Chapter V: Front Matter (5)

Before proceeding with these details, I would for one moment expose that degradation of free labor, which is one of the general results. Where there are slaves, whose office is work, it is held disreputable for a white man to soil his skin or harden his hands with honest toil. The Slave-Master of course declines work, and his pernicious example infects all others. With impious resolve, they would reverse the Almighty decree appointing labor as the duty of man, and declaring that in the sweat of his face shall he eat his bread. The Slave-Master says, “No! this is true of the slave, of the black man, but not of the white man: he shall not eat his bread in the sweat of his face.” Thus is the brand of degradation stamped upon that daily toil which contributes so much to a true Civilization. It is a constant boast in the Slave States, that white men there will not perform work performed in the Free States. Mr. Calhoun and Mr. Waddy Thompson made this boast. Let it be borne in mind, then, that, where Slavery prevails, there is not only despair for the black man, but inequality and ignominy for the white laborer. By necessary consequence, the latter, whether emigrating from our Free States or fleeing from oppression and wretchedness in his European home, avoids a region disabled by such a social law. Hence a twofold injustice: practically he is excluded from the land, while the land itself becomes a prey to that paralysis which is caused by a violation of the laws of God. And now for the testimony.

The States where this Barbarism exists excel the Free States in all natural advantages. Their territory is more extensive, stretching over 851,448 square miles, while the Free States, including California, embrace only 612,597 square miles. Here is a difference of more than 238,000 square miles in favor of the Slave States, showing that Freedom starts in this great rivalry with a field more than a quarter less than that of Slavery. In happiness of climate, adapted to productions of special value,--in exhaustless motive power distributed throughout its space,--in natural highways, by more than fifty navigable rivers, never closed by the rigors of winter,--and in a stretch of coast, along Ocean and Gulf, indented by hospitable harbors,--the whole presenting incomparable advantages for that true Civilization, where agriculture, manufactures, and commerce, both domestic and foreign, blend,--in all these respects the Slave States excel the Free States, whose climate is often churlish, whose motive power is less various, whose navigable rivers are fewer and often sealed by ice, and whose coast, while less in extent and with fewer harbors, is often perilous from storm and cold.

But Slavery plays the part of a Harpy, and defiles the choicest banquet. See what it does with this territory, thus spacious and fair.

An important indication of prosperity is in the growth of _population_. In this respect the two regions started equal. In 1790, at the first census under the Constitution, the population of the present Slave States was 1,961,372, of the present Free States 1,968,455, showing a difference of only 7,083 in favor of the Free States. This difference, at first merely nominal, has been constantly increasing since, showing itself more strongly in each decennial census, until, in 1850, the population of the Slave States, swollen by the annexation of three foreign Territories, Louisiana, Florida, and Texas, was only 9,612,969, while that of the Free States, without such large annexations, reached 13,434,922, showing a difference of 3,821,953 in favor of Freedom. But this difference becomes still more remarkable, if we confine our inquiries to the white population, which at this period was only 6,184,477 in the Slave States, while it was 13,238,670 in the Free States, showing a difference of 7,054,193, in favor of Freedom, and showing also that the white population of the Free States had not only doubled, but, while occupying a smaller territory, commenced to triple, that of the Slave States. The comparative sparseness of the two populations furnishes another illustration. In the Slave States the average number of inhabitants to a square mile was 11.29, while in the Free States it was 21.93, or almost two to one in favor of Freedom.

These results are general; but if we take any particular Slave State, and compare it with a Free State, we shall find the same marked evidence for Freedom. Take Virginia, with a territory of 61,352 miles, and New York, with a territory of 47,000, or over 14,000 square miles less than her sister State. New York has one seaport, Virginia some three or four; New York has one noble river, Virginia has several; New York for 400 miles runs along the frozen line of Canada, Virginia basks in a climate of constant felicity. But Freedom is better than climate, river, or seaport. In 1790 the population of Virginia was 748,308, and in 1850 it was 1,421,661. In 1790 the population of New York was 340,120, and in 1850 it was 3,097,394. That of Virginia had not doubled in sixty years, while that of New York had multiplied more than nine-fold. A similar comparison may be made between Kentucky, with 37,680 square miles, admitted into the Union as long ago as 1792, and Ohio, with 39,964 square miles, admitted into the Union in 1802. In 1850, the Slave State had a population of only 982,405, while Ohio had a population of 1,980,329, showing a difference of nearly a million in favor of Freedom.

As in population, so also in _the value of property, real and personal_, do the Free States excel the Slave States. According to the census of 1850, the value of property in the Free States was $4,102,162,098, while in the Slave States it was $2,936,090,737; or, if we deduct the asserted property in human flesh, only $1,655,945,137,--showing an enormous difference of billions in favor of Freedom. In the Free States the valuation per acre was $10.46, in the Slave States only $3.04. This disproportion was still greater in 1855, when, according to the Report of the Secretary of the Treasury, the valuation of the Free States was $5,770,197,679, or $14.71 per acre; and of the Slave States, $3,977,354,046, or, if we deduct the asserted property in human flesh, $2,505,186,446, or $4.59 per acre. Thus in five years from 1850 the valuation of property in the Free States received an increase of more than the whole accumulated valuation of the Slave States in 1850.

Looking at details, we find the same disproportions. Arkansas and Michigan, nearly equal in territory, were organized as States by simultaneous Acts of Congress; and yet in 1855 the whole valuation of Arkansas, including its asserted property in human flesh, was only $64,240,726, while that of Michigan, without a single slave, was $116,593,580. The whole accumulated valuation of all the Slave States, deducting the asserted property in human flesh, in 1850, was only $1,655,945,137; but the valuation of New York alone, in 1855, reached the nearly equal sum of $1,401,285,279. The valuation of Virginia, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, and Texas, all together, in 1850, deducting human flesh, was $559,224,920, or simply $1.96 per acre,--being less than that of Massachusetts alone, which was $573,342,286, or $114.85 per acre.

