The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1853-06-16


for which high wages are given, depend for
market upon the wants of the South For all
of them, and much of our fneries, pay the to-
baccO, the cotton, the sugars and the rice the
black man raises.
Strike from North Americas commercial
balance-shect the 100000 of the black
mans export productions and crisis would
come in our progress that might make our
pale faces paler still Let some fell disease
sweep the negro population Of this Union out
of existence and those who shout loudest for
the fOrcible expectation of the imported negro
would be the first to stand aghast at the pow
erty which would then impend over our land
We talk Of England needing our products and
that that necessity is a bond for peace, and a
guarantee that she will yield any reasonable
demand. Let me ask you, Do not we ourselves
need all our products, or at least their proceeds
When could North America have spared, with
out serious commercial and financial embarrass-
ments the products of all our labor
Friends! Labor, human labOr-the freer
and the more truly intelligent and the more
yirtuous the better-is the great lever of ma
tonal and individual wealth. comfort, and
strength. The application of this truth is uni
yersal, and it is only modified by the relative
| position of the respective laboring forces
The North has 5000 600 of adult laboring
men, the South about 100000. We have seen
that to say the least, the products Of each Of
these laboring men, as averaged over the whole
population, are about equal This gives the
North an excess of laboring men of 100000
which, at $500 per annum, would make
So, 900, O0O 900 more production in the North
over the South. have also shown what kind
Of people these labOring men consist of and
feel, that no one of my intelligent hearers will
any longer doubt that the comparatively
! greater progress of the North arises in con-
siderable degree, in the Middle and Western
States especially from the fact that the North
is migrated into, while the South is restricted
to the natural increase.of its population in
fact migrated from. Nor will any one any
longer doubt that the negro-slave though he
be--is an important productive element in our
general wealth and national progress The
Negroes importation, rs the white mans imm-
grafton, has been one of the chief elevators
in our progress since it constituted one Of the
chief elements of our increasing productive
ness
Slavery is serious barrier to white immi-
grafton in the South. Free labor is too proud
to mingle its labor with slave labor in the
same State. Why, the proud and spirited
thistle-eating ass How much more Unborn
deem the dignity of labor by scorning to labor
alongside of slave White immigration has
therefore been sparse TO the South.
Black importation is no longer available
! The United States Constitution authorized the
passage Of an act, after sSOS, declaring the
forcibe importation of any person. piracy.
| The act has been passed, and in that clause,
and in that act we must seek for the control
| ling cause, why the great change" Mr.. Fisher
talks about took place in the progress in that
section Of our Union.
That clause and that act has enabled one of
the great statesmen Of the South to call with
truth, slavery a temporary institution. 1t
made the negro an evanesccnt and exotic plant
in America. 1t was the turning point whence
| the tooth of Time commenced to gnaw both
| down.
Neither is to receive any further accessiOns
from abroad The noIrshment il withdrawn.
Whoever administered the medicine its effects
are that neither slavery nor the black popua
ton can be permanent in North America.
But you ask me-Do you regret it No It |
was wise, be it accidentally, prOyidentially, or
Intentionally but still it was wise, to stop all
further importation IN voluntary immigration
of black men to North America is not a sup
possible case) Of negro slaves. Whatever NAV
have been, up to this time, the necessities of
North America, for such population as that
that necessity is passing away and it now be-
comes every day more self-evident that slavery
is gradually yielding to free white labor near
ly all OF our Southern area, There is not
State in our Union whose soil may not ulti-
mately be the undivided home of free white
men. We might have been richer now, if we
had continued to import human beings in the
same ratio in the South AZ they migrated into
the North. Many political questions would |
then never have arisen or they would have
been materially changed but one great over
shadowing question would by this time have
received an all-pervading Importance, and that
would have been-ShalI the future of this
country be to the blacks or to the whites
As it ls the danger is past Not one of the
forebodngs that addle the brains of travelling
tourists and some of our own statesmen, will
ever be realized. The Constitution and the
Piracy act have cstopped any other increase Of
slaves, except by birth and slavery, while it
exists, is an obstacle it is true to white immi-
grafton, but to free black migration hither it
IL perpetual injunction
The black race is therefore dwindling away
alongside of the white race. In 1910 there
were about five whites to one black; in 1850
| there are almost seven whites to one black
Tins ratio will hencelorth increase very ran
idly Even in the South the climax is passed,
Tor the whites there largely exceed the blacks;
and this Will become more and more apparent,
IA the generations of the negroes born here
become further removed from the African pa
rent stock. In but two States-Nlississinpi
| and South Carolina-the slaves exceed the free.
FOrty-fve years ago the slave trade was abol.
ished the generation of the imported must
therefore soon run out. The climate will not
be without it's effects upon each succeeding
generation. | recollect reading, in speech of
| Henry Clay's that of those who landed at the |
jamestown settlement, onehalf died in ten
| years and that in forty years afterwards, but
few of these immigrants were left mention
this only to show what we must expect of a |
| change of climate, greater in the case Of the
negro than in that of the Engshman in vir.
| gna. 1t is a well-known law of Nature, that
northern men and northern animals and
| plants bear far easier transplanting southwark,
than southern men, animals, and plants, can
stand 1t northward. This climate Is not suit
able Tor permanent home of the negro. |
doubt whether grown-up black man lives in
America whose ancestors were born in Amer
lea for four generations
The black race, amounting now to about
$500 900, is spread principally over the South,
covering an area Of 1000 900 square miles
say about 500,000,0O0 acres of land This
makes but 80 to each square mile, and would
give to each black man, woman, and child,
almost quarter-section of land
DO not, then, deem me u trher, if cannot
zee anything so very black in all this question,
see nothing black in it, except the upturned
faces OF the children of Africa, who seem to
watch, halfbewildercd, our connections about
them and, no doubt, often ask themselves the
question:" Wonder what white man is about
now y
Their presence in such limited numbers in
North America has not been, il not now and
never will he "A purSo tn A ,,a,;,a Wl..o.o.