The Placer herald., 1861-12-28
What to do With Them.

emancipation of great many slaves, an all
important question aises, like stumbling
block, before the anti.slavery propaganda.
That slavery is an evil, is easily declared, but
the abolishing of it is a great difficulty
That difficulty has been partially surmounted,
as they declare, by the exigences of supp
pressing rebellion, and now comes an enigma
that no one seems able to answer satisfac
toriy, viz: What shall be done with the
slave when set at liberty? No one believes
that he is, in his present condition, capable
of discharging the responsibility of an
American citizen, or even, sustaining himself
unaided. His idea of civil liberty, is a wild
license in sensual enjoyment, free from care
or labor If he had not these erroneous
ideas, he is by his ignorance, incapable to
cope with the educated and experienced
white man. Hence it is plain that for his
own benefit, he must be retained in state
of tutelage, call it by its mildest name.
President Lincoln suggests that they be
colonized; but is very unspecfc on that head
submitting the matter to ''the wisdom of
Congress-" A learned letter writer suggests
that Florida should become this land of
promise; but whether he speaks the views
of the powers that be, or is only uttering his
own ideas, we are not able to say. In our
judgment these schemes, if attempted in
practice, must prove failures The negro
character does not embrace tenacity of pur
pose, and if not urged to 1t by master, he
will certainly never undergo the years of
toll and care necessary to build him home
in a new and unopened country. He will
quietly creep n'o his bush hut, and degen-
crate into barbarsm In fact he rather
delights in the dark, dreary swamp and mat
ted jungle.
his for centuries, has been true Of his
ancestors in Africa, and he will never make
a living by colonization in a new country
If you leave him in cultivated land.
experience shows tha, he will not take care
Of it, but sutf'r everything TO fall into ruin
and waste, and himself to rags AMI beggary.
Take for example The Island of Jalnaica -
lie could not have been set free nnder more
fN orable auspices than he was there With
a soil as productive as any on earth, climate
equal and suited 10 bis nature-there in his
own home with every assistance and enroar.
sgement, he has by his sl5th ruined the
Island. In the year 1905 the Island pro.
dured for export l50,452 hogsheads Of
sugar, but The year after emancipation became
complete, it dwindIed down to 40.213
hog,heads. The latter season is expr, sslv
stated TO have been most favorable. bat the
cane not gathered from the fields. And
although another question has sprung up
since that period, statistics prove that they
have by no means improved on the old stock.
for in 1857, it was rednced 10 3O,459 hoes
heads Intelligent travellers tell us of once
cultivated fields, now overgIown with youuo
torests-of splendid mansions, once the
abode Of luxury aud refinement, now a mass
Of ruins, and tlnanted only by the owl and
bat.
These are the results of experience, from
which We should profit. With these facts
in view, it is more than probable, that if you
were to turn the white masters of the South
out OF ther homes and farms, and put the
slaves in their places, in five years they
would Africanize the whole country. Does
the Administration, wish to produce such
results as these? or are they, so much more
capable Of managing this matter, than the
statesmen of The British Empire? Would a
colony of blacks be desirable anywhere on
our borders? The history of the world proves
that if the scheme succeeded, it would onl,
be the fruitful source Of bloody wars betwee,
the two races Two as distinct races of me,
as black and white, cannot live among, o
alongside of each other without one havin,
a mastery over the other. 1t is not possibl
to mingle socially on equal terms, and tn
distinction soon becomes marked politically
by laws distranchising one, and cstablishin!
the exclusive rule of the Other. For one W
prefer HAT the white man should be !,
power, and we think there can be no doub
but ,hat the interests of civilization, through
out the world demands it, 1t may be th
Intention of The Government to quarter thes
"contrabands" on the free white people G
the North. If so we slall have competitio,
/ ln laLOr hrOnnlt TO nnI lnnrs and snHor Il.