Cotton is King, and Pro-Slavery Arguments Part 36

It was by casting his eyes over "our Southern region" that Dr. Channing concluded "that we are holding in bondage one of the best races of the human family." If he had cast them over the appallingly dark region of Africa, he would have been compelled, in spite of the wonder-working power of his imagination, to p.r.o.nounce it one of the very worst and most degraded races upon earth. If, as he imagines, this race among us is now nearer to the kingdom of heaven than we ourselves are, how dare he a.s.sert--as he so often has done--that our slavery has "degraded them into brutes?" If, indeed, they had not been elevated--both physically and morally--by their servitude in America, it would have been beyond the power of even Dr. Channing to p.r.o.nounce such a eulogy upon them. We say, then, that he knew better when he a.s.serted that we have degraded them into brutes. He spoke, not from his better knowledge and his conscience, but from blind, unreflecting pa.s.sion. For he knew--if he knew any thing--that the blacks have been elevated and improved by their contact with the whites of this enlightened portion of the globe.

The truth is, the abolitionist can make the slave a brute or a saint, just as it may happen to suit the exigency of his argument. If slavery degrades its subjects into brutes, then one would suppose that slaves are brutes. But the moment you speak of selling a slave, he is no longer a brute,--he is a civilized man, with all the most tender affections, with all the most generous emotions. If the object be to excite indignation against slavery, then it always transforms its subjects into brutes; but if it be to excite indignation against the slaveholder, then he holds, not brutes, but a George Harris--or an Eliza--or an Uncle Tom--in bondage. Any thing, and every thing, except fair and impartial statement, are the materials with which he works.

No fact is plainer than that the blacks have been elevated and improved by their servitude in this country. We cannot possibly conceive, indeed, how Divine Providence could have placed them in a better school of correction. If the abolitionists can conceive a better method for their enlightenment and religious improvement, we should rejoice to see them carry their plan into execution. They need not seek to rend asunder our Union, on account of the three millions of blacks among us, while there are fifty millions of the same race on the continent of Africa, calling aloud for their sympathy, and appealing to their Christian benevolence.

Let them look to that continent. Let them rouse the real, active, self-sacrificing benevolence of the whole Christian world in behalf of that most degraded portion of the human family; and, after all, if they will show us on the continent of Africa, or elsewhere, three millions of blacks in as good a condition--physically and morally--as our slaves, then will we most cheerfully admit that all other Christian nations, combined, have accomplished as much for the African race, as has been done by the Southern States of the Union.

FOOTNOTES:

[175] Life of Joseph John Gurney, vol. ii. p. 214.

[176] Bigelow's Notes on Jamaica in 1850, as quoted in Carey's "Slave Trade, Foreign and Domestic."

[177] Quoted by Mr. Carey.

[178] Carey's Slave Trade.

[179] "The West Indies and North America," by Robt. Baird, A. M., p.

145.

[180] "The West Indies and North America," by Robt. Baird, A. M., p.

143.

[181] The Corentyne.

[182] East bank of the Berbice River.

[183] West bank of the Berbice River.

[184] West coast of Berbice River.

[185] Quoted in Carey's Slave Trade.

[186] Gurney's Letters on the West Indies.

[187] Ibid.

[188] Ibid.

[189] Dr. Channing.

[190] We moot a higher question: Is he fit for the pulpit,--for that great conservative power by which religion, and morals, and freedom, must be maintained among us? "I do not believe," he declares, in one of his sermons, "the miraculous origin of the Hebrew church, or the Buddhist church, or of the Christian church, nor the miraculous character of Jesus. I take not the Bible for my master--nor yet the church--nor even Jesus of Nazareth for my master. . . . . . He is my best historic ideal of human greatness; not without errors--not without the stain of his times, and I presume, of course, not without sins; for men without sins exist in the dreams of girls." Thus, the truth of all miracles is denied; and the faith of the Christian world, in regard to the sinless character of Jesus, is set down by this very modest _divine_ as the dream of girls! Yet he believes that half a million of men were, by the British act of emanc.i.p.ation, turned from slaves into freemen!

That is to say, he does not believe in the miracles of the gospel; he only believes in the miracles of abolitionism. Hence, we ask, is he fit for the pulpit,--for the sacred desk,--for any holy thing?

[191] See extract, p. 156.

[192] Spirit of Laws, vol. i. book xv. chap. vii.

[193] Spirit of Laws, vol. i. book xv. chap. viii.

[194] The emphasis is ours.

[195] See pages 155, and 159, 160.

[196] See chap. i. -- 2.

[197] Works, vol. v. p. 63.

[198] See chap. i. -- 2.

[199] We have in the above remark done Boston some injustice. For New York has furnished the Robespierre, and Ma.s.sachusetts only the Brissot, of "les Amis des Noirs" in America.

[200] This reply is sometimes attributed to Robespierre and sometimes to Brissot; it is probable that in substance it was made by both of these b.l.o.o.d.y compeers in the cause of abolitionism.

[201] See Alison's History of Europe, vol. ii. p. 241.

[202] Encyclopaedia of Geo. vol. iii. pp. 302, 303.

[203] Prov. x.x.x. 22.

[204] Encyc. of Geo., vol. iii. p. 303. Mackenzie's St. Domingo, vol.

ii. pp. 260, 321.

[205] Franklin's Present State of Hayti, etc., p. 265.

[206] Dr. Channing's Works, vol. v. p. 47.

[207] April No., 1855.

[208] Dr. Channing's Works, vol. vi. p. 50, 51.

CHAPTER V.

THE FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW.

Mr. Seward's Attack on the Const.i.tution of his Country--The Attack of Mr. Sumner on the Const.i.tution of his Country--The Right of Trial by Jury not impaired by the Fugitive Slave Law--The Duty of the Citizen in regard to the Const.i.tution of the United States.

WE have, under our present Union, advanced in prosperity and greatness beyond all former example in the history of nations. We no sooner begin to reason from the past to the future, than we are lost in amazement at the prospect before us. We behold the United States, and that too at no very distant period, the first power among the nations of the earth. But such reasoning is not always to be relied on. Whether, in the present instance, it points to a reality, or to a magnificent dream merely, will of course depend on the wisdom, the integrity, and the moderation, of our rulers.

It cannot be disguised that the Union, with all its unspeakable advantages and blessings, is in danger. It is the Fugitive Slave Law against which the waves of abolitionism have dashed with their utmost force and raged with an almost boundless fury. On the other hand, it is precisely the Fugitive Slave Law--that great const.i.tutional guarantee of our rights--which the people of the South are, as one man, the most inflexibly determined to maintain. We are prepared, and we shall accordingly proceed, to show that, in this fearful conflict, the great leaders of abolitionism--the Chases, the Sewards, and the Sumners, of the day--are waging a fierce, bitter, and relentless warfare against the Const.i.tution of their country.

-- I. _Mr. Seward's attack on the Const.i.tution of his country._

There is one thing which Mr. Seward's reasoning overlooks,--namely, that he has taken an oath to support the Const.i.tution of the United States.