Chapter II: Part 2

It will be seen that the arguments here advanced are predicated, to some extent, upon the fact that the African is a barbarian. That he is so in his native wilds, we have shown by high authority. That he is so in this country, is obvious, from the fact that in the South he is held a slave, and is satisfied with his condition; and because, as a race, the African in this country, and on this continent, shows not the least capacity for self-control. In the South, the African, in his best estate, is a slave. In the North, laws are wisely enacted to prevent him from going there, because of his barbarism, and because that portion of the most advanced race on earth shrinks from contact with it. The fact, then, of his barbarism is sustained, fully,--by his normal condition in Africa; his condition of retrogradation in Jamaica and San Domingo, where the experiment of emancipation has proved a failure, where the relapse into barbarism is sure and irrevocable; and in this country, where common sense and public opinion and public law, both North and South, hold him in the condition of social, moral, and physical vassalage and servitude, and confine him effectually within certain prescribed limits, or hold him in that marked estimation of inferiority which makes him forever conscious of his own degradation. I have felt justified, therefore, not by way of opprobrium, nor in the spirit of invidious or odious comparison, to name the category in which he belongs, and then, by fair moral and philosophical argument to deduce the justice and right of civilization in holding dominion over him.

EMANCIPATION IS WRONG.

It is not our purpose to blame the African for being a barbarian; but to insist that emancipation is wrong because it restores him to barbarism, and that slavery is right because it holds him to those roles of justice which pertain to civilization, and protects him from the injustice, violence, and degradation which are the concomitants of barbarism. As the slave of civilization, he is raised infinitely above his former condition as the subject of barbarism. He knows this, and it satisfied. His instinct teaches him to love his master, because he is his protector, and because, mistrusting his own capacity for self-government, he knows the necessity for a master; and instances are numerous, of slaves, having misjudged their own capacity for self-government, having fled from supposed wrongs, they found they were mistaken as to the means of bettering their condition, and returned to voluntary servitude, begging, with tears, to be again admitted to the sacred precincts of the patriarchial care.

FITNESS OF THE AFRICAN FOR SLAVERY.

It is the fitness of things that makes the African a slave. His brawny limbs, seconding and aiding the intellect of the superior race, constitute the left hand and foot of labor. Slavery is the left hand of our body politic. Free labor is the right hand. Intellect is the head. All combined, constitute a power which is felt and feared by the foes of this Republic. Hence their endeavor to detach one portion from the other, and thus weaken the whole. To change the position of the slave is to interrupt or reverse the order of nature.

"What if the foot, ordained the dust to tread,
Or hand to toil, aspired to be the head?
What if the head, the eye, or ear repined
To serve, mere engines of the ruling mind?
Just as absurd for any part to claim
To be another in this general frame;
Just as absurd to mourn the tasks or pains
The great directing Mind of All ordains."

ABSURDITY OF NEGRO EQUALITY.

The truth is, slavery is right, and is proved to be so, notwithstanding all the noisy declamation we hear about human equality. The Negro is a barbarian, and barbarism is not humanity but inhumanity; hence the unfitness to the case, of such illogical reasoning as is adopted by the advocates of Negro equality. Human equality, as applied to the Negro, is an idle fantasy, without even the shadow or semblance of plausibility. White men are equals in few things; certainly not in physical nor mental capacity, nor power. The equality declared by our Revolutionary Sires was the political equality of white men. Let us arise from that lethargy in which we have dreamed of universal equality, and escape the dangers of that moral and intellectual somnambulism in which we have been groping to the verge of social and political destruction.

AMERICAN AND EUROPEAN RADICALISM.

This restless spirit of change, in a portion of our people, this craving for universal equality, by the blind victims of popular fanaticism, finds its parallel in the destructive element of European radicalism, (that bane of European democracy,) which mistakes freedom for the right of plunder, and Democracy for the right of popular despotism. It is that blind spirit of rage which adapts not the means to the end, but overreaches itself, and falls a prey to its own cupidity, duplicity, and folly.

INEQUALITY OF RACES.

Universal equality,--the equality of the African with the Caucasian, or the savage with the civilized races, is no more possible than to blend right with wrong. The inequality exists in nature, as indubitably as the varied magnitudes of the stars. And the characteristics of the various savage races differ as widely as their varied physiognomy. There is no equality among them, mental or physical,--not even equality of degradation. The gigantic Patagonian, and the dwarfish Laplander; the wild Feejeeian, and docile Guinea Negro; the stolid Indian, and ant-like plodder of teeming India,--are but the outward symbols of that contrariety of moral, or rather immoral existence which is the fate of barbarism. They have no equality of beauty nor ugliness, leanness nor obesity, vice nor virtue, but varying differences, such as the spontaneous growth of uncultured nature in different climes exhibits in the vegetable and lower orders of the animal creation. What a contrast is this to that trained, drilled conformation to the order and proper conventionalities of civilized life, which our free schools, free press, social rites, laws, and customs impose.

