The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1851-11-13

state oil kentucky mas not u cent IN tile tretS-
ury for the same glorious purpose. Our mas
tiers not only wasted the money, but they burn
ed the bonds the evidences of the debt in the
streets of the capital, rs if they were cast-off
cholera clothes bringing disease and death
upon the people! And now, when the friends
Of education and liberty have aroused the pub
lie to these infamies, and caused the Legislators
to restore the bonds-and when the Democrat
ic Convention, to their eternal honor have put
it in the Constitution that the sinking fund shall
be held sacred for their payment-we find
contest going on between the friends of educa-
ton and a slayeholding Governor, whether these
benefcent ends shall be accomplished or not
In the free States the children of the rich and
the poor are educated in the same school and the
division of farms and the density Of the popu-
lation insure always a sufficient number OF
scholars to bring down the cost of education to
the most economical rate But here we not
only lack a common school fund to Tighten in
diyidual expense, but the cooperation and joint
means of the rich and the laborers
We are not only frequently prevented from
making a school at all ON account of the large
farms and Shareholders but when the slave
holders send their children to county acade-
mics or distant cities as they do in nine cases
of ten, the expense is increased TO those who
remain. And the grand result is, that whilst
in the free States nearly the whole mass OF
natye-born citizens are educated, here, IN all
the slave States the cost of education is about
three times as great rs in the free States, and
in all the slave States of the Union, more than
one half of all the laborers, white and black,
are unable to read and write
Here the educated are drones in society
consuming without producing, whilst the great
mass of laborers are deprived of the aids of
letters and science in production. Of course
we fail in manufactures; and without manufac-
lures, commerce also fails. Thus, whilst the
South takes hold of three and one half millions
of slaves as producers. only equal to one and
three-quarters millions of men-the North, far
wiser, lays hold ON the winds, the waters, and |
and magnetism, and the powers of
science, and enslayes them | estimate the |
power of machinery in the free States to be !
equal to be labor Of forty millions of mems
The free States. then, have" the long end of the
and hold US in lasting dependence,
Is simple agricultnrists-a thrd-rate stage of
civilization We stand as the tribes of Asia
.hrec thousand years ago ); and many of our
nsrmofe Ios,.s - ......r, -
,csl e g., ,-~tst p 6-r'o the ruin CT
dave chltivatiOnf =
These disadvantages of slavery are common
% the whole people. What we the non-slaye-
holders lose, is not gained by the masters
for, by directing the whole power Of the State
10 agriculture, they tend to glut all those mar
kets where our mules, horses. cattle, sheep
hogs, hemp and tobacco, go-so that the tend
ency of prices is always towards the lowest
profit above the cost of production, and frequent
y the sales are under the cost, and the gains
Of many years lost in one unfortunate market.
These arguments are addressed alike to all
but stand here rs the advocate of the non-slavc-
holders Of the country; and them would
each in a manner more practical and OF less
generalization.
propose to show to them how it is that the
million of citizens have been expelled from the
'oil by inevitable and inexorable laws In the
rec States, man upon fifty, eighty, and one
hundred acres, (which last perhaps is the aver
lge of all the farms in all the free States can
'aise educate, and settle in life, large family
Nhyt because he has his manufacturer and
merchant set down alongside of him. He sells
everything; nothing il lost; "many mckles
make muckle," says the Scottish maxim.
But here in the slave States, in consequence
fall our markets being distant markets Charles
on, New Orleans, Cincinnati or New York,
md through them the great world, we lose all
he "odds and ends which are saved in the
rec States. But the main loss is in the main
Irtcles of production and return consumption
1or instance, the citizen of Fayette sends
,ound of beef to the city of New York there
{ is sold for six cents but three cents comes
fl for cost of transp0rtation--the nett proceeds
re therefore three cents a pound. But the
armcr living alongside Of New York sells
.lso for six cents; but that is the nett profit
" he has no outlay in going to market. He
cells, therefore, for twice rs much as we. Of
course, if he can live upon one hundred, we
must have two hundred acres
Again; the articles which he gets in ex-
change cost him near one hundred per cent |
less than us or one-haf of our income is lost |
in consequence of the distance of our articles |
of consumption. IT. then, the free farmer can
live upon one hundred acres, we must have four |
hundred Any one can well see, then, that
if we must have four times a. much land to
live here, rs there, we must of necessity emf
CRATE. But u home market can afford manures
and high price and personal supervision en-
courage "high farming" and the lands are
continually improving Freedom gives educa-
ton, education gives science in cultivation, and
increased product-more leisure--more SCI
ence-and more population. But in the slave
States the "sknning system" prevails. Large
farms are necessary, in consequence of distance
Of markets. Large farms cannot undergo the
manuring system. The virgin soil of centuries,
exhausted in deposite, is worn out in slovenly,
ignorant cultivation. In Virginia and Mary
land, and North Carolina were good plains
and fertile slopes, but slaves have turned them
into barrenness. The whites emigrated, drove
out the wild beasts and Indians, cleared the
forest But once more the tide of slaves fol- |
lows on; the result is the same. Barrenness
follows in the wake of the slave. The broom
sedge the mullen, and the brier, pursue ever
in their footsteps! Are not those who have
desolated Judea and Asia Minor, and turned
her cities and fertile wales into the abodes of
wild beasts, where :" the fox looks out at the
window, and the long grass grows upon the
wallis" as criminal in the eyes of Natures
God rs they who stoned the prophets, and re-
jcctcd Him who taught justice, mercy, and
love
In the midst of these depressing causes tls
laborer finds yet greater oppression-the direct
competition of capital. In the free States, when
the capitalist has one or two hundred acres,
he wants no more land He says to his neigh
Dor who is educated in the common school, in
dustrious and moral, have thousand or five
thousand dollars take it and invest it in man
ufactures or commerce divide portion of the
profits with yourself for your personal supervi.
sion and the other portion with me for my capi.
tai. Thus capital and labor are friends, and build
up each other; and the whole mass of society
Is moving up to independence and wealth But
here the saveholding capitalist is the worst en-
/ A l.l..
money in machinery or commerce he gives no
employment to white labor lie comes then
into the land market where only the whites
can hope to live, and he invests his money at
no matter what price The consequence is,
| that land has not only n reaI value and nr;oo