SLAVERY IN THE UNITED STATES.
A
SERMON
DELIVERED IN AMORY HALL,
ON
THANKSGIVING DAY,
NOVEMBER 24, 1842.
BY
ES FREEMAN CLARKE,
(PRINTED BY FRIENDS FOR GRATUITOUS DISTRIBUTION.)
BOSTON:
BENJAMIN H. GREENE.
1843:

JOHN PUTNAM, PRINTER.

SERMON.
HEBREWS 13:3.
“Remember them that are in bonds as bound with them."
I TAKE for the subject of my discourse to-day an im-
portant matter, and one concerning which I have not
before spoken to you, and one which I think should be
sometimes treated, namely,
« Slavery in the United States. Its evils. Its sin-
fulness. Our duties concerning it."
"But what has this to do with thanksgiving ?” you
will say. Perhaps it may be a good way of thanking
God for the mercies he has bestowed upon us, to re-
member those to whom they are denied. We may
thank
God in various ways, and not merely by recounting
his mercies, and glorifying his goodness to ourselves.
• Herein is my Father glorified that ye bear much fruit."
The most acceptable fruit to God, is love to our breth-
ren ; the most genuine form which gratitude to God can
take is a deep sympathy with all God's creatures ; the
surest way of proving that we recognize thankfully the
blessing of Christianity, is to show that we have received
its spirit,-a spirit which binds us in brotherhood with
all men, whether Jew or Samaritan, bond or free.
6 But what good will it do to consider this subject at

4
66
all ?" you may say,
we can do nothing to remove the
evils of slavery." I shall show, by and by, that we can
do something ; but supposing that we cannot, still it may
do us good to consider the subject. Will it do no good
to learn to feel an interest in the sufferings of others who
are at a distance from us? Will it do no good to extend
our sympathies beyond the little limits of our own
State and neighborhood”? * Will it do no good to look
at great moral questions,-questions of right and wrong,
toward which the intellect of the World is turning its
attention ? And ought we to decide, before we have in-
quired, whether we certainly can do no good ? whether
we certainly have no share in the sin ? It will not do,
when we stand before the judgment-seat of Christ, to say
that two millions of our fellow beings were under a hard
yoke, under a system of government which we were sup-
porting, under laws which we were enacting, and that we
would not so much as ask whether we could do any
thing to abate the evil, -would not so much as listen to
any statement concerning it. Will it do to say then, that
it was an exciting subject, —one which the majority of
the respectable citizens disliked to hear mentioned,—that
the agitation of it might disturb our political, eco iasti
cal, or social organizations ?
I do not sympathize with those who are for intro-
ducing this or the like topics on all occasions. But on
this day, in which the State has invited us to meet to-
gether, it seems not inappropriate to speak of moral
questions in which the State is largely concerned. I feel
somewhat qualified to speak of it,-if a seven years' resi-
dence in a slave-holding community can entitle one to
claim some acquaintance with the facts,—if an intimate
friendship with many slaveholders, and many obligations
* Daniel Webster.

5
and kindnesses received at their hands, can vindicate one
from any prejudice against the men,—and if a New Eng-
land love for freedom, breathed in with her air in child-
hood, confirmed in youth, and I thank God never relin-
quished amid other influences in manhood, can prevent
me from having imbibed an undue partiality for the system.
Another motive has influenced me, also, in selecting this
subject to-day. Speaking of Dr. Channing, a few weeks
ago, I said that we ought to honor him as he would wish,
by increasing our efforts in behalf of those truths and ob-
jects for which he labored, so that as far as possible his
absence might be supplied. As far as possible, for if all
his numerous friends ; if all of us who, since his depar-
ture, have felt it our duty publicly to express our respect
and gratitude for his talents and virtues ; if all were to
combine their efforts in behalf of any one of these ob-
jects, I doubt if all together could do as much as he
singly, so vast is the energy which belongs to the indi-
vidual mind. But the cause of the slave is one of those
objects, and I wish to do my part of that work, which
he would have continued to do had he been continued
و
among us.
I. Let us look, then, in the first place, at the evils of
the system of slavery.
In speaking of these evils, I desire not to exaggerate
them. They have sometimes, I think, been exagger-
ated,—or at least the attention has been called so much
to particular evils, that the mind has been filled full of
them, and they have assumed a preposterous magnitude
in the imagination. People have imagined that the slaves
were being whipped and worked all the time, that they
were dripping with blood, that their misery was constant
and universal. Going to the South with these ideas in
their heads, and perhaps staying there for months without
2*