QUIBBLE OF THE SOPHIST.--TAKING THE EXCEPTION FOR THE RULE.

And here comes the quibble of the sophist, who singles out instances of law violated in civilized communities, and holds them up as the criterion by which to judge civilization, and triumphantly exclaims, Lo! the fruits of civilization--of that civilization which arrogates to itself the right to enslave mankind! But this is merely a bare perversion of truth. He deceives no one so much as himself, when he imagines the world will take the _exception_ for the RULE of civilization, or make it the pretext to sustain barbarism.

THE SUPREMACY OF MIND OVER MATTER.

It is safe to assert that right holds a just and hereditary control over wrong. _Veritas vincit._ Justice and truth go hand in hand. Barbarism must bow before the genius of civilization. And what is not found in international law, nor suppressed by it, nor dictated by the commercial rivalries of nations, nor the zealous diplomacy of kings, will yet continue as it ever has, to recognize the power of mind over matter, of reason over passion, of intellect over animal existence; and the dominion and supremacy of written constitutions over citizens, communities, States, and empires. The right of government in civilized States more than suggests the right and supremacy of civilization over barbarism. But the right of mind over matter, of intellect over mere animal life, of reason over passion, is asserted upon the broadest principles of philosophy in nature. The Infinite Spirit, unseen, moves the visible material creation as the creature of his will.

He framed the universe, and instant twirled
Upon its orbit, this terrestrial world;
Bid chaos flee, and called the glittering train
Of constellations to the ethereal plain;
He built the fabric of creation fair;
Lit every sun that shines in glory there;
Strewed with his hand, to deck heaven's argent fields,
Each starry atom that refraction yields;
And holds in order, as it moves along,
Each seraph bright, of the celestial throng!

SHALL BARBARISM CONTROL CIVILIZATION?

Behold the order of heaven! Does any passion bear sway there? The ponderous globes obey the mandate of spiritual superiority; and shall the order of nature be reversed here, and the animal species lord it over men? Shall barbarism again come on the track of civilization, with fire and sword, and ruthless annihilation? Shall civilization invoke the demon of destruction to its own downfall? Shall the frenzy and rage of visionary enthusiasts, _or the dark schemes of the emissaries of despotism in this Republic_, lay in ruins this fair temple of freedom, the home, and refuge, and hope of the down-trodden nations?

THE RAGE OF PASSION.

What are these dreams of sophists, these vagaries of imagination, this rage of passion, this perversion of reason, and high-sounding declamation, confounding right with wrong, civilization with barbarism, but the paraphernalia of despotism arrayed against the liberties of mankind? Emancipation is all a delusion, a foible, a fantasy, an idle dream! The soul and intellect of man is heaven-derived, and knows its order and beauty, and will hold in abeyance these elements of chaos. The barbarian is indeed dark of skin, and the radiance of a million constellations in a thousand ages will not change him, nor the light of civilization fade to moral brightness his gloomy mind!

EMANCIPATION OF THE WHITE RACES.

It will be observed that my argument on the subject of slavery is new, and is drawn from the actual nature of the case. I offer no antique authority to sustain the RIGHT of slavery. The history of the African race for four thousand years is sufficient, which is, that in no country nor condition has that race shown the capacity for or enjoyed self-government. And, indeed, self-government with the superior white races is still deemed but an experiment. The great mass of the white races ever have been, and still are, governed by the strong hand of despotism, or by the more plausible, but ofttimes not less diabolical power of constitutional sovereignties, or hereditary or revolutionary oligarchies. It is not, then, so great a disparagement to the African that he is unfit for freedom, when nine-tenths of the foremost of the white races, show not the capacity to enjoy it. Certainly, the African is not their superior. Why, then, demand for him more than is allowed to the superior white races? If emancipation is to be thought of, would it not be well to emancipate the white races first?

THE ARGUMENT INVULNERABLE.

