xt7gms3jx877 https://exploreuk.uky.edu/dips/xt7gms3jx877/data/mets.xml  1849  books b92-161-29919612 English Corresponding and Executive Committee on Emancipation, : [Louisville, Ky. : Contact the Special Collections Research Center for information regarding rights and use of this collection. Slavery United States Controversial literature. Address to the people of Kentucky on the subject of emancipation text Address to the people of Kentucky on the subject of emancipation 1849 2019 true xt7gms3jx877 section xt7gms3jx877 












                               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

 


2



condemning slavery, and after fifty years ex-
perience of its advantages, if any there be, are
we asking too much of its advocates when we
request them to specify those advantages At
this period, when we are about framing a new
organic law, under which the interests of all the
citizens of the State are to be protected, should
we be acting wisely, by deliberately using our
influence to perpetuate a known evil, unless
that evil is mixed with much good, and is in
some of its aspects a manifest advantage to the
community tolerating it We are now acting
for future generations-we are to promulgate
the organic law under which our children and
our children's children are to live and act.-
Should we then be faithful to ourselves or to
them, or should we be acting faithfully toward
our beloved Commonwealth, in deliberately
engrafting on that organic law a provision
which will perpetuate an institution so obnox-
ious as slavery  Shall our own experience,
and the opinions of the wisest and best men of
the present and past generations be entirely dis-
regarded in the settlement of this question, or
shall we fold our arms in quiet indifference and
permit the great question of the age, now press-
ed upon us for deliberation and decision, to go
by default Fellow-citizens, these are impor-
tant questions which force themselves upon our
attention at the present juncture, and which in
one way or another WE MUST ANSWER.
  We have asserted that slavery is a positive
evil viewed in all its aspects, and we feel it due
to those who differ from us on this question to
enumerate the facts upon which this assertion
is based. With Emancipationists this course
of procedure is unnecessary. They know the
evils of slavery, and see the necessity of taking
steps with a view to the gradual but ultimate
extirpation of those evils. We desire to win
over to our views a large majority of those who
honestly and sincerely differ from us, and we
therefore ask a candid examination of the facts
and statistics we are about to offer.
  In a country like ours, made up of various
States, each one inviting immigration by pre.
senting as many advantages as possible, popula-
tion will naturally and irresistibly centre where
the most numerous and valuable considerations
are presented.  We may, therefore, safely
affirm thata rapid and continuous increase of
population, is the most certain measure of pub-
lic and private prosperity. This proposition
needs no proof, for its opposite involves the
absurdity that our citizens, when left free to



act, are incapable of appreciating and under-
standing their own interests. Centuries must
roll around before any portion of these States
can touch the point "where population presses
upon the means of subsistence." That dogma
can, therefore, form no element in our present
reasonings on the progress and laws of popula-
tion.
  Commencing, then, with Maryland, one of
the oldest slaves States, we submit the follow-
ing statements and statistics, taken from a
pamphlet published in Baltimore, in 1846, en-
titled "Slavery in Maryland, briefly considered."
This pamphlet was written by John L. Carey,
Esq., a distinguished member of the Baltimore
Bar. After a well considered introduction, Mr.
Carey thus speaks of the blighting effect of
slavery in his own State.
  For years past our cotton growing states
have been exporting their soil; and with that
improvidence which slavery generates, that love
of present indulgence, careless of what may
follow, the South has received in return the
means of enjoyment only-nothing wherewith
to renovate the outraged ground. Such a pro-
cess long continued must, in the end, ruin the
finest lands in the world  Its effects are appa-
rent in the Atlantic States, in the south-west
operating irresistibly to draw the planters of
Carolina and Georgia from their worn out fields.
  The same general observations will apply to
our slave-holding sections in Maryland, and to
many parts of eastern Virginia too, if it were
necessary to pursue the investigation there -
Emigration to the west has kept pace with the
impoverishment of our lands. Large tracts have
come into the hands of a few proprietors-too
large to be improved, and too much exhausted
to be productive. But this is not the worst.-
The traveller, as he journeys through these
districts, smitten with premature barrenness as
with a curse, beholds fields, once enclosed and
subject to tillage, now abandoned and waste,
and covered with straggling pines or scrubby
thickets, which are fast overgrowing the wan-
ing vestiges of former cultivation.  From
swamps and undrained morasses, malaria ex-
hales, and like a pestilence infects the country.
The inhabitants become a sallow race; the cur-
rent of life stagnates; energy fails; the spirits
droop. Over the whole region a melancholy
aspect broods. There are everywhere signs of
dilapidation,from the mansion of the planter
with its windows half-glazed, its doors half-
hinged, its lawn trampled by domestic animals
that have ingress and egress through the broken
enclosures, to the ragged roadside house where
thriftless poverty finds its abode. No neat cot-
tages with gardens and flowers giving life to
the landscape; no beautiful villages where cul-
tivated taste blends with rustic simplicity, en-
riching and beautifying; no flourishing towns
alive with the bustle of industry-none of those
are seen; no, nor any diversified succession of



