The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1844-08-09

d beyond this, with the striclest economy
and highest skill, and most undinching in
dustry, European lands have not gone
Indeed, long before The population reacl
i eS this point, voluntary emigration begin
: with those who have the means; an
t when the point is fully reached, the guar
> dams Of the poor are busy freighting ship
TO carry off their paupers.
D But all these Europeans do no, live b,
agriculture. One half at least, so tn
books say, live in the cities and towns, i
London with lis millions, in Paris, Wen
ma, &C., where lradesmen can nours
without occupying their shares of tn,
land. Not so our American slaves they
as we have seen, must live in the country
and use up their full proportion of tn,
soil. And hence as we know, there art
no large towns in the slave States, ex
cept such as are supported by commerce
with abroad. More than fifteen six
'eenihs of all the inhabitants Of those
States, as shown by the last census, live
on farms.
Remember now that the slave, what.
ever his employment, produces less and
wastes more than the freeman, and add ia
1t the fact that from the nature of his only
occupation, he requires more land, and i,
VIII be easy to see that if six acres, on
the average, are required TO suppor. a
freeman. who works for himself, a good
deal more will be necessary to make food
for human being under the ignorant, la.
zy, and thriflless culture of slave.
1t has been said, and with apparen,
truth, that from thirty-fve to forty in the
square mile, is about as large popula-
ton as slave labor can support. The uii-
tens Of England began to be freed when
the population attained this rate, many
hundred years ago. Delaware, where
slavery is nearly worn out, the entire
number of It's slaves being but 1000, has
an average of little over thirty five and
those parts of Maryland and Virginia,
which have approached this average, find
slave labor unproduclive, and scarcely
more than adequate 10 its own support.
Here, then, we have the two extremes.
Slavery begins 10 be a bad business for
The master when the country becomes so
tlickly settled that on the average 40 peo-
pie are living on square mile of land;
and when the average reaches ITO, mere
TABOR, whether bond or free, is unable TO
support itself, but is forced TO rely in
whole or in par, on the skill and charity
OF others.
When will these numbers be reached
II our southern states !-Il is mere ques-
lIon of arithmetic, and an easy one. We
know what the population of the slave
states was IN 1870, 1900, 1910, 1920,
1880, and 1910, and can easily calculate
the rate of It's increase. This rate has va.
RED somewhat; sometimes rising as high
as 33 per cent. for a period Of ten years
sometimes sinking to about PSI, when
causes happened 10 encourage emigration
more than usual. The average has been
about 80 per cent.--lhat is to say, at the
end OF every ten years 1870 inhabitants
have been found where 100 used to be.
THUS in 1890 the slave population was
abou, two millions; in 1900 about two
millions six hundred thousand; in 1910
something less than three millions and
bali; in 1920 four millions and half
in 1880 five millions and three quarters
and in 1910, liule over seven millions
and third. If the population shall con.
unue to increase in the southern states, as
1t has done thus far, it will have reached
twenty-five millions by the year 1887,
and about the year 1926 will not be less
than seventy millions. So far is plain
enough. There is no mistake in the CAL
culalon. nor in the facts on which il
rests. Examine them as we may, the re-
suit is as we have just stated it i'm 1887,
twenty-five miIIlons--in 1926, seventy
millions. Now mark the conclusion.
The entire area of the present slave
states and slave territories, counting in
Delaware, the District of Columbia, and
the Floridas, is little less than $50 900
square miles. A population of twenty
five millions on this area, such as will be
on II in 1887, gives 40 persons TO the
square mile; population of 70 millions,
such as il will have in 1926, an avarage
to the square mile of 10.
], is startling fact, but we cannot es-
cape from it. In 1887, 43 years from
the time at which we are writing, the |
average value of slaves labor through
out the south will be little more than ade- |
quale TO his support; in 1926, less than
So years, it will be impossible for slavery
to subsist except as bur,hen on the mas.
ter The politician who fancifully mag.
mes that a freeman is more apt TO be fond