6
tem.
hearing the sound of a lash,—seeing the slaves very
merry, and often having enough to eat and very little to
do, they have come back from their trip to the Virginia
Springs or the Mammoth cave, and said that slavery was
not so very bad a system after all, that the evils of it had
been exaggerated. Yet the real evils of slavery never have
been, and hardly can be exaggerated. Some circumstan-
ces about it may be. There are many very
kind masters,
-Very many
As far as I have seen, the fault was that
the blacks had too little rather than too much to do. In
the cities this is certainly the case, for they have too
much time left for dissipation and bad company. There
are also many pleasing features connected with the
sys-
God has given alleviations and compensations to
the worst institutions. There is often a strong attach-
ment between the master and servant, very different from
the mercenary relation which exists so much among our-
selves between employer and domestic. The white
child and black grow up together,—they play together
on the floor when children, and as they grow up, the one
feels the responsibility of a protector, and the other the
affection which comes from respect and reliance. Re-
liance and respect are native to the African character,
and they make a relation tolerable to him, that to a differ-
ently organized character,—the Indian, for example,-
would be worse than death. These and other allevia-
tions belong to this institution, and they ought to be men-
tioned. Evils, sufficiently enormous remain, after all
such abatements.
1. First the evils to the slave are very great. He is
not always treated badly, but he is always liable to be so
treated. He is entirely at the mercy of his master. If
his master is passionate, arbitrary, despotical, avaricious,
he is liable to be beaten, starved, over-worked, and sep-
arated from his family ; and whoever knows human nature,

7
knows that such cases will not be rare. Let me describe
the character of two planters, whose estates adjoined.
The first was one of the best men I ever knew, and one
of the best friends I ever had. He owned some sixty-
five slaves. He governed them as children, with mingled
firmness and kindness. He visited them constantly in
their houses, to be sure that they were always comforta-
ble. They had neat houses, plenty to eat and to wear.
They earned by extra work, for which he paid them,
sometimes half a dollar, sometimes a dollar a day, which
they spent as they chose. I have known him sit half the
day holding in his lap the head of an old sick negro, who
would not let any one but his old master come near him,
nor take medicine but from his hand. This planter's
wife and children were like him, indefatigable in their
care of the servants. No servant was ever sold except
for behavior which rendered it impossible for him to be
retained. Once this happened, and then the whole house-
hold was filled with gloom, as if one of the children had
Yet kind and wise as were this family
in their management of their servants, they all confessed
that the system was bad, and that while men were kept
in slavery, it was impossible for them to be made really
happy.
Let us now look into the adjoining plantation. Here
lived a man who had been a trader in slaves,—buying
them in Virginia, and carrying them down the river to
Mississippi. He had a favorite servant, named Daniel,
whom he used to employ to persuade the slaves whom
he wished to buy, that they would have more to eat and
less to do where the trader was going to take them. So
they would ask their masters to sell them, and the mas-
ters, who would often refuse to sell their servants against
their will, would be glad to get the advanced price which
the trader offered, if the men themselves were willing to
been taken away.

8
go.
Daniel saved his master's life twice; once from a
gang of slaves whom he was taking chained South, who
broke their chain in the night, and were about to kill him ;
another time when the steamer Tennessee was wrecked
in the Mississippi, and Daniel took off his master in a
skiff. Yet after all this he sold Daniel too to a sugar-
planter. This man left some twenty slaves, and before
he died, being smitten with compunctions of conscience,
left them their freedom, on condition that they should not
be set free till each had been in his possession fifteen
years. His executor, who was as bad a man as himself,
contrived that of the whole only two actually became
free. The rest were sold down the river before the
time came.
Who was to take the trouble to inquire into
it ? One of them was to be free in a year, and was to
be married to a free colored woman. He determined to
escape or die, and was shot trying to get away at a wood-
landing.
I could tell you stories of barbarities which I knew of,
which it would sicken you to hear, as it does me to think
of them. But it would give you a false impression. It
would be as if I should collect all the accounts of mur-
ders and other atrocities committed in this city during ten
years, and present them as a specimen of its character.
It is enough to know, that when men are trusted with
irresponsible power they will often abuse it.
A worse evil to the slave than the cruelties he some-
times endures, is the moral degradation which results from
his condition. Falsehood, theft, licentiousness, are the
natural consequences of his situation. He steals,—why
should he not ?—he cannot, except occasionally, earn
money ; why should not he steal it ? He lies —it is the
natural weapon of weakness against tyrant strength. He
goes to excess in eating and drinking and animal plea-
sures,-for he has no access to any higher pleasures.

