Part 123 (1/2)
SIR,--I have to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 1st instant, in which you again refer to the publication of the Correspondence between us, in relation to the measures and designs of the abolitionists. I would have certainly answered yours of the 2d ult., on the same subject, more fully before this, had it not escaped my recollection, in consequence [of] having been more engaged than usual in the business before the House. I hope the delay has been productive of no inconvenience.
If I correctly understand your letters above referred to, the control of these papers, and the decision as to their publication, have pa.s.sed into the 'Executive Committee of the American Anti-Slavery Society;' and, from their tenor, I infer that their determination is so far made, that nothing I could object would prevent it, if I desired to do so. I was certainly not apprised, when I entered into this Correspondence, that its disposition was to depend on any other will than yours and mine,--but that matters nothing now,--you had the power, and I am not disposed to question the right or propriety of its exercise. I heard of you as a man of intelligence, sincerity, and truth,--who, although laboring in a bad cause, did it with ability, and from a mistaken conviction of its justice. As one of the Representatives of a slave-holding const.i.tuency, and one of a committee raised by the Representatives of the slave-holding States, to ascertain the intentions and progress of your a.s.sociations, I availed myself of the opportunity offered by your character and situation, to propose to you inquiries _as to facts_, which would make those _developments so important to be known by our people_. My inquiries were framed to draw out _full and authentic details_ of the organization, numbers, resources, and designs of the abolitionists, of the means they resorted to for the accomplishment of their ends, and the progress made, and making, in their dangerous work, that all such information might be laid before the _four millions and a half of white inhabitants in the slave States, whose lives and property are menaced and endangered_ by this ill-considered, misnamed, and disorganizing philanthropy. They should be informed of the full length and breadth and depth of this storm which is gathering over their heads, before it breaks in its desolating fury. Christians and civilized, they are _now_ industrious, prosperous, and happy; but should your schemes of abolition prevail, it will bring upon them overwhelming ruin, and misery unutterable. The two races cannot exist together upon terms of equality--the extirpation of one and the ruin of the other _would be inevitable_. This humanity, conceived in wrong and born in civil strife, would be baptized in a people's blood. It was, that our people might know, in time to guard against the mad onset, the full extent of this gigantic conspiracy and crusade against their inst.i.tutions; and of necessity upon their lives with which they must sustain them; and their fortunes and prosperity, which _exist only while these inst.i.tutions exist_, that I was induced to enter into a correspondence with you, who by your official station and intelligence were known to be well informed on these points, and from your well established character for candor and fairness, would make no statements of facts which were not known or believed by you to be true. To a great extent, my end has been accomplished by your replies to my inquiries. How far, or whether at all, your answers have run, beyond _the facts inquired for_, into theories, arguments, and dissertations, as erroneous as mischievous, is not a matter of present consideration. We differed no wider than I expected, but that difference has been exhibited courteously, and has nothing to do with the question of publication. Your object, or rather the object of your Committee, is to publish; and I, having no reason to desire it, as you have put me in possession of the facts I wished, and no reason not to desire it, as there is nothing to conceal, will leave yourself and the Committee to take your own course, neither a.s.senting nor dissenting, in what you may finally decide to do.
Very respectfully,
Your obedient servant,
F.H. Elmore.”
[This letter of Mr. Elmore contains but little more than a reiteration of alarming cries on the part of the slaveholder;--cries that are as old as the earliest attempts of philanthropy to break the fetters of the enslaved, and that have been repeated up to the present day, with a boldness that seems to increase, as instances of emanc.i.p.ation multiply to prove them groundless. Those who utter them seem, in their panic, not only to overlook the most obvious laws of the human mind, and the lights of experience, but to be almost unconscious of the great events connected with slavery, that are now pa.s.sing around them in the world, and conspiring to bring about its early abrogation among all civilized and commercial nations.
However _Christian, and civilized, industrious, prosperous and happy_, the SLAVEHOLDERS of the South may be, this cannot be said of the SLAVES.
A large religious denomination of the state in which Mr. Elmore resides, has deliberately p.r.o.nounced them to be ”HEATHEN.” _Their_ ”industry” is seen at the end of the lash--of ”prosperity” they have none, for they cannot possess any thing that is an element of prosperity--their ”happiness” they prove, by running away from their masters, whenever they think they can effect their escape. This is the condition of a large _majority_ of the people in South Carolina, Mississippi and Louisiana.
The ”two races” exist in peace in Mexico,--in all the former South American dependencies of Spain, in Antigua, in the Bermudas, in Canada, in Ma.s.sachusetts, in Vermont, in fine, in every country where they enjoy _legal equality_. It is the _denial_ of this that produces discontent.
MEN will never be satisfied without it. Let the slaveholders consult the irreversible laws of the human mind--make a full concession of right to those from whom they have withheld it, and they will be blessed with a peace, political, social, moral, beyond their present conceptions; without such concessions they never can possess it.