I have rested my argument on no antique authority to show the right of slavery. I have appealed to no religious dogmas to show this right. I have not even availed myself of the whole tenor of sacred history to justify it, which has been done heretofore by others, and done in vain. I have not labored to produce a voluminous collation of other men's opinions to swell my pages. Sacred history is in the hands of all, and its teachings need not my endorsement, recommendation, nor reiteration. Indeed, if the right of slavery here asserted is not based upon truth, and if it does not commend itself to the unbiased judgment of my countrymen, then I demand that they discard it. I ask if the argument here advanced, has been or can be refuted? If it can be, let it be done fairly, openly, and without circumvention. Let it be shown that barbarism ought not to subserve civilization. Let it be shown that civilization is wrong, because it does not conduce to the well-being and happiness of mankind; let it be shown that barbarism is right because it does this. Let the apologists and advocates of barbarism show its equality with civilization. Let it be denied, and the denial proved, that the laws of universal right and justice hold true and heaven-derived supremacy over wrong. Let it be shown that the slave-owner has no legal right of property in his slaves. Or, if it be admitted that he has such right, let any possible process of emancipation be pointed out. Will the violent denunciations of fanaticism induce him to free his slaves? Does the divided sentiment and feeling evinced in even the division of the churches north and south, indicate the willingness of the owners to free their slaves? If not, then by what means are they to be set free? Is it to be by purchase? and if so, is it proposed to pay the value of the slaves? and how? Let it be shown that the purchase and transportation of 4,000,000 of Negroes to Africa will cost less than $2,400,000,000; or to Central America less than $2,200,000,000. Let it be shown to be expedient, practicable, or possible to do this; and even if done, let it be shown to be a benefit to the slave or the master; a benefit either to civilization or barbarism.

If none of these things can be shown, and I aver they cannot, then how about the last startling alternative of robbing the slave-owner of his property? of the freeing of the Negroes by servile insurrection and civil war? What would be the cost in blood and treasure to effect this? and the probable result of _such_ an effort at emancipation, on the freedom and civilization of the world?

WHY ENGLAND ABOLISHED THE SLAVE TRADE,--HER DREAD OF OUR GREATNESS AND POWER.

The truth is, the slave trade was abolished by British and Tory influence, at about the time of the American Revolution, when slavery, as an adjunct of colonial vassalage, could no longer subserve the interests of British commerce. This was their first success in circumventing us. Her complicity in the Cooley trade is an evidence of this. She is willing to morally damn herself for purposes of monarchical intrigue, in order to supplant us. Our agriculture and commerce, and rapidly accumulating wealth and power, and republican glory, are too much for her. Our example of success in freedom tempts the loyalty of the most enlightened subjects of the British crown. The fascinations of freedom beguile the ardent and noble aspirations of the English democracy, and Britannia, with her antiquated and wrinkled visage, shrinks abashed from the majestic presence of Freedom's immortal and fadeless bloom!

This is the true cause of the present British Negro philanthropy, and the occasion of her _assumed_ moral turpitude in elevating the heathen barbarian of Africa to the primary plane of civilization, to the protection of its laws, and the meliorations of its moral, political, social, and religious institutions. It is because monarchy was beginning to be odious in the eyes of the European democracy, when contrasted with our antagonistical system of the divine right of the people. It is her policy and her purpose to render our institutions unstable by means of a suborned and venal press, and a band of mercenary, hireling, political and religious monarchical conspirators, parasites and traitors. These her gold can furnish. Her arms having repeatedly failed to subjugate the American democracy, she now has recourse to her diplomacy, her intrigues, and her gold. Twenty millions of money expended in this way in the last twenty years, has had its effect, and to her emissaries, and hireling presses and scribblers, we are indebted for a dastardly generation of traitors, who would barter the liberties of their country for the applause of faction, and the complacency of kings.

ENGLAND'S SELF-IMPOSED ODIUM.

It is a monstrous absurdity, nay it is an act of egregious hypocrisy, for England now to _assume_ for herself an _hypothetical guilt_,--after bringing the African to her American Colonies for purposes of _gain_, and after exercising an intolerable tyranny over the white race in those colonies, and even invoking the aid of the tomahawk and scalping knife of the American savage in their attempted subjugation,--for the purpose now, when her arms and diplomacy have repeatedly failed, of seeking to overthrow the freedom of a Republic, which has risen, in despite of her, to such colossal proportions, as, in its very existence, to menace the combined monarchies of the world. But we hold these 4,000,000 of barbarians subject to the laws of civilization; and let England remember that we, even now, have the magnanimity to relieve her from the self-imposed odium of doing right! We now tell her monarchists, degenerate sons of illustrious sires, that in their maritime decadence they have also morally retrograded, for they now seek to restore these Africans to barbarism!

