A Visit to the United States in 1841 Part 11

[Footnote A: "American Slavery as it is," page 187.]

The dest.i.tution of the means of moral and religious improvement is in like manner very great. A recent number of the "Monthly Extracts from the correspondence of the American Bible Society," contains the following extract from the 28th annual report of the Virginia Bible Society: "The sub-sheriff of one of our Western Counties stated the following fact to your agent. A jury was to be empannelled in a remote settlement of this country--he happened to have left his home without a Bible--there was no Bible in the house where the jury was to sit, and the sheriff travelled fourteen miles calling at every house, before he found a Bible. Pious surveyors stated to your agent that they had traversed every settlement in a remote section of one or two of our south western counties, that they had frequently inquired among the settlers for a Bible, but had never seen or heard of one in a region, say sixty miles by fifty."

There are few things more striking in the free States than the number and commodiousness of the places of wors.h.i.+p. In the New England States, however general the attendance might be, none would be excluded for want of room. The other means or accompaniments of religious instruction are in the same abundance. How is it possible to evade the conclusion that Christianity flourishes most, when it is unenc.u.mbered and uncorrupted by state patronage? What favored portion of the United Kingdom could compare its religious statistics with New England?

Religion and morality, viewed on the broad scale, are cause and effect--a remark which is fully borne out in the Northern States, and in no instance more remarkably exemplified than in the spread of temperance. A few years ago the consumption of ardent spirits, and other intoxicating drinks, was as general as in England, and the effects even more conspicuous and debasing. It is now very rare, in the free States, to see a drunken person, even in the most populous cities. At the large hotels, as far as my observation extended, it is the exception, not the rule, to take any spirituous or fermented beverage at or after dinner; and no case of inebriety came under my notice in any of these establishments. I have already remarked, that some of the first hotels in the princ.i.p.al cities are established on the strictest temperance principles. I believe, in private hospitality, intoxicating drinks are, in like manner, very much discarded. At the tables of members of the Society of Friends, it is very rare to see either wine or malt liquor introduced; while, as already noticed, the selling, using, or giving ardent spirits is so great an offence as to be made the subject of church discipline. This is, by no means, one of the "peculiarities" of "Friends," as I believe it may be generally stated that the same practices, in most other Christian communities, would be considered as quite incompatible with a profession of religion.

The effects of this great reformation are not confined to the United States, although the change hitherto has been much more gradual in my native country; not so, however, in Ireland, now, by a happy reverse, a scene of light and promise, amidst surrounding gloom and depression. Of the American facts I have to record, connected with the temperance movement, the most grateful is the striking contrast that is exhibited in the Irish emigrants. By the divine blessing on Theobald Mathew's benevolent labors, they have generally forsaken their besetting sin of drunkenness in their native land, and if compelled to seek the means of subsistence in another country, they now at least do not carry with them habits that tend irresistibly to dest.i.tution and degradation. The Irish movement is likewise re-acting most beneficially on the native Irish, who have long been settled in America, and who are joining the total abstinence societies in great number, though hitherto the most intemperate part of the community.

In short, whether I consider the religious, the benevolent, or the literary inst.i.tutions of the Northern States--whether I contemplate the beauty of their cities, or the general aspect of their fine country, in which nature every where is seen rendering her rich and free tribute to industry and skill--or whether I regard the general comfort and prosperity of the laboring population,--my admiration is strongly excited, and, to do justice to my feelings, must be strongly expressed.

Probably there is no country where the means of temporal happiness are so generally diffused, notwithstanding the constant flow of emigrants from the old world; and, I believe there is no country where the means of religious and moral improvement are so abundantly provided--where facilities of education are more within the reach of all--or where there is less of extreme poverty and dest.i.tution.