The Slave States boast of _agriculture_; but here again, notwithstanding superior natural advantages, they must yield to the Free States at every point,--in the number of farms and plantations, in the number of acres improved, in the cash value of farms, in the average value per acre, and in the value of farming implements and machinery. Here is a short table.

Free States. Slave States.

Number of farms, 873,608 569,201
Acres of improved land, 57,720,494 54,970,327
Cash value of farms, $2,147,218,478 $1,117,649,649
Average value per acre, $19.17 $6.18
Value of farming implements $85,840,141 $65,345,625

Such is the mighty contrast. But it does not stop here. Careful tables place the agricultural products of the Free States, for the year ending June, 1850, at $888,634,334, while those of the Slave States were $631,277,417; the product per acre in the Free States at $7.94, and the product per acre in the Slave States at $3.49; the average product of each agriculturist in the Free States at $342, and in the Slave States at $171. Thus the Free States, with a smaller population engaged in agriculture than the Slave States, and with smaller territory, show an annual sum total of agricultural products surpassing those of the Slave States by two hundred and twenty-seven millions of dollars, while twice as much is produced by each agriculturist, and more than twice as much is produced on an acre. The monopoly of cotton, rice, and cane-sugar, with a climate granting two and sometimes three crops in the year, is thus impotent in competition with Freedom.

In _manufactures, mining, and the mechanic arts_ the failure of the Slave States is greater still. It appears at all points,--in the capital employed, in the value of the raw material, in the annual wages, and in the annual product. A short table will show the contrast.

Free States. Slave States.

Capital, $430,240,051 $95,029,877
Value of raw material, 465,844,092 86,190,639
Annual wages, 195,436,453 33,247,560
Annual product, 842,586,058 165,423,027

This might be illustrated by details with regard to different manufactures,--as shoes, cotton, woollens, pig iron, wrought iron, and iron castings,--all showing the contrast. It might also be illustrated by comparison between different States,--showing, for instance, that the manufactures of Massachusetts, during the last year, exceeded those of all the Slave States combined.

In _commerce_ the failure of the Slave States is on a yet larger scale. Under this head the census does not supply proper statistics, and we are left to approximations from other sources; but these are enough for our purpose. It appears, that, of products which enter into commerce, the Free States had an amount valued at $1,377,199,968, the Slave States an amount valued only at $410,754,992; that, of persons engaged in trade, the Free States had 136,856, and the Slave States 52,622; and that, of tonnage employed, the Free States had 2,791,096 tons, and the Slave States only 726,284. This was in 1850. But in 1855 the disproportion was still greater, the Free States having 4,320,768 tons, and the Slave States 855,510 tons, being a difference of five to one,--and the tonnage of Massachusetts alone being 979,210 tons, an amount larger than that of all the Slave States together. The tonnage built during this year by the Free States was 528,844 tons, by the Slave States 52,938 tons. Maine alone built 215,905 tons, or more than four times the whole built in the Slave States.

The foreign commerce of the Free States, in 1855, as indicated by exports and imports, was $404,365,503; of the Slave States, $132,062,196. The exports of the Free States were $167,520,693; of the Slave States, including the vaunted cotton crop, $107,475,668. The imports of the Free States were $236,844,810; of the Slave States, $24,586,528. The foreign commerce of New York alone was more than twice as large as that of all the Slave States; her imports were larger, and her exports were larger also. Add to this evidence of figures the testimony of a Virginian, Mr. Loudon, in a letter written just before the sitting of a Southern Commercial Convention. Thus he complains and testifies:--

“There are not half a dozen vessels engaged in our own trade
that are owned in Virginia; and I have been unable to find a
vessel at Liverpool loading for Virginia within three years,
during the height of our busy season.”

_Railroads and canals_ are the avenues of commerce; and here again the Free States excel. Of railroads in operation in 1854, there were 13,105 miles in the Free States, and 4,212 in the Slave States. Of canals there were 3,682 miles in the Free States, and 1,116 in the Slave States.

The _Post-Office_, which is the agent not only of commerce, but of civilization, joins in the uniform testimony. According to the tables for 1859, the postage collected in the Free States was $5,581,749, and the expense of carrying the mails $6,945,545, leaving a deficit of $1,363,796. In the Slave States the amount collected was only $1,936,167, and the expense of carrying the mails $5,947,076, leaving the enormous deficit of $4,010,909,--the difference between the two deficits being $2,647,113. The Slave States did not pay one third of the expense in transporting their own mails; and not a single Slave State paid for transporting its own mails, not even the small State of Delaware. Massachusetts, besides paying for hers, had a surplus larger by one half than the whole amount collected in South Carolina.

According to the census of 1850, the value of _churches_ in the Free States was $66,177,586; in the Slave States, $20,683,265.

The _voluntary charity_ contributed in 1855, for certain leading purposes of Christian benevolence, was, in the Free States, $955,511; for the same purposes in the Slave States, $193,885. For the Bible cause the Free States contributed $321,365; the Slave States, $67,226. For the Missionary cause the former contributed $502,174; and the latter, $101,934. For the Tract Society the former contributed $131,972; and the latter, $24,725. The amount contributed for Missions by Massachusetts was greater than that contributed by all the Slave States, and more than eight times that contributed by South Carolina.

