Thoughts on African Colonization Part 10

'We must be true to our own maxims, which are taken from the word of G.o.d; and ask for all that we are ent.i.tled to have on the ground of justice and humanity, and be contented with nothing less.

'In the second place, the plan objected to is not merely an acquiescence in the continuance of crime, it is a violation of the best feelings of our nature. For, let any man but reflect on the circ.u.mstance of children being born to slavery, merely because they came into the world the last hour of December 1830, instead of the first hour of January 1, 1831--and of children in the same family, brothers and sisters--some of them destined to bondage for life, and others gifted with freedom, for no other reason than that the former were born before, and the latter after, a particular day of a particular year--and of parents being unjustly and inhumanly flogged in the very sight of their offspring arbitrarily made free, while they are as arbitrarily kept slaves--let any man but reflect on those things, and unless the sensibilities of his heart be paralysed even to deadness, he must surely revolt at such a cruel and cold blooded allotment in the fortune of those little ones, and be satisfied with nothing short of the emanc.i.p.ation of the whole community, without a single exception.

'In the third place, supposing all children born after January 1, 1831, were declared free, how are they to be educated? That they may be prepared for the enjoyment of that liberty with which you have invested them, they must undergo a particular and appropriate training. So say the _gradualists_. Very well; under whom are they to get this training? Are they to be separated from their parents? Is that dearest of natural ties to be broken asunder? Is this necessary for your plan? And are not you thus endeavoring to cure one species of wickedness by the instrumentality of another? But if they are to be left with their parents and brought up under their care, then either they will be imbued with the faults and degeneracies that are characteristic of slavery, and consequently be as unfit for freedom as those who have not been disenthralled: or they will be well nurtured and well instructed by their parents, and this implies a confession that their parents themselves are sufficiently prepared for liberty, and that there is no good reason for withholding from them, the boon that is bestowed upon their children.

'Whatever view, in short, we take of the question, the prospective plan is full of difficulty or contradictions, and we are made more sensible than ever that there is nothing left for us, but to take the consistent, honest, uncompromising course of demanding the abolition of slavery with respect to the present, as well as to every future generation of the negroes in our colonies.'

We are told that 'it is not right that men should be free, when their freedom will prove injurious to themselves and others.' This has been the plea of tyrants in all ages. If the immediate emanc.i.p.ation of the slaves would prove a curse, it follows that slavery is a blessing; and that it cannot be unjust, but benevolent, to defraud the laborer of his hire, to rank him as a beast, and to deprive him of his liberty. But this, every one must see, is at war with common sense, and avowedly doing evil that good may come. This plea must mean, either that a state of slavery is more favorable to the growth of virtue and the dispensation of knowledge than a state of freedom--(a glaring absurdity)--or that an immediate compliance with the demands of justice would be most unjust--(a gross contradiction.)

It is boldly a.s.serted by some colonizationists, that '_the negroes are happier when kept in bondage_,' and that 'the condition of the great ma.s.s of emanc.i.p.ated Africans is one in comparison with which the condition of the slaves is _enviable_.' What is the inference? Why, either that slavery is not oppression--(another paradox)--or that real benevolence demands the return of the free people of color to their former state of servitude. Every kidnapper, therefore, is a true philanthropist! Our legislature should immediately offer a bounty for the body of every free colored person! The colored population of Ma.s.sachusetts, at $200 for each man, woman and child, would bring at least _one million three hundred thousand dollars_. This sum would seasonably replenish our exhausted treasury. The whole free colored population of the United States, at the same price, (which is a low estimate,) would be worth _sixty-five millions of dollars_!! Think how many churches this would build, schools and colleges establish, beneficiaries educate, missionaries support, bibles and tracts circulate, railroads and ca.n.a.ls complete, &c. &c. &c.!!!

The Secretary of the Colonization Society a.s.sures us, (vide the African Repository, vol. v. p. 330,) that '_were the very spirit of angelic charity to pervade and fill the hearts of all the slaveholders in our land, it would by no means require that all the slaves should be instantaneously liberated_'!!--i. e. should the slaveholders become instantaneously metamorphosed into angels, they would still hold the rational creatures of G.o.d as their _property_, and yet commit no sin!

Think, for one moment, of an angel in the capacity of a man-stealer--feeding his victims upon a peck of corn per week, or three bushels of corn and a few herrings every 'quarter-day,' as a compensation for their severe labor--flouris.h.i.+ng a cowskin over their heads, and applying it frequently to their naked bodies! Think of him selling parents from children, and children from parents, at private sale or public auction!

