Lands of the Slave and the Free Part 27

I must, however, state that, in speaking of the sufferings or injuries to which the slave is liable, I am not proclaiming them merely on the authority of Northern abolitionists, or on the deductions which I have drawn from human nature; many travellers have made similar charges. Miss Bremer writes:--"I beheld the old slave hunted to death because he dared to visit his wife--beheld him mangled, beaten, recaptured, fling himself into the water of the Black River, over which he was retaken into the power of his hard master--and the law was silent. I beheld a young woman struck, for a hasty word, upon the temples, so that she fell down dead!--and the law was silent. I heard the law, through its jury, adjudicate between a white man and a black, and sentence the latter to be flogged when the former was guilty--and they who were honest among the jurymen in vain opposed the verdict. I beheld here on the sh.o.r.es of the Mississippi, only a few months since, a young negro girl fly from the maltreatment of her master, and he was a professor of religion, and fling herself into the river."--_Homes of the New World._ Would Miss Bremer write these things for the press, as occurring under her own eye, if they were not true?

Then, again, the Press itself in the South bears witness to what every one must admit to be an inhuman practice. How often must the reader of a Southern States' paper see children of the tenderest age, sometimes even under a year old, advertised for public sale! Did any one every take up the New Orleans paper without seeing more than one such advertis.e.m.e.nt as the following?--

150 NEGROES FOE SALE.

Just arrived, and for sale, at my old stand, No. 7, Moreau-street, Third Munic.i.p.ality, one hundred and fifty young and likely NEGROES, consisting of field-hands, house servants, and mechanics. They will be sold on reasonable terms for good paper or cash. Persons wishing to purchase will find it to their advantage to give me a call. [Sep.

30--6m.] Wm. F. TALBOTT.

What happiness can the slave enjoy among a community where such an advertis.e.m.e.nt as the following can be tolerated, or, worse still, when, as in the present instance, it is sent forth under the sanction of the law? The advertis.e.m.e.nt is taken from a paper published at Wilmington, North Carolina.

$225 REWARD.--STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA, NEW HANOVER COUNTY.--_Whereas_, complaint upon, oath hath this day been made to us, two of the Justices of the Peace for the State and County aforesaid, by BENJAMIN HALLET, of the said county, that two certain male slaves belonging to him, named LOTT, aged about twenty-two years, five feet four or five inches high, and black, formerly belonging to LOTT WILLIAMS, of Onslow county; and BOB, aged about sixteen years, five feet high, and black; have absented themselves from their said master's service, and are supposed to be lurking about this county, committing acts of felony and other misdeeds. These are, therefore, in the name of the State aforesaid, to command the slaves forthwith to return home to their masters; and we do hereby, by virtue of the Act of the General a.s.sembly in such cases made and provided, intimate and declare that _if the said_ LOTT and BOB _do not return home and surrender themselves,_ immediately after the publication of these presents, that ANY PERSON MAY KILL AND DESTROY THE SAID SLAVES, by such means as he or they may think fit, without accusation or impeachment of any crime or offence for so doing, and without incurring any penalty or forfeiture thereby.

Given under our hands and seals, this 28th day of February, 1853.

W.N. PEDEN, J.P., [Seal]

W.C. BETTENCOURT, J.P., [Seal.]

$225 REWARD.--TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS will be given for negro LOTT, EITHER DEAD OR ALIVE; and TWENTY-FIVE DOLLARS FOR BOB'S HEAD, delivered to the subscriber in the town of Wilmington.

BENJAMIN HALLET.

March 2nd, 1853.

There is another evidence of a want of happiness among the slaves, which, though silent and unheard, challenges contradiction: I mean the annual escape of from one to two thousand into Canada, in spite not only of the natural difficulties and privations of the journey, but also of the fearful dread of the consequences of re-capture. Doubtless some of these may be fleeing from the dread of just punishment for offences against the law, but none can doubt that many more are endeavouring to escape from what they feel to be cruelty, injustice, and oppression.

I do not wish to pander to a morbid appet.i.te for horrors by gathering together under one view all the various tales of woe and misery which I have heard of, known, or seen. I think I have said enough to prove to any unprejudiced person that such things do and must ever exist under the inst.i.tution of slavery; and that, although the statements of rabid abolitionists are often the most unwarranted exaggerations, the all but total denial of their occurrence by the slave-owners is also not correct. The conviction forced upon my own mind, after much thought and inquiry on this most interesting topic is, that there are many dark clouds of cruelty in a sky which is bright with much of the truest and kindest sympathy for the poor slave.

