Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1845-02-07

mas Deen uOHt OIAllOl NC uiluOltC l. ht QuOS-I
ton is, by what means can Great Britain regain
and keep a superiority in tropical cultivation,
commerce, and influenced Or shlll that be abln-
doned, and other nations be suffered to acquire
the supremacy, even to the extent of supplying
British markets, to the destruction of the capital
already vested in their productions These are
the questions which now profoundly occupy the
attention of her statesmen, and have the great
est influence over her councils.
In order to regain her superiority, she not on
" seeks to revive and increase her own capacity
reproduce tropical productions, but to diminish
and destroy the capacity of those who hive so
far outstripped her in consequence of her error.
In pursuit of the former, she has cast her eyes
to the East India possessions-to Central and
Eastern Africa,-with the view of establishing
colonies there, and even to restore, substantially,
the Sllve-Trade itself, under the %specious name
of transporting her free laborers from Africa to
her West India possessions, in order, if possible,
to compete successfully with those who have re-
fused to follow her suicidal policy. But these
all afford but uncertain md distant hopes of re-
covering her lost superiority. Her main reliance
is on the other alternative-to cripple or destroy
the productions of her successful rivals. There
is but one way by which it can be done, and
that is by abolishing African slavery throughout
this continent-and that she openly avows to be
the constant object of her policy and e%Xertions.
1t matters not how, or from what motive, it may
be done-whcther it be done by diplomacy, in
fuence or force-by secret or open means-and
whether the motive be humane or selfish, with
out regard to manner, means, or motive. The
thing itself, should it be accomplished, would
put down all rivalry, and give her the indisputed
supremacy in supplying her own wants, and those
Of the rest of the world; and thereby more than
fully retrieve what she lost by her errors. 1t
would give her the monopoly of tropical prcduc-
tons, which | shall next proceed to show.
What would be the consequence if this object
of her unceasing solicitude and e%Xertions should
be effected by the abolition of negro slavery
throughout this Continent, some idea may be
formed from the immense diminution Of produc-
tons, as has been shown, which has followed
abolition in her West India possessions. But,
as great as that has been, it is nothing compared
to what would be the effect if she should succeed
in abolishing slavery in the United States, Cuba,
Brazil, and throughout the continent. The .ex-
pertinent in her own colonies was made under
the most favorable circumstances. 1t was bro't
about gradually and peaceably, by the steady
and firm operation of the parent country, armed
with complete power to prevent or crush at once
all lnsurrectionary movements On the part Of the
negroes, and able and disposed to maintain the
full, the political and social ascendancy of the
former masters over their former slaves. 1t is
not at all wonderful that the. ch1nge Of the rela-
tons of master and slave took place under such
circumstances, without violence and bloodshed.
and that order and peace should have been since
preserved. Very different would be the result
of abolition, should it be effected by her indu-
ence and e%xertlons in the possessions Of other
countries on this continent and especially in
the United States, Cuba, and Brazil, the great
cultivators of the principal tropical products of
America. To form a correct conception Of
what would be the result with them, we must
look, not to Jamaica, but to St. Domingo for ex-
ample. The change would be followed by I'M
f~orgiving hate between the two races, and end
in a bloody and deadly struggle between them
for the superiority, One or the other would
have to be subjugated, extirpated, or expelled
and desolation would ovcrspread their territories,
as in St. Domingo, from which it would take
centuries to recover. The end would be, that
the superiority in cultivating the great tropical
afan1ao vuoi1ld ho troDefnrra1 from, tboo, 20 tbo
British tropical possessions. a
They are of vast extent, and those beyond tbs
Cape of Good Hope, possessed of an unlimited
amount of labor, standing ready, by the aid of
British capital, to supply the deficit which would
be occasioned by destroying the tropical produc-
tions of the United States, Cuba, Brazil, and 9TH
er countries cultivated by slave labor on this con-
t%inent, so soon as the increased prices, in consc-
quence,, would yield a profit. It is the success
full competition of that labor which keeps the pri-
ces Of the great tropical staples so low as to pre-
vent their cultivation with profit in the posses
sions of Great britain, by what she is pleased to
call free labor. If she can destroy its COMPETE
ton, she would have monopoly of these produc-
tons. She has all the means of furnishing an
|L |.f| .. . p m
unlimited supply-vast and fertile possessions in
both Indies, boundless command of capital and
labor, and ample power to suppress disturban-
ces and preserve order throughout her wide do
mains. . IA. ..,.r
1t is UNREASONABLE that she regards the abo-
lition of slavery in Texas as a most important
step towards this great object of policy, so much
the aim of her solicitude and exertions-and the
defeat ofthe annexation of Texas to our Union
as indispensable to the Abolition of Slavery there.
She is too spgacious not to see what fatal blow
it would give to slavery in the United States, and
how certainly its abolition with us would abolish
it over the whole continent, and thereby give her
q monopoly in the productions of the great tro-
Pical staples, and the command of the commerce,
navigation, and manufactures of the world, with
an established naval ascendancy and political pre-
monderanee To this continent the blow would