Part 14 (2/2)

[Footnote 1: Cobb, _Digest of the Laws of Georgia_, p 555; and Prince, _Digest of the Laws of Georgia_, p 658]

[Footnote 2: Laws of South Carolina, 1834]

North Carolina was a the last States to take such drastic measures for the protection of the white race In this commonwealth the whites and blacks had lived on liberal tere there Soht white children[1]

[Footnote 1: Bassett, _Slavery in North Carolina_, p 74; and testiainst Negroes engendered by the frequency of insurrections, however, sufficed to swing the State into the reactionary coluislature that year prohibited the public instruction of Negroes, et any more education than what they could in their own family circle[1] The public school system established thereafter specifically provided that its benefits should not extend to any descendant froeneration inclusive[2] Bearing so grievously this loss of their social status after they had toiled up from poverty, many aenial communities

[Footnote 1: _Revised Statutes of North Carolina_, 578]

[Footnote 2: _Laws of North Carolina, 1835_, C6, S2]

The States of the West did not have to deal so severely with their slaves as was deemed necessary in Southern States Missouri found it advisable in 1833 to aorously the traveling and the asse of slaves It was not until 1847, however, that this commonwealth specifically provided that no one should keep or teach any school for the education of Negroes[2] Tennessee had as early as 1803 a law governing the movement of slaves but exhibited a littlethat there should be no circulation of seditious books or pa Negroes[3] Tennessee, however, did not positively forbid the education of colored people Kentucky had a systeress of slaves but never passed any law prohibiting their instruction Yet statistics show that although the education of Negroes was not penalized, it was in many places made impossible by public sentiment So was it in the State of Maryland, which did not expressly forbid the instruction of anyone

[Footnote 1: _Laws of the Territory of Missouri_, p 498]

[Footnote 2: _Laws of the State of Missouri_, 1847, pp 103 and 104]

[Footnote 3: _Public Acts passed at the First Session of the General assembly of the State of Tennessee_, p 145, chap 44]

These reactionary results were not obtained without so element of some States divided on the question The opinions of this class ell expressed in the discussion between Chancellor Harper and JB O'Neal of the South Carolina bar The forroes who, he had never seen one read anything but the Bible He thought that they imposed this task upon theroes' ”defective comprehension and the laborious nature of this e an inefficient ious instruction He, therefore, supported the oppressive measures of the South The other member of the bar maintained that men could not reflect as Christians and justify the position that slaves should not be permitted to read the Bible ”It is in vain,” added he, ”to say there is danger in it The best slaves of the State are those who can and do read the Scriptures

Again, who is it that teaches your slaves to read? It is generally done by the children of the owners Who would tolerate an indict a slave to read? Such laws look to me as rather cowardly”[2] This attorney was alument that to Christianize and educate the colored people of a slave commonwealth had a tendency to elevate theitimate distinctions” of the community, could be adraded

[Footnote 1: DeBow, _The Industrial Resources of the Southern and Western States_, vol ii, p 269]

[Footnote 2: DeBow, _The Industrial Resources of the Southern and Western States_, vol ii, p 279]

After these laws had been passed, American slavery extended not as that of the ancients, only to the body, but also to the arded as positively inconsistent with the institution The precaution taken to prevent the dissemination of information was declared indispensable to the system The situation in many parts of the South was just as Berry portrayed it in the Virginia House of Delegates in 1832 He said: ”We have as far as possible closed every avenue by which light uish the capacity to see the light, our ould be completed; they would then be on a level with the beasts of the field and we should be safe! I am not certain that ould not do it, if we could find out the process, and that on the plea of necessity”[1]

[Footnote 1: Coffin, _Slave Insurrections_, p 23; and Goodell, _Slave Code_, p 323]

It had then come to pass that in the South, where once were found a considerable nuly scarce or disappeared froether On plantations of hundreds of slaves it was common to discover that not one of thee districts it was considered alro who could read the Bible or sign his name[1]

[Footnote 1:_Ibid_, pp 323-324]

The reactionary tendency was in no sense confined to the Southern States Laere passed in the North to prevent the roes to that section Their education at certain places was discouraged In fact, in the proportion that the conditions in the South made it necessary for free blacks to flee frorew less tolerant on account of the large number of those who crowded the towns and cities of the free States near the border The antislavery societies at one time found it necessary to devote their tiees to make them acceptable to the white people rather than to direct their attention toan influx of free Negroes, drove them even from communities to which they had learned to, repair for education

[Footnote 1: _Proceedings of the American Convention_]

The best example of this intolerance was the opposition encountered by Prudence Crandall, a well-educated young Quaker lady, who had established a boarding-school at Canterbury, Connecticut Trouble arose when Sarah Harris, a colored girl, asked admission to this institution[1] For many reasons Miss Crandall hesitated to admit her but finally yielded Only a few days thereafter the parents of the white girls called on Miss Crandall to offer their objections to sending their children to school with a ”nigger”[2] Miss Crandall stood firirls withdrew, and the teacher advertised for young women of color The determination to continue the school on this basis incited the towns They passed resolutions to protest through a coainst the establishment of a school of this kind in that co Andrew T Judson denounced the policy of Miss Crandall, while the Rev Samuel J May ably defended it Judson was not only opposed to the establishment of such a school in Canterbury but in any part of the State He believed that colored people, who could never rise from their menial condition in the United States, should not to be encouraged to expect to elevate themselves in Connecticut He considered them inferior servants who should not be treated as equals of the Caucasians, but should be sent back to Africa to improve themselves and Christianize the natives[3] On the contrary, Mr May thought that there would never be fewer colored people in this country than were found here then and that it would be unjust to exile theroes their rights or lose their own and that since education is the priht of all men, Connecticut was the last place where this should be denied[4]

[Footnote 1: Jay, _An Inquiry_, etc, p 30]

[Footnote 2: _Ibid_, pp 32 _et seq_]