Daily Richmond Whig. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1865-1869, 1865-06-20
RICHMOND WHIG.
TUESDAY MoRNING....JUNE 20, 1865.
From the Lynchburg Virginian.
FFECT5 OF EMANUIPATIUN.

tentiOn, to consult history, to learn what has
been the experience Of other people who have
passed through a similar career.
We have always held that II was dangerous
experiment, and one fraught with vital injury to
the industrial interests of the country-to say the
least-to proclaim wholesale and sudden eman-
cipation. When the French Assembly, amidst
the tempest and passion Of that revolutionary
era was bent upon proclaiming freedom to hu
manity-aye, liberty and equality" there were
not wanting wise and patriotic men who
strongly argued that men long ustomed TO
seryiinde could not receive the r nlOus gift OF
liberty with safety either TO themselves or Others
but by slow degrees, and that the effect Of sud.
denly admitting that bright light upon q be.
nighied population would be 10 throw them into
inevitable and fatal convulsions." But, says
Alison, "Mirabeau, the master spirit Of the As.
sembly, and the only one of its leaders who COM
bined popular principles with q just appreciation
of the danger OF pushing them TO excess was no
more, and the declamations Of Brissot and the
Girondists prevailed over these statesman.like
IDEAS" We all know what followed. st.
Domingo, the French part OF which alone fur
nished exports amounting to l6oOOOO 600 francs
being the hiefsupport OF the French maritime
power, aud giving employment to sixteen hun
dred vessels and twenty seven thousand sailors,
became, after slavery was abolished, almost
barren waste. In 1859 1t exported 67200000
pounds of sugar, aud at the end Of forty years Of
nominal freedom net single pound. The 1880
ships employed in trade had dwinded to one,
and the population had declined from 100000 to
280,0O0. Alison, from whose pages these figures
are taken, says ut was this splendid and IN.
equalled colonial possession which the French
nation threw away and destroyed at the COM
mencement Of the revolution, with Q recklessness
and improvidence of which the previous history
of the world had afforded no example" Nor did
actual freedom result from the decree Of the
French Assembly, for, after the dominion of ths
French had been broken, the negro chief, Tous.
saint converted personal into rural servitude. =
The negroes were compelled to work in common by
their overseers and officers. The inspectors ex-
ercised summary jurisdiction over their labors.
All delinquences were brought before them
by the propietors and they forthwith investiga.
ted and punished the offence with rigid severity.
Free labor was unknown, and continues so, gen.
orally speaking, TO this day. 1t was the reality
of slavery, without its name." Such Is the testi-
mony of Dumas, respecting the change wrought
In the condition OF the negro. Alison adds his
testimony in the following: "Since the expulsion
of the French from the island, st. Domingo has
been nominally independent but slavery has
been far from being abolished, and the Condi.ion
Of the people anything but ameliorated by the
change. Nominally free, the blacks have re-
mained really enslaved. Compelled to labor by
the terms of military discipline for small part
of the produce of the SOIL they have retained the
severity without the advantages of servitude
the industrious habits the hourishing aspect OF
the island has disappeared the surplus wealth,
the agricultural opulence Of the fields have ceas-
ed from being the greatest exporting island in
the West Indies, it has ceased to raise any sugar
and the Inhabitants, reduced to half their former
amount and bitterly CALLED by their republican
task-masters, have relapsed into the Incidence
and inactivity of savage life." Thus much for
St Domingo, after thousands OF white men had
been sacrificed, and the island deluged in blood
to give freedom TO the negro.
Nor has the experience of the English been es-
sentialy different. After striking the fetlers
from their West India slaves to forge them anew
upon their own people in the shape of an enor.
nous debt'-to use the language of an eminent
British statesman-we have Parliamentary re.
ports and other Brit sh evidence TO prove that
the scheme is q lamentable failure. When Capt.