And a man cannot be an animal without sinking below an
animal,
-a brutal man is worse than a brute. An animal
cannot be more savage or more greedy than the law of
his nature allows. But there seems to be no limit to the
degradation of a man. Slavery is the parent of vices ; it
always has been, and always will be. Cowardice and
cruelty, cunning and stupidity, abject submission and
deadly vindictiveness, are now as they always have been,
the fruits of slavery.
I do not mean that there are no exceptions. There
are pure, honest, and virtuous slaves.
There are truly
and tenderly pious slaves, I have sat in their churches,
and been deeply touched by their devotion. God does
not leave himself without a witness anywhere in the soul
of man.
I have observed with awe and joy the same
evidences of a profound Christian experience in these
downcast souls, trodden under feet of men,—the same
experiences which we see described in the epistles of Paul,
the confessions of Augustine, the journals of Wesley,
Fenelon, and Fox.
Masters often can and do preserve their slaves from
great immorality by careful superintendence,—but there is
one evil so inherent in the system, that no care can ob-
viate it. The slave's nature never grows.
The slave is
always a child. God has made Progress and Freedom
inseparable. You are astonished, when you first go to
the South, to hear a grey-headed black man called boy,
but there is a propriety, though unintended, in the term ;
they are boys always. What is it which turns the white
child into a man, but the necessity of looking forward, of
preparing now for the future ? But the slave has no mo-
tive to look forward. He has nothing to hope, nothing
to fear beyond the present day. If he should be ever so
industrious, diligent, skilful, and faithful, he would gain
nothing by it --he would only be worth so much more to

10
tem.
his master. If he should be ever so lazy, stupid, or un-
faithful, he loses nothing by it. He must still be fed and
clothed. His only ambition, then, is to do as little work
as possible to-day, and to get as much rest, food and
sleep as he can. Tomorrow may take care of itself.
The system of slavery, then, is a soul-destroying sys-
Perhaps some of you have seen the drawings
illlustrating one of Schiller's ballads, representing Apollo's
horse Pegasus, sold to a farmer, and having had his wings
tied together, and his spirit subdued by beating and starva-
tion, at last he is yoked with an ox into a plough, and sinks
exhausted on the ground. It is full of pathos,-but
what a poor emblem of the human soul, when by means
of slavery, its aspirations are checked, and it becomes a
mere mechanical principle of life, informing a brute
body.
2. I have spoken of a few of the evils of the system of
slavery to the slave himself.
The evils to his master are,
perhaps, nearly as great. This is admitted by intelligent
slaveholders. It was admitted by Mr. Clay, when he
said in a speech at Lexington, before he became the
champion of the institution, -_“that he considered the
system as a curse to the master as well as a bitter wrong to
the slave, and to be justified only by an urgent political ne-
cessity.” It is an evil to the slaveholder every way. It
impoverishes him. Slave cultivation destroys the value
of the soil ---manufactures cannot thrive where slavery
exists,--the energy is taken out of the community by it.
It depopulates a country. Kentucky has greater advan-
tages than Ohio. It was settled fifteen years before her,
-it is surrounded and cleft with navigable streams,-it
lies under a warmer sun,-it is larger, and has as much
or more good soil, -it is rich in minerals; and yet the
population of Ohio was about double that of Kentucky in
1840. Slavery is a domestic evil. There is no com-

