eagerly retained. When the supply

begins to exceed, and competition is established, higher and higher

qualifications will be required, until at length when it becomes very

intense, none but the most consummately skillful can be sure to be

employed. Nothing but necessity can drive men to the exertions which are

necessary so to qualify themselves. But it is not in arts, merely

mechanical alone, that this superior excellence will be required. It

will be extended to every intellectual employment; and though this may

not be the effect in the instance of every individual, yet it will fix

the habits and character of the society, and prescribe everywhere, and

in every department, the highest possible standard of attainment.