SLAVE-BREEDING-COLONIZATION. 71 plantation might not suffer. We hers must share her own bitter and hopeless degradation. It was long ago observed that American Slavery, with its habitual and life-long separations of husband from wife, of parent from child, its exile of perhaps the larger portion of its victims from the humble but cherished homes of their childhood to the strange and repulsive swamps and forests of the far South-West, is harsher and viler than any other system of bondage on which the sun ever shone. And when we add that it has been carefully computed that the State of Virginia, since the date of the purchase of Louisiana, had received more money for her own flesh and blood, regularly sold and exported, than her soil and all that was upon it would have sold for on the day when she seceded from the Union, we need adduce no more of the million facts which unite to prove every wrong a blunder as well as a crime-that God has implanted in every evil the seeds of its overthrow and ultimate destruction. need not dwell on this new phase of Slavery, its revolting features, and still more revolting consequences. The simple and notorious fact that clergymen, marrying slaves, were accustomed to require of them fidelity in their marital relation, until separated by death, or by inexorable necessity, suffices of itself to stamp the social condition thus photographed with the indignant reprobation of mankind. And when we add that slave-girls were not only daily sold on the auction-blocks of New Orleans, and constantly advertised in her journals, as very nearly white, well-educated, and possessed of the rarest personal attractions, and that they commanded double and treble prices on this account, we leave nothing to be added to complete the outlines of a system of legalized and priest-sanctioned iniquity, more gigantic and infernal than heathenism and barbarism ever devised. For the Circassian beauty, whose charms seek and find a market at Constantinople, is sent thither by her parents, and is herself a willing party to the speculation. She hopefully bids a last adieu to the home of her infancy, to find another in the harem of some wealthy and powerful Turk, where she will achieve the life of luxury and idleness she covets. But the American-born woman, consigned by the laws of her country and the fiat of her owner to the absolute possession of whomsoever bids most for her, neither consents to the transfer, nor is at all consulted as to the person to whom she is helplessly consigned. The Circassian knows that her children will be free and honored. The American is keenly aware that The conflicting currents of American thought and action with regard to Slavery-that which was cherished by the Revolutionary patriots, and gradually died with them, and that by which the former was imperceptibly supplanted are strikingly exhibited in the history and progress of the movement for African Colonization. Its originator was the Rev. Samuel Hopkins, D. D., who was settled as a clergyman at Newport, R. I., in 1770, and found that thriving sea-port a focus of Slavery and the Slave-Trade, upon both of which he soon commenced an active and determined war. The idea of coun teracting, and ultimately suppressing, on it early in the following year. the Slave-Trade, through a systematic colonization of the western coast of Africa with emancipated blacks from America, was matured and suggested by him to others, even before the outbreak of the Revolutionary war; and its realization, interrupted by that struggle, was resumed by him directly after it had been closed. This was anterior to the British settlement of Sierra Leone, and preceded the appearance of Clarkson's prize essay, commanding public attention to the horrors of the Slave-Trade. Among Dr. Hopkins's European correspondents were Granville Sharp and Zachary Macaulay, who were among the earliest and least compromising of British abolitionists. Through his influence and efforts, three colored youth were educated in New England, toward the close of the last century, with express reference to missionary labor in Africa in connection with the Colonization movement. Two of these ultimately, though at a mature age, migrated to Liberia, where they died soon after. Thirty-eight American blacks emigrated to Sierra Leone in 1815, under the auspices and in the vessel of one of their own number. The initial organization of the American Colonization Society took place at Princeton, N. J., in the autumn of 1816; and that Society was formally constituted at Washington, by the choice of officers, on the 1st of January, 1817. Its first attempt at practical colonization was made in 1820 on Sherbro Island, which proved an unfortunate location; its present position on the main land, at Cape Mesurado, was purchased December 15, 1821, and some colonists landed was About one thousand emigrants were dispatched thither in the course of the following seven years, including a small church of colored persons which migrated from Boston in 1826. The additional number dispatched during the succeeding thirty years not far from eight thousand. The city founded by the original emigrants received the name of Monrovia, and in 1847 the colony declared itself an independent republic under the name of Liberia. That republic still exists, enjoying a moderate and equable prosperity, in spite of its unhealthiness for whites, and for all but duly acclimated blacks, on account of its tropical and humid location. But