I



I

 




well cultivated farms with their substantial
homesteads and capacious barns; no well-con-
structed bridges, no well-constTucted roads.-
Neglect,the harbinger of decay, has stamped
her impress everywhere.   Slavery, bringing
with it from itsAfrican home its characteristic
accompaniments, seems to have breathed over
its resting places here the same desolating
breath which made Sahara a desert."
  Mr. Carey next gives a detailed statement of
the population of each county in Maryland,
commencing in 1790,and bringing it on in regu-
lar decades to 1840, exhibiting in the aggregate
the following remarkable results:
  "In nine counties in Maryland the white pop-
ulation has diminished since 1790. These are
the counties: Montgomery, Prince George, St.
Mary's, Calvert, Charles, Kent, Caroline, Tal-
bot and Queen Anne's. The aggregate white
population of those counties in 1790 was 73,352;
in 1840 it was 54,408. Here is a falling off of
nearly 20,000; if the account were carried to
the present year the falling off would be more
than 20,000.
  "These nine counties include the chief slave-
holding sections of the State. In five of them
taken together, to-wit:-Montgomery, Prince
George, St. Mary's, Calvert, and Charles, the
number of slaves exceeds that of the white pop-
ulation. These are chiefly the tobacco grow-
ing counties, together with the county of Fred-
erick.
  "The counties of Alleghany, Washington,
Frederick, and Baltimore, and Baltimore City,
are the portions of the State in which slavery
has existed but partially. That is to say, Alle-
ghany, with an aggregate population of 15,704,
has but 811 slaves; Washington,iu a population
of 28,862, has 2,505 slaves; Frederick has 6,370
slaves to a population of 36,703; Baltimore
county, 6,533 slaves inan aggregate population
of 80,256; and Baltimore City includes but
3,212 slaves in its population of 102,513-
  "Now taking these four counties and Balti-
more City out of the account, it will be found
that the aggregate white population of the rest
of the State has diminished since 1790. In
other words the increase of our population,
which is about one hundred and fifty thousand
since the first census, has bEen mainly in those
counties where slavery has been least promi-
nent. In those portions of the State where
slavery prevails most prominently, the white
population, during the last fifty years, has di-
minished."
  He then sums up by the following compari-
son of a portion of the free and slave States,
which exhibits the latter in a painfully humili-
atimng contrast:
  "The contrast presented by the progress of
the free States, whithin fifty years, and by that
of the slaveholding States for the same period,
is so familiar that it would be useless to burden
these pages with statistics to illustrate it. It
may be sufficient to state, in respect to the in-
crease of population, that in 1790 the free