SLAVERY IS AN INCIDENT OF CIVILIZATION.

Let it not be claimed, even as a sophistical subterfuge, that the _motive_ which brought the African here was mercenary, and that, therefore, his coming here was not justifiable. Commerce is the handmaid of civilization, and if his coming was only incidentally right, yet that incident belongs to civilization, which is amenable to the moral code, and is also to be commended, with all its incidental, as well as more matured blessings. The institutions of civilization rescued these 4,000,000 of barbarians from the dangers, degradation, and miseries of barbarism, and by causing them to subserve civilization, compelled them to do right. The English and American false philanthropists, monarchical emissaries, ecclesiastical parasites, and pseudo-republican traitors now demand that these Africans shall be restored to barbarism, not because it is practicable or possible, or right, but because the proposition involves the equality of these States, and consequently the existence of the American Union. The success of these conspirators depends upon an adequate numerical proportion of knaves and monomaniacs, the well-adjusted mechanism of monarchy for the overthrow of this Republic. Their success would forever settle the long mooted question of the capacity of Anglo-Saxon race for self government. Hence the lavish employment of British gold to suborn the American press, and seduce the American mind from the safe precepts of Washington, whose name is, and ever has been, a terror to the British oligarchy.

SOLUTION OF THE SUBJECT.

The only tribunal at which to try human actions, is the tribunal of justice. That which is right can stand the test of this tribunal; that which is wrong will shrink in terror from it. At this tribunal American Negro slavery has nothing to fear, because it is founded in moral right. Its advocacy is the advocacy of right, and right alone; unless, forsooth, we are to confound right with wrong, and declare barbarism equal with civilization. Of course, our argument is based upon the hypothesis that civilization is one thing, and barbarism another. To the mind which is so mentally and morally obtuse as not to discover the difference between these two conditions, this appeal must be in vain. But to the right-minded man, who is open to conviction of truth, who has the mental freedom to act and think independent of his prepossessions and prejudices, who is guided by his intellect, and reason, and not by passion nor prejudice, this solution of the slavery question, though new, must and will be satisfactory, because it is the logical result of a trial of the question at the tribunal of justice and of rights, because slavery rescues the African from wrong, and subjects him to the rule of right; because it rescues him from the wrongs and miseries of barbarism, and raises him to the _primary_ elevation of a progressive and ennobling civilization.

EQUALITY OF THE STATES AND CITIZENS.

The equality of the sovereign States which compose the American Republic, and the equality of the citizens, both in the States and the Territories, constitute the true and only bond of union for the American people. This equality is the foundation stone upon which our whole social and political superstructure rests. To call this in question is to menace the very existence of the Union which is founded upon it. The sovereignty of the Union, extending over the Territories, where no other sovereignty exists, is the panoply of protection to all the inhabitants of the Territories. There they are all equal in person and property. There they are not sovereign, but subjects under the sovereignty of the united confederacy of States, which have no individual superiority and right in the Territories, neither for themselves, nor their citizens. For the inhabitants of such Territories to _assume_ a sovereignty therein, not in accordance with the Constitution of the United States, not in conformity to law, and in violation of the equality of the people of the States there congregated, is USURPATION. Nor can the democracy of numbers, nor the will of the majority of inhabitants congregated in such Territories be invoked to decide the rights of the people of the several States congregated in such Territories, either as to persons or property; because the sovereignty of the Union holds, until superseded by the sovereignty of a State constitutionally organized, deriving its sovereignty from the supreme authority of the confederated States, by whose assent alone the primordial sovereignty of the Union is so far abandoned as to admit the exercise of State sovereignty in such Territories. There would be no propriety nor justice in allowing an _hypothetical sovereignty_ to a few thousands of individuals congregated in a large Territory, not one fiftieth part of which they occupied; allowing them to establish a rule of exclusion of the persons or property of the people of a portion of the States coming to settle in the Territories. Such persons have neither the right to decide for the present, nor the future; because at present they are not sovereign, and certainly they should not be allowed to exercise a _usurped_ authority over the millions who shall occupy those Territories in the future. It is a morbid desire to forestall the future, in its judgment of barbarism, and of its fitness to subserve civilization, that creates the present animosity between the citizens of the different sections of the Union, going into the Territories. This is all wrong. The sovereignty of the Union is the present, and the sovereignty of States the future arbiter of the rights of the people in the Territories; all other power is assumed, arbitrary, gratuitous, and in violation of legitimate, delegated constitutional power.

