The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1859-07-07
EMANCIPATION IN THE WEST INDIES

jects.
EMANCIPATION IN THE WEST INDIES.
West India correspondent of the New York
Times, several of whose letters, showing the
psogress of the islands, we have heretofore
quoted, writes as follows:
"BRIDGETOwN, BARBADOS, June u, 1889
Ever since Easter, when, as | wrote you, the
island was agitated with rumors of an appre
hended instruction, there have been successive
disturbances of the public peace-rioting, fight
ing, murder. These rumOrs, utterly untounded
as | believe them to have been, seem to have
DESTROYED the little confidence that ever existed
between the white and black populations; and
if they were started with any such design, the
author was singularly successful in his mali
cious schemes. Abotionists may hug to their
souls their favorite distractions, but Barbados
is living proof that white and black will not
pull together. Both being perfectly free, there
exists here hostility between them unknown
in a slave community. Contempt on the one
side and hatred on the other are ingrained, and
are among the first fruits of emancipation. The
rule, of course, has its exceptions, but the evil
spreads with the material and intellectual prog
ress ofthe black his hatred the white increases
with his intelligence. One race or the other
must eventually succumb, and there is too much
reason to believe that, as far as these islands
are concerned, the white will yield. 1t is yield
ing now. The black, or, more properly speak
ing, the mulatto, after he is civilized and edu-
Gated, has the force mGjenre within the tropics"
The same correspondent some months ago
represented the island of Barbados as in a
highly prosperous condition. So that, what
ever may be the social relations of the whites
and blacks since emancipation, it is fixed
fact, according to this writer, that Freedom has
redeemed the island from the decrepitude to
which Slavery had reduced it.
The i'll feeling which is alleged to exist be-
tween the white and black races may be ex-
planned by previous statements of the same
writer. He has told us, that notwithstanding
the vast numerical preponderance of the blacks,
the whites possess all the political power. In
the constitution of the Provincial Parliament,
none but the large property holders are allowed
to vote. To such an absurd extreme is this
aristocratic principle carried that, in this very
island, if our memory is not at fault, the same
correspondent related case in former letter,
in which one eIectOr sent t,oo members to the
Parliament. The effect of this monopoly of
voting in the hands of the wealthy few is to ex-
clude entirely the emancipated class. A few of
those whose ancestors have been free for two
or three generations back may possess the
elective franchise but the whole class who
were emancipated by the general act for that
purpose, passed in 1894, are excluded. Yet
the correspondent speaks of this as state Of
perfect equality between the whites and blacks |!
When it is reflected that the blacks, who are
thus deprived of all participation in the govern
eminent of the island, outnumber the whites in
the proportion of twenty or thirty to one, it is
very easy to account for the i'll feeling between
the two races which the writer describes 1t
would be singular if the case were otherwise .
and it would give little promise of progress
and elevation of spirit on the part Of the blacks;
to relate of them that they are perfectly lamb
like under the oligarchal tyranny which de-
prives them of all share in the Government.
1t is very clear from the foregoing statement,
taken in connection with others from the same
source, that it is not freedom and equality, but
an odious and oppressive oligarchal provincial
Government, which has produced the mutual
hatred between the blacks and whites
The fact presented by the Times correspond
ent is therefore no argument against emancipa-
ton in this country, where there is a large pre-
ponderance of white population. If peace and
order have been preserved in the British West
Indies, DUNG twenty-five years of Freedom,
and with twentyfold preponderance of blacks,
it is fair to conclude, for a twenty-fold greater
reason, that all apprehension of collision Of
races, resulting from emancipation in this coun-
try, may be discarded,