Slavery: letters and speeches

by Horace Mann

We have fallen, gentleman, on momentous times. Great events have occurred, in rapid succession, both in this and in the other hemisphere. There seems to have been a grand upheaving of the elements of society from its deep foundations. We have been so often astonished and amazed, by shock after shock, and convulsion after convulsion, that I fear we are beginning to lose our moral sensibility to political catastrophes, however grand or fatal they may be.

You know there is a spot near the Mississippi River famous for the frequency of its earthquakes. A gentleman who visited there some years ago, told me that soon after entering a hotel, at a place called New Madrid, his attention was suddenly arrested by the rattling of the crockery, the jarring of the household furniture, and the shaking of the chair in which he sat. Starting up in trepidation, he sprang for the door. “O,” said his landlord, “don’t be alarmed. It is nothing but an earthquake.” These phenomena, it seems, had become so common as to have lost their power of exciting alarm. So, I fear, it is in regard to the late commotions in Europe; and especially in regard to some of the marvellous doings of Congress in our own country. From their astounding character, and their rapid succession, I fear we are becoming insensible to their importance, like the inhabitants who dwell at the base of Mount Etna, whom neither the rumbling of the mountain, nor the lava rivers which pour down its side, can awake from their stupor, until, like Pompeii or Herculaneum, they are buried in the ruins.

In the old world, things seem already to be settling back into their former condition, and hopes are darkening into fears. In this country, I still trust that we shall redeem something of the past, and secure the future. Yet the events of the last few months are of a disheartening character, if any thing could ever dishearten a true lover of his country. It has been my fortune and duty to be in the midst of these events. I have watched the tide of battle with sleepless eye; and when Liberty at last was stricken down, my heart bled with hers.

I believe I understand, gentlemen, what you wish me to do on this occasion; and therefore I shall endeavor to lay before you, briefly but impartially, the humble part which I, as your representative, have taken in those events which have filled the hearts of good men with alarm.

I would, however, premise a few words, in order to show how we have come, step by step, to the fearful position we now occupy.

Very early in our history, as a republic established to maintain the rights of man, an extent of territory was acquired equal to all we possessed before; and this addition accrued to the special advantage of those who maintain, as the first great article in their creed, the wrongs of man. The same European wars which enabled Mr. Jefferson’s administration to purchase Louisiana with fifteen millions of dollars,—a sum mostly paid by the north,—brought the commercial interests of the north also within the destructive sweep of those contests, and the non-intercourse act and the embargo were the consequence. These came upon New England at a time when commerce was her only resource. They brought as great a calamity upon the New England states as it would now be to the south if their whole cotton crop, or to the west if their whole grain crop, were to fail for a series of years. They palsied our industry; and, without industry, men, any where out of Paradise, will be poor. Upon the back of this calamity came the war of 1812, which we bore as well as we could, and performed our full share in carrying the country through it, though it cut off our very means of living. That war revealed a lamentable condition of things. It revealed the fact that, notwithstanding our political independence, we were, in a commercial sense, most deplorably dependent. It pointed to a new policy. It put the country upon achieving its second independence,—its independence, at least for the necessaries of life, of foreign mechanics, manufacturers, and artisans, as it had already achieved its political independence of foreign kings, aristocracies, and ecclesiastics. It gave birth to the American system, in which Calhoun, Lowndes, Cheves, and Clay,—all from the slave states,—took the lead. I mention the first three names, particularly, because they were from the state of South Carolina. So heartily did they enter into the new policy that they took their seats in Congress clad in homespun. They said they would exemplify their principles by their garments, and wear them outside as well as inside of their bodies. I am sorry their principles lasted but little longer than their clothes,—one suit worn out, and all, both without and within, clean gone. Even Mr. Madison boasted that his coat was woven in an American loom. The south led off in this policy, and New England, whose capital had been wrecked on the ocean, was reluctantly compelled to follow their lead. This was the origin of the protective tariff, the child of South Carolina, though, at a later period, adopted by Massachusetts. It was not, however, until 1824, that New England, and Massachusetts particularly, gave in her adhesion to the protective policy. Then our people engaged in manufactures. The streams were dammed, and the mighty powers of nature were set to spinning and weaving, to dyeing and printing, under the guidance of that genius which had been kindled and nurtured in our schoolhouses. Those establishments were founded which have produced so marvellous a change in our household condition, surrounding all with so many comforts, and filling our dwellings with so vast a variety of the refinements and luxuries of life. Those of you who have arrived at my age, and are therefore acquainted with the condition of things throughout our country towns thirty years ago, know that the change is almost magical. Though opposed in its inception by the cities and the merchants, yet it has promoted their prosperity not less than that of the people.