3

States, including Massachusetts and Maine,
New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Connecticut,
Vermont, New York, New Jersey and Pen nsyl-
vania, had a population of 1,971,455; while the
slaveholding States, Delaware, Maryland, with
the District, Virginia, North Carolina, South
Carolina, and Georgia, contained 1,852,494 in-
habitants. In 1840 the same free States num
bered a population of 6,761,082, and the same
slaveholding States had an entire population of
3,827,110. The former increased in a ratio more
than double as compared with the latter.
   "In our own State, however, where we do not
grow cotton, sugar, or rice, and where there are
no new lands to present a fresh soil to the plough,
and to invite settlers from a distance, the in-
crease of population in our chief slaveholding
counties has been nothing at all. There has been
a decrease, and a very marked one. How has
this decrease happened but by a process similar
to that which rendered desolate three hundred
thousand acres in the campagna of Naples, in
the days of slavery among the Romans-which
made Italy itself almost one wilderness, re-in-
habited by wild boars and other animals, be-
fore a single barbarian had crossed the Alps!
   "Let us not conceal the truth from ourselves.
Slavery in Maryland is no longer compatible
with progress; it is a dead weight and worse; it
has become a wasting disease, weakening the
vital powers-a leprous distilment into the life-
blood of the commonwealth."
   This, then, fellow-citizens, is the result of the
continued existence of slavery in one of the
older States. We shall presently see that the
deleterious effects of slavery are palpaple in
Kentucky as well as in Maryland.
   We will now turn to Virginia, "Old Vir-
ginia, " the State that we proudly claim as our
mother, and let us see if the picture of slavery
has there a brighter side. And first we give a
comparative view of the progress and devel
opment of the agricultural, manufacturing, and
commercial interests of New England and Vir-
ginia, as gathered from the best authorities
within our reach. The first sett ement in Vir-
ginia was commenced in 1607, at Jamestown,
while the first colony planted in New England,
was in 1620, at Plymouth. Both sections may,
therefore, be considered as nearly of the same
age in point of settlement, both were settled by
Englishmen, and there is a striking similarity in
extent of territory. Mr. Martin, a Virginia ge-
ographer, states the area of Virginia at 65,624
square miles; Mr. Darby says, 'the area of this
State is usually underrated, as by a careful
measurement by the rhombs, the superfices are
within a fraction of 70,000 square miles."-
(l he area of England and Wales is but 57,812;
Scotland, 25,016; and Ireland, 31,874 square
miles.)

 





authorities, viz:
Square Miles.
   30,000
   9,280
   10,212
     7,500
     1,306
     4,674

   63,026
Hn that Virginia



   Acres.
   19,200,000
   5,939,200
   6,535,680
   4,800,000
     870,400
   2,991,360

   40,336,640
is superior to



New England in extent of territory; the advan-
tage must also be conceded to her in climate, in
fertility of soil, in the variety of agricultural pro-
ductions, in her natural position, inthe extent of
internal navigation, thus affording avenues to
market, with equal facilities for foreign or do-
mestic commerce. It might also be shown that
Virginia possesses great advantages for manu-
facturing, and that in minerals she is superior to
any other State. "Few countries," says Martin,
"possess greater advantages than Virginia for
success in manufacturing; she has labor cheap
and abundant, inexhaustible supplies of fuel,
and almost unlimited water power."  " In min-
erals, and fossils," says Flint, 'Virginia is con-
sidered the richest State in the Union. Quarries
of the most beautiful marble and freestone, blue
limestone, pit coal, and iron ore, are found in
inexhaustible abundance, and in places too nu-
merous to be designated. Black lead, lead ore,
rock crystal, amethysts, and emeralds, are dis
covered. Porcelain clay and chalk arecommon,
and almost all the useful fossils. The extensive
belt of hill and mountainous country, in which
gold is found in every form, commences in this
State, nearly in the midland regions, and ex-
tends S. W. many hundred miles."
   We have alluded to theace natural resources of
Virginia, to show her capabilities of employing
a large population in manufacturing and mining,
and thus to diversify the industrial pursuits of her
inhabitants.
  The relative condition of New England and
Virginia, at the present time, is shown by the
following statements. They present a compara-
tive view of toe substantial elements of pros-
perity, as well as of moral and intellectual im-
provement, in these two sections of the United
States-the one a population of diversified in-
dustrial employments, and improving all their
advantages-the other a population chiefly agri-
cultural, its manufacturing, mining, and com-
mercial advantages but partially developed, im-
porting from abroad a large portion of the manu-



factures necessary for the supply of its inhabi-
tants, most of which could readily and advanta-
geously be made within its own borders.
COMPARATIVE VIEW OF THE PRaSENT CONDITION
      OF NEW ENGLAND AND VIRGINiA.
                     New England Virginia.
White population, 1840, 2,212,165  740,968
Free col'd do      do.     22,633     49,872
Slaves,            do.         23    448,987

