Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1859-03-07 00:00:00

AMERICAN PREJUDICE

OUR trusty and well-beloved cousins on the
other side of the Atlantic have, like ourselves,
many national prejudices. And we are not of
those who would indiscriminately . decry all
national prejudice. When there is discrimination
in the object, propriety in the application, and
moderation in the degree of it, we regard such
prejudice as a virtue ; just as it has been well
observed, that "it must be confessed it is a happy
attachment, which can reconcile the Laplander to
his freezing snows, and the African to his scorch-
ing sun." Prejudice is often an equivocal term,
and may as well mean right opinions taken upon
true, and deeply rooted in the mind, as false and
absurd opinions so derived, and grown into it.
The fact is, then, we must suppose, that there are
good prejudices, as well as bad ones—rational ones
as well as irrational —virtuous as well as vicious.
The merit is, to cherish the one class ; the reproach,
to indulge the other. National prejudices are all,
more or less, of those varied characters ; only in

one nation there may happen sometimes to be a
peculiarity or two, that there may not be in
another. This is particularly the case with the
Americans. For example, there is a striking
peculiarity in their prejudice against the Negro.
And this is not confined to the Slave States, where
it is not difficult to account for it ; but it pervades,
in a greater or less degree, all the Free States
also—it prevails even among the noisiest and most
zealous abolitionists.
A remarkable instance of this is related in one
of the last numbers we have to hand of the New
York newspapers. It is the rejection of—not even
a Negro, it would seem, but only one in whom
there was supposed to be a slight admixture of
Negro blood. It is thus briefly related in the New
York Times,—"May a Negro go to College ?
This question was decided in the negative, a few
days ago, at Schenectady. A young man of sombre
complexion presented himself for admission as a
student of Union College. His colour was in fact
so shadowy that it was thought he must be a
mulatto, or at the very least a quadroon. This
being taken for granted, the practical inquiry
arose as to his admission. The authorities of the
Institution did not choose to decide it, though it
would seem to be their province so to do. Con-
sidering, probably, that the students—who must
become in some sense the associates of the dark
individual - were deeply interested, the faculty
referred the matter to the taste and judgment of
the young gentlemen. The vote being taken, the
result was the coloured man's exclusion."

Now, it so happened, after all, the young man was
acknowledged to be not even of Negro extraction,
and that thereupon he was, with great justice,
permitted to pass muster. "It is proper to say,"
adds the account, " that the applicant referred to
was eventually admitted, the vote of exclusion
being reconsidered and rescinded upon proof that
he was a. half-bred Indian, without a particle of
African blood in his veins,"—an issue of the case
which in no wise weakens, but, on the contrary,
rather strengthens our argument. It occurred,
be it remembered, in the Free State of New York.
And the journalist whose account of it we have
quoted, refers to it, he says, " as a curious illustra-
tion of the relations between the whites and the
blacks in the Free States ;" sensibly adding, that
" the course pursued towards the man in question,
whose desire it was to fit himself for usefulness by
means of a public institution of learning, shows
how much easier it is to utter sentiments in behalf
of black ' men and brothers' than to extend prac-
tical sympathy."

And it is this most unreasonable and cruel pre-
judice against the Negro, thus carefully fostered,
and continually exercised, in the Free States,
which does so much, by reaction in the opposite
direction, to excuse and to perpetuate slavery.
Only too truly does Mr. COLLEY GRATTAN ob-
serve, in his interesting and valuable work* on
America, just published, that " even in the Free
States the position of the free blacks is a shameless
violation of their rights as men and citizens,"—
that " altogether the badge they still bear is one,
if not of servitude, at least of degradation,"—and
that " such is the picture of their position
in all the Free States of the Union."

And well may another able writer on Ame-

rica, Mr. W. CHAMBERS, who also speaks
from personal observation, declare, that " all the

* Civilised America. By Thomas (nil.,, n.,.,“,,..

efforts which may be made with a view to
influencing the South, in favour of emancipatiori,
are valueless so long as there exists a determined
resolution throughout the Northern society to
consider the coloured race, in all its varieties of
shade, as beneath the dignity of human nature,
and in no respect worthy to be associated with,
countenanced, honoured, or so much as spoken to
on terms of equality,—excluded by such inflexible
and carefully nourished prejudices, from entertain-
ing the slightest prospect of ever rising beyond the
humblest position—condemned, in short, to infamy
from birth."