SLAVERY AND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT.
A. D. 1842 TO 1844.
1. When the year of our Lord 1842 had come, peace and prosperity
were in all portions of North Carolina. Society was still
divided into three classes. These were: the white people, the
slaves and the free negroes. The latter class had originated by
manumission, and were numerous in some of the eastern counties.
They had lost the right of suffrage by the action of the State
Convention of 1835.
2. This action on the part of the Convention was due in some
degree, doubtless, to the constant agitation of the slavery
question, though by no means due to that alone; but to the
further fact, as well, that during the time they voted by
sufferance they had plainly demonstrated their utter unfitness to
appreciate or exercise the great right of suffrage.
3. As a class they were unthrifty and dishonest, and each year
becoming more useless as members of the community; their
association with the slaves was regarded as an evil to be avoided
if possible; therefore, they were discriminated against in the
legislation of the period. Virginia and Ohio had both enacted
statutes which forbade them access to their borders. North
Carolina provided by law that in case of their removal from the
State they lost their residence, and were forbidden to return.
4. The right of the States to pass such laws for the protection
of their slave property cannot be denied, unless the right of
property in slaves be also denied. Nor can they properly be
called unjust. The right of property in their slaves the people
of North Carolina regarded as settled by the Constitution of the
State and that of the United States. Theorists might speculate
whether African slavery was consistent with the American
Declaration of Independence as they pleased, but the right of
property in slaves was undisputably recognized and secured in the
fundamental laws of the land. As to the moral question involved,
if any such there was, the Southern slave-owner regarded it as
one between himself and his God, and not between himself and his
Northern brother.
5. As a matter of course, slavery and intellectual culture are
incompatible, and education was therefore denied the slaves. The
right to testify in the courts against a white man, and even the
right to defend himself from the assaults of white men, except in
defence of life in the last extremity, were also necessarily
denied him. These restrictions were necessary to the maintenance
of the legal relations between the dominant and subject races.
6. Of course there were those who studied the slavery problem
from every possible standpoint, except the constitutional
legality of it. That, at least, was fixed. Some doubted the
morality of it and others questioned the policy of it, and it is
quite possible, had time and opportunity for gradual manumission
and exportation offered, North Carolina would have been a free
State, in the course of events, of her own accord.
7. The Northern States had sold their slaves rather than free
them under their acts of manumission. It was not possible for
this to be further repeated by the Commonwealths still retaining
the institution; so in a blind ignorance of the future and in
utter hopelessness of any practicable solution of their
difficulty, except in remaining as they were, the statesmen of
the South contented themselves with a simple policy of resistance
to change.
1844.
8. Among the white people of North Carolina were found all who
participated in the conduct of public affairs. The means of
popular education had been too recently adopted to show effects
upon the community. The labors of a few wise men were just being
crowned with success, and the children of the poor were receiving
the rudiments of education in every portion of the State.
9. In religion, the great mass of the people belonged to country
churches. These rural congregations, as a general thing, met on
one Saturday and the succeeding Sabbath of each month, to attend
the preaching of a minister who often served other churches as
pastor the remaining Sundays. Beyond the Sunday schools and
annual protracted meetings, there were no other religious
observances except occasional funerals and prayer meetings at
private houses.
10. The balls and horse-races of former days in the eastern
counties had, in a large measure, ceased. In the growth of the
Methodist and Baptist Churches in that section, such amusements
had been so discouraged that festivities of this kind became
rare. In the western sections of North Carolina they had never
been countenanced by the Presbyterians.
11. The summers became more or less marked by great assemblages
in the protracted or "camp-meetings." They were, to the devout,
seasons of religious devotion, but to the young and thoughtless,
opportunities for courtship and social enjoyment.
QUESTIONS.
1. What three classes of society existed in North Carolina in 1842?
2. What action was taken by the Convention of 1835 in regard to
free negroes?
3. What is said of this class of our population?
4. How did our people view the question of slavery?
5. What privileges were denied the slaves? Why?
6. What would probably have been the final result in North Carolina?
7. What had the Northern States done with their slaves? How was
the South compelled to act?
8. What educational progress was being made?
9. What was the condition of religious matters?
10. What effects were seen from the growth of the churches?
11. What great congregations were found in various places during the summer?