Nor have the Free States been backward in charity for the benefit of the Slave States. The records of Massachusetts show that as long ago as 1781, at the beginning of the Government, there was a contribution throughout the Commonwealth, under the particular direction of that eminent patriot, Samuel Adams, for the relief of inhabitants of South Carolina and Georgia.[49] In 1855 we were saddened by the prevalence of yellow fever in Portsmouth, Virginia; and now, from a report of the Relief Committee of that place, we learn that the amount of charity contributed by the Slave States, exclusive of Virginia, the afflicted State, was $12,182; and including Virginia, it was $33,398; while $42,547 was contributed by the Free States.

In all this array we see the fatal influence of Slavery. But its Barbarism is yet more conspicuous, when we consider its _Educational Establishments_, and the unhappy results naturally ensuing from their imperfect character.

Of _colleges_, in 1856, the Free States had 61, and the Slave States 59; but the comparative efficacy of the institutions assuming this name may be measured by certain facts. The number of graduates in the Free States was 47,752, in the Slave States 19,648; the number of ministers educated in Slave colleges was 747, in Free colleges 10,702; and the number of volumes in the libraries of Slave colleges 308,011, in the libraries of Free colleges 668,497. If materials were at hand for comparison between these colleges, in buildings, cabinets, and scientific apparatus, or in standard of scholarship, the difference would be still more apparent.

Of _professional schools_, teaching law, medicine, and theology, the Free States had 65, with 269 professors, 4,417 students, and 175,951 volumes in their libraries; while the Slave States had only 32 professional schools, with 122 professors, 1,816 students, and 30,796 volumes in their libraries. The whole number educated at these institutions in the Free States was 23,513, in the Slave States 3,812. Of these, the largest number in the Slave States study medicine, next theology, and lastly law. According to the census, there are only 808 students in the Slave theological schools, and 747 studying for the ministry in Slave colleges; and this is the education of the Slave clergy. In the law schools of the Slave States the number of students is only 240, this being the sum-total of public students in the land of Slavery devoted to that profession which is the favorite stepping-stone to political life, where Slave-Masters claim such a disproportion of office and honor.

Of _academies and private schools_, in 1850, the Free States, notwithstanding multitudinous public schools, had 3,197, with 7,175 teachers, 154,893 pupils, and an annual income of $2,457,372; the Slave States had 2,797 academies and private schools, with 4,913 teachers, 104,976 pupils, and an annual income of $2,079,724. In the absence of public schools, to a large extent, where Slavery exists, the dependence must be upon private schools; and yet even here the Slave States fall below the Free States, whether we consider the number of schools, the number of pupils, the number of teachers, or the amount paid for their support.

In _public schools_, open to all, poor and rich alike, the preëminence of the Free States is complete. Here the figures show a difference as wide as that between Freedom and Slavery. Their number in the Free States is 62,433, with 72,621 teachers, and with 2,769,901 pupils, supported at an annual expense of $6,780,337. Their number in the Slave States is 18,507, with 19,307 teachers, and with 581,861 pupils, supported at an annual expense of $2,719,534. This difference may be illustrated by details. Virginia, an old State, and more than a third larger than Ohio, has 67,353 pupils in her public schools, while the latter State has 484,153. Arkansas, equal in age and size with Michigan, has only 8,493 pupils at her public schools, while the latter State has 110,455. South Carolina, nearly four times as large as Massachusetts, has 17,838 pupils at public schools, while the latter State has 176,475. South Carolina spends for this purpose, annually, $200,600; Massachusetts, $1,006,795. Baltimore, with a population of 169,054, on the northern verge of Slavery, has school buildings valued at $105,729; Boston, with a population of 136,881, has school buildings valued at $729,502. Baltimore has only 37 public schools, with 138 teachers, and 8,011 pupils, supported at an annual expense of $32,423; Boston has 203 public schools, with 353 teachers, and 20,369 pupils, supported at an annual expense of $237,100. Even these figures do not disclose the whole difference; for there exist in the Free States teachers’ institutes, normal schools, lyceums, and public courses of lectures, unknown in the region of Slavery. These advantages are enjoyed by the children of colored persons; and here is a comparison which shows the degradation of the Slave States. It is their habit particularly to deride free colored persons. See, now, with what cause. The number of colored persons in the Free States is 196,016, of whom 22,043, or more than one ninth, attend school, which is a larger proportion than is supplied by the whites of the Slave States. In Massachusetts there are 9,064 colored persons, of whom 1,439, or nearly one sixth, attend school, which is a much larger proportion than is supplied by the whites of South Carolina.

Among educational establishments are _public libraries_; and here, again, the Free States have their customary eminence, whether we consider libraries strictly called public, or libraries of the common school, Sunday school, college, and church. The disclosures are startling. The number of libraries in the Free States is 14,893, and the sum-total of volumes is 3,883,617; the number of libraries in the Slave States is 713, and the sum-total of volumes is 654,194: showing an excess for Freedom of more than fourteen thousand libraries, and more than three millions of volumes. In the Free States the common-school libraries are 11,881, and contain 1,589,683 volumes; in the Slave States they are 186, and contain 57,721 volumes. In the Free States the Sunday-school libraries are 1,713, and contain 474,241 volumes; in the Slave States they are 275, and contain 68,080 volumes. In the Free States the college libraries are 132, and contain 660,573 volumes; in the Slave States they are 79, and contain 249,248 volumes. In the Free States the church libraries are 109, and contain 52,723 volumes; in the Slave States they are 21, and contain 5,627 volumes. In the Free States the libraries strictly called public, and not included under heads already enumerated, are 1,058, and contain 1,106,397 volumes; those of the Slave States are 152, and contain 273,518 volumes.