Hamilton, British officer, was summoned before
a select committee of Parliament, he stated that
the once fertile island of Jamaica had become
"a desert" and being asked if he thought the
term desert" was quite applicable to the state
of things there he replied: :" i should say pecu-
liarly applicable, without any exaggeration." In
a memorial addressed by the Council and Assem-
bly Of Jamaica to the Queen, dated Feb. 18th, 1852
aiier alluding TO the unhappy condition of the
island and the danger OF being compelled TO aban-
don the culture of sugar therein, they say "n con.
clusion, we would humbly entreat the consi1era.
ton of your majesty to the mOral effects which
must be produced on the lower classes OF the pop
ulation of this island by the general abandon.
ment of property and withdrawal OF capital, now
unhappily 10 progress. Convinced that in grant.
ing freedom to the British slave, it never was in.
tended 10 allow him to sink into state of bar.
barism and uncivilization, we still feel it our
humble duty TO assure your majesty, that the
downward progress of the agricultural res lurces
of the colony has been already accompanied by
a retrogression in moral conduct upon the part Of
the lower classes, and We are assured that this
retrogression must and will, for obvious reasons
keep pace with the destruction OF property, and
the consequent expulsion from the colony Of all
whom necessity may not compel to residence
events that must speedily occur, unless ycuI
majesty shall be pleased gracOusly TO receive our
petition, and we obtain from the Imperial Parlia.
ment efficient aid, ere ruin and dtsolation shall
have taken the place OF prosperity and cultiva-
ton, and religion and morality shall have been
superseded by barbarism and superstition"
Earl Grey said in the House of Lords, on the
10th of June, 1852 that /" 1t was established by
statistical facts that the negroes were becoming
idle. and falling bach in civilization, and the
like, and to what principal cause had that been
attributed 1t was attributed by every man who
had looked into the state of the colonies to this
simple reason, that the negroes had been relieved
subjected" In the London Times, of January
6, 1860, Mr.. Trollopeamongst other things, speak.
ing of the deness Of the freed negro, says: f" The
evil which thus cruelty embanasses the planters
is chiefly felt In Jamaica, and In some of the
smaller islands, Grenada, Dominica and st. Luz
cien, where the negro has the chance Of squat
ting. The negro imagined that his emancipation
was to be an emancipation not merely from sla.
very, but from work, and British philanthropy
proposes to protect him in his laziness from the
competition of the coolies. As far as Jamaica
is concerned, what is there to tempt the English
mani 1t is fact that half the sugar estates
and more than half the coffee plantations have
gone back into state OF waste.
In Lewis West Indies, written seventeen years
before emancipation, he says AS TO the iree
blacks they are almost uniformly lazy and i'm
provident most of them half-staryed, and only
anxiou, to live from hand to mouth. Some
lounge about the highways with pedlar-boxes
stocked with various worthless baubles; others
keen miserable stalls, provided with rancid butter,
damaged salt pork and other such articles, and
these they are always willing to exchange for
stolen rum and sugar, which they secret
ly tempt the negroes to pilfer from their
proprietors but few of them endeavor 10 earn
their livelihood creditably. Even those who
profess to be tailors carpenters or coopers, are,
for the most part, careless, drunken and dlssipa-
ted, and never take pains sunlclent 10 attaln any
dexteiity in their trade. As to Tree negro hiring
out for plantation labor no instance of such q
thing was ever known in Jamaica But, we have
mot space 10 multiply the evidence upon this
peint that might be furnished; all going to prove
That constraint is necessary TO make the negro
an efficient laborer and to prevent him from
lansing messursbly into idleness and barbarism.
We are passing now through that transition
state which las been indicated in the preceding
remarks, and those who are to control In this
matter should have true appreciation of the
dangers ahead, and see to 1t that that section
which has heretofore contributed SO largely TO
the wealth Of the country be not ruined by the
change. The latest reliable statistics that We
have at hand. show that the exports OF the
Gnnfhern States for the wear 1859 amounted TO