As morals have an intimate connection with politics, I do not think it out of place here to record my conviction, that the great principle of popular control, which is carried out almost to its full extent in the free states, is not only beautiful in theory, but that it is found to work well in practice. It is true that disgraceful scenes of mob violence and lynch-law have occurred; but perhaps not more frequently than popular outbreaks in Great Britain; while, generally, the supremacy of law and order have been restored, without troops, or special commissions, or capital punishments. It is also true, that these occurrences are, for the most part, directly traceable, not to the celebrated declaration of the equal and inalienable right of all men to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, which is the fundamental principle of the const.i.tution; but to the flagrant violation of that principle in the persons of the colored population, of whom those in most of the free states are actually or virtually deprived of political rights; and the rest, const.i.tuting a majority of the population in some of the Southern States, are held in abject slavery. The corruptions and disorders that obscure the bright example of the American people, and detract from the estimation in which their inst.i.tutions and policy would otherwise be held, generally spring from this source. So long as slavery and distinction of color exist, America will always be pointed at with the finger of scorn, for her flagrant violation of all truth and consistency. But let us not forget that this odious inst.i.tution is the disgraceful legacy of a monarchy--that it is no necessary effect of republican inst.i.tutions, but the reverse. Our quarrel, therefore, is not with the declaration of rights, but that this celebrated declaration should be regarded, in the instance of one cla.s.s in the community, as a mere rhetorical flourish, and should thus be deprived of its legitimate practical effect.

The great feature of the political arrangements of the free States is, the absence of the aristocratic element. A pure despotism in the hands of one man has seldom been seen, except in the instances of those renowned military chiefs, whom a retributive Providence has at intervals employed as the scourge of guilty nations. An aristocracy under various forms and names, has usually been the governing power, and as the too frequent result, laws have been made and administered for the benefit of the few, and not for the many. Yet the United States of North America exhibit, however, notwithstanding their political theory to the contrary, an aristocracy of the worst kind, _an aristocracy of color_; in the free States of the many against the few, in affirming these to be a degraded race, as long as African blood runs in their veins; and in the slave States, for a no better reason, reducing them even when they are the majority; to the condition of brute beasts, to be held and sold as goods and chattels. And this leads me to observe that the writer who mistakes the general government of the confederacy, with its limited scope and powers, for the chief source of laws and administration in the separate States will unavoidably present a confused and distorted representation of existing facts. Each State const.i.tutes within itself a distinct republic, virtually independent of the general government, so long as its legislation does not conflict with the specific articles of the const.i.tutional compact; all the rights and powers of sovereignty, not specifically delegated to the Government in that instrument, being retained by the States. Hence nothing can present a wider contrast than the slavery-blackened code of South Carolina, and the statutes of Ma.s.sachusetts, characterized by republican simplicity and equality.

The preceding observations in favor of the democratic inst.i.tutions of the northern States, are therefore to be understood as of local application; and I would explicitly admit that a well-ordered and a well-working government on such principles must in a great measure depend upon the amount of virtue and intelligence in the community: but while a government which is based upon the principles of impartial justice requires a virtuous people properly to administer it, it has, I believe, within itself one of the most powerful elements for the formation of such a community.

On the subject of peace my inquiries elicited an almost uniformly favorable response. If we except those who would encourage the war spirit, from hopes of sharing in the plunder, or those to whom it would open up the path to distinction and emolument, there are comparatively few who do not desire the maintenance of peace. In the religious part of the community, there is a rapidly spreading conviction of the unchristian character of war, in every shape; and the President, in his late message to Congress, in stating that "the time ought to be regarded as having gone by when a resort to arms is to be esteemed as the only proper arbiter of national differences", has expressed the sentiments of the great bulk of the intelligent citizens of the United States. I believe also that the majority would be found willing to a.s.sent to any reasonable and practical measure that should preclude the probability of an appeal to arms, or of keeping up what are absurdly called "peace establishments" of standing armies and appointed fleets for the protection of national safety or honor. The late excitements on the Boundary and McLeod questions were confined to comparatively few of the population, and the report of them was magnified by distance.