  Total pop. in 1840,  2,234,821 1,239,827



Persons employed in
  Agriculture,            414,138    318,771
In Manufactures,          187,258     54,147
In Mining,                    811      1,995
In Commerce,               17,757      6,361
In Navigation,             44,068      3,534
In Learned Profes-
sions,                   11,050      3,866
Whites over 20 years
of age who cannot
  read and write,          13,041     58,787
Students in Colleges,       2,857      1,097
  Do in Academies,         43,664     11,083
Scholars in Primary Schools,574,277  35,331
Capital employed in
  Manufactures,     86,824,229 11,360,861
In Foreign Commerce, 19,467,793 4,299,500
In Fisheries,          14,691,294     28,383
In Lumber Business,   2,096,041  113,210
Banking capital in 1840, 62,134,850  3,637,400
ESTIMATES OF THE ANNUAL PRODUCTS, BY PRO-
    FESSOR TUCKER OF VIRGINIA, ON THE
       BASIS OF THE CENSUS OF 1840.
Annual products of
  Agriculture,       74,749,889 59,085,821
Of Manufactures,     82,784,186  8,349,211
Of Commerce,           13,528,740  5,299,461
Of Mining,              3,803,638  3,321,629
   POPULATION, ACCORDING TO THE CENSUS
              OF 1830 AND 1840.



White persons in 1830
Colored do.    1830
White   do.    1840
Colored do.    1840
Increase of whites in
fifty years,
Increase of colored
  persons in fifty yr's,
In crease of total pop-
ulation,



1,933,338
   21,378
2,212,165
  22,657



694,300
517,105
740,908
498,829



1,219,384   298,853

   5,613   192,636

1,224,997   491,489



  The per centage of increase on the total popu-
lation in fifty years, in New England, 121 3-10;
in Virginia, 65 6-10.
  If we now compare Virginia with New York,
the disadvantages of slavery will appear in a
still more striking point of view. One of the
citizens of our State, Thomas F. Marshall, in
a pamphlet published in 1840, draws the follow-
ing comparison between Virginia and New
York:
  "In 1790, Virginia, with 70,000 square miles
of Territory, contained a population of 749,308.



The area of the New England States is thus



4



given by the best

Maine,
New Hampshire,
Vermont,
Massachusetts,
Rhode Island,
Connecticut,

    Total,
  It is, thus show



I

 