11
fort, no cleanliness, no improvement with slaves
your
family. It is a perpetual annoyance and vexation. So-
ciety is poisoned in its roots by this system. The spirit,
tone, and aim of society is incurably bad, wherever
slavery is. There are noble exceptions to this, but they
are exceptions. Public education is out of the question
in slave States,-common schools cannot exist except in
cities. It has been tried again and again, always unsuc-
cessfully.
With the bloody affrays which are constantly occurring
in the slave States, we are all familiar. There no white
man is ever punished for shooting or stabbing his enemy
in the street. According to Southern law, to go up to
a man in the high-way, abuse him till he is provoked to
make some violent reply, and then to draw a knife and
cut him down, is self-defence. In the city where I lived,
three Mississippi gentlemen, one a judge, attacked three
unarmed mechanics, who had offended them, in a public
bar-room, with dirks and bowie knives. Two of the
mechanics were killed, one by the judge, in the following
The judge was entering the bar-room, and saw
his brother struggling with an opponent. He drew his
bowie knife, and flourishing it in the air, rushed across
the room and thrust it in the back of a man who was pull-
ing another away from the affray. The judge was tried,
defended on the ground of self-defence by a distinguished
member of Congress from Mississippi, and acquitted.
From the speech of the prosecuting officer, an old and
distinguished Kentuckian, I quote the following testi-
mony to the different habits of the South and North. *
“If you go into the Northern States, it is a rare thing
if you can find a man in ten thousand with concealed
manner.
* Speech of Ben Hardin at the trial of Wilkinson, &c.

12
weapons on his person. Go South, to Arkansas or
Mississippi, for example, and though you would be a
peaceable man at the North, in these States you may
arm yourself to the teeth, and track your steps in blood
with impunity. I went down the river lately, and it was
pointed out to me where the Black Hawk had blown up
and killed her scores; to another place where the Gen.
Brown had blown up and killed her hundreds ; to one
spot on the shore where two gentlemen blew out each
other's brains with rifles; to another where the widow
somebody's overseer was butchered ; to another where
the keeper of a wood-yard was shot for asking pay for his
wood; to another where an aged gentleman was stabbed
for protecting his slave from cruel treatment. Great
God ! cried I, at last, -take me back, take me back to
where there is more law, if less money,--for I could not
bear the horrid recital any longer,--when every jutting-
point or retiring bend bore the landmark of assassination
and irresponsible murder."
This is the testimony of a distinguished and patriotic
Southerner.
The cause of this is obvious,-habits of dictation and
violence, formed among slaves, cause these affrays among
masters.
The political evils of slavery form a distinct and im-
portant part of the argument --but I cannot stop to dwell
on them. I refer you to the speeches of John Quincy
Adams, that noble old man, who has stood up alone in
manly opposition to the encroachments of slavery, and
borne the tumultuous and furious denunciations of its
champions, when no Northern man had the courage to
take a stand by his side. “Unshaken, unseduced, unterri-
fied,” he stood like the mountain, round which cluster and
darken the black clouds, and against whose summit they
discharge fire and hail, but which emerges from the tu-

13
mult serene and calm, while the broken, baffled wreaths
of mist are driven down the wind. I cannot dwell on the
dangers to the Union from the encroachments of slavery,
but its machinations are untiring, its jealousy sleepless. It
is still determined to annex Texas to the Union. It has
occupied the President's chair, the Speaker's seat in the
House, it insists on having a majority of judges of the
Supreme Court, and, contrary to all law, on the last day
of the last session it forced a bill through Congress, mak-
ing the nation pay the expenses of those Americans who
were taken prisoners by the Mexicans, in an expedition
to Santa Fe.*
II. Let us now examine the question of the sinfulness
of slavery.
There are two theories on this subject which I think
extreme, --one, of the Abolitionists who demand imme-
diate emancipation, the other, of the South Carolina
party of slaveholders.yabb
The first theory declares that to hold slaves, or to
have anything to do with holding slaves, is always sinful,
and to be repented of immediately,--that no slaveholder
should be permitted to commune in our churches, and
that we should come out and be separate from this un-
clean thing as far as possible. They support this theory
by the inconsistency of slavery with the rights of man
and the spirit of the gospel.
The other party, among whom, I am sorry to say, are
to be found ministers of the gospel at the South and
North, professors of moral philosophy in Southern col-
leges, and distinguished citizens of the free States, de-
clare slavery to be a system which is sanctioned by the
Bible, has existed in all times, and is necessary to the
* See J. Q. Adams's Speech, at Weymouth, to his constituents, 1842.
2

