Cotton is King, and Pro-Slavery Arguments Part 45

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 G.o.d, 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 circ.u.mstances 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 G.o.d-abhorred miscreant, utterly unfit for the a.s.sociation 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 G.o.d's blessing upon the observance of his laws.

The fundamental law of G.o.d, _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 G.o.d_ 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 G.o.d 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 G.o.dly humility? Does it exhibit the evidence of humility, and a desire to glorify G.o.d, 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 G.o.d 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 G.o.d. 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 inst.i.tutions of society. Why is this? The inst.i.tution 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 inst.i.tutions, 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 inst.i.tution 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 a.s.sumed by the North, that slavery tends to produce social, moral, and religious evils. This a.s.sumption 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 cla.s.s 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 circ.u.mstances, 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 inst.i.tutions in securing social prosperity.

In every country there is a cla.s.s to be found in such utter dest.i.tution, that they must either be supported by charity, or perish of want. This dest.i.tution arises, generally, from oppressive exactions or excessive vice, and is evidence of the tendency of social inst.i.tutions, 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 inst.i.tutions; therefore they ought to be admitted, as h.o.m.ogeneous 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 dest.i.tution, 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 dest.i.tution, 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.