The wisdom of the sages who founded the American Union left nothing for experiment to their successors, so far as the absolute equality of American citizens is concerned; and there is no safety but in the recognition of that perfect equality which the spirit of our race demands, and which the power of the civilized world will be invoked to maintain.

THE NECESSITY OF OUR ONWARD PROGRESS AS A NATION.

The intimate commercial relations existing between this Republic and the principal maritime and warlike nations of the globe, mainly by means of the products of slave labor, constitute a necessity for our onward, uninterrupted progress, as the great agricultural and commercial almoner of civilization, and cannot be disturbed, except at the peril of that civilization which they have been so instrumental and conspicuous to promote. The proposed annihilation of the hand of labor whose products amount to $250,000,000 per annum, and those products constituting the articles of prime necessity to civilization, is a matter which involves other interests than our own; and however willing monarchists and their minions may be to disrupt our political system, and destroy this temple of freedom, they will find the genius of commerce and the genius of liberty will continue to go hand in hand to uphold the principles of right and justice, which demand that barbarism shall subserve civilization.

AMERICAN COTTON.

American cotton, the product of slave labor, clothes, to a large extent, one-fourth part of the human race; without it the glory of civilization would vanish. It embellishes the denizen of the city, and hides the nakedness of barbarism. It is the tablet on which is inscribed the history of the present, and rescues from oblivion the mouldering records of the past. It is the talisman of thought, and the vehicle of those electric currents that blaze athwart the sky of mind, with which intellect binds together, with silver thread, the mind's great empire, where kings do homage at the shrine of genius, and bow in awe, and humble reverence before the majesty of mind. It is the medium through which the internal and external domains of thought are blended, and truth made universal, and obvious to the apprehension of a world!

WASHINGTON NOT OPPOSED TO SLAVERY AS WRONG.

It has been urged, that because Washington regretted the impossibility of devising some feasible means of emancipation, that, therefore, he was opposed to slavery, as wrong. The precise opposite was the case. He was too wise to oppose that which he could not overcome. His whole career was success in overcoming opposition. He might, with us, regret the barbarism of the African and the impracticability of his release from servitude, on account of his unfitness for freedom; but he never could logically or reasonably oppose, as wrong, that which made the African better and happier, and which protects him from the dangers and miseries of barbarism, though it placed him in the position to learn only the rudiments of civilization. To assert that Washington deemed slavery a wrong to the slave, is to accuse him of knowingly doing wrong, for he held slaves to the day of his death; and if he emancipated them then, it was more with the hope than the reasonable expectation, that even HIS slaves, with all the force of his example during his whole life, had become fitted for freedom, or that they would be benefited by the experiment of their own attempted self-control. Washington could not, therefore, consistently oppose slavery as a wrong to the slave, nor conscientiously believe it to be wrong; because he would not oppose that which he could not overcome, and because his whole life was occupied in doing right. It is against the prophetic character of Washington's mission, ever crowned with success; against his wisdom, which was most profound; and against his judgment, which was unerring,--to presume his hostility to slavery as wrong, or his opposition to it in a moral point of view, when he knew, as we know, the emancipation of the slaves to be wrong in itself, and impossible, even if right or desirable. It is plain, then, that if Washington had any real aversion to Negro slavery, it was not because it was wrong so far as any natural right of the slave was involved, but because of his ability to do without slaves; and notwithstanding his fortune was ample, he _held_ his slaves during the whole course of his life; whereas, if he had deemed slavery a wrong to the slaves, he would undoubtedly have granted them their liberty. What right would he have had, as a just man, to bestow his generosity upon the public, by refusing the emoluments of office, justly due him, and unjustly appropriating the proceeds or avails of the labor of his slaves, if he knew, or believed they were justly entitled to their freedom. If our moral view of slavery is clear, he was _just_, as well as _generous_, and wise as well as successful.

WASHINGTON REPROACHES THE EMANCIPATIONISTS.

It is well known how powerful the secret influence of the British and Tory abolitionists was in this country immediately after the American Revolution, as well as before and since that time; and that at about that time, or soon after, the question was seriously entertained of abolishing slavery in Virginia by legislation, as was done in other States of the Union; and it was on account of the annoying importunities of these _disinterested philanthropists_ (_?_), and the apparent inclination of the people of the State of Virginia to experiment in their theories, that Washington expressed his willingness to see slavery abolished by legislative enactment. But in what characteristic terms of manly reproach did he address the Emancipation Society on the subject when he found their principles and practices to be that "_the end justifies the means_." He says:

"_But when slaves, who are happy and contented with their present masters, are tampered with and seduced to leave them; when masters are taken unawares by these practices; when a conduct of this kind begets discontent on one side, and resentment on the other; and when it happens to fall on a man whose purse will not measure with that of the Society, and he loses his property for want of means to defend it,--it is oppression in such a case, *AND NOT HUMANITY IN ANY*, because it introduces more evils than it can cure._"[6]

OUR FATHERS ON THE RIGHT OF SLAVERY.

