Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1844-08-16

War of Slavery on Northern Commerce
and Agriculture.
BY CHARLES 7. TORREY.

and Agriculture,
BY CHARLES t. ToRREY.
More than sixty years ago, Edmund Burke, the
great philosophc statesman, declared that the les
sons of all history proved that slavery was not Il
self supporting system. Crime is seldom profta-
BILE. He who ensaves man must keephlm in igno-
rance, or the slave will burst his letters. With
little Intelligence, and deprived of nearly every
motive to industry, the slave will do less than the
thinking freeman, and his labor will have little
skill or enterprise to guide it. Hence the univer-
sal acknowledgements of Southern men that one
freeman does the work of two slaves, with less
hardshps. Besides, in slave State, labor is dis
graceful. No person will work if he can help it,
lest he sink to the level of the slave. The labors
of the field and the cares of the household are a.
like thrown upon the slave, who must support
himself and his thrftIess master. Hence in
slave country, one half Of the people perform lit
tie or no productive labor to add to their wealth
or comforts. One half of the laboring class, of
course, are children too young, OF persons too in
firm to labor. Many more are house and body
servants. Hence, in State like South Carolina,
or in those parts of it from which free labor is
banshed, hardly one IN fue of the whole popua-
ton is producing laborer. In a free State, like
New York, one in every two persons does the
work of an able bodied man. Yet the State val
uations show that we inNew York only retain our
capital stock, and add about 4 1-2 per cent Il year
to it, 1t is easy to see that if only one i'll five
worked, we should be growing poorer every year.
This is actually true of the slave labor parts of the
South The only apparent exception is where
new lands are cleared up. In the older section
where slave labor still prevails, there is an actual
loss of wealth. The free States about twice
as rich as the slave States, in proportion to their
population. The wealth of the free section in
creases faster than the population, while the in
l. i: fh,It
its wealth. Free labor makes one richer, slave
labor makes the other poorer every day. The
entire value of the annual productions of the
Southern States is less than $50 to each lnhablt-
ant. Taking Senator Walkers estimate of the
cost of maintaining slaves, at SIT head, it leaves
$S3 each for every free person. Any body by cal
cuatng the cost of maintaining his family, will
see that it is not enough to support them. MucI
less can it support the reckless extravaganza Of
Shareholders Hence, though the plantation slaves
be half starved, on their peck of corr per week
the saveholding South cannot live on its own re-
sources. 1t is not enough to rob the slave OF hi
manhood, by taking away all right motives to IN
dustry, and then to rob him of what little none!
can be whipped out of his miseries. The slave
system must PLUMBER FREE LABOR, also, of 1t
earnings or it must die For this system of rob
berry and fraud never did and never can earn al
! honest living! Slavery needs at least $50. 900 00
year, to keep it alive. 1t aust plumber the fire.
:, States of this amount. IL does.
> Do you ask how? Attend to the facts | sha
now give. We buy up about 500, 000, 900 wort
of clothing, food, drinks, iron, glass, crockery, tool
and other goods, each year in foreign countries.
= How are they to be paid for? Not by gold or sill
" yer. A single year would drain the nation of il
last penny. We do it by exchanging the product
of our labor for these goods. Now the man thu
! raises the wheat cotton with which pay fo
u English broadcloths, or French silks, has in h
- hand the real money must use to pay for then
- - | must buy his wheat or his corn on has terms
:. If he chooses to ask pay in advance, one or wv
\ years, must give it, or go without my coat, an
=, my wife must 90 without her silk gown He COZ
trolls the foreign exchanges of the country ,becau'
y he has the only thing by which they can be mad
y y And then, must pay him for his cotton or whe
- - in pork, or shoes, or anything he wants; and
u musttrust him till his cotton is sold in Europe
- and the money for it comes back in the shape
=. iron, or glass; or whatever | wish to buy. So the
- he has the control of the domestic, as well Il
- foreign exchanges. Hence, this man can cor
, nand as much credit as he wants, better than al
: one else, because he raises the real money, (tl
- wheat or cotton) that must be used to buy torels
goods with, and which lies at the bottom of all b
:, sness. This shows the reason why slavehoIde
=; have always been anxious to have nothing but Il
" products of Slaue labor exported from the countr
of They could then control the business of the cou
" try They could establish an unlimited credit f
themselves at the North, run in debt two to TO
hundred millions beyond their means, and eth
plumber US of twenty-five or forty millions yea
= in the shape of bad debts, or rob us of the who
is once in every three or FIVE years, by genel
d; bankruptcy, as they have done, ever since 1872
ly Now look at the following facts. By eev
ad years. struggle, the seat Of government was p
We ced between two slave States, where freedom
IL speech and of the press might be crushed and
*, government corrupted and controlled by the sa
all power to suit its interests. By the purchase
es Florida and louisiana and the violent and crl
es, removal of the Indians the richest lands on
full continent were thrown open to slave labor.
its the war of 1912 and its connected measures
he north were deprived Of the carrying trade W
ger Europe, its commerce crippled, and its indus
cir paralyzed By the tariff of 1917, the burden
nd paying seven eghths of the national debt '
Ike thrown the northern consumers of foreign GOO
by, while foreign nations were excited to shut
NY northern products from their markets. And fin
to ly, by the disgracefu Missouri compromise,
ou control over Congress and the Executive w
secured to slavery, fits southern supporters co