But a far stronger guaranty for the permanence of international peace than any treaties, will be found in the interchange of mutual benefits by commerce. For this reason he who is successful in promoting a free and unchecked commerce, is the benefactor, not of his own country alone, but of the world at large. There are few countries where in practice free trade is more fully carried out than in the United States, but in theory the true doctrine of this subject is only in part adopted by her statesmen and leading minds. They are willing to trade on equal terms, but will meet prohibition with prohibition. Here undoubtedly they mistake their real interests, but though such a policy will not advance the prosperity of America, it will inflict tremendous and lasting injury on Great Britain. Whatever the event, _we_ cannot complain. The terms offered by the United States, though not wise, on an enlarged view of her own interests, are yet _reciprocal_, and therefore fair between nation and nation. If, however, I possessed any influence with the enlightened citizens of North America, I should be in no common degree anxious to exert it against those false views of trade and commerce which distort alike the maxims and the policy of her rulers. Their manufactures flourish, not in consequence of protection, but in defiance of it. With such an extended coast, and such facilities of internal communication, prohibition is impossible. The manufactures of England are excluded, not by the revenue laws of the States, but by the corn laws of Great Britain, which forbid the British manufacturer to take in exchange the only article of value his American customer has to spare; a prohibition which, unhappily for the people of this country, our government has power to enforce. The prohibitory system is, to a great extent, impracticable in the United States; and just so far as it should be found practicable, it would prove injurious, by creating fict.i.tious and dependent interests, which, in the course of time, would become insupportably burdensome to the commonwealth, and eventually would have to be relinquished at the cost of a fearful amount of individual distress and national suffering. Legitimate commerce is that department of the national welfare, in which it is the business of statesmans.h.i.+p to do nothing but remove the impediments of its own creating in past times.

In all other respects, commercial legislation is a nuisance; and if under some circ.u.mstances trade is found to flourish concurrently with such interference, the fact is due either to the restrictions and regulations being practically inoperative, or more frequently, to the high profits arising from unexhausted resources, in the absence of compet.i.tion, enabling commerce to advance in spite of impediments; in the same way as cultivation by slave labor, notwithstanding its expensiveness and inordinate waste, enables the first planter on a virgin soil, and with an open market for his produce, to roll in his carriage, though beggary is to be the fate of the second or third generation of his descendants.

In giving the preceding representation of the religious, the moral, and the intellectual elevation of the population of the Northern States of the Union, I have indicated the source we must look to for the abolition of slavery, to which it is now time to turn our attention, for no American question can be discussed, into which this important subject does not largely enter.

Light and darkness, truth and falsehood, are not more in opposition than Christianity and slavery. If the religion that is professed in the free States be not wholly a dead letter,--if the moral and intellectual light which they appear to enjoy be indeed light, and not darkness,--then the abolition of slavery is certain, and cannot be long delayed. In order to make this apparent, as well as to vindicate my own proceedings in the United States, it is inc.u.mbent on me to show, that the great contest, for the abolition of American slavery, is to be decided in the _free_ States, by the power of public opinion. I have distinctly admitted, that the confederated republics have each their independent sovereignty.

Neither the free States, nor the general Government, can perhaps const.i.tutionally abolish slavery in any one of the existing slave States. Yet there are certain objects clearly within the limits of the const.i.tutional power of the general Government, such as the suppression of the internal slave-trade, and the abolition of slavery in the district of Columbia, for which it is undeniably lawful and const.i.tutional for every American citizen to strive; and the attainment of which would suffice to cripple, and ultimately destroy slavery in every part of the Union. The slave-holding power is so sensible of this, that all its united strength is employed to retain that control over the general Government, which it has exercised from the date of the independence, and never more despotically than at the present time.

Amidst the difficulties which beset, and the dangers which threatened the country, at the period of the formation of the const.i.tution, the southern States dictated such a compromise as they thought fit; and, with the great principles of liberty paraded on the face of the declaration of independence, came into the Union on the express understanding that those principles should be perpetually violated in their favor. Of the details of this compromise, by far the most important, and one which has mainly contributed to consolidate the political supremacy of the south, is the invest.i.ture of the slave masters with political rights, in proportion to the amount of their slave property. Every five slaves confer three votes on their owner; though, in other points of view, a slave is a mere chattel--an article of property and merchandize,--yet, in this instance, and in _criminal proceedings against him_, his _personality_ is recognized, for the express object of adding to the weight of his chains, and increasing the power of his oppressor.