14
pages of
progress of the world in freedom and happiness. They
speak much of the patriarchs of the Old Testament, and
of the fact that while slavery, in atrocious forms, existed
in the times of Christ and his Apostles, neither Jesus nor
his Apostles were abolitionists, or rebuked it, but instead
of commanding the masters to emancipate their slaves, or
the slaves to run away, told the masters to be just and
kind, and the slaves to be obedient and faithful in the
relation.
The answer of the Abolitionists to this is not satisfac-
tory, because they wish to prove too much,—they deny
that slavery did exist under Mosaic institutions; and
they accuse their opponents of " torturing the
the blessed Bible.»*
Now the true doctrine, I think, is, that slavery as a
system is thoroughly sinful and bad,--but it does not
follow that every slaveholder commits sin in holding
slaves. That the whole spirit of the gospel is opposed
to slavery, and that the tendency of Christianity is to
break every yoke, is perfectly plain. But the fact, which
always remains a fact, that Jesus and his Apostles did
not attempt violently to overthrow and uproot this institu-
tion, did not denounce all slaveholders, and that while
we have catalogues of sins which are to be repented and
forsaken, slaveholding is not among them, shows that, under
all circumstances, it is not sinful. This is also evident
from fact. Here is a young man who inherits a hundred
slaves from his father ; some are good, some bad; some
are industrious, some idle ; some young, some old, -
shall he tell them they are free, and let them go ? Some
could do well, but others not,—they are too old, or too
lle, or too vicious,—they have been made so by slavery,
* See Weld's - Bible Argument.”

15
and it is the duty of the slaveholder to keep them and
take care of them, till they can be prepared for freedom.
But what shall we say of those who attempt to justify
the system, and would have us believe, that because
Jesus did not denounce it he approved of it,--that God
ordained and Jesus approved a system that turns man
into a brute,-degrades the soul, and makes it almost in-
capable of progress, -a system, then, which allowed the
master to crucify his slave, and throw him into a fish-
pond, to be eaten by carp, for breaking a glass dish,-
that Jesus, who taught that we are to love our breth-
ren as ourselves, did not disapprove of this system,
or think it sinful ? It was my hard lot, at the South, to
hold a controversy in the newspapers with a man who
held this doctrine. He maintained, also, that what was
not forbidden was commanded ; and that it was, there-
fore, a Christian duty to hold slaves; and that it was a
covenant blessing and privilege, granted by God to the
Jews, to have the power of beating their servants to
death, provided they did not die immediately. *
III. I must now say something on the third point,-
What are our duties in relation to slavery ?
And here I must notice some objections made by
those who think we have no duties in the premises.
OBJECTION 1. "We ought to let the whole matter
alone. We have nothing to do with it. It is a Southern
matter, and should be left exclusively to the South.”
I think we have a good deal to do with it. We sup-
port slavery directly in the District of Columbia, and in-
directly throughout the Union. Our Congress, com-
posed in part of those whom we elect, and who are our
* Dr. J. N. McDowell's Letters to J. F. Clarke, in the St. Louis
Bulletin.

16
representatives, has power to make all laws for the Dis-
trict of Columbia. Now the North should insist, either
that slavery should be done away with there, or that the
seat of government should be removed to some State
where slavery does not exist. I am disposed to think
that Congress would do wrong in doing away with slavery
in the District without the consent of the inhabitants.
But it has a right to say to them,—“Consent to eman-
cipate, or we leave you.” And if this alternative
were proposed, there is little doubt but that they would
consent.
We have a good deal to do with slavery. We sup-
port it indirectly throughout the South. It is the
strength of the Union which supports slavery, not the
strength of the South. It is the power of the free States
which upholds this system. If the Union between the
free and slave States were dissolved, slavery could not
last ten years. This is a thesis easy to prove, though I
have no room here to argue it.
Again, by the clause in the Constitution which declares
that the slave, escaping North, shall be given up to his
Southern master, Massachusetts becomes a hunting-
ground for the South. She is not wholly a free State,-
not so free as Canada. The soil of Canada cannot tol-
erate the presence of a slave ; the soil of New England
The Southern bondman, flying North, and enter-
ing the limits of New England, is still a bondman. When
he has passed through New England and crossed the
Canada boundary, he has ceased to be a slave. His
chains have fallen off from him. Slavery, then, can
and does exist on our soil. So long as this compact ex-
ists let us not nullify it. I abhor nullification under all
its forms. Were we indeed to pass laws forbidding an
escaped slave to be given up, we should no more nullify
the Constitution than several Southern States have done,
can.