In the year 1820, a national question of a great moral character arose. The south, whose policy had before secured a territory as large as that of the original thirteen, sought to extend slavery over its whole surface. Missouri applied to be admitted into the Union as a slave state. The morality and religion of the north thought the time had come to arrest the strides of slavery, and they opposed the application. Earnest resistance was made. The battle was obstinately fought; but at last, the north, or rather enough recreants of the north yielded, and the day was lost. The south bought or bullied a sufficient number of the invertebrate creatures whom we send to Congress, and triumphed over us. This was the first great surrender of principle on the part of the north, and a fatal surrender it was. We, and humanity, and all that is dearest to the heart and thoughts of man, might have achieved the victory but for a few cases of foul treachery to the cause of freedom. O, that the retributions for that treason had been so terrible, that the coward motive of fear, if not the angel impulse of humanity, might have deterred all men in after times from ever daring to repeat it.

The next great struggle was in 1833, when nullification first reared its hideous head. At that epoch, the south, and especially South Carolina, observing that our capital had been too deeply invested in manufactures to be withdrawn, changed their policy, and sought to reap a double harvest,—both of the manufacturing system they had introduced, and of the free trade system they had abandoned. She therefore set about to strangle that offspring of protection to which she had given birth. Even in Virginia, Mr. Madison’s coat had become an unconstitutional coat, and the idea of American woollens so wrought upon Mr. John Randolph’s gentle affections, that he said he would go a mile out of his way to kick a sheep. The South Carolina resistance was beginning to assume a military form. Then occurred a most admirable opportunity to test the strength of our government,—to learn and know whether the pillars of this Union are made of granite or of pipe-stems. We had a clear case of right. In the chair of state was a man of Roman will, who would have rejoiced in the opportunity to see that the republic received no detriment. He contemned the nonsense as much as he despised the fraud, of the cry that the Union was in danger. If it was in any danger, he would have saved it in such a way that it would not need saving again every twelvemonth. But the chance was lost. A compromise was brought forward, by which South Carolina consented to a sort of armed truce, on her part, provided the tariff, though not given up, should be tapered down almost to nothing. Though, on many accounts, I have a high respect for the author of that compromise, yet I regard it as the most unfortunate act ever done,—the most fatal precedent ever set by this government. It taught the south the efficacy of clamoring; it taught them that there are cases where a Bombastes Furioso is as powerful as a Julius Cæsar; and it taught them also, notwithstanding all appearances of solidity and firmness, of what a delicate nervous tissue a money-bag consists.

When that compromise law had had time to reach its legitimate issues, you all know the result. A whirlwind of bankruptcy swept over the land. Its ravages reached even the humblest portions of society. The laborer suffered even more than the capitalist. The latter suffered in his gains, but the former in his bread. All classes perceived the cause; and they rallied, almost as one man, to that tremendous effort to change the policy of the country, which resulted in the election to the presidency of General Harrison. Though, but a few days after his inauguration, the reins of government fell from his lifeless hands, yet the tariff of 1842 was the consequence of his election. This restored the drooping fortunes of New England. Then it was, while we were immersed in our business and our money making, that southern politicians addressed themselves to that great scheme of pro-slavery aggrandizement,—the annexation of Texas. You are all familiar with the details of this transaction, and it is painful to revert to them. The kid was seethed in its mother’s milk. Northern Democrats cast the votes which gave Texas to the south, and destroyed our own prosperity. Texas was admitted just in season to repeal, by her votes in the Senate, the tariff of 1842, by that of 1846. This again put in jeopardy all our means embarked in manufactures. Would to Heaven that nothing more dear than pecuniary interests had been sacrificed by that measure.

I do not blame the south for seeking an equilibrium with the north; but they do not seek the true equilibrium. If they would sustain themselves in a competition with us in economical affairs, they must encourage labor and render it honorable. They must, all of them, labor as we do, in one way or another, with the hand or with the head; or,—which is the only true way,—with both together. They must build schoolhouses to develop the minds of their children, and churches to cultivate their morals. If they would only do this, and not attempt to carry every thing by slave-begotten votes, and by adding new states to beget more slave votes, they would soon surpass us; for nature has done vastly more for them, in soil and climate and in all the means of earthly prosperity, than for us. A superiority obtained in this way, we, as lovers of human happiness, should not repine at, but rejoice in.