The North, in voting away the rights and freedom of the laboring population of the South, surrendered its own liberty. The haughty slave-holding masters of the great confederacy have from the beginning chosen the Presidents, and the high officers of state, and have controlled the policy of the Government, from a question of peace or war, to the establishment of a tariff or a bank. In the executive department they have dictated all appointments, from a letter-carrier to an amba.s.sador; an amusing ill.u.s.tration of which I find in my recent correspondence. A late member of the Ma.s.sachusetts legislature, writes on the Eighth Month (August) 26, 1841:

"One instance of the all-pervading _espionage_ of the slave power I may mention. The newly appointed postmaster of Philadelphia employed, among his numerous clerks and letter-carriers, Joshua Coffin, who, some three years ago, aided in restoring to liberty a free colored citizen of New York, who had been kidnapped and sold into slavery. The appointment of the postmaster not being confirmed, he wrote to his friends in Congress to inquire the reason, and was told that the delay was occasioned by the fact that he had employed Coffin as one of his letter-carriers! Coffin was immediately dismissed, and the senate in a few days confirmed the appointment! Is not this a pitiful business?"

If the reader, who wishes further information, will consult William Jay's work, ent.i.tled "A View of the Action of the Federal Government in behalf of Slavery," he will find ample historical proof that the internal and external administration of the Union--legislative, executive, and diplomatic--has been employed, without any deviation from consistency, to subserve the interests of the slave-holding States. Yet these States are, in population, numerically weaker than those of the North, and inferior, to a far greater degree, in wealth, intelligence, and the other elements of political power. They are strong only in the compactness of their union, while the citizens of the free States are divided in interest and opinion. Here, then, is presented a distinct and legitimate object for those of the abolitionists who regard their political rights as a trust for the benefit of the oppressed and helpless, to combine the scattered and divided power of the North into a united phalanx, which shall wrest the administration of the Federal Union from the slave-holding interest, and shall purify the general Government from the contamination of slavery, by reversing its general policy on that subject, and by the adoption of the specific measures before mentioned; while, in the States in which they respectively reside, the abolitionists feel it to be their duty to exert themselves, to wipe away from the statute book every vestige of that barbarism which makes political, civil, or religious rights depend upon the color of the skin.

Yet more important is it, however, to bring the moral force of the North to bear against slavery, by reforming the prevailing public sentiment of the religious, moral, and intelligent portion of the community. Here again, one of the most sagacious leaders of the pro-slavery party, J.C.

Calhoun, has descried the danger from afar, and has publicly proclaimed it in the senate of the United States, by vehemently deprecating the anti-slavery proceedings, not as intended to provoke the slaves to a servile war, but as a crusade against the _character_ of the slave-holders.

Although the different States are distinct governments, their geographical boundaries are mere lines upon the map; their inhabitants speak the same language, and enjoy a communion of citizens.h.i.+p all over the Union. The North Eastern States have by far the greater part of the whole commerce of the Union, and are the medium through which the planter exchanges his cotton for provisions and clothing for his slaves, implements for his agriculture, and his own family supplies. These commercial ties create a direct and extensive pro-slavery interest in the North. Again, the planter is yet more dependent on the North for education for his children, and for the gratification of his own intellectual wants, as the slave-holding region has few colleges, and those of secondary reputation; while I believe it has no periodical of higher pretension than the political newspapers. The pro-slavery re-action in this way, on the seminaries of the North, and on the literature of the United States, is most sensibly felt.

Another powerful cause that contributes to leaven the entire population into one mind on the subject of slavery, is the double migration that annually takes place of people of the Southern States to the North, in summer, and of the inhabitants of the free States to the South in winter. Hence follow family alliances, the interchange of hospitalities, and a fusion of sentiments, so that the slavery interest spreads its countless ramifications through every corner of the free north.