A system that cannot withstand the a.s.saults of truth--that replies to arguments with threats--that cannot be ”talked about”--that flourishes in secrecy and darkness, and dies when brought forth into the light and examined, must in this time of inexorable scrutiny and relentless agitation, be a dangerous one. If _justice_ be done, all necessity for the extirpation of any part of the people will at once be removed.
Baptisms _of blood_ are seen only when humanity has failed in her offices, and the suffering discern hope only in the brute efforts of despair.
Mr. Elmore is doubtless well versed in general history. To his vigorous declamation, I reply by asking, if he can produce from the history of our race a single instance, where emanc.i.p.ation, full and immediate, has been followed, as a legitimate consequence, by insurrection or bloodshed. I may go further, and ask him for a well authenticated instance, where an emanc.i.p.ated slave, singly has imbrued his hands in his master's blood. The first record of such an act in modern times, is yet to be made.
Mr. Elmore says ”the white inhabitants in the slave states should be informed of the full length and breadth and depth of this storm which is gathering over their heads, before it breaks in its desolating fury.” In this sentiment there is not a reasonable man in the country, be he abolitionist or not, who will not coincide with him. We rejoice at the evidence we here have, in a gentleman of the influence and intelligence of Mr. Elmore, of the returning sanity of the South. How wildly and mischievously has she been heretofore misled! Whilst the Governors of Virginia, Alabama, Tennessee and Arkansas, have been repelling offers, made in respectful terms, of the fullest and most authentic accounts of our movements; and whilst Governor Butler of South Carolina, has not only followed the example of his gubernatorial brethren just named, but is found corresponding with an obscure culprit in Ma.s.sachusetts--bribing him with a few dollars, the sum he demanded for his fraudulent promise to aid in thwarting the abolitionists[A]; whilst too, Mr. Calhoun has been willing to pa.s.s laws to shut out from his const.i.tuents and the South generally information that concerned them more nearly than all others--we now have it from the highest source, from one selected by a state delegation as its _representative_ in a general committee of the whole slaveholding delegations, that the South ought to be ”_informed of the full length and breadth and depth_” of the measures, intentions, &c, of the abolitionists. At this there is not an abolitionist who will not rejoice. We ask for nothing but access to the popular mind of the South.
We feel full confidence in the eternal rect.i.tude of our principles, and of their reception at the South, when once they are understood. Let the conflict come, let the truth of liberty fairly enter the lists with the error of slavery, and we have not a doubt of a glorious triumph.
[Footnote A: Appendix H.]
May we not, after this, expect the aid of Mr. Elmore and others of equal distinction in the South, in giving to their fellow-citizens the information that we have always believed, and that they now acknowledge, to be so, important to them?
_May 24, 1838_.
JAMES G. BIRNEY.]
APPENDIX.
APPENDIX A.
Extract from an article addressed to the editor of the Christian Register and Observer, signed W.E.C.--attributed to the Rev.
Dr. Channing.
”Speaking of slavery, I wish to recommend to your readers a book just from the press, ent.i.tled 'Emanc.i.p.ation in the West Indies,' and written by J. A. Thome and J.H. Kimball, who had visited those islands to inquire into the great experiment now going on there. I regard it as the most important work which has appeared among us for years. No man, without reading it, should undertake to pa.s.s judgment on Emanc.i.p.ation. It is something more than a report of the observation and opinions of the writers. It consists, chiefly, of the opinions, conversations, letters, and other doc.u.ments of the very inhabitants of the islands whose judgments are most trust-worthy; of the governors, special magistrates, police officers, managers, attorneys, physicians, &c; and, in most cases, the names of these individuals are given, so that we have the strongest evidence of the correctness of the work.
The results of this great experiment surpa.s.s what the most sanguine could have hoped. It is hardly possible that the trial could have been made under more unfavorable circ.u.mstances. The planters on all the islands were opposed to the Act of Emanc.i.p.ation, and, in most, exceedingly and fiercely hostile to it, and utterly indisposed to give it the best chance of success. The disproportion of the colored race to the whites was fearfully great, being that of seven or eight to one; whilst, in our slaveholding states, the whites outnumber the colored people. The slaves of the West Indies were less civilized than ours, and less fit to be trusted with their own support.
Another great evil was, that the proprietors, to a considerable extent, were absentees; residing in England, and leaving the care of their estates and slaves to managers and owners; the last people for such a trust, and utterly unfit to carry the wretched victims of their tyranny through the solemn transition from slavery to freedom.
To complete the unhappy circ.u.mstances under which the experiment began, the Act of Emanc.i.p.ation was pa.s.sed by a distant government, having no intimate knowledge of the subject; and the consequence was, that a system of 'Apprentices.h.i.+p,' as it was called, was adopted, so absurd, and betraying such ignorance of the principles of human nature, that, did we not know otherwise, we might suspect its author of intending to produce a failure. It was to witness the results of an experiment promising so little good, that our authors visited three islands, particularly worthy of examination--Antigua, Barbadoes, and Jamaica.