It is not to be concealed, however, that some of the sages who framed this Republic, in their zeal for freedom, overlooked the fact of African barbarism, or failed to be explicit in their unpremeditated enunciations of human freedom. Perhaps, however, they had more astuteness than has been supposed by some. Perchance they considered barbarity not humanity, but its opposite, and would have deemed it a work of supererogation to explain that which natural history, the history of the African ram for four thousand years, and common sense, and common observation, had established as a self-evident proposition; to wit, that equality was a _political_, and not a social, nor moral, nor even physical condition; and that, especially, neither equality nor freedom were to be construed to be the prerogatives nor the right of barbarism. And the Constitution of the United States, the work of their own hands, sanctions this supposition, by recognizing the existence, and providing for the right of Negro slavery, and rescues the Fathers of the Republic from the absurd and opprobrious imputation of advocating Negro equality. Whatever opinions they may have expressed under the varying aspects of our Revolutionary epoch, the Constitution of these United States was the finality of their arduous toils, heroic achievements, and sublime wisdom; and that Constitution, the very sublimation and quintessence of a hundred civilizations, exhibiting the onward progress of the human race, recognizes the Right of Slavery, founded upon the immutable principles of justice.

MONARCHICAL SCHEMES TO DESTROY THIS REPUBLIC.

Is it strange, however, that since this Republic is the mighty antagonism of monarchy, and since it is invincible in arms, is it strange, that civil dissension, and the appropriate means to produce it, should be employed by despotism to subvert this government? What else should they do; What is the interest of monarchy in relation to the existence and onward progress of this Empire of Freedom? What, but its subversion, its disseverment, by its own internal antagonism? And what other means could monarchy and its parasites employ to accomplish this, but precisely the means and agency which have been employed, at vast expense, especially for the last twenty-five years, first to divide, and finally to destroy that which no external force, nor combination of external forces could subdue? Is it not already the boast of the minions of despotism that they have rendered our government insecure? With what jubilation did they catch the tidings of our recent rebellion, as the harbinger of their own redemption from the fate of political decadence and downfall, which our all-absorbing greatness was beginning to make so manifest to the willing apprehension of mankind? Their ears were charmed, even at the supposed triumphant voice of barbarism over a civilization as stable as the sun, which is immortal in its every individual microcosm, and to which they are conscious their own unequal systems of government never can attain.

OUR VINDICATION.

Need we inquire further what is the interest of monarchy? Can we any longer be blind to our own interest? Are we not arraigned at the tribunal of civilization, by the helots of despotism? Are we not accused of wrong? Are not we, and our sainted and godlike ancestors, held as amenable to moral law for a violation of Right? And shall we submit in silence to all this clamor: this false and slanderous accusation, when all history, all knowledge, all experience, all reason, and all nature, are voluble in our defense, and pronounce our just and triumphant vindication!

Let us, then, henceforth cultivate and encourage friendship and cordial co-operation between the different sections of the Union, and a patriotic emulation for its continuance; not upon any such visionary and deceptive hypothesis as the superiority and predominance of sectional partiality, but upon the equable and fundamental principles of justice, and of the absolute equality of these sovereign States, and the equality of the citizens of a well-compacted and glorious confederacy.

THE PHILOSOPHICAL POSTULATES OF AMERICAN SLAVERY.

1. Right holds a just and heaven-derived supremacy over wrong.

2. Barbarism is wrong. It conduces to the misery and degradation of mankind. Africa is barbarous. The African race is a race of barbarians.

3. Civilization is right. It conduces to the elevation and happiness of mankind.

4. Civilization carries with it the right of supremacy over barbarism.

5. It is right to summon the barbarian to the lessons of civilization, and to teach him its _primary_ lessons; to elevate him to the dignity of labor.

6. It is right to HOLD the barbarian subject to the rules of civilization; to protect him by its laws, and rescue him from the wrongs and miseries of barbarism. In this way, only, he can be made happier and better. He falls, if unsupported by external power.