Another cause, and perhaps the most powerful of all, is the community of religious fellows.h.i.+p in leading denominations. The Episcopalians, the Methodists, the Baptists, and the Presbyterians of two schools, are severally but one body, all over the Union, and as a matter of course, all are tainted with slavery, and for consistency's sake, make common cause against abolition. The pamphlet of James G. Birney, ent.i.tled "The American Churches the Bulwarks of American Slavery,"[A] offers the amplest proof that the Methodist Episcopal, the Baptist, the Presbyterian, and the Anglican Episcopal Churches are committed, both in the persons of their eminent ministers, and by resolutions pa.s.sed in a church capacity, to the monstrous a.s.sertion that slavery, so far from being a moral evil, which it is the duty of the church to seek to remove, is a Christian inst.i.tution resting on a scriptural basis; this a.s.sertion is repeated in the numerous quotations of the pamphlet, in a variety and force of expression that show the utterers were resolved not to leave their meaning in the smallest doubt. Indeed, it might be supposed, from the perusal of this pamphlet, that the suppression of abolitionism, if not the maintenance of slavery, was one of the first duties of the Christian churches in America.

[Footnote A: Published by Ward & Co., Paternoster-row, London.]

The following extracts are offered in ill.u.s.tration:--

THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH.--"Resolved, That it is the sense of the Georgia Annual Conference, that slavery, as it exists in the United States, _is not a moral evil_."

"The Rev. Wilbur Fisk, D.D., late President of the (Methodist) Wesleyan University in Connecticut--'The New Testament enjoins obedience upon the slave as an obligation _due_ to a present _rightful_ authority.'"

"Rev. E.D. Simms, Professor in Randolph Macon College, a Methodist Inst.i.tution--'Thus we see, that the slavery which exists in America, _was founded in right_.'"

"The Rev. William Winans, of Mississippi, in the General Conference, in 1836--'Yes, sir, Presbyterians, Baptists, Methodists, should be slaveholders,--yes, he repeated it boldly--there should be members, and _deacons_, and ELDERS and BISHOPS, too, who were slave-holders.'"

"The Rev. J.H. Thornwell, at a public meeting, held in South Carolina, supported the following resolution--'That slavery, as it exists in the South, is no evil, and is consistent with the principles of revealed religion; and that all opposition to it arises from a misguided and fiendish fanaticism, which we are bound to resist in the very threshold.'"

"Rev. Mr. Crowder, of Virginia, at the Annual Conference in Baltimore, 1840--'In its _moral_ aspect, slavery was not only countenanced, permitted, and regulated by the Bible, but it was positively _inst.i.tuted_ by G.o.d HIMSELF--he had, in so many words, ENJOINED IT.'"

THE BAPTIST CHURCH--"Memorial of the Charleston Baptist a.s.sociation, to the Legislature of South Carolina:

"'_The right of masters to dispose of the time of their slaves has been distinctly recognized by the Creator of all things_, who is surely at liberty to vest the right of property over any object in whomsoever he pleases.'"

"Rev. R. Furman, D.D., of South Carolina--'The right of holding slaves is clearly established in the Holy Scriptures, both by precept and example.'"

"The late Rev. Lucius Bolles, D.D., of Ma.s.sachusetts, Cor. Sec.

Am. Bap. Board for Foreign Missions, (1834.)--'There is a pleasing degree of union among the multiplying thousands of Baptists throughout the land.... Our Southern brethren are generally, both ministers and people, slave-holders.'"

PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH.--"Resolution of Charleston Union Presbytery--'That, in the opinion of this Presbytery, the holding of slaves, so far from being a SIN in the sight of G.o.d, is no where condemned in his holy word.'"

"Rev. Thomas S. Witherspoon, of Alabama, writing to the Editor of the _Emanc.i.p.ator_, says--'I draw my warrant from the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament, to hold the slave in bondage. The principle of holding the heathen in bondage is recognized by G.o.d.... When the tardy process of the law is too long in redressing our grievances, we of the South have adopted the summary remedy of Judge Lynch--and really, I think it one of the most wholesome and salutary remedies for the malady of Northern fanaticism, that can be applied.'"