Turn these figures over, look at them in any light, and the conclusion is irresistible for Freedom. The college libraries alone of the Free States are greater than all the libraries of Slavery; so, also, are the libraries of Massachusetts alone greater than all the libraries of Slavery; and the common-school libraries alone of New York are more than twice as large as all the libraries of Slavery. Michigan has 107,943 volumes in her libraries; Arkansas has 420; and yet the Acts for the admission of these two States into the Union were passed on the same day.

Among educational establishments, one of the most efficient is the _press_; and here again all things testify for Freedom. The Free States excel in the number of newspapers and periodicals published, whether daily, semi-weekly, weekly, semi-monthly, monthly, or quarterly,--and whatever their character, whether literary, neutral, political, religious, or scientific. The whole aggregate circulation in the Free States is 334,146,281, in the Slave States 81,038,693; in Free Michigan 3,247,736, in Slave Arkansas 377,000; in Free Ohio 30,473,407, in Slave Kentucky 6,582,838; in Slave South Carolina 7,145,930, in Free Massachusetts 64,820,564,--a larger number than in the twelve Slave States, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Florida, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Texas, combined. This enormous disproportion in the aggregate is also preserved in the details. In the Slave States political newspapers find more favor than all others together; but even of these they publish only 47,243,209 copies, while the Free States publish 163,583,668. Numerous as are political newspapers in the Free States, they form considerably less than one half the aggregate circulation of the Press, while in the Slave States they constitute nearly three fifths. Of neutral newspapers the Slave States publish 8,812,620, the Free States 79,156,733. Of religious newspapers the Slave States publish 4,364,832, the Free States 29,280,652. Of literary journals the Slave States publish 20,245,360, the Free States 57,478,768. And of scientific journals the Slave States publish 372,672, the Free States 4,521,260. Of these last the number of copies published in Massachusetts alone is 2,033,260,--more than five times the number in the whole land of Slavery. Thus, in contributions to science, literature, religion, and even politics, as attested by the activity of the periodical press, do the Slave States miserably fail,--while darkness gathers over them, increasing with time. According to the census of 1810, the disproportion in this respect between the two regions was only as two to one; it is now more than four to one, and is still darkening.

The same disproportion appears with regard to persons connected with the Press. In the Free States the number of _printers_ was 11,812, of whom 1,229 were in Massachusetts; in the Slave States there were 2,625, of whom South Carolina had only 141. In the Free States the number of _publishers_ was 331; in the Slave States, 24. Of these, Massachusetts had 51, or more than twice as many as all the Slave States; while South Carolina had but one. In the Free States the _authors_ were 73; in the Slave States, 6,--Massachusetts having 17, and South Carolina none. These suggestive illustrations are all derived from the last official census. If we go to other sources, the contrast is still the same. Of the authors mentioned in Duyckinck’s “Cyclopædia of American Literature,” 434 are of the Free States, and only 90 of the Slave States. Of the poets mentioned in Griswold’s “Poets and Poetry of America,” 122 are of the Free States, and only 16 of the Slave States. Of the poets whose place of birth appears in Read’s “Female Poets of America,” 71 are of the Free States, and only 11 of the Slave States. If we try authors by weight or quality, it is the same as when we try them by numbers. Out of the Free States come all whose works have a place in the permanent literature of the country,--Irving, Prescott, Sparks, Bancroft, Emerson, Motley, Hildreth, Hawthorne; also, Bryant, Longfellow, Dana, Halleck, Whittier, Lowell,--and I might add indefinitely to the list. But what name from the Slave States can find entrance there?

A similar disproportion appears in the number of _Patents_, during the last three years, 1857, 1858, and 1859, attesting the inventive industry of the contrasted regions. In the Free States there were 9,557; in the Slave States, 1,306: making a difference of 8,251 in favor of Freedom. The number in Free Massachusetts was 1,351; in Slave South Carolina, 39. The number in Free Connecticut, small in territory and population, was 628; in Slave Virginia, large in territory and population, 184.

From these things we might infer the _ignorance_ prevalent in the Slave States; but this shows itself in specific results of a deplorable character, authenticated by the official census. In the Slave States there were 493,026 native white adults, persons over twenty years of age, unable to read and write; while in the Free States, with double the native white population, there were but 248,725 persons of this class in this unhappy predicament: in the Slave States the proportion being 1 in 5 of the adult native whites; in the Free States 1 in 22. The number in Free Massachusetts, in an adult native white population of 470,375, was 1,055, or 1 in 446; the number in Slave South Carolina, in a like population of only 120,136, was 15,580, or 1 in 8. The number in Free Connecticut was 1 in 256, in Slave Virginia 1 in 5; in Free New Hampshire 1 in 192, and in Slave North Carolina 1 in 3.

Before leaving this picture, where the dismal colors all come from official sources, there are two other aspects in which Slavery may be regarded.

1. The first is its influence on _emigration_. The official compendium of the census (page 115) tells us that inhabitants of Slave States who are natives of Free States are more numerous than inhabitants of Free States who are natives of Slave States. This is an egregious error. Just the contrary is true. The census of 1850 found 606,139 in the Free States who were born in the Slave States, while only 206,624 born in the Free States were in the Slave States. And since the white population of the Free States is double that of the Slave States, it appears that the proportion of whites moving from Slavery is six times greater than that of whites moving into Slavery. This simple fact discloses something of the aversion to Slavery which is aroused even in the Slave States.

