[ [4] This summary from the return of the census, is copied from the Richmond (Va.) Compiler.
It will be observed by looking at this table, that Indiana and Illinois are the only free States, which in point of education are surpassed by any of the slave States: for this disgraceful circumstance three causes may be assigned, viz., their recent settlement, the influx of foreigners, and emigration from the slave States. The returns from New York, Rhode Island, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, are greatly affected by the vast number of foreigners congregated in their cities, and employed in their manufactories and on their public works. In Ohio, also, there is a large foreign population: and it is well known that comparatively few emigrants from Europe seek a residence in the slave States, where there is little or no employment to invite them. But what a commentary on slavery and slaveholders is afforded by the gross ignorance prevailing in the old States of South Carolina, Virginia, and North Carolina! But let us proceed. The census gives a return of "scholars at public charge."
| Of these, there are in the free States, | 432,173 |
| " " slave States, | 35,580 |
Ohio alone has 51,812 such scholars,—more than are to be found in the 13 slave States! Her neighbor Kentucky has 429!! Let us compare in this particular the largest and the smallest State in the Union.
| Virginia has scholars at public charge | 9,791 |
| Rhode Island | 10,912 [5] |
[ [5] See American Almanac for 1842, page 226.
But we have some official confessions, which give a still more deplorable account of Southern ignorance. In 1837, Governor Clarke, in his message to the Kentucky Legislature, remarked, "By the computation of those most familiar with the subject, one third of the adult population of the state are unable to write their names."
Governor Campbell reported to the Virginia Legislature, that from the returns of 98 clerks, it appeared that of 4614 applications for marriage licenses in 1837, no less than 1047 were made by men unable to write.
These details will enable you to estimate the impudence of the following plea in behalf of slavery:
"It is by the existence of slavery, exempting so large a portion of our citizens from the necessity of bodily labor, that we have leisure for intellectual pursuits, and the means of attaining a liberal education."—Chancellor Harper of South Carolina on Slavery.—Southern Literary Messenger, Oct. 1838.