Diary in America, Series One

by Frederick Marryat

It appears, therefore, that slavery can only be abolished by the slave state itself in which it exists; and it is not very probable that any class of people will voluntarily make themselves beggars by surrendering up their whole property to satisfy the clamour of a party. That this party is strong, and is daily becoming stronger, is very true: the stronger it becomes the worse will be the prospects of the United States. In England the case was very different; the government had a right to make the sacrifice to public opinion by indemnification to the slave-holders; but in America the government have not that power; and the efforts of the abolitionists will only have the effects of plunging the country into difficulties and disunion. As an American author truly observes, “The American abolitionists must trample on the constitution, and wade through the carnage of a civil war, before they can triumph—”

Already the abolition party have done much mischief. The same author observes, “The South has been compelled, in self-defence, to rivet the chains of slavery afresh, and to hold on to their political rights with a stronger hand. The conduct of the abolitionists has arrested the improvements which were in progress in the slave states for the amelioration of the condition of the slave; it has broken up the system of intellectual and moral culture that was extensively in operation for the slave’s benefit, lest the increase of his knowledge should lend him a dangerous power, in connection with these crusading efforts; it has rivetted the chains of slavery with a greatly increased power, and enforced a more rigorous discipline; it has excluded for the time being the happy moral influence which was previously operating on the South from the North, and from the rest of the world, by the lights of comparison, by the interchange of a friendly intercourse, and by a friendly discussion of the great subject, all tending to the bettering of the slave’s condition, and, as was supposed, to his ultimate emancipation. Before this agitation commenced, this subject, in all its aspects and bearings, might be discussed as freely at the South as anywhere; but now, not a word can be said. It has kindled a sleepless jealousy in the South toward the North, and made the slave-holders feel as if all the rest of the world were their enemies, and that they must depend upon themselves for the maintenance of their political rights. We say rights, because they regard them as such; and so long as they do so, it is all the same in their feelings, whether the rest of the world acknowledge them or not. And they are, in fact, political rights, guaranteed to them by the constitution of the United States.”

It is not, however, impossible that the abolition party in the Eastern and Northern states may be gradually checked by the citizens of those very states. Their zeal may be as warm as ever; but public opinion will compel them, at the risk of their lives, to hold their tongues. This possibility can, however, only arise from the Northern and Eastern states becoming manufacturing states, as they are most anxious to be. Should this happen, the raw cotton grown by slave labour will employ the looms of Massachusetts; and then, as the Quarterly Review very correctly observes, “by a cycle of commercial benefits, the Northern and Eastern states will feel that there is some material compensation for the moral turpitude of the system of slavery.”

The slave proprietors in these states are as well aware as any political economist can be, that slavery is a loss instead of a gain, and that no state can arrive at that degree of prosperity under a state of slavery which it would under free labour. The case is simple. In free labour, where there is competition, you exact the greatest possible returns for the least possible expenditure; a man is worked as a machine; he is paid for what he produces, and nothing more. By slave labour, you receive the least possible return for the greatest possible expense, for the slave is better fed and clothed than the freeman, and does as little work as he can. The slave-holders in the eastern states are well aware of this, and are as anxious to be rid of slavery as are the abolitionists; but the time is not yet come, nor will it come until the country shall have so filled up as to render white labour attainable. Such, indeed, are not the expectations expressed in the language of the representatives of their states when in congress; but, it must be remembered, that this is a question which has convulsed the Union, and that, not only from a feeling of pride, added to indignation at the interference, but from if feeling of the necessity of not yielding up one tittle upon this question, the language of determined resistance is in congress invariably resorted to. But these gentlemen have one opinion for congress, and another for their private table; in the first, they stand up unflinchingly for their slave rights; in the other, they reason calmly, and admit what they could not admit in public. There is no labour in the eastern states, excepting that of the rice plantations in South Carolina, which cannot be performed by white men; indeed, a large proportion of the cotton in the Carolinas is now raised by a free white population. In the grazing portion of these states, white labour would be substituted advantageously, could white labour be procured at any reasonable price.

The time will come, and I do not think it very distant, say perhaps twenty or thirty years, when, provided America receives no check, and these states are not injudiciously interfered with, that Virginia, Kentucky, Delaware, Maryland, North Carolina, (and, eventually, but probably somewhat later, Tennessee and South Carolina) will, of their own accord, enrol themselves among the free states. As a proof that in the eastern slave states the negro is not held in such contempt, or justice toward him so much disregarded, I extract the following from an American work:—

“An instance of the force of law in the southern states for the protection of the slave has just occurred, in the failure of a petition to his excellency, PM Butler, governor of South Carolina, for the pardon of Nazareth Allen, a white person, convicted of the murder of a slave, and sentenced to be hung. The following is part of the answer of the governor to the petitioners:—

“‘The laws of South Carolina make no distinction in cases of deliberate murder, whether committed on a black man or a white man; neither can I. I am not a law-maker, but the executive officer of the laws already made; and I must not act on a distinction which the legislature might have made, but has not thought fit to make.’

“That the crime of which the prisoner stands convicted was committed against one of an inferior grade in society, is a reason for being especially cautious in intercepting the just severity of the law. This class of our population are subjected to us as well for their protection as our advantage. Our rights, in regard to them, are not more imperative than their duties; and the institutions, which for wise and necessary ends have rendered them peculiarly dependent, at least pledge the law to be to them peculiarly a friend and a protector.

“The prayer of the petition is not granted.

“Pierce M Butler.”