2. The second is furnished by the character of the region on the border-line between Freedom and Slavery. In general, the value of lands in Slave States adjoining Freedom is advanced, while the value of corresponding lands in Free States is diminished. The effects of Freedom and Slavery are reciprocal. Slavery is a bad neighbor; Freedom is a good neighbor. In Virginia, lands naturally poor are, by nearness to Freedom, worth $12.98 an acre, while richer lands in other parts of the State are worth only $8.42. In Illinois, lands bordering on Slavery are worth only $4.54 an acre, while other lands in Illinois are worth $8.05. As in the value of lands, so in all other influences is Slavery felt for evil, and Freedom felt for good; and thus is it clearly shown to be for the interest of the Slave States to be surrounded by a circle of Free States.

At every point is the character of Slavery more and more manifest, rising and dilating into an overshadowing Barbarism, darkening the whole land. Through its influence, population, values of all kinds, manufactures, commerce, railroads, canals, charities, the post-office, colleges, professional schools, academies, public schools, newspapers, periodicals, books, authorship, inventions, are all stunted, and, under a Government which professes to be founded on the intelligence of the people, one in five of native white adults in the region of Slavery is officially reported as unable to read and write. Never was the saying of Montesquieu more triumphantly verified, that countries are not cultivated by reason of their fertility, but by reason of their liberty. To this truth the Slave States testify perpetually by every possible voice. Liberty is the powerful agent which drives the plough, the spindle, and the keel,--opens avenues of all kinds,--inspires charity,--awakens love of knowledge, and supplies the means of gratifying it. Liberty is the first of schoolmasters: nay, more; it is the Baconian philosophy of Civilization, through which the powers and activities of man are enlarged beyond measure or imagination.

Unerring and passionless figures thus far are our witnesses. But their testimony will be enhanced by a final glance at the _geographical character_ of the Slave States; and here there is a singular and instructive parallel.

Jefferson described Virginia as “fast sinking” to be “the Barbary of the Union,”[50]--meaning, of course, the Barbary of his day, which had not yet turned against Slavery. And Franklin also wrote, that he did “not wish to see a new Barbary rising in America, and our long extended coast occupied by piratical States.”[51] In this each spoke with prophetic voice. Though on different sides of the Atlantic and on different continents, our Slave States and the original Barbary States occupy nearly the same parallels of latitude, occupy nearly the same extent of longitude, embrace nearly the same number of square miles, enjoy kindred advantages of climate, being equally removed from the cold of the North and the burning heat of the tropics, and also have similar boundaries of land and water, affording kindred advantages of ocean and sea, with this difference, that the boundaries of the two regions are precisely reversed, so that where is land in one is water in the other, while in both there is the same extent of ocean and the same extent of sea. Nor is this all. Algiers, for a long time the most obnoxious place in the Barbary States of Africa, once branded by an indignant chronicler as “the wall of the Barbarian world,”[52] is situated near the parallel of 36° 30´ north latitude, being the line of the Missouri Compromise, which once marked the wall of Slavery in our country west of the Mississippi, while Morocco, the chief present seat of Slavery in the African Barbary, is near the parallel of Charleston. There are no two spaces on the surface of the globe, equal in extent, (and careful examination will verify what I am about to state,) which present so many distinctive features of resemblance, whether we consider the common regions of latitude in which they lie, the common nature of their boundaries, their common productions, their common climate, or the common Barbarism which sought shelter in both. I do not stop to inquire why Slavery--banished at last from Europe, banished also from that part of this hemisphere which corresponds in latitude to Europe--should have intrenched itself, in both hemispheres, in similar regions of latitude, so that Virginia, Carolina, Mississippi, and Missouri are the American complement to Morocco, Algiers, Tripoli, and Tunis. But there is one important point in the parallel which remains to be fulfilled. The barbarous Emperor of Morocco, in the words of a treaty, so long ago as the last century, declared his desire that “the odious name of Slavery might be effaced from the memory of men”;[53] while Algiers, Tripoli, and Tunis, whose tenacity for the Barbarism was equalled only by that of South Carolina, have renounced it one after another, and delivered it over to the indignation of mankind. Following this example, the parallel will be complete, and our Barbary will become the complement in Freedom to the African Barbary, as it has already been its complement in Slavery, and is unquestionably its complement in geographical character.

II.

From the consideration of Slavery in its practical results, illustrated by contrast between the Free States and Slave States, I pass to another stage of the argument, where Slavery appears in its influence on the CHARACTER OF SLAVE-MASTERS. Nothing could I undertake more painful, and yet there is nothing more essential to the discussion, especially in response to pretensions of Senators on this floor, nor is there any point on which the evidence is more ample.

It is in the Character of Slavery itself that we are to find the Character of Slave-Masters. I need not go back to the golden mouth of Chrysostom to learn that “Slavery is the fruit of covetousness, of extravagance, of insatiable greediness”;[54] for we have already seen that this fivefold enormity is inspired by the single idea of _compelling men to work without wages_. This spirit must naturally appear in the Slave-Master. But the eloquent Saint did not disclose the whole truth. Slavery is founded on violence, as we have already too clearly seen; of course it can be sustained only by kindred violence, sometimes against the defenceless slave, sometimes against the freeman whose indignation is aroused at the outrage. It is founded on brutal and vulgar pretensions, as is unhappily too apparent; of course it can be sustained only by kindred brutality and vulgarity. The denial of all rights in the slave can be sustained only by disregard of other rights, common to the whole community, whether of the person, the press, or speech. Where this exists there can be but one supreme law, to which all other laws, statute or social, are subordinate,--and this is the pretended law of Slavery. All these things must be manifest in Slave-Masters; and yet, unconscious of their true condition, they make boasts which reveal still further the unhappy influence. Barbarous standards of conduct are unblushingly avowed. The swagger of a bully is called chivalry; a swiftness to quarrel is called courage; the bludgeon is adopted as substitute for argument; and assassination is lifted to be one of the Fine Arts. Long ago it was fixed certain that the day which makes man a slave “takes half his worth away,”--words from the ancient harp of Homer, sounding through long generations. Nothing here is said of the human being at the other end of the chain. To aver that on this same day all his worth is taken away might seem inconsistent with exceptions which we gladly recognize; but, alas! it is too clear, both from reason and from facts, that, bad as Slavery is for the Slave, it is worse for the Master.

