In the light of Reconstruction, this was prophecy.
These words, once heard by a Southern white man, of course sank into his heart. They could never have been forgotten. The argument of Helper fell on deaf ears. If Helper had come with the promise (and an assurance of its fulfilment) that the negroes, when emancipated, would be sent to Liberia, or elsewhere out of the country, the South would have become Republicanized at once. Even if the slave-holder had been unwilling, the Southern non-slave-holder, with his three, and often five, to one majority, would have seen to it.
And it is not too much to say that if the negro had been, as the Abolitionists and ultimately many Republicans contended he was, the equal of the white man, Liberia would have been a success. What a glorious consummation of the dreams of statesmen and philanthropists that would have been! Abolitionists, unable to frustrate their scheme, and the American negro, profiting by the civilization here received from contact with the white man, building by his own energy happy homes for himself and his kinsmen, and enjoying the blessings of a great government of his own, in his own great continent!
Africa with its vast resources is a prize that all Europe is now contending for. It is believed to be adapted even to white men. Most assuredly, for the negro Liberia offered far better opportunities than did the rocky coast of New England to the white men who settled it. Liberia had been carefully selected as a desirable part of Africa. It was an unequalled group of statesmen and philanthropists that had planted the colony; they provided for it and set it on its feet. But it failed; failed just for the same reason that prevented the aboriginal African from catching on to the civilization that began to develop thousands of years ago, close by his side on the borders of the Mediterranean; failed for the same reason that Hayti, now free for a century, has failed. The failure of the plan of the American Colonization Society to repatriate the American negro in Africa was due primarily to the incapacity of the negro.
A very complete and convincing story will be found in an article entitled "Liberia, an Example of Negro Self-Government,"[75] by Miss Agnes P. Mahony, for five years a missionary in that country. The author of the article was a sympathizing friend. She says: "In 1847 the colony was considered healthy enough to stand alone.... So our flag was lowered on the African continent, and the protectors of the colony retired, leaving the people to govern the country in their own way." Then she recites that in order to test their capacity for self-government their constitution (1847) provided that no white man should hold property in the country; and to this Miss Mahony traces the failure that followed. When she wrote, the Liberian negroes, for fifty-nine years under the protectorship of the United States, had been troubled by no foreign enemy; yet their failure was complete—not a foot of railroad, no cable communication with foreign countries, no telegraphic communication with the interior, etc. Still the devoted missionary thinks that Liberia might prosper, if it could but have "the encouraging example of and contact with the right kind of white men."
The presidential campaign of 1860 was very exciting. There were four tickets in the field, Douglas and Johnson, Democrats; Breckenridge and Lane, Democrats; Lincoln and Hamlin, Republicans, and Bell and Everett representing the "Constitutional Union" party. As the election approached it became apparent that the Republicans were leading, and far-seeing men, like Samuel J. Tilden, of New York, became much alarmed for fear that the election of Lincoln would bring about secession in the South. Mr. Tilden, in view of the danger that to him was apparent, wrote, shortly before the election, to William Kent, of New York City, an open letter in which he earnestly urged a combination in New York State of the supporters of other candidates, in order to defeat Abraham Lincoln. The letter was so alarming that some of Tilden's friends thought he had lost his balance; but now that letter is regarded as a remarkable proof of his sagacity. In the first volume of Mr. Tilden's "Life and Letters," by Bigelow, appears an "Appreciation" by James C. Carter and an analysis of this letter. Of this the following is a brief abstract: Mr. Tilden first argued that two strictly sectional parties, arrayed upon the question of destroying an institution which one of them, not unnaturally, regarded as essential to self-existence, would bring war.
Then Mr. Tilden further said that if the Republican party should be successful in establishing its dominion over the South, the national government in the Southern States would cease to be self-government and become a government of one people over a distinct people, a thing impossible with our race, except as a consequence of a successful war, and even then incompatible with our democratic institutions. He also said: "I assert that a controversy between powerful communities, organized into governments, of a nature like that which now divides the North and South, can be settled only by convention or by war."
And again: "A condition of parties in which the Federative Government shall be carried on by a party, having no affiliations in the Southern States, is impossible to continue. Such a government would be out of all relations to those States. It would have neither the nerves of sensation, which convey intelligence to the intellect of the body politic, nor the ligaments and muscles, which hold its parts together and move them in harmony. It would be in substance the government of one people by another people. That system will not do for our race."
Mr. Tilden, when he spoke of "two sectional parties arrayed upon the question of destroying an institution," viz., slavery, saw the situation exactly as the South did. To prove that the Republican party was looking to the ultimate destruction of the institution, Mr. Tilden cited the leadership of Chase and his speeches in which he was propounding the higher law theory; asserting that the conflict was "irrepressible"; suggesting the power of the North to amend the Constitution, etc.