Many slaveholders are giving up their slaves from conscientious motives; they cannot, they dare not longer keep them in servitude; they believe that the law of G.o.d has a higher claim upon their obedience than the laws of their native State. Now suppose all the owners of slaves in our land should be suddenly and simultaneously convicted of sin, and moved to repentance in a similar manner, and should say to their slaves, 'G.o.d forbid that we should longer call you our property, or place you on a level with our cattle, or defraud you of your just dues, or sell you or your wives or children to others, or deny you the means of instruction, or lacerate your bodies! henceforth you are free--but you want employment, and we need laborers--go and work as freemen, and be paid as freemen!'--suppose, I say, a case like this should happen, and a troop of _gradualists_ should surround these penitent oppressors, and cry, 'Were the very spirit of angelic charity to pervade and fill your hearts, it would by no means require that all your slaves should be instantaneously liberated--your throats will be cut, your houses pillaged, and desolation will stalk through the land, if you carry your mad purpose into effect--emanc.i.p.ate by a slow, imperceptible process!'--how would this advice sound? What should be their reply?

Clearly this: 'Whether it be right in the sight of G.o.d to hearken unto men more than unto G.o.d, judge ye.' Here would be presented a strange spectacle indeed--one party confessing and resolving to forsake their sins, and another urging them to disregard the admonitions of conscience, and to leave off sinning by degrees! To be sure, a few, a very few, would be _generously_ allowed to reform _instanter_!

Those who prophesy evil, and only evil, concerning immediate abolition, absolutely disregard the nature and const.i.tution of man, as also his inalienable rights, and annihilate or reverse the causes and effects of human action. They are continually fearful lest the slaves, in consequence of their grievous wrongs and intolerable sufferings, should attempt to gain their freedom by revolution; and yet they affect to be equally fearful lest a general emanc.i.p.ation should produce the same disastrous consequences. How absurd! They _know_ that oppression must cause rebellion; and yet they pretend that a removal of the cause will produce a b.l.o.o.d.y effect! This is to suppose an effect without a cause, and, of course, is a contradiction in terms. Bestow upon the slaves personal freedom, and all motives for insurrection are destroyed. Treat them like rational beings, and you may surely expect rational treatment in return: treat them like beasts, and they will behave in a beastly manner.

Besides, precedent and experience make the ground of abolitionists invulnerable. In no single instance where their principles have been adopted, has the result been disastrous or violent, but beneficial and peaceful even beyond their most sanguine expectations. The immediate abolition of slavery in Mexico, in Colombia, and in St. Domingo,[O] was eminently preservative and useful in its effects. The manumitted slaves (numbering more than two thousand,) who were settled in Nova Scotia, at the close of our revolutionary war, by the British government, 'led a harmless life,' says Clarkson, 'and gained the character of an industrious and honest people from their white neighbors.' A large number who were located at Trinidad, as free laborers, at the close of our last war, 'are now,' according to the same authority, 'earning their own livelihood, and with so much industry and good conduct, that the calumnies originally spread against them have entirely died away.'

According to the Anti-Slavery Reporter for January, 1832, three thousand prize negroes at the Cape of Good Hope had received their freedom--four hundred in one day; 'but not the least difficulty or disorder occurred: servants found masters, masters hired servants--all gained homes, and at night scarcely an idler was to be seen.'

These and many other similar facts show conclusively the safety of immediate abolition. Gradualists can present, in abatement of them, nothing but groundless apprehensions and criminal distrust. The argument is irresistible.

FOOTNOTES:

[N] The slaves, they say, are their _property_. Once admit this, and all your arguments for interference are vain, and all your plans for amelioration are fruitless. The whole question may be said to hang upon this point. If the slaves are not property, then slavery is at an end.

The slaveholders see this most clearly; they see that while you allow these slaves to be their _property_, you act inconsistently and oppressively in intermeddling, as you propose to do, with what is theirs as much as any other of their goods and chattels: you must proceed, therefore, in your measures for amelioration, as you call it, with 'hesitating steps and slow;' and there is nothing you can do for restraining punishment, for regulating labor, for enforcing manumission, for introducing education and Christianity, which will not be met with the remonstrance, undeniably just by your own concessions, that you are encroaching on the sacred rights of property,--the slaveholders see all this, and they can employ it to paralyse and defeat all your efforts to get at emanc.i.p.ation, and to prepare for it. It is on this account, that I wish it settled in your minds, as a fixed and immutable principle, that there is and can be no property of man in man. Adopt this principle, and give it that ascendency over your minds to which it is ent.i.tled;--and slavery is swept away.--_Speech of Rev. Dr Thomson of Edinburgh._

