The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1858-12-30
MATERIAL DEVELOPMENT IN THE
SOUTH

was a maxim of Mr. Jefferson, that the world
is governed too much "a good maxim, j
properly understood and as he understood it,
but unluckily, the South, while upholding a
tyranny upon every plantation, construed it TO
mean that Governments should do nothing to
promote the welfare of society, except to pre-
| serve order. The maxim as thus construed ac-
| corded well with the plantation system. Every
large plantation is petty State, or community,
| in which all the various occupations of rude
| state of society are carried on. The proprietor
| is his own merchant; he sends his crop to mar
| ket, perhaps hundred miles distant, in his own
wagons, accompanied by his agent, or himself
in person, and, after dsposing of his crop, he
purchases a supply of sugar and coffee, salt and
iron, negro CLOTH hats, shoes, blankets, &c., be-
sides articles of luxury for his family. The
iron is wrought into plows, hoes, axes, and
| other utensils, by his own slaves The nails are
| driven by his own carpenters and the negro
cloth is manufactured into clothing by his own
seamstresses. Every plantation has cobbler,
who mends, and sometimes makes, the shoes OF
his fellow-saves The tan-trough" is also
| Southern institution of immemorial existence,
in which leather is rudely tanned for the pur-
pose of patching old shoes, brides, plow-
gear, &c.
This plantation system begets in the proprie-
tors the pride and logged independence for
which the class is remarkable, and, coupled
with the jealousy of interference which natural
" belongs to those who exercise absolute power,
they resist the most obviously-uselul reforms
and improvements. Instinct seems to teach
them that even bchefcent changes will gradu-
ally undermine and eventually overthrow the
system of Slavery, and they set their faces
agants all Innovations.
We have rather described what the planta
ton system and the planters were, than what
they are for, in spite of ignorance, prejudice,
and the pride of caste, the commercial spirit has
insinuaied itself into the South, and aroused
the people to sense of the utilities of the age
They have at length become sensible that pro-
gress is essential to selfpreservation that with
their utmost exertions they will be far outstrip
ped by free communities; but that something
must be done in order to recuperate the ex-
hausted energies of the country.
This reaction of the intelligence of the South
against its listless pride and ignorance took
place about twenty years ago. Railroads, mac
adamized roads, and plank-roads, were con-
structed, the river navigation was improved
canals were made, and factories were erected.
The effect of these internal improvements and
manufacturing enterprises is now visible In the
growth of towns and cities, but more especially
in the improved state of agriculture, and the ell
HANGED value Of labor and of laborers. The
value of land has increased three-lold, and Of
slaves fifty per cent.
The champions of Slavery have become the
champions of railroads and Of steam packets;
and the high prices paid for slaves andt pro
ducts of slave labor has deluded them into the
belief that Slavery has received new lease Of
existence; that thew have found the philoso-
pliers stone, which is to make. 1t perpetual.
They say that in Virginia and ths border slave
States the price of labor and OF slaves Is kept
~, by the facilities which their railroads and
steamboats, give them for intercourse with the
Northern cities; and they boast that they have
thus made the North the principal supporter of
Slavery. =
There can be no doubt that the South owes
It's present prosperity to the causes stated and
we could wish that their prosperity was greater
than it is, even if the effect should be to en-
nance the value of negroes still higher. We
have no fears that the present high prices paid
for negroes will tend to the perpetuation of the
system.
The prosperity of Virginia may prevent the
emigration or deportation of slaves for few
years, but it will not induce the planters in the
Gulf States to leave their more profitable cot
ton, sugar, and rice culture, TO emigrrtc with
their slaves to Virginia. And, on the other hand,
the same prosperity in Virginia will prevent
the emigration of her white population, and at E
tract Northern and European immigration.
While everything tended downward in the
South, while the prices of Southern products
was low, while the prices of land and negroes
were low, and a stream Of emigration was con
stantly flowing from Maryland, Virginia, and
the CaroIinas to the Southwest. there was no
inducememt held out to Northern immigration
But the construction of railroads and other inn
provements created demand for labor and
while the effect was to arrest the tide Of slave
deportation, it at the same time checks the emf
grafton of the poor whites, and draws upon the
Northern hive Within the last fifteen years, a
large district of Virginia, near Washington, has
been reclaimed from waste by cmigrants from
the western part of New York. During the
same period thousands of emigrantS have pour
ed into other parts Of the State, and the same
thing has taken place, in still greater degree,
in Maryland, Missouri, and Kentucky. Slavery
has almost ceased to exist in the northern coun-
ties of Maryland, including the city of Balti-
more. That city now contains about two hun
dred and fifty thousand inhabitants, of whom
less than three thousand are slaves. St. Louis,
| Louisville, and Wheeling, are in a similar con-
dition. Their population is for the most part
foreign or Northern, and they have ceased to
be Southern cities except in name.
! Virginia boasts of her prosperity, of the high
| prices of land and slaves, and of her internal
improvements She boasts that these improve
ments have been made by slave labor for the
most part, in proof that Slavery can adapt it
self to the new order of things We are not
disposed to question that the slaves are compe-
tent to such work. or that it tends to improve and
civilize them, by diversifying their labors but
it is equally true that the employment of slaves
serves to repress the interests of free labor, and
thereby prevent the growth of towns and cities
The agriculture of Virginia has been much i'm