I now propose to take a short review of the progress and real state of slavery, and I will commence by giving _in extenso_ an enactment which materially affects the negro, and, as I have before observed, has more than once threatened the Republic with disunion:--

Section 2.--Privileges of Citizens.--Clause 3. "No person held to service or labour in one state under the laws thereof, escaping to another, shall in consequence of any law or regulation therein be discharged from such service or labour, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labour may be due."

Of course the word "slave" would have read strangely among a community who set themselves up as the champions of the "equal rights of man;" but it is clear that, according to this clause in the const.i.tution which binds the Republic together, every free state is compelled to a.s.sist in the recapture of a fugitive slave.

What was the exact number of slaves at the date of this law being pa.s.sed I have not the means of ascertaining: at the beginning of this century it was under 900,000; in the Census of 1850 they had increased to 3,200,000.[BT] There were originally 13 States. At present there are 31, besides territory not yet incorporated into States. The Slave States are 15, or nearly half. Thus much for increase of slaves and the slave soil. But, it will naturally be asked, how did it happen that, as the additional soil was incorporated, the sable workmen appeared as if by magic? The answer is very simple. The demand regulated the supply, and slave breeding became a most important feature in the system: thus the wants of the more southern States became regularly lessened by large drafts from Maryland, Kentucky, and Virginia. Anybody desirous of testing the truth of this statement will find statistical data to a.s.sist him in an unpretending volume by Marshall Hall, M.D., &c., _On Twofold Slavery,_ which I read with much interest, although I cannot agree with him in everything.[BV]

I am aware that residents in these breeding States are to be found who would scorn to utter a wilful falsehood, and who deny this propagation of the human chattel for the flesh market; but there can be little doubt that the unbiased seeker after truth will find that such is the case.

And why not? Why should those who make their livelihood by trafficking in the flesh of their fellow-creatures hesitate to increase their profits by paying attention to the breeding of them? These facts do not come under the general traveller's eye, because, armed with letters of introduction, he consorts more with worthy slave-owners, who, occupied with the welfare of those around and dependent upon them, know little of the world beyond; in the same way as in England, a Christian family may be an example of patriarchal simplicity and of apostolic zeal and love, and yet beyond the circle of their action, though not very far from its circ.u.mference, the greatest distress and perhaps cruelty may abound. How many of the dark spots on our community has the single zeal of the Earl of Shaftesbury forced upon the public mind, of which we were utterly ignorant, though living in the midst of them. The degraded female drudge in a coal-pit, the agonized infant in a chimney, and the death-wrought child in a factory--each and all bear testimony to how much of suffering may exist while surrounded by those whose lives are spent in Christian charity. And so it is in every community, Slave States included. Christian hearts, pregnant with zeal and love, are diffusing blessings around them; and, occupied with their n.o.ble work, they know little of the dark places that hang on their borders. The Southern planter and his lady may be filled with the love of St. John, and radiate the beams thereof on every man, woman, and child under their guardianship, and then, "measuring other people's corn by their own lovely bushel," they may well hesitate to believe in the existence of a profligate breeding Pandemonium within the precincts of their immediate country. Yet, alas! there can be little doubt that it does exist.

Let us now fix our attention on the actual facts of the case which all parties admit. First, we have a slave population of 3,200,000. I think, if I estimate their marketable value at 80_l_ a head, I shall be considerably below the truth. That gives us in human flesh, 250,000,000l. Secondly, let us take the product of their labour. The Slave States raise annually--

Rice 215,000,000 lbs.

Tobacco 185,000,000 "

Sugar 248,000,000 "

Cotton 1,000,000,000 "

Mola.s.ses 12,000,000 gallons.

Indian Corn. 368,000,000 bushels.

Estimating these at a lower value than they have ever fallen to, you have here represented 80,000,000l. sterling of annual produce from the muscle and sinew of the slave.[BW] Surely the wildest enthusiast, did he but ponder over these facts, could not fail to pause ere he mounted the breach, shouting the rabid war-cry of abolition, which involves a capital of 250,000,000_l_, and an annual produce of 80,000,000l.

The misery which an instantaneous deliverance of the slave would cause by the all but certain loss of the greater portion of the products above enumerated, must be apparent to the least reflecting mind. If any such schemer exist, he would do well to study the history of our West India islands from the period of their sudden emanc.i.p.ation, especially since free-trade admitted slave produce on equal terms with the produce of free labour. Complaints of utter ruin are loud and constant from the proprietors in nearly every island; they state, and state with truth, that it is impossible for free labour at a high price, and which can only be got perhaps for six hours a day, to compete with the steady slave work of twelve hours a day; and they show that slaveholding communities have materially increased their products, which can only have been effected by a further taxing of the slave's powers, or a vast increase of fresh human material.[BX] But they further complain that the negro himself is sadly retrograding. "They attend less to the instruction of their religious teachers; they pay less attention to the education of their children; vice and immorality are on the increase,"

&c.--_Pet.i.tion to the Imperial Parliament from St. George's, Jamaica,_ July, 1852.