[O] The history of the Revolution in St Domingo is not generally understood in this country. The result of the instantaneous emanc.i.p.ation of the slaves, in that island, by an act of the Conventional a.s.sembly of France in the month of February, 1794, settles the controversy between the _immediatists_ and _gradualists_. 'After this public act of emanc.i.p.ation,' says Colonel Malenfant, who was resident in the island at the time, 'the negroes _remained quiet_ both in the South and in the West, and _they continued to work upon all the plantations_.' 'Upon those estates which were abandoned, _they continued their labors_, where there were any, even inferior agents, to guide them; and on those estates, where no white men were left to direct them, they betook themselves to the planting of provisions; but upon _all the plantations_ where the whites resided, the blacks _continued to labor as quietly as before_.' 'On the Plantation Gourad, consisting of more than four hundred and fifty laborers, _not a single negro refused to work_; and yet this plantation was thought to be under the worst discipline and the slaves the most idle of any in the plain.' General Lacroix, who published his 'Memoirs for a History of St Domingo,' at Paris, in 1819, uses these remarkable words: 'The colony marched, _as by enchantment_, towards its ancient splendor; _cultivation prospered_; every day produced perceptible proofs of its progress. The city of the Cape and the plantations of the North rose up again visibly to the eye.' General Vincent, who was a general of a brigade of artillery in St Domingo, and a proprietor of estates in that island, at the same period, declared to the Directory of France, that 'every thing was _going on well in St Domingo_. The proprietors were in peaceable possession of their estates; cultivation was making rapid progress; _the blacks were industrious, and beyond example happy_.' So much for the horrible concomitants of a general emanc.i.p.ation! So much for the predicted indolence of the liberated slaves! Let confusion of face cover all abolition alarmists in view of these historical facts! This peaceful and prosperous state of affairs continued from 1794, to the invasion of the island by Leclerc in 1802. The attempt of Bonaparte to reduce the island to its original servitude was the sole cause of that sanguinary conflict which ended in the total extirpation of the French from its soil.--[Vide Clarkson's 'Thoughts on the Necessity of Improving the Condition of the Slaves in the British Colonies,' &c.]

SECTION VI.

THE AMERICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY IS NOURISHED BY FEAR AND SELFISHNESS.

The reader will find on the fifth page of my introductory remarks, the phrase 'naked terrors;' by which I mean, that, throughout all the speeches, addresses and reports in behalf of the Society, it is confessed, in language strong and explicit, that an irrepressible and agonizing fear of the influence of the free people of color over the slave population is the primary, essential and prevalent motive for colonizing them on the coast of Africa--and not, as we are frequently urged to believe, a desire simply to meliorate their condition and civilize that continent. On this point, the evidence is abundant.

'In reflecting on the utility of a plan for colonizing the free people of color, with whom our country abounds, it is natural that we should be first struck by its tendency to confer a benefit on ourselves, by ridding us of a population for the most part idle and useless, and too often vicious and mischievous.'

* * * 'Such a cla.s.s must evidently be a burden and a nuisance to the community; and every scheme which affords a prospect of removing so great an evil must deserve to be most favorably considered.

'But it is not in themselves merely that the free people of color are a nuisance and burthen. They contribute greatly to the corruption of the slaves, and to aggravate the evils of their condition, by rendering them idle, discontented and disobedient.

This also arises from the necessity under which the free blacks are, of remaining incorporated with the slaves, of a.s.sociating habitually with them, and forming part of the same cla.s.s in society. The slave seeing his free companion live in idleness, or subsist however scantily or precariously by occasional and desultory employment, is apt to grow discontented with his own condition, and to regard as tyranny and injustice the authority which compels him to labor.[P]

'Great, however, as the benefits are, which we may thus promise ourselves, from the colonization of the free people of color, by its tendency to prevent the discontent and corruption of our slaves,' &c. * * 'The considerations stated in the first part of this letter, have long since produced a thorough conviction in my mind, that the existence of a cla.s.s of free people of color in this country is highly injurious to the whites, the slaves and the free people of color themselves: consequently that all emanc.i.p.ation, to however small an extent, which permits the persons emanc.i.p.ated to remain in this country, is an evil, which must increase with the increase of the operation, and would become altogether intolerable, if extended to the whole, or even to a very large part of the black population. I am therefore strongly opposed to emanc.i.p.ation, in every shape and degree, unless accompanied by colonization.'--[General Harper's Letter--First Annual Report, pp. 29, 31, 32, 33, 36.]