In making this exposure I am fortified at the outset by two classes of authority, whose testimony it will be difficult to question: the first personal, and founded on actual experience; the second philosophical, and founded on everlasting truth.

First, _Personal Authority_. And here I adduce words, often quoted, which dropped from the lips of Slave-Masters in those better days, when, seeing the wrong of Slavery, they escaped from its injurious influence. Of these, none expressed themselves with more vigor than George Mason, a Slave-Master from Virginia, in debate on the adoption of the National Constitution. This is his language:--

“Slavery discourages arts and manufactures. The poor despise
labor, when performed by slaves. They prevent the emigration
of whites, who really enrich and strengthen a country. _They
produce the most pernicious effect on manners._ EVERY MASTER
OF SLAVES IS BORN A PETTY TYRANT. They bring the judgment of
Heaven on a country.”[55]

Thus, with a few touches, does this Slave-Master portray his class, putting them in that hateful list which, according to every principle of liberty, must be resisted so long as we obey God. And this clear testimony received kindred support from the fiery soul of Jefferson. Here are his words:--

“There must doubtless be an unhappy influence on the manners of
our people produced by the existence of Slavery among us. The
whole commerce between master and slave is a perpetual exercise
of the most boisterous passions, THE MOST UNREMITTING DESPOTISM
on the one part, and degrading submissions on the other. Our
children see this, and learn to imitate it.… _The man must be
a prodigy who can retain his manners and morals undepraved
by such circumstances._ And with what execration should the
statesman be loaded, who, permitting one half the citizens thus
to trample on the rights of the other, _transforms those into
despots_ and these into enemies, destroys the morals of the one
part and the _amor patriæ_ of the other!… With the morals of
the people, their industry also is destroyed.”[56]

Next comes the _Philosophic Authority_. Here, while the language which I quote may be less familiar, it is hardly less commanding. Among names of such weight I shall not discriminate, but simply follow the order of time. First is John Locke, the great author of the English system of Intellectual Philosophy, who, though once unhappily indulgent to American Slavery, in another place describes it, in words which every Slave-Master should know, as--

“The state of war continued between a lawful conqueror and a
captive.” “So directly opposite to the generous temper and
courage of our nation, that _’tis hardly to be conceived that
an Englishman_, MUCH LESS A GENTLEMAN, _should plead for
’t_.”[57]

Then comes Adam Smith, the founder of the science of Political Economy, who, in his work on Morals, thus utters himself:--

“There is not a negro from the coast of Africa who does not
possess a degree of magnanimity which the soul of his sordid
master is too often scarce capable of conceiving. Fortune never
exerted more cruelly her empire over mankind than when she
subjected those nations of heroes to the refuse of the jails
of Europe, to wretches who possess the virtues neither of the
countries which they come from nor of those which they go to,
_and whose levity, brutality, and baseness so justly expose
them to the contempt of the vanquished_.”[58]

This judgment, pronounced just a century ago, was repelled by the Slave-Masters of Virginia in a feeble publication, which attests at least their own consciousness that they were the criminals arraigned by the distinguished philosopher. This was soon followed by the testimony of the great English moralist, Dr. Johnson, who, in a letter to a friend, thus shows his opinion of Slave-Masters:--

“To omit for a year, or for a day, the most efficacious method
of advancing Christianity, in compliance with any purposes that
terminate on this side of the grave, is a crime of which I
know not that the world has yet had an example, except in the
practice of _the planters of America, a race of mortals whom, I
suppose, no other man wishes to resemble_.”[59]

These are British voices. There are French also of equal character, whose is the same implacable judgment. First I name Condorcet, who did so much to develop the idea of Human Progress. Constantly he testifies against Slavery. His brand of it as Barbarism is sententiously expressed in a letter to Voltaire, describing a successful Slave-Master:--

“L’Éprémesnil is a little American, who, by dint of plying his
negroes with the lash, has succeeded in getting enough sugar
and indigo to buy an office of King’s Councillor in the revenue
service.”[60]

Voltaire adds to this expression other words kindred in scorn:--

“The American savage of whom you speak does not astonish me;
but he frightens me, for I know beyond doubt that he is of the
horde of other French savages who have sworn immortal hate to
reason.”[61]

In harmony with these is that famous irony of Montesquieu, where, speaking of the Africans, he says:--

“It is impossible that we should suppose these people men;
because, if we supposed them men, the world would begin to
think that we ourselves were not Christians.”[62]

Other countries might testify; but this is enough.

With such authorities, Personal and Philosophic, American and Foreign, I need not hesitate in this ungracious task; but Truth, which is mightier than Mason and Jefferson, than John Locke, Adam Smith, and Samuel Johnson, than Condorcet, Voltaire, and Montesquieu, marshals the evidence in unbroken succession.

Proceeding with the argument, broadening as we advance, we shall see Slave-Masters (1) in the Law of Slavery, (2) in relations with Slaves, (3) in relations with each other and with Society, and (4) in that unconsciousness which renders them insensible to their true character.

* * * * *

(1.) As in considering the Character of Slavery, so in considering the Character of Slave-Masters, we must begin with the _Law of Slavery_, which, as their work, testifies against them. In the face of this unutterable abomination, where impiety, cruelty, brutality, and robbery all strive for mastery, it is vain to assert humanity or refinement in its authors. Full well I know that the conscience, which speaks so powerfully to the solitary soul, is often silent in the corporate body, and that, in all ages and countries, numbers, when gathered in communities and States, have sanctioned acts from which the individual revolts. And yet I know no surer way of judging a people than by its laws, especially where those laws have been long continued and openly maintained.