17
in passing laws by which a free colored citizen of the
North, entering their borders, becomes thereby liable to
be imprisoned and to be sold into perpetual slavery.*
For the same section and article which requires bond-
men to be given up to their owners, declares that “the
citizens of each State shall be entitled to all privileges
and immunities of citizens in the several States.”+ Nev-
ertheless, we are not to infringe the Constitution because
the South infringes it. But have we nothing to do with
slavery, while these laws remain ? We ought not to cease
our efforts, wisely and earnestly conducted, for the aboli-
tion of slavery, till it can be said of New England, as it
could long ago be said of Old England, that a slave's foot
cannot tread her soil, a slave's breath taint her air. “No
matter in what language his doom may have been pro-
nounced, no matter what complexion incompatible with
freedom, an Indian or African sun may have burned
The moment his foot touches the sacred
soil of Britain, the altar and the god sink together in the
dust. His soul walks abroad in her original majesty.
His body swells beyond the reach of the chains which
fall from around him, and he stands redeemed, regenera-
ted, and disenthralled by the irresistible spirit of Univer-
sal Emancipation.”I
But we ought to take higher ground. Have we noth-
ing to do with slavery? Are we, then, Christians ? Is
not our neighbor the suffering man, at the pole or be-
neath the equator ? Ought we not to love him as our-
selves. Shall Mason and Dixon's line be an insurmount-
able barrier to our Christian sympathies ? Shall we send
missionaries to Africa or India, and help to Poland and
upon him.
* Laws of South Carolina and Louisiana; perhaps others.
+ Constitution of the United States, Art. IV, sect. 2.
† Curran.
2*

18
Greece, and think nothing of the poor slave in Georgia
and Missouri ? Or is political freedom so much more
valuable a possession than personal, that it becomes a
duty to interfere on behalf of a nation which is taxed
without being represented, but criminal to interfere on
behalf of a man, who is made a chattel, and despoiled of
all his rights?
2
OBJECTION 2. “But you can do nothing. The
North cannot do anything for the slave. We cannot ap-
proach him. And if we could, the system is too deeply
rooted, and too extensive to be overthrown by human
efforts. We must leave it to the Providence of God.”
The system of slavery is a deep-rooted and widely-
spread system, but if this is an argument for not opposing
it, it is one which would have prevented every great
reform which has ever taken place from being attempted.
The British slave trade was a deeply-rooted and wide-
spread system, and resisted for years the efforts of those
who contended against it. But it was at last overthrown.
The Roman Catholic church was wide spread and deeply
rooted when Luther seceded from it. But the Reforma-
tion has shorn it of its strength. Once all Europe held
slaves; but now slavery is almost extinct on its soil.
Paganism and Judaism were deeply-rooted and wide-
spread systems when the Apostles began to preach a
Master who had been publicly executed by a felon's
death. But in less than three hundred years a Christian
emperor sat on the throne of the world.
When we consider slavery as a whole, and think that
there are two millions and a half of slaves, valued at
twelve hundred millions of dollars, in the United States,
and that twelve states are slaveholding, the evil seems
very great, and it seems almost in vain to attempt oppo-
sing it. But when we look at it in detail, many circum-

19
Some of them
stances appear of an encouraging nature.
are as follows.
1. By accurate calculations it appears that there are
not more than 200,000 slaveholders in the United States.
That is, not more than 1 in 12 of the free inhabitants of
the slave states is a slaveholder. In some states not
more than one in three of the legal voters is a slaveholder.
Non-slaveholders in the South, must, from their very po-
sition, be opposed to slavery. Slavery constitutes an
aristocracy from which they are excluded. Farmers or
mechanics, who do not own slaves, are thus the natural
enemies of the system. This is particularly the case
wherever slaves are taught the mechanic arts, and thus
come in competition with the free laborers. From these
causes there is a strong under current of opposition to the
system throughout the South. It is seldom heard of, be-
cause the
organs of expression are in the hands of the
slaveholders. These are rich, have leisure, are united
by a common interest, and can devote themselves to
strengthening their position, and opposing all utterance of
anti-slavery sentiments. But their real weakness is bet-
ter understood at the South, than it is here.
2. There are many regions of the South where sla-
very hardly exists. Throughout the extensive mountain
region, which stretches through the middle of Virginia,
through North and South Carolina, and into Georgia,
there are comparatively few slaves. The mountains are
always the home of freedom. East Tennessee has so few
slaves, that attempts have been made to constitute a free
state out of her.
horob boom
3. The last census shows that slavery is steadily di-
minishing in the Northern slave states, that is, in Mary-