New York, upon a surface of 45,658 square that reigns in her dilapidated villages-the large
miles contained a population of 344,120. This quantity of exhausted land that is lying waste,
statement exhibits in favor of Virginia a differ-
ence of 405,188 inhabitants, which is double and the forests of pine and cedar now waving
that of New York and 68,000 more. In 1830, over a soil that once rewarded the labors of the
after a race of 40 years, Virginia is found to husbandman.
contain 1,211,405 souls, and New York 1,918,-  We thus perceive that slavery produces the
608, which exhibits a difference in favor of New  same melancholy results in Virginia as we have
York of 707,203. The increase on the part of
Virginia will be perceived to be 453,187, starting Pointed out as existing in Maryland. But bad
from a basis more than double that of New as the condition of Virginia is, a still more
York. The increase of New York upon a basis gloomy state of things is before her. She now
of 340,120 has been 1,578,391 human beings.
Virginia has increased in a ratio of 61 percent., gains her support principally by selling slaves
and New York in that of 566 per cent. The to other States. This trade, in the present
total amount of property in Virginia, under the state of things, is to her of the most vital im-
assessment of 1838, was 211,930,508. The ag- portance, but it places her at the mercy of the
regate value of Real and Personal property in
New York, in 1839, was 654,000,000, exhibit- States with which she carries on the traffic.-
ing an excess in New York over Virginia of These States have drained off the dark waters
442,066,492.  Statesmen may differ about which would have overwhelmed her. But now
policy, or the means to be employed in the pro- some of them show an inclination to shut out
motion of the public good, but surely they
ought to agree as to what prosperity means. the stream from themselves. It must then roll
I think there can be no dispute that New York back, and spread desolation over the face of that
is a greater, richer, more prosperous and Pow- ancient Commonwealth. She will be reduced
erful State than Virginerr                    to a condition worse than any which her worst
is but one explanation of the facts I have enemies could wish for her. Sooner or later
shewn. The clog that has staid the march of this state of things must come. Too many of
her people, the incubus that has weighed down her citizens seem to think that they can keep off
her enterprise, strangled her commerce, kept
sealed her exhaustless fountains of mineral this dark cloud by shutting their eyes. If they
wealth, and paralysed her arts, manufactures continue to do so, its thunders will burst upon
and improvement, is Negro Slavery."        their ears when it is too late for them to avoid
  Since these remarms were written, the cen- the storm,
sus of 1840 has been published, shewing that  Before the convention for amending the Con-
New York has increased during 10 years, 515,- stitution of Virginia, called in 1830, Charles
413 inhabitants, while Virginia has increased Fenton Mercer, of Loudon county, made the
only 28,525-all of which is in the western part following remarks, which drew tears from the
of the State where there are but few slaves, and eyes of members of the convention:
the ruinous effects of the system are less severe-  "Mr. Chairman, as I descended the Chesa-
ly felt.                                      peake the other day, on my way to this city,
  Furthermore, the census of 1840 has de- impelled by a favoring west wind, which, co-
                                              operating with the genius of Fulton, made the
veloped the important and alarming fact that vessel on which I stood literally fly through the
the population of Eastern Virginia, is less by wave before me, I thought of the early descrip-
26,106 inhabitants than it was in 1830. The tions of Virginia, by the foliowers of Raleigh,
population of the Union has increased during and thecompanions of Smith. I endeavored to
                                              scent the fragrance of the gale which reached
the same period 32 7-10 per cent., which ap- me from the shores of the capacious bay along
plied to the population of Eastern Virginia in which we steered, and I should have thought
1830, say 8,330,048 would give 1,105,454 as the the pictures of Virginiawhich rose to my fancy,
number of inhabitants there ought to be in this not too highly colored, had I not often traversed
                                               our lowland country, the land not only of my
section of the State, but deducting from this, nativity, but that of my fathers-and I said to
the actual population shews that Eastern Vii- myself, how much it has lost of its primitive
glnia has, In 10 years, fallen short of the gen- loveliness! Does the eye dwell with most pleas-
eral advancement by the number of 298,512 in- ure on its wasted fields, or on its stunted forests
                                              of secondary growth of pine and cedar Can
habitants. If the ratio of the increase of popu- we dwell without mournful regret on the tem-
lation and the value of Real Estate be consi- ples of religion sinking in ruin, and those spa-
dered as tests of the prosperity of a State, then cious dwellings whose doors once opened by the
it is evident that the Eastern section of Virginia hand of liberal hospitality, are now fallen upon
           it is                             their portals, or closed in tenantless silence-
is the reverse of prosperous. This conclusion Excepton the banks of Its rivers, the march of
is further corroberated by the mournful silenes desolation now saddens this once beautiful

 