Whatever may be the eminence of individual virtue,--and I would not so far disparage humanity as to suppose that offences so general where Slavery exists are universal,--it is not reasonable or logical to infer that the body of Slave-Masters are better than the Law of Slavery. And since the Law itself degrades the slave to be a chattel, and submits him to irresponsible control,--with power to bind and to scourge, to usurp the fruits of another’s labor, to pollute the body, and to outrage all ties of family, making marriage impossible,--we must conclude that such enormities are sanctioned by Slave-Masters; while the refusal of testimony, and the denial of instruction, by supplementary law, complete the evidence of complicity. And this conclusion must stand unquestioned, just so long as the Law of Slavery exists unrepealed. So mild and philosophical a judge as Tocqueville says, in his authoritative work: “The legislation of the Southern States with regard to slaves at the present day exhibits such unparalleled atrocities as suffice to show that the laws of humanity have been totally perverted, and to betray the desperate position of the community in which that legislation has been promulgated.”[63] All of which is too true. Cease, then, to blazon the humanity of Slave-Masters. Tell me not of the lenity with which this cruel Code is tempered to its unhappy subjects. Tell me not of the sympathy which overflows from the mansion of the master to the cabin of the slave. In vain you assert such “happy accidents.” In vain you show individuals who do not exert the wickedness of the law. The Barbarism still endures, solemnly, legislatively, judicially attested in the very SLAVE CODE, and proclaiming constantly the character of its authors. And this is the first article in the evidence against Slave-Masters.

* * * * *

(2.) I am next brought to _Slave-Masters in their relations with Slaves_; and here the argument is founded on facts, and on presumptions irresistible as facts. Only lately has inquiry burst into that gloomy world of bondage, and disclosed its secrets. But enough is already known to arouse the indignant condemnation of mankind. For instance, here is a simple advertisement--one of thousands--from the _Georgia Messenger_:--

“RUN AWAY.--My man Fountain; has holes in his ears, a scar on
the right side of his forehead; has been shot in the hind parts
of his legs; is marked on his back with the whip. Apply to
Robert Beasley, Macon, Ga.”

Holes in the ears; scar on the forehead; shot in the legs; and marks of the lash on the back! Such are tokens by which the Slave-Master identifies his slave.

Here is another advertisement, revealing Slave-Masters in a different light. It is from the _National Intelligencer_, published at the capital; and I confess the pain with which I cite such an indecency in a journal of much respectability. Of course it appeared without the knowledge of the editors; but it is none the less an illustrative example.

“FOR SALE.--An accomplished and handsome lady’s-maid. She is
just sixteen years of age; was raised in a genteel family in
Maryland; and is now proposed to be sold, not for any fault,
but simply because the owner has no further use for her. A
note directed to C. D., Gadsby’s Hotel, will receive prompt
attention.”

A sated libertine, in a land where vice is legalized, could not expose his victim with apter words.

These two instances illustrate a class.

In the recent work of Mr. Olmsted, a close observer and traveller in the Slave States, which abounds in pictures of Slavery, drawn with caution and evident regard to truth, is another, where a Slave-Master thus frankly confesses his experience:--

“‘I can tell you how you can break a nigger of running away,
certain,’ said the Slave-Master. ‘There was an old fellow I
used to know in Georgia, that always cured his so. If a nigger
ran away, when he caught him, he would bind his knee over a
log, and fasten him so he couldn’t stir; then he’d take a pair
of pincers, and pull one of his toe-nails out by the roots, and
tell him, that, if he ever run away again, he would pull out
two of them, and if he run away again after that, he told him
he’d pull out four of them, and so on, doubling each time. He
never had to do it more than twice; it always cured them.’”[64]

Like this story, from the lips of a Slave-Master, is another, where the master, angry because his slave sought to regain his God-given liberty, deliberately cut the tendons of his heel, thus horribly maiming him for life.

In vain these instances are denied. Their accumulating number, authenticated in every possible manner, by the press, by a cloud of witnesses, and by the confession of Slave-Masters, stares us constantly in the face.

Here we are brought again to the Slave Code, under the shelter of which these things, and worse, are done with complete impunity. Listen to the remarkable words of Mr. Justice Ruffin, of North Carolina, who, in a solemn decision, thus portrays, affirms, and deplores this terrible latitude. The obedience of the slave, he says,--

“is the consequence only of _uncontrolled authority over the
body.… The power of the master must be absolute, to render
the submission of the slave perfect._ I most freely confess
my sense of the harshness of this proposition. I feel it as
deeply as any man can. And, as a principle of moral right,
every person in his retirement must repudiate it. But in the
actual condition of things it must be so. There is no remedy.
_This discipline belongs to the state of Slavery.…_ It is
inherent in the relation of master and slave.”[65]

This same license is thus expounded in a recent judicial decision of Virginia:--

“It is the policy of the law in respect to the relation
of master and slave, and for the sake of securing proper
subordination and obedience on the part of the slave, _to
protect the master from prosecution, even if the whipping and
punishment be malicious, cruel, and excessive_.”[66]

