Chapter XVI: A Hypothetical View of Abolitionism

We think it must strike every intelligent observer--every one certainly that lays claims to any knowledge in the workings of society--that _immediate_ Abolition, whenever acquired by the measures now in operation--admitting it can be effected without a civil war, though we do not believe it can--must find the two conflicting parties in the worst possible humour in relation to each other. On the one side would be arrayed the Abolitionists with their protégés; and on the other the party defeated after a long and violent struggle. In the mean time all the colored people, now free or in bondage, will have been filled with the most violent hatred and animosity towards the opponents of their claims. The feeling already produced in that class of colored people, that has come under the influence of Abolitionists, may serve as an illustration; and the well known principles of human nature may fill out the complement of the lesson. It would be seen by the people of this country, in the progress of events, long before this object shall have been attained, that an immediate emancipation at any time, brought about by such means, will place the country in a most undesirable and perilous condition. These anticipations and apprehensions must necessarily, as we think, mount to an insuperable barrier.--Self-preservation is the first law of nature; and when that comes to be the question, either with individuals or with society, people are not wont to suspend action to discuss casuistry or right.--The drowning man seizes the plank within his reach, even though he should hear the voice of a remonstrant, giving some very subtle reasons why he ought not to do so. So society, finding itself in peril, from within or from without, will save itself, if it can. We are inclined to believe, that the harder Abolition is pushed in its present shape, and under its present avowed principles, so much greater will be the apprehensions of the people, as to the consequences of its success. We think they will never consent, that three millions of the colored race should be raised by one step, from the condition in which they now are, to a full equality of privilege with all other citizens, backed by such a party as the Abolitionists, and actuated by their principles. The dangers would be too obvious and too imminent to admit of parley. They must first be made to believe in _perfectionism_, before they would venture on such an experiment. Every stage of the progress of Abolitionism hitherto, instead of allaying those apprehensions, has only served to augment them. If the peace of the country can hardly be maintained now, and is more and more disturbed at every successive stage of the movement, under its present organization, who can answer for it a little while to come?--Much more, who could answer for it in the hottest of the conflict? The Abolitionists insist on principles, apart from emancipation, which rouse popular indignation, and occasionally blow it into flame, even while the people know that the power is in their own hands. But when once they shall be obliged to see, that these principles are actually going into practice by force, throughout the length and breadth of the land, it requires no prophet to foretell how they will feel, and how they will act. Honestly, we do not think it among the possible events of the future, that Abolition principles, as they now stand forth before the public, can be forced upon the people of this country; but on the contrary, that, foreseeing the evil, they will take care to prevent it.

The Abolitionists cannot appeal to the effects of emancipation in the British West Indies, even on the ground of their own showing, to allay these apprehensions; for there is no parallel between the two cases. Every circumstance and every attribute of the question, as it exists here, in its essential influences, are at variance with that example.

But so long as our political fabric remains such as it is, it would seem to be folly to discuss this subject on this hypothetical basis. We have only taken this license for a moment, for the sake of showing, that, if this political structure of our society were all out of the way, and if the slave-holders had no interest or voice in the question, the avowed principles of the Abolitionists, apart from the difficulty of political rights, would erect an insuperable barrier in the public mind to the accomplishment of their designs.