Civilian & telegraph. [volume] (Cumberland, Md.) 1859-1875, 1864-05-19

cal economy, and the elect OF tampef1ng
with the laws Of industry, be embodied
his sane views in report to that conven-
ton, part of which will read for the
benefit Of the House: - l F@
"The existence of 30 large q number
of free blacks in the midst Of slsvehoid.
ing State is believed to be Of itself an
evil, and this evil is readily perceived to
be greater when it is considered that .
portion of them are idle, vicious, and un-
productive. This, however is not the
case with the majority of them, and their
removal would, as the committee believe.
be far greater than all the evils the peo-
pie of MARYLAND ever suffered from them.
In the city of Baltimore it is estimated
tiat there aie more than twenty-five
thousand of them, employed chiefly as
domestic servants or laborers in various
departments of findustry. In many ofthe
rural districts of the State, where labor
is by no means abundant, they furnish
large supply of agricultural labor, and
it is unquestionable that quite a large
portion of our soil could not be titled
without their aid" -4-- -
"1he committee, therefore, cannot re-
commend their expulsion from the State.
Still more unwillingly should they be to
favor any measure which looked to their
being deprived of the right to freedom
which they have acquired by the indul-
gence # our laws and the tenderness tf
their tiers, whether wise or unwise,
or which they have inherited as birth
right" 4
Thtn, sir, in Maryland free negro
has some rights ...
The policy of the report prevailed in
this convention of Shareholders, and the
iniquitious purpose was not by them
pressed on the Legislature. &s
Some If the people in that convention
we're in the Legislature, and q Mr.. ia
cobs was one Of. them. He introduced.
law to hire the free negroes ouok ito the
highest bidders; and if they should be
disobedicnt after being hired out, then
they were to be sold as slaves for life.
The bill could not be passed. 1t was
objected to by county after county. 1t
was only allowed to become law with
reference to four or five counties--St.
Mary's, Charles, Somerset, Worcester.
Baltimore county, and perhaps one or
two others; and it was not allowed to be
operative till approved by the people of the
counties respectively. The friends of the
infamous scheme went before the people
the Presidential election in those coun-
ties; for the Legislature would not allow
the law even to apply to those counties
unless o majority Of the people willed it.
In Howard, one of the slaveholding coun-
ties, they got just 55 votes for it.
and against it 1897. In Baltimore
county they got 6S1 votes for, and 1894
against it. In Kent county they got IA
votes for, and l ,502 votes against it. It
passed in no county except in one. and
there by an accident. That is the judg-
ment Of the people of Maryland on tho
relations of the laboring free colored peo-
pie living among them, essential to their
industry, part Of their social system,
filing well their place in life, without
whom their interests cannot be protected
and which VIC neither will expel our
selves, nor encourage to 60, nor allow
other people to expel.
If gentleman want to know still further
how Maryland regards the free negro
population, desire to say that the eman-
Clip, ton movement of Maryland is in
dcbtcd very much to the commencement
of negro enlistments in Maryland for the
same economic reason. Colonel Birney
was scet there with general orders to en-
list negroes. He was not instructed to
take slaves He commenced the enlist
ment of free negroes. Gentlemen found
at once that that was a discrimination be-
tween the loyal people who do not own
slaves and the disloyal people who do
own slaves; and my friend, Judge Bond,
wrote to the Secretary of War remon-
strating against the inequality of taking
from the Union men their labor and leav-
ing with the secessionist his labor. He
pointed put the law Of 1862, authorizing.
the cnlisting of one as well as of the 9TH
er. The Secretary of War agreed with
him. Birney acted under the implied if
not the express authority Of the Secretary
of War, and commenced to levy from tho
slave population, in order that the Union
men might have the free colored popula-
tion to hire. So the beginning Of slave
enlistments was question of political
economy which the President and his
&C mmentator propose to solve in one way.
but which the people of Maryland mean
to solve in another way.
But it was also apparent that every
slave enlisted was poor white mans sub
stitute. 1t was that more than anything
else that brought directly before the Ieo-
pie of Maryland at the last election tho
burdens they were suffering from the ex-
istencc of slavery; and that aided moro
than did the bayonets to which the gen.
tlcman from New York refers, more than
all proclamations, mere than any
other argument urged, in bringing on
our side the people of the slaveholding
counties of Maryland, who had voted At
the back of the Shareholders for geneIa q.
tions. They said. "if we are to have =
draft, and if our rich neighbor's plantation
is to be cultivated while we are dragged
off to fill the quota of the State, we think
that an injustice. We ere for slave en-
listmcnts and in favor of relieving the
white people from the disproportionate
; burdens of the draft" 1t was that. sir.
and no proclamation it was that view.
carried home by my honorable friend who
represents the first congressional district.
MIR. Creswell, urged upon every husting
in every fcnce-corner, that dragged out
men in homespun to cast their first inde-
pendent vote, and my honorable friend
from the first district is the representative
, of that independent vote.
Such was the telling power Of the en-
listment of slaves that my colleague go'
in the county of Worcester, one of the
| great slayeholding counties, several hun
dred moro votes than his predecessor, Mr.
, Crisfeld, most allie gentleman. go1
, when he was candidate of the united