Can Barbarism further go? Here is irresponsible power, rendered more irresponsible still by the seclusion of the plantation, and absolutely fortified by supplementary law excluding the testimony of slaves. That under its shelter enormities should occur, stranger than fiction, too terrible for imagination, and surpassing any attested experience, is simply according to the course of Nature and the course of history. Antiquity has illustrations which are most painful. From Ovid we learn how the porter was chained at his master’s gate;[67] by Plautus we are introduced to the various instruments of punishment, in fearful catalogue;[68] and in the pages of the philosopher Seneca we are saddened by the cruelties of which the slave was victim.[69] A later writer, the great teacher of medicine, Galen, describes men knocking out the teeth of slaves with the fist, falling upon them not only with fist, but with the heels, and gouging the eyes with a pen, if at hand, as did the Emperor Adrian on one occasion;[70] while Tacitus shows how four hundred slaves in the house of an assassinated master were handed over to vindictive death.[71] St. Chrysostom portrays a mistress dragging a slave-girl by the hair, and herself applying the whip, until the cries of her bruised victim filled the whole house and penetrated the street.[72]

All this is ancient Barbarism, according to the evidence; but the analogies of life show that such things must be, where Slavery prevails. The visitation of the abbeys in England disclosed vice and disorder in startling forms, cloaked by the irresponsible privacy of monastic life. A similar visitation of plantations would disclose more fearful results, cloaked by the irresponsible privacy of Slavery. Every Slave-Master on his plantation is a Bashaw, with all the prerogatives of a Turk. According to Hobbes, he is a “petty king.” This is true; and every plantation is of itself a petty kingdom, with more than the immunities of an abbey. Six thousand skulls of infants are reported to have been taken from a single fish-pond near a nunnery, to the dismay of Pope Gregory.[73] Under the Law of Slavery, infants, the offspring of masters “who dream of Freedom in a slave’s embrace,” are not thrown into a fish-pond, but something worse is done. They are sold. This is a single glimpse only. Slavery, in its recesses, is another Bastile, whose horrors will never be known until it shall be razed to the ground; it is the dismal castle of Giant Despair, which, when captured by the Pilgrims, excited their wonder, as they saw “the dead bodies that lay here and there in the castle-yard, and how full of dead men’s bones the dungeon was.” The recorded horrors of Slavery are infinite, and each day, by the escape of its victims, they are still further attested, while the door of the vast prison-house is left ajar. But, alas! unless examples of history and lessons of political wisdom are alike delusive, its unrecorded horrors must assume a form of more fearful dimensions. Baffling all attempts at description, they sink into that chapter of Sir Thomas Browne entitled “Of some Relations whose Truth we fear,” and among kindred things whereof, according to this eloquent philosopher, “there remains no register but that of Hell.”

* * * * *

If this picture of the relations of Slave-Masters with their slaves could receive any darker coloring, it would be by introducing figures of the congenial agents through which the Barbarism is maintained,--_the Slave-Overseer, the Slave-Breeder, and the Slave-Hunter_, each without a peer except in the brothers, and the whole constituting a triumvirate of Slavery, in whom its essential brutality, vulgarity, and crime are all embodied. There is the Slave-Overseer, with bloody lash,--fitly described, in his Life of Patrick Henry, by Mr. Wirt, who, born in a Slave State, knew the class, as “last and lowest, most abject, degraded, unprincipled,”[74]--and his hands wield at will the irresponsible power, being proper successor to “the devil,” described by the English dramatist, who appeared

“_in Virginia_, and commanded
With many stripes; for that’s his cruel custom.”[75]

There is next the Slave-Breeder, who assumes a higher character, even entering legislative halls, where, in unconscious insensibility, he shocks civilization by denying, like Mr. Gholson, of Virginia, any alleged distinction between the “female slave” and the “brood mare,” by openly asserting the necessary respite from work during the gestation of the female slave as the ground of property in her offspring, and by proclaiming that in this “vigintial” crop of human flesh consists much of the wealth of his State,--while another Virginian, not yet hardened to this debasing trade, whose annual sacrifice reaches twenty-five thousand human souls, confesses the indignation and shame with which he beholds his State “converted into _one grand menagerie_, where men are reared for the market, like oxen for the shambles.” Verily the question may be asked, Have we a Guinea among us? And, lastly, there is the Slave-Hunter, with the bloodhound as his brutal symbol, who pursues slaves as the hunter pursues game, and does not hesitate in the public prints to advertise his Barbarism thus:--

“BLOODHOUNDS.--I have TWO of the FINEST DOGS for CATCHING
NEGROES in the Southwest. They can take the trail TWELVE
HOURS after the NEGRO HAS PASSED, and catch him with ease. I
live four miles southwest of Bolivar, on the road leading
from Bolivar to Whitesville. I am ready at all times to catch
runaway negroes.

“DAVID TURNER.

“March 2, 1853.”[76]

The bloodhound was known in early Scottish history; it was once vindictively put upon the trail of Robert Bruce, and in barbarous days, by cruel license of war, was directed against the marauders of the Scottish border. Walter Scott makes one of his heroes “cheer the dark blood-hound on his way”; but more than a century has passed since the last survivor of the race was seen in Ettrick Forest.[77] The bloodhound was employed by Spain against the natives of this continent, and the eloquence of Chatham never touched a truer chord than when, gathering force from the condemnation of this brutality, he poured his thunder upon the kindred brutality of the scalping-knife, adopted as an instrument of war by a nation professing civilization. Tardily introduced into this Republic some time after the Missouri Compromise, when Slavery became a political passion and Slave-Masters began to throw aside all disguise, the bloodhound has become the representative of our Barbarism, when engaged in the pursuit of a fellow-man asserting his inborn title to himself; and this brute becomes typical of the whole brutal leash of Slave-Hunters, who, whether at home on Slave Soil, under the name of Slave-Catchers and Kidnappers, or at a distance, under politer names, insult Human Nature by the enforcement of this Barbarism.

* * * * *