AIDDRES S

                                        TO THE

PEOPLE OF KENTUCKY, ON THE SUBJECT OF EMANCIPATION.



  FELLOW-CITIZENS: In August next the duty
of selecting delegates to the Convention called
to remodel the Constitution of our beloved
Commonwealth, will devolve on you.  You
have already been frequently addressed by those
in favorof certain proposed reforms, who have
not seen fit to urge on your attention the neces-
sity of reform in relation to the greatest evil
under which we labor. We regard slavery as
by far the greatest of all the evils now afflicting
the people of this State, and are deeply solicitous
that some steps shall be taken toward its gradual
removal from among us. It is our present pur-
pose to urge you to co-operate with us in the
great and good work of Emancipation. We beg
you to give us your attention while we proceed
to enumerate some of the evils which slavery in-
flicts on us, and to point out some of the many
benefits which would result from its removal.
  In proposing to change that portion of the
organic law of the State which refers to slavery,
we take the ground that slavery is an evil,view-
ed in all its aspects-social, moral, political and
pecuniary. We cannot name a single interest
which we value, and which we would desire to
cherish and perpetuate, that would Hot be pro-
moted and strengthened by the removal of
slavery. We cannot close our eyes to the fact
that our sister States, with greatly inferior
natural advantages, are outstripping us in pop-
ulation, wealth, extent and variety of internal
improvements, and in the general diffusion of
knowledge. In all those tnmistakeable signs
of prosperity which mark the adjacent free
States, our State compares most unfavorably;
and we but repeat the observation of thousands
of unprejudiced observers, in attributing this
unfavorable State of things to SLAVERY.
  We are aware that many of our fellow-citi-
zens, who have not examined this subject thor-
oughly, differ from us in their views of the
comparative progress and prosperity of the free
and slave States. Even during the short period
that the subject of Emancipation has been un-
der discussion in Kentucky, we have seen it



asserted "that it is not true that the Northern
States have increased more rapidly than the
southern," and further, that "National wealth
mid prosperity when predicated of the States of
this Union," so far as they may be affected by
slavery, is "mere loose speculation, not deserrinE
a serious answer."
  We are willing, fellow-citizens, to make this
the point on which the decision of this question
shall turn. For, if it can be made to appear
that slavery is a blessing-if it can he proved to
be an element of permanent national wenlth-
if it increases public security and private hap-
piness-if it elevates the morals, refines the
tastes, or develops the resources of a people-
then should we at once cease our opposition to
it, and labor most zealously and faithfully for
its perpetuation and extension.  If slavery
gives us any advantages which we would not
possess in its absence, the advocates of its per-
petuation can certainly enumerate them. If
the capitalist can invest his money to a better
advantage in a slave than in a free State, or if
the laborer, the mechanic and the manufacturer
can procure higher wages, or hold a more ele-
vated position in society in slave States, the
facts can easily be shown. When we are asked
to perpetuate slavery we can but ask in our
turn, what good has it done, and what good
does it propose to do
  When we examine American slavery by the
light of history, we find it condemned by large
and respectable meetings of the citizens in the
slave States before the Revolution. We find
the deliberate opinions of such men as Wash-
ington, Jefferson, Madison, Henry and Frank-
lin recorded against it.  Commencing at the
Revolution and coming down to our own day,
we find a very large proportion of our own
wisest legislators and statesmen testifying to its
blighting and withering influence. In our own
.tate, and in the halls of our own Legislature,
, has frequently been characterised in terms of
loquent and bitter denunciation.  In view
then of this concurrent ard united testimony