After the above speech was delivered, I was referred to a Tract, written by a Virginian, on the subject of slavery; and, by the politeness of its author, I have since obtained a copy of it. It is entitled, “Address to the People of West Virginia; showing that Slavery is injurious to the public welfare, and that it may be gradually abolished, without detriment to the rights and interests of Slaveholders. By a Slaveholder of West Virginia. Lexington: R. C. Noel. 1847.” This Address was written by the Rev. Henry Ruffner, D. D., president of Lexington College, Lexington, Va. Some of the passages of this Address are so striking; it is throughout so corroborative of one of the arguments contained in the speech; and coming, as it does, from a Virginian, an eye-witness of the effects of slavery, and a holder of slaves, that I have thought it would be useful to append them. The extracts, of course, are not, as here, consecutive.
Nowhere, since time began, have the two systems of slave labor and free labor been subjected to so fair and so decisive a trial of their effects on public prosperity as in these United States. Here the two systems have worked side by side for ages, under such equal circumstances, both political and physical, and with such ample time and opportunity for each to work out its proper effects, that all must admit the experiment to be now complete, and the result decisive. No man of common sense, who has observed this result, can doubt for a moment that the system of free labor promotes the growth and prosperity of states in a much higher degree than the system of slave labor. In the first settlement of a country, when labor is scarce and dear, slavery may give a temporary impulse to improvement; but even this is not the case, except in warm climates, and where free men are scarce and either sickly or lazy; and when we have said this, we have said all that experience in the United States warrants us to say, in favor of the policy of employing slave labor.
It is the common remark of all who have travelled through the United States, that the free states and the slave states exhibit a striking contrast in their appearance. In the older free states are seen all the tokens of prosperity;—a dense and increasing population; thriving villages, towns, and cities; a neat and productive agriculture, growing manufactures, and active commerce.
In the older parts of the slave states,—with a few local exceptions,—are seen, on the contrary, too evident signs of stagnation, or of positive decay;—a sparse population, a slovenly cultivation spread over vast fields that are wearing out, among others already worn out and desolate; villages and towns, “few and far between,” rarely growing, often decaying, sometimes mere remnants of what they were, sometimes deserted ruins, haunted only by owls; generally no manufactures, nor even trades, except the indispensable few; commerce and navigation abandoned, as far as possible, to the people of the free states; and generally, instead of the stir and bustle of industry, a dull and dreamy stillness, broken, if broke at all, only by the wordy brawl of politics.
New England and the middle states of New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania contained, in 1790, 1,968,000 inhabitants, and in 1840, 6,760,000; having gained, in this period, 243 per cent.
The four old slave states had, in 1790, a population of 1,473,000, and in 1840, of 3,279,000; having gained, in the same period, 122 per cent., just about half as much, in proportion, as the free states. They ought to have gained about twice as much; for they had at first only seven inhabitants to the square mile, when the free states not only had upwards of twelve, but, on the whole, much inferior advantages of soil and climate. Even cold, barren New England, though more than twice as thickly peopled, grew in population at a faster rate than these old slave states.
About half the territory of these old slave states is new country, and has comparatively few slaves. On this part the increase of population has chiefly taken place. On the old slave-labored lowlands, a singular phenomena has appeared; there, within the bounds of these rapidly growing United States,—yes, there, population has been long at a stand; yes, over wide regions,—especially in Virginia,—it has declined, and a new wilderness is gaining upon the cultivated land! What has done this work of desolation? Not war, nor pestilence; not oppression of rulers, civil or ecclesiastical; but slavery, a curse more destructive in its effects than any of them. It were hard to find, in old king-ridden, priest-ridden, overtaxed Europe, so large a country, where, within twenty years past, such a growing poverty and desolation have appeared.
It is in the last period of ten years, from 1830 to 1840, that this consuming plague of slavery has shown its worst effects in the old Southern States. Including the increase in their newly-settled and western counties, they gained in population only 7¹⁄₂ per cent.; while cold, barren, thickly peopled New England gained 15, and the old Middle States 26 per cent. East Virginia actually fell off 26,000 in population; and, with the exception of Richmond and one or two other towns, her population continues to decline. Old Virginia was the first to sow this land of ours with slavery; she is also the first to reap the full harvest of destruction. Her lowland neighbors of Maryland and the Carolinas were not far behind at the seeding; nor are they far behind at the ingathering of desolation.
Let us take the rich and beautiful State of Kentucky, compared with her free neighbor Ohio. The slaves of Kentucky have composed less than a fourth part of her population. But mark their effect upon the comparative growth of the state. In the year 1800, Kentucky contained 221,000 inhabitants, and Ohio, 45,000. In forty years, the population of Kentucky had risen to 780,000; that of Ohio to 1,519,000. This wonderful difference could not be owing to any natural superiority of the Ohio country. Kentucky is nearly as large, nearly as fertile, and quite equal, in other gifts of nature. She had greatly the advantage, too, in the outset of this forty years’ race of population. She started with 5¹⁄₂ inhabitants to the square mile, and came out with 20: Ohio started with one inhabitant to the square mile, and came out with 38. Kentucky had full possession of her territory at the beginning. Much of Ohio was then, and for a long time afterwards, in possession of the Indians. Ohio is by this time considerably more than twice as thickly peopled as Kentucky; yet she still gains, both by natural increase and by the influx of emigrants; while Kentucky has for twenty years been receiving much fewer emigrants than Ohio, and multitudes of her citizens have been yearly moving off to newer and yet newer countries.
Compare this natural increase with the census returns, and it appears that, in the ten years from 1830 to 1840, Virginia lost by emigration no fewer than 375,000 of her people, of whom East Virginia lost 304,000, and West Virginia 71,000. At this rate Virginia supplies the west every ten years with a population equal in number to the population of the State of Mississippi in 1840!