"Rev. Robert N. Anderson, of Virginia--'Now _dear Christian brethren_, I humbly express it as my earnest wish, that you _quit yourselves like men_. If there be any stray goat of a minister among you, tainted with the bloodhound principles of abolitionism, let him be ferreted out, silenced, excommunicated, and left to the _public to dispose of him in other respects_.'"

THE PROTESTANT EPISCOPAL CHURCH.--"John Jay, himself an Episcopalian--'She has not merely remained a mute and careless spectator of this great conflict of truth and justice with hypocrisy and cruelty, but her very _priests and deacons may be seen ministering at the altar of slavery_, offering their talents and influence at its unholy shrine, and openly repeating the awful blasphemy, _that the precepts of our Savior sanction the system of American slavery_.'"

In page 25 is the following:--

"The Rev. James Smylie, A.M., of the Amite Presbytery, Mississippi, in a pamphlet, published by him a short time ago, _in favor_ of American slavery, says:--'If slavery be a sin, and advertising and apprehending slaves, with a view to restore them to their masters, is a direct violation of the Divine law; and if _the buying, selling, or holding a slave, for the sake of gain_, is a heinous sin and scandal; then, verily, _three-fourths of all the Episcopalians, Methodists, Baptists_, and _Presbyterians_, in _eleven States of the Union_, are of the devil. They 'hold,' if they do not buy and sell slaves, and, _with few exceptions_, they hesitate not to 'apprehend and restore' runaway slaves, when in their power.'"

Yet, in the face of evidence so overwhelming as this, showing how the whole moral atmosphere of the Northern States is tainted with pro-slavery corruption, the abolitionists are frequently taunted with the question, what has the North to do with slavery? It is, however, a part of their vocation to bear contempt and reproach. They know they are at the right end of the lever, though at some apparent distance from the object to be moved. _Their mission is to correct public opinion in the free States_. Let us suppose, for a moment, this object attained--the whole slave-holding portion of the churches cut off, as a diseased and corrupt excrescence; the national literature purified, and the entire community pervaded by sound Christian feeling--a feeling which should abhor all partic.i.p.ation, in word or deed, with the guilt of slavery; and how could the South maintain, for a single day, the perpetual warfare, which would be thus waged against her from without, and seconded by alarmed consciences in her own citadel?

The rise of the present abolition movement dates from the year 1832, when a few persons met at Philadelphia, and adopted and signed a declaration of their sentiments. He, however, who would trace anti-slavery sentiments to their source, must go back to the first era of Christianity, and to the authoritative promulgation of the Divine law of love by the lips of the Savior of mankind himself. In the darkest times, since that period, the true doctrine of the unlawfulness of slavery has never been wholly lost, being in fact a part of the imperishable substance of vital Christianity.

From 1832 until the division referred to in an early portion of this work, the anti-slavery societies multiplied with extraordinary rapidity.

The following account of the present state of the cause is furnished by my friend, John G. Whittier.

"He who, at the present time, judges of the progress of the anti-slavery cause in the United States, by statistics of the formation of new societies, or the activity and efficiency of the old, will obtain no adequate idea of the truth. The unfortunate divisions among the American abolitionists, and, the difficulty of uniting, for any continuous effort, those who differ widely as to the proper means to be used, and measures to be pursued, have, in a great measure, changed the direction and manifestation of anti-slavery feeling and action. Thus, while public opinion, in all the free States, is manifestly approximating to abolition, and new converts to its principles are daily avowing themselves, it is exceedingly rare to hear of the formation of a new anti-slavery society, and there are few accessions to those which are already in existence. Yet the fresh recipients of the truths of anti-slavery doctrine find abundant work for their hands to do, even without the pale of organized societies, in purifying the churches with which they are connected, and in counteracting the pro-slavery politics of the country.