7. American Slavery promotes civilization by the production of materials wherewith to clothe the nakedness of mankind, and the useful medium or knowledge and intelligence, through books, and literature, printed upon materials which are the product of slave labor.

8. It is just that barbarism should subserve civilization; that Wrong should subserve Right.

9. The African is not equal to the white man, but is a barbarian, and as such has no political rights.

10. American Slavery is Right.

CONCLUSION.

If, then, it is not right, nor practicable, nor possible, to restore these 4,000,000 of Africans to barbarism, why any longer agitate the subject? Why keep the negro in perpetual dread of change, and the owner dubious of the future? Why, by this negro agitation, create apprehension in the minds of our own people for the stability and permanence of this government, and hope in the minds of all the monarchists of the world that this agitation will divide and destroy this last great bulwark of human freedom?

Why shall we put to hazard that freedom which is already secure? Why involve in experiments those tangible acquisitions which we have made to this priceless inheritance of freedom? Washington is gone, but he has left us his bright example, and his solemn admonitions. Let those who are greater, and wiser, and purer than Washington, impeach him. Let those whose precepts or examples excel his, question the superiority of his virtue and valor. Let those who have done more for human freedom, denounce him as the enemy of mankind, and erect for themselves a standard of moral action, which shall rise to the stupendous height of their own boundless egotism!

But if it is found to be inexpedient and wrong to agitate the subject of slavery, when it is known to be impracticable, impossible, and unjust to emancipate the slaves, then let us go on in our career of greatness, with success and tranquility. Let us watch with jealous care the honor of our country, and scorn the aspersions of its vilifiers. Let us honor and vindicate our country in its attitude of justice, and in its mission of civilization, and mark with the imputation of opprobrium every recreant defamer of our government and its institutions. Let the emissaries of despotism find some other means of subduing us than to "divide and conquer." Let the name of Washington be revered; let his admonitions be heeded: let his commands be obeyed, and his example followed. Let barbarism still be blessed with the light of civilization; let the glory and dominion of freedom be established, and the citizens of this Republic rest in security and peace within their patriarchal bowers!

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FOOTNOTES:

[1] Leo Africanus says, Book vii., "The King of Borno sent for the merchants of Barbary, and willed them to bring the great store of horses; for in this country they used to exchange horses for slaves, and to give fifteen and sometimes twenty slaves for one horse; and by this means there were abundance of horses brought; howbeit, the merchants were constrained to stay for their slaves till the king returned home with a great number of captives and satisfied his creditors for their horses." "The king maketh invasions but every year once, and that at one set and appointed time of the year."--_Geogr. Hist. of Africa, trans. by Pory, pp. 293, 294, Lon., 1600._

[2] "From Abyssinia, the caravans carry yearly to Cairo nearly two thousand Negroes, those poor creatures having unfortunately been captured in war. Most of the chiefs and sovereigns in the interior of Africa sell or put to death all their prisoners."--_Narrative of a Ten Years' Residence at Tripoli, p. 185, London, 1816._

[3] Hegel, the distinguished German philosopher, in his Philosophy of History, says, pp. 102, 103:

An English traveler states that when a war is determined on in Ashantee, solemn ceremonies precede it. Among other things, the bones of the king's mother are laved with human blood. As a prelude to the war, the king ordains an onslaught upon his own metropolis, as if to excite the due degree of frenzy.

In Dahomey, when the king dies, the bonds of society are loosed; in his palace begins indiscriminate havoc and disorganization. All the wives of the king (in Dahomey their number is exactly 3,333) are massacred, and through the whole town plunder and carnage run riot. The wives of the king regard their deaths as a necessity; they go richly attired to meet it. The authorities have to hasten to proclaim the new governor, simply to put a stop to massacre.

The only essential connection that has existed and continued between the Negroes and Europeans is that of slavery. In this the Negroes see nothing unbecoming them; and the English, who have done most for abolishing the slave trade and slavery, are treated by the Negroes themselves as enemies. For it is a point of first importance with the kings to sell their captured enemies, or even their own subjects; and viewed in the light of such facts, we may conclude _slavery_ to have been the occasion of the increase of human feeling among Negroes.

Tyranny is regarded as no wrong, and _cannibalism is looked upon as quite customary and proper_. Among us, instinct deters from it, if we can speak of instinct at all as appertaining to man. But with the Negro this is not the case, and the _devouring of human flesh is altogether consistent with the general principles of the African race_; to the sensual Negro, human flesh is but an object of sense,--mere flesh. At the death of a king, hundreds are killed and eaten; prisoners are butchered, and _their flesh is sold in the markets_. The victor is accustomed to eat the heart of his slain foe. When magical rites are performed, it frequently happens that the sorcerer kills the first that comes in his way, _and divides his body among the bystanders_.