20
land, Virginia, Kentucky, North Carolina and Missouri.
The natural course of things is driving slavery South.
ests.
4. There is every probability that in a few years
Kentucky, Maryland and Virginia will emancipate their
slaves and secede from the ranks of slavery. I have
heard the most distinguished men in Kentucky say that
when a convention is called in that state to alter the con-
stitution, slavery is gone. I have heard them say that
when that time comes they will take the stump through
the state to argue against the system. Of this disposition
in Kentucky the South Carolina school, who contend for
the perpetuity of slavery, are well aware, and have re-
peatedly endeavored to bend the state to Southern inter-
This was undoubtedly one object of the Charles-
ton and Ohio railroad, which failed; of the railroad Bank,
which was to be established in Kentucky, with directors
in South Carolina, and which could not obtain a charter
from the Kentucky legislature, notwithstanding the most
strenuous efforts.
This was the object of the desperate
struggle made a year or two since to induce the Kentucky
legislature to repeal the law prohibiting the importation of
slaves for sale into the state, a struggle which was also
unsuccessful, and during which, speeches were made, and
pamphlets published by T. F. Marshall, Cassius M. Clay,
Robert I. Breckenridge and others, which breathed a
Northern spirit of freedom.
These, and other facts, show that there are natural
causes at work, under Providence, which indicate very
certainly that slavery in the United States must terminate
sooner or later. But they do not authorize us to say
that its termination may be left to be brought about by
these influences, and that therefore we need do nothing.
For there will always be a determined opposition made
to every movement towards emancipation in the South,

21
and to resist this, moral convictions are needed, and the
influence of a sound public opinion at the North. Much
can, and must be done by the friends of freedom every-
where to pour light into the intricacies of this subject,
and to awaken the moral sentiment concerning it. And
however we may differ from some of the sentiments and
some parts of the course pursued by abolitionists, they
deserve the credit of having been the first effectually to
call the public mind to the earnest consideration of this
great subject.
OBJECTION 3. “But the blacks cannot take care of
themselves."
Many of them cannot, and such ought not to be imme-
diately emancipated. But that the majority cannot, or
that a very large minority cannot, is not correct. The
following facts are evidence enough of this. In all the
southern cities, there are a large proportion of slaves who
hire their own time from their masters, i. e. hire themselves,
and pay so much a week. The women pay from one to
two dollars a week, which they earn by washing, and in
other
ways; the men from two to three dollars a week,
which they earn by driving carriages, and drays, and like
employments. Now if a slave can support himself, when
he has to pay so much to his master, (for they support
themselves beside), it is clear that he can support himself
where he has not to pay this. Nor are these chosen or
selected servants, but merely those whose masters happen
to live in the city. Dollar
66
OBJECTION 4. They do not wish to be free. They
are very happy as they are.”
they are.” or uns bons
So they are, sometimes. Undoubtedly they are often
satisfied with their lot. But not generally. I have gen-
erally found, on conversing with them, a strong desire for

22
freedom deeply seated in their breasts. If they do not
desire freedom, why are the southern newspapers con-
stantly filled with advertisements of runaway negroes, and
constantly decorated with a series of embellishments rep-
resenting a black man, with a bundle on his shoulder,
running ? Why these rigorous laws against every ship
and captain who shall assist a slave in escaping ? Why
all this jealousy of the abolitionists? The slaves do ar-
dently desire freedom—they would not be men did they
not. They have, to be sure, vague ideas of what it is.
Many are disappointed with it when they get it. But on
the whole they would be much happier as freemen than
they can be as slaves. They would have to work harder
and fare more poorly perhaps than they do now; but
what then ? they would be working for themselves and for
their children, and hope would lighten their toil, and a
sense of independence strengthen them in their labor.
OBJECTION 5. “But they are not intended to he
free. They are an inferior race. ."
I shall not soon forget the answer once made to this
suggestion by a Kentuckian. I was once visited, when I
resided in Louisville, by a young man from Boston who
had been bred up here under highly conservative influ-
ences, and who thought slavery an excellent institution,
and all kinds of anti-slavery movements terrible fanati-
cisms. We took a ride together in the country. The
first place where we stopped, he entered into conversation
with the lady of the house, a woman of remarkable talents,
and possessing the fluency and readiness native to Ken-
tuckians. Being among slaveholders my friend thought
it a good time to bring out his pro-slavery sentiments.
But he was soon interrupted : “We cannot agree with
you,” said the lady ; "it will not do for you to attempt
to persuade us of the advantages of slavery. Our family