                                              6
 country.  The cheerful notes of population often expressed. In the original draft of the
 have ceased, and the wolf and wild deer, no Declaration of Independence, he expressed the
 longer scared from their ancient haunts, have greatest indignation towards the British King
 descended from the mountains to the plains.-
 They look on the graves of our ancestors, and for capturing and bringing to the colonies "a
 traverse their former paths. And shall we do distant people who had never offended him."-
 nothing to restore this once lovely land There In a letter to Mr. Warville, he gives the follow-
 was a time when the sun in his course shone ing melancholy and yet truthful picture of
 on none so fair!"                             slavery:
    Since the time at which Mr. Mercer spoke, slaeryn
  freemen have been invited to come and takepos-  "Tihe whole commerce between master and
                                                slave is a perpetual exercise of the most bolster-
  session of these lands, and the wolf is again be- ous passions; the most unremitting despotism
  ginning to fly to his mountain den. Slavery had on the ene part and degrading submission on
  so poisoned the soil that slavery itself could not the other. Our children see this and learn to
  live upon it. It fastened its teeth upon the soil, imitate it; for man is an imitative animal. The
                                              a  parent storms, the child looks on, catches the
  and never let go its vampyre hold while life lineaments of wrath, puts on the same airs in
  remained in its victim. But as if to show that the circle of smaller slaves, gives loose to his
  slavery has no sorrow that freedom cannot cure, worst passions, and thus nursed, educated and
  the land is again reviving. The beautiful plains daily exercised in tyranny, cannot but be stain-
  are again rejoicing In the smiles of freedom, must be a prodigy pho eculiaaritines  The man
  and send forth their welcome in herbs and and morals undepraved by such circumstances.
  flowers. The country will acquire more than And with what execration should the states-
  its former glory, if slavery is not again permit- man be loaded, who, permitting one-half the
  ted to enter likeanotherserpent into thegardencitizens thus to trample on the rights of the
  o  en.                                      other, transforms those into despots, and these
  of Eden.                                      into enemies, destroys the morals of the one
    The enlighted public sentiment of the age is part, and the amor patrics of the other. For if
  ancompromisingly hostile to slavery. The tes- the slave can have a country in this world, it
  timony of the Conscript Fathers of the Repub- must be any other in preference to that in
                                                which he is born to live and labor for another-
  lic, those great and wise men who laid the foun- in which he must lock up the faculties of his
  dations of our government, is also against Afri- nature, contribute as far as depends on his in-
  zanslavery. There isscarcelyagreatmanwho dividual endeavors to the evalishment of the
  flourished in our revolutionary history, who has human race, or entail his own miserable condi-
  not taken occasion to record his opinions against tion on the endless generations proceeding from
                                                him. With the morals of the people, thei in-
  slavery. In proof of this assertion listen to the dustry is also destroyed. For in a warm climate
  following great men:                          no man will labor for himself who can make
    Washington, it is well known, provided for another labor for him, This is so true, that of
             the  manipaton  f al slvesoverwho  hethe proprietors of slaves, a very small propor-
  the emancipation of all slaves over whom he thtion indeed are ever seen to labor. And can the
  had control, by his will. In a letter to General liberties of a nation be thought secure when we
  Lafayette he said:                            have removed their only firm basis, a conviction
    "ithe benevolence of your heart, my dear in the minds of the people that these liberties
  Marquis, is so conspicuous on all occasions, are of the gift of God That they are uot to be
  that I never wonder at fresh proofs of it; but violated but with his wrath  Indeed, I tremble
  your late purchase of an estate in the colony of for my country when I reflect that God is just;
  Cayenne, with a view of emancipating the that his Justice cannot sleep forever; that, con-
  slaves. is a generous and noble proof of your sidering numbers, nature, and natural means
  humanity. Would to God, a like spirit might only, a revolution of the wheel of fortune, an
  diffuse itself generally into the minds of the exchange of situation is among possible events
  people of this country' But I     despair of seeing -that it may become probable by supernatural
  it. Some petitions were presented tothe As- interference! The Almighty has no attribute
  sembly at its last session, for the abolition of which can take sides with us in such a contest.
  slavery; but they could scarcely obtain a hear-  "What an incomprehensible machine is man!
  ing.                                          Who can endure toil, famine, stripes, imprison-
                                                ment, and death itself, in vindication of his own
   In another letter addressed to Joh  F. Mercer, :liberty, and the next moment be deaf to all those
 he said:                                      motives whose power supported him through
   "I never mean, unless some particular cir- his trial, and inflict on his fellow-men a bond-
 zumstances should compel me to it, to possess age, one hour of which is fraught with more
 another slave by purchase; it being among my misery than ages of that which he rose In re-
 first wishes to see some plan adopted by which ellion to oppose. But we must wait with
.satery in this country may be abolished bplaw." patience the working of an overruling Provi-