the Colonization movement, though bountifully lauded and glorified by the eminent in Church and State, and though the Society numbered among its Presidents Bushrod Washington, Charles Carroll, James Madison, and Henry Clay, has not achieved a decided success, and for the last twenty years has steadily and stubbornly declined in importance and consideration. It has ceased to command or deserve the sympathy of abolitionists, without achieving the hearty confidence, though it has been blessed or cursed with the abundant verbal commendations, of their antagonists. It was soon discovered that, while it was presented to the former class as a safe and unobjectionable device for mitigating the evils, while gradually undermining the existence, of human bondage in our country, it was, at the same time, commended to the favor and patronage of slaveholders as a means of relieving the South of its dangerous free-negro element, and EMANCIPATION DISCARDED. thus augmenting the security and insuring the perpetuity of their beloved institution. Moreover, as the enhanced and constantly increasing market value of slaves obstructed and diminished manumissions with a view to colonization, the class of subjects for deportation to Africa steadily fell off in numbers, and in the quality of those composing it. When, at last, the South, under the lead of Mr. Calhoun, quite generally adopted the novel and extraordinary doctrine of the essential righteousness and signal beneficence of Slavery-when the relation of life-long servitude and utter subjugation to the will of a master was declared the true, natural, and most enviable condition of the laboring class anywhere-the condition most conducive to their happiness," moral culture, and social well-beingthe idea of liberating individuals or families from this subjugation, and sending them from peaceful, plentiful, and prosperous America to benighted, barbarous, and inhospitable Africa, became, in this view, a transparent absurdity. No disciple of Calhoun could be a logical, consistent colonizationist, any more than In 10" What disposition God, in His providence, will eventually make of these blacks, cannot be foretold; but it is our duty to provide for our own happiness and theirs as long as we can. dealing with this question, it will not do to be guided by abstract notions of liberty and slavery. We can only judge the future by the past; and, as experience proves that the negro is better off in slavery at the South than in freedom elsewhere, it is the part of philanthropy to keep him here, as we keep our children in subjection for their own good."-De Bow's Review, vol. ii., p. 310. Mr. Chestnut of S. C., in a long pro-slavery speech in the U. S. Senate, April 9, 1860, presented his views of the inherent excellence of human bondage, as regards the slaves themselves, as follows: "But you say, 'I leave out of the consideration th happiness of the race enslaved By no It is an important element of the moral means. 73 a follower of Garrison and Wendell Phillips. The constantly and widely diverging currents of American opinion soon left the Colonization movement hopelessly stranded. The teachings of the new Southern school tended palpably toward the extirpation from the South of the free-negro anomaly, through reënslavement rather than exile. Legislative efforts to decree a general sale of free negroes into absolute slavery were made in several States, barely defeated in two or three, and fully successful in one. Arkansas, in 1858-9, enacted the enslavement of all free colored persons within her limits, who should not remove beyond them before the ensuing 4th of July, and this atrocious edict was actually enforced by her authorities. The negroes generally escaped; but, if any remained, they did so in view of the fact that the first sheriff who could lay hands on them would hurry them to the auction-block, and sell them to the highest bidder. to the highest bidder. And this was but a foretaste of the fate to which the new Southern dogma was morally certain, in a few years, to consign the whole free colored population of the argument. *** In the general march of human progress, there is no one interest of humanity which has advanced more rapidly than the institution of African Slavery as it is in the Southern States. It has stood the test of every trial. Its mission is to subdue the unbroken regions of the warm and fertile South, and its end is the happiness and civilization of the human race, including the race of the slave, in all respects." Said Mr. Jas. M. Mason, of Va., in the debate of the following day: "As to the slave population, I agree with the Senator from South Carolina: if a problem, it has worked itself out; the thing is settled here, so far as the South is concerned, or the opinions and purposes of the South, or their ability to make their opinions and purposes good. It will become, as it has already begun to be, the established policy of the South to have no more emancipation. Let them continue in bondage as they now exist, as the best condition of both races.' Slave States, had not those States been precipitated into their great resisted and protested, but only to be overborne by inexorable logic, and Rebellion. Individuals would have even more inexorable majorities. VII. THE MISSOURI STRUGGLE. WHEN the State of Louisiana, previously known as the Territory of Orleans, was admitted into the Union,' the remainder of the Louisiana purchase, which had formerly borne the designation