I might multiply such statements from nearly every island, and quote the authority of even some of their governors to the same effect; but the above are sufficient for my purpose. They prove three most important facts for consideration, when treating the question of Slavery. First, that you may ruin the planter. Secondly, that you may free--without benefiting--the slave. Thirdly, that each State, as it becomes free, tends to give additional value to the property of those States which choose to hold on to slavery; and all these results may occur despite the wisdom (?) of senators, and an indemnity of 20,000,000l.

Surely, then, the Southern planter may well a.s.sert that he sees not sufficient inducement to follow our hasty wholesale example. But while such convictions are forced upon him, he will be a degenerate son of energetic sires, if he be so scared at our ill-success as to fear to look for some better path to the same n.o.ble object; and there is one most important consideration which should impel him, while avoiding all rash haste, to brook no dangerous delay; that consideration is, that the difficulty of dealing with the question is increasing with fearful rapidity, for the slave population has nearly quadrupled itself since the beginning of the century. The capital involved is, we have seen, gigantic; but the question of numbers is by far the most perplexing to deal with, in a social point of view. The white population of the Slave States is, in rough numbers, 6,000,000; the slave population is more than 3,000,000, and the free blacks 250,000. Does any sane man believe that, if slavery had existed in Great Britain, and that the slaves had const.i.tuted one-third of the population, we should have attempted to remove the black bar from our escutcheon, by the same rapid and summary process which we adopted to free the negro in our colonies?

An American writer on Slavery has said, and I think most justly, "that two distinct races of people, nearly equal in numbers, and unlike in colour, manners, habits, feelings and state of civilization to such a degree that amalgamation is impossible, cannot dwell together in the same community unless the one be in subjection to the other." So fully am I convinced of the truth of this statement, and so certain am I that every one who has been in a Slave State must be satisfied of the truth of it, that I feel sure, if the South freed every slave to-morrow, not a week would elapse before each State in the Union without exception would pa.s.s stringent laws to prevent them settling within their borders; even at this moment such a law exists in some States.

With all these difficulties constantly before them, who can wonder that a kind-hearted planter, while gazing on the cheerful and happy faces of his well-fed and well-housed slaves, should look distrustfully at emanc.i.p.ation, and strive to justify to his conscience opposition to any plan, however gradual, which leads thereto. Nevertheless, however satisfied in his mind that the slaves are kindly treated, and that harshness even is never used, he cannot contemplate the inst.i.tution from a sufficient distance to be beyond its influences, without feeling that emanc.i.p.ation is the goal towards which his thoughts should ever bend, and that in proportion as the steps towards it must be gradual, so should they speedily commence. But how? Washington, while confessing his most earnest desire for abolition, declares his conviction that "it can only be effected by legislative authority."

The next chapter will detail such propositions as, in my humble opinion, appear most worthy of the consideration of the Legislature, with a view to the gradual removal of the black star from the striped banner.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote BT: _List of States and Territories forming the Confederation.

Those marked_ S. _are Slave-holding States._

STATES.

New Hampshire Ma.s.sachusetts Rhode Island Connecticut New York New Jersey[BU]

Pennsylvania S. Delaware S. Maryland S. Virginia S. North Carolina S. South Carolina S. Georgia

NEW STATES.

Vermont 1791 S. Kentucky 1792 S. Tennessee 1796 Ohio 1802 S. Louisiana 1812 Indiana 1816 S. Mississippi 1817 Illinois 1818 S. Alabama 1819 Maine 1820 S. Missouri 1821 S. Arkansas 1836 Michigan 1837 S. Florida 1845 S. Texas 1845 Iowa 1846 Wisconsin 1848 California 1850

DISTRICT.

S. Columbia 1791

TERRITORIES.

Oregon 1848 Minnesota 1849 S. Kansas 1855 S. Utah 1850 New Mexico 1850 Nebraska 1853]

[Footnote BU: I believe the last slave has been removed from New Jersey.--H.A.M.]

[Footnote BV: Between 1810 and 1850 the slave population in Virginia has only increased from 392,000 to 470,000, while in Tennessee it has increased from 44,000 to 240,000; and in Louisiana, from 35,000 to 240,000.]

[Footnote BW: I take no notice of the various other valuable productions of these States: they may fairly represent the produce of the white man's labour.]

[Footnote BX: _Vide_ ch. xii., "The Queen of the Antilles."]