[4] Says Herder,--But the peculiar formation of the members of the human body says more than all these; and this appears to me applicable in the African organization. According to various physiological observations, the lips, breasts, and private parts, are proportionate to each other; and as nature, agreeably to the simple principle of her plastic art, must have conferred on these people, to whom she was obliged to deny nobler gifts, an ampler measure of sensual enjoyment, this could not but have appeared to the physiologist. _According to the rules of physiognomy, thick lips are held to indicate a sensual disposition_; as thin lips, displaying a slender, rosy line, are deemed symptoms of chaste and delicate taste; not to mention other circumstances. _What wonder, then, that in a nation for whom the sensual appetite is the height of happiness, external marks of it should appear?_ A Negro child is born white; the skin round the nails, the nipples, and private parts, first become colored; and the same consent of parts in the disposition to color is observable in other nations. _A hundred children are a trifle to a Negro; and an old man who had not above seventy, lamented his fate with tears._

With this oleaginous organization to sensual pleasure, the profile and whole frame of the body must alter. _The projection of the mouth would render the nose short and small, the forehead would incline backwards, and the face would have at a distance the resemblance of that of an ape._ Conformably to this would be the position of the neck, the transition to the occiput, and the elastic structure of the whole body, which is formed, even to the nose and skin, for sensual, animal enjoyment.--_Herder's Philosophy of the History of Man, pp. 150, 151. Translated by Churchill, London, 1800._

[5] Witness the following extract from the Report of the Committee of the Maryland Legislature in 1860, recommending the discontinuance of the annual appropriation of $5,000 to the Colonization Society for the purpose of sending free Negroes back to Africa. It will be seen by this extract, that the expense of transporting Negroes to Africa is much greater than I have stated, owing, perhaps, to an extravagant use or waste of the money by the Colonization Society; for if it costs $500,000 to transport 300 Negroes, it would certainly cost $6,668,000,000 to send away the 4,000,000 of Negroes in the United States. Add to this the value of the Negroes, to be paid in remuneration to the owners for their property, $2,000,000,000, and the total cost of purchase and transportation, based upon the experience and the statistics of the State of Maryland, would be $8,668,000,000! or more than forty times the amount of all the gold and silver in the United States! It will be seen that my own is a low estimate compared with this, and either of those estimates shows the utter futility of the advocacy of emancipation. That Report says:--

"The passage of the act of 1831, ch. 281, was framed with the design of removing our free Negroes beyond the limits of this State. But experience has shown that they will not willingly leave us. That act has been in operation for twenty-seven years, at an expense to the State of about $280,000, raised by taxation upon our citizen population. It is safe to say that $75,000 more has been cleared by the profits in trade to the coast of Africa in that time; and that $145,000 has probably been bestowed by voluntary contribution for the same object--making in all the sum of $500,000. And yet, with all this vast outlay of money, not over _three hundred free Negroes_ have been removed. Slaves to a larger number have been set free and sent to Africa. During the last year not one single free Negro was sent to Africa from this State. When this law went into effect, we had 52,000 free Negroes in the State; and after a trial of twenty-seven years, we now have 90,000 or 100,000. The inefficiency of this enterprise being so obvious to every one of the least reflection, your committee propose the repeal of all laws taxing the people for colonization purposes."

[6] Scroeder's Max. of Washington, p. 256.

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[Transcriber's Notes:

Every effort has been made to replicate this text as faithfully as possible, including obsolete and variant spellings and other inconsistencies.

The transcriber noted the following issues and made changes as indicated to the text to correct obvious errors:

1. p. 14, "sieze" changed to "seize"
2. p. 30, "Iagas" changed to "Jagas"
3. p. 30, "Iaga" changed to "Jaga"
4. p. 31, "Macoco" partially illegible, changed to "Macaco"
5. p. 41, "retrogaded" changed to "retrograded"
6. p. 42, "psuedo-" changed to "pseudo-"
7. p. 51, "opprobium" changed to "opprobrium"
8. various, The source document for this ebook contains several
handwritten changes. They have not been incorporated
into this ebook, except as noted above.
9. various, text in bold is marked as *BOLD*.

End of Transcriber's Notes]

End of Project Gutenberg's The Right of American Slavery, by True Worthy Hoit