of Louisiana Territory, was renamed the Territory of Missouri. The people of a portion of this Territory, stretching westward from the Mississippi on both sides of the river Missouri, petitioned Congress for admission into the Union as the State of Missouri; and their memorials were referred by the House to a Select Committee, whereof Mr. Scott, their delegate, was chairman. This Committee reported a bill in accordance with their prayer, which was read twice and committed; but no further action was taken thereon during that session. The same Congress reconvened for its second session on the 16th of the following November, and the House resolved itself into a Committee of the whole, and in due time took up the Missouri bill aforesaid, which was considered throughout that sitting and that of the next day but one, during which several amendments were adopted, the most important of which, moved by General James Tallmadge, of Dutchess County, New York, was as follows: "And provided, That the introduction of Slavery, or involuntary servitude, be prohibited, except for the punishment of crimes, whereof the party has been duly convicted and that all children born within the said State, after the admission thereof into the Union, shall be declared free at the age of twenty-five years." On the rising of the Committee, the Yeas and Nays were demanded in the House on the question of agreeing to this amendment; when a division was called, and so much of it as precedes and includes the word "convicted" was adopted by 87 Yeas-all from the substantially Free States except one of the two members from Delaware-to 76 Nays, whereof ten were from Free States-Massachusetts (then including Maine) supplying three of them, New York three, with one each from New Jersey, New Hampshire, Ohio, and Illinois. The residue of the amendment was likewise sustained, by the close vote of 82 Yeas to 78 Nays. The bill thus amended was ordered to a third reading by 98 Yeas to 56 Nays, and the next day was passed and sent to the Senate, where the restriction aforesaid was stricken out by a vote of 22 to 16, and the bill thus amended passed without a division, on the last day but one of the session. Being now returned to the House, General Tall 5 New York and New Jersey still he a few slaves, but the former had decreed the. manumission. THE MISSOURI STRUGGLE. madge moved its indefinite postponement, which, was defeated Yeas 69, Nays 74. But the question next presented, of concurrence in the Senate's amendment aforesaid, was decided in the negative-Yeas 76, Nays 78; and the bill returned to the Senate accordingly. The Senate insisted on its amendment without a division; and, on the return of the bill to the House, Mr. John W. Taylor, of New York, moved that the House adhere to its disagreement; which prevailed-Yeas 78, Nays 66 And so the bill failed for that session. A bill, organizing so much of the Territory of Missouri as was not included within the borders of the proposed State of that name, to be known as the Territory of Arkansas, was considered at this session, and Mr. Taylor, of New York, moved the application thereto of the restriction aforesaid. So much of it as required that all slaves born within the Territory after the passage of this act should be free at twenty-five years of age, was carried,' by 75 Yeas to 72 Nays, and the residue defeated by 70 Yeas to 71 Nays. Next day, however, the adopted clause was reconsidered and stricken out, and the bill ultimately passed without any reference to Slavery. Arkansas became in consequence a Slave Territory, and ultimately a Slave State. A new Congress convened December 6, 1819; and Mr. Scott moved a reference to a Select Committee of the memorials from Missouri, including that of her Territorial Legislature, asking admission into the Union. This motion prevailed, and Mr. Speaker Clay appointed as such * Some years afterward, Speaker of the House. ¡ 75 Committee three members from Slave States, beside Mr. Scott, who was chairman, with but one from a Free State. In the Senate, the legislative memorial aforesaid was referred to the Judiciary Committee, consisting of three members from Slave States with but two from Free States. Upon the conflict which ensued, the Slave Power entered with very great incidental advantages. The President, Mr. Monroe, though he took no conspicuous part in the strife, was well known to favor that side, as did a majority of his Cabinet, so that the patronage of the Government and the hopes of aspirants to its favor were powerful makeweights against the policy of Restriction. The two ex-Presidents of the dominant party, Messrs. Jefferson and Madison, still survived, and gave their powerful influence openly in accordance with their Southern sympathies rather than their Anti-Slavery convictions. Mr. Clay, the popular and potent Speaker of the House, though likewise Anti-Slavery in principle, was a zealous and most efficient adversary of Restriction. The natural fears of a destruction, or at least a temporary prostration, of the Republican ascendency, through the reformation of parties on what were called geographical lines, also tended strongly to defeat the proposed inhibition of Slavery. The North, it had by this time come to be understood, if beaten in such a struggle, would quietly submit; while the South, it was very clearly intimated and generally believed, would shiver all party bands, and perhaps even the Union itself, rather than submit to a defeat on this issue. |