23
on both sides are all abolitionists. Anti-slavery senti-
ments are not new with the M.'s and B.'s." After this
we rode on and came to the farm of the gentleman of
whom I spoke before. My Boston friend thought he
could not be so unlucky a second time, especially as he
saw clusters of negro houses as we rode up the long
avenue which led to the house. So in conversation he
presently began to say that “slavery was not so bad a
thing as it was represented at the North.” “Perhaps
not,” replied the slaveholder, “but we find it bad
enough.” “But at any rate,” continued the Northern-
er,
- the blacks are not fit to be free. They have not
intelligence enough to bear freedom. They are an infe-
rior race.” “My friend,” replied the Kentuckian, “I
could select from the men on my farm, seven, each of
whom would do to go to the Kentucky legislature, and
each of them has as much sense and knowledge as the
majority of the representatives there."
I felt ashamed of my Massachusetts friend, and proud
of my Kentucky friend. For it is perhaps natural, cer-
tainly excusable, for one born at the South to be blind
to the evils of the system, though it is noble when he
rises above the influences of his situation, and is willing to
acknowledge them. But it always seemed to me the
part of a traitor, for a Northerner to become their apolo-
gist. I can excuse a Southerner who defends this sys-
tem, though I reverence and love him if he has moral
strength enough to see its evils, and the moral courage to
confess its injustice. But false in heart, and mean in
soul must be the man, who, having trod in childhood and
youth the free soil of the North, afterward becomes at
the South the defender of slavery.
It is a mistake to speak of the African as an infe-
rior race to the Caucasian. It is doubtless different
from this, just as this is also different from the Malay,

24
the Indian, the Mongolian. There are many varieties in
the human family. The Englishman, Welshman, Scotch-
man and Irishman are organically different—so are the
Pawnee, the Mandan and the Winnebago Indians. But
it will not do to say now that the African is inferior-he
never has been tried. In some faculties he probably is
inferior—in others probably superior. The colored man
has not so much invention as the white, but more imita-
tion. He has not so much of the reflective, but more of
the perceptive powers. The black child will learn to
read and write as fast or faster than the white child, having
equal advantages. The blacks have not the indomitable
perseverance and will, which make the Caucasian, at
least the Saxon portion of it, masters wherever they
go—but they have a native courtesy, a civility like that
from which the word “gentleman” has its etymological
meaning, and a capacity for the highest refinement of
character. More than all, they have almost universally, a
strong religious tendency, and that strength of attachment
which is capable of any kind of self-denial, and self-sac-
rifice. Is this an inferior race—so inferior as to be only
fit for chains ?
What then is our duty ? We ought to remember the
bond as bound with them. In our thoughts and our
prayers remember them. We ought to make our legis-
lators and those who wish for office remember them.
We ought to spread the conviction that public men, if
they would gain the favor of the community, must rise
above mere party questions, and look at the moral bear-
ings and influences of measures. We should make
those whom we send to Congress feel that if they suffer
the encroachments of slave power, that if they do not
manfully uphold the rights of the North, we shall hold
them faithless and recreant, unworthy to have been born
on the hills of New England. We ought to watch them.

25
We leave these matters too much to a few professed
party politicians.
What is needed more than anything else now, on this,
and many other subjects, is a class of independent men-
who will not go all lengths with any party--who will
govern themselves by conscience-who will not join the
abolitionists in their denunciations and their violence, nor
join the South in their defence of slavery—who can be
temperate without being indifferent—who can be mod-
erate and zealous also—who can make themselves felt as a
third power, holding the balance between violent parties,
and compelling both to greater moderation and justice.
We can each of us, in our own private and humble sphere,
inform ourselves on this and the like great questions, en-
deavor to inform others, and so create by degrees that
mighty power,—a sound and just public opinion, before
which
every abuse must at last go down. We can be
willing to hear, to judge, to think. We can avoid the
fanaticism of the North and of the South. We can op-
pose to the violence and passion of southern blood, the
sterner and more awful face of conscience. We can re-
buke every man who truckles or bows to slavery, or who
voluntarily offers himself as its instrument—rebuke him
by refusing him our countenance or support as long as he
shows this disposition. Finally, feeling that the Lord
reigns, and that no evil can triumph forever, we can
calmly look to him for aid, and rely on his Providence,
yet doing ourselves also, whatever our hand finds to do-
working while the day lasts, knowing that the night com-
eth when no man can work.

ma nodou
Bloot wodoon
1843
Clarke, James Freeman
un,
ca
cole. & ole
6-10-65
74045