'The slaves would be greatly benefitted by the removal of the free blacks, who now corrupt them and render them discontented.'--[Second An. Rep.]

'What are these objects? They are in the first place to aid ourselves, by relieving us from a species of population pregnant with future danger and present inconvenience.'--[Seventh Report.]

'They are dangerous to the community, and this danger ought to be removed. Their wretchedness arises not only from their bondage, but from their political and moral degradation. The danger is not so much that we have a million and a half of slaves, as that we have in our borders nearly two millions of men who are necessarily any thing rather than loyal citizens--nearly two millions of ignorant and miserable beings who are banded together by the very same circ.u.mstances, by which they are so widely separated in character and in interest from all the citizens of our great republic.'--[Seventh Annual Report.]

'It may be safely a.s.sumed, that there is not an individual in the community, who has given to the subject a moment's consideration, who does not regard the existence of the free people of color in the bosom of the country, as an evil of immense magnitude, and of a dangerous and alarming tendency.

Their abject and miserable condition is too obvious to be pointed out. All must perceive it, and perceiving it, cannot but lament it. But their deplorable condition is not more obvious to the most superficial observer, than is (what is far worse, and still more to be dreaded,) the powerful and resistless influence which they exert over the slave population. While their character remains what it now is, (and the laws and structure of the country in which they reside, prevent its permanent improvement,) this influence must of necessity be baneful and contaminating. Corrupt themselves, like the deadly Upas, they impart corruption to all around them. Their numbers too, are constantly and rapidly augmenting. Their annual increase is truly astonis.h.i.+ng, certainly unexampled. The dangerous ascendency which they have already acquired over the slaves, is consequently increasing with every addition to their numbers; and every addition to their numbers is a subtraction from the wealth and strength, and character, and happiness, and safety of the country. And if this be true, as it unquestionably is, the converse is also true; the danger of their undue influence will lessen with every diminution of their numbers; and every diminution of their numbers must add, and add greatly, to the prosperity of the country.'--[Twelfth Annual Report.]

'Another reason is, the pressing and vital importance of relieving ourselves, as soon as practicable, from this most dangerous element in our population.' * * 'We all know the effects produced on our slaves by the fascinating, but delusive appearance of happiness, exhibited in some persons of their own complexion, roaming in idleness and vice among them. By removing the most fruitful source of discontent from among our slaves, we should render them more industrious and attentive to our commands.'--[Fourteenth Annual Report.]

'What is the free black to the slave? A standing perpetual incitement to discontent. Though the condition of the slave be a thousand times the best--supplied, protected, instead of dest.i.tute and desolate--yet, the folly of the condition, held to involuntary labor, finds, always, allurement, in the spectacle of exemption from it, without consideration of the adjuncts of dest.i.tution and misery. The slave would have then, little excitement to discontent but for the free black.'--[Fifteenth Annual Report.]

'The evils which arise from the communication of the free people of color with our slaves, must be obvious to every reflecting mind; and the consequences which may result from this communication at some future day, when circ.u.mstances are more favorable to their views, are of a more alarming character. Sir, circ.u.mstances must have brought us to the conclusion, if our observation had not enabled us to make the remark, that it is natural for our slaves, so closely allied to the free black population by national peculiarities, and by relations.h.i.+p, to make a comparison between their respective conditions, and to repine at the difference which exists between them. This is a serious evil, and can only be removed _by preventing the possibility of a comparison_.

'By removing these people, we rid ourselves of a large party who will always be ready to a.s.sist our slaves in any mischievous design which they may conceive; and who are better able, by their intelligence, and the facilities of their communication, to bring those designs to a successful termination.'--[African Repository, vol. i. p. 176.]

'The labors of the Colonization Society appear to us highly deserving of praise. The blacks, whom they carry from the country, belong to a cla.s.s far more noxious than the slaves themselves. They are free without any sense of character to restrain them, or regular means of obtaining an honest livelihood. Most of the criminal offences committed in the southern States are chargeable to them, and their influence over the slaves is pernicious and alarming.' * * * 'What is the true nature of the evil of the existence of a portion of the African race in our population? It is not that there are some, but that there are so many among us of a different caste, of a different physical, if not moral, const.i.tution, who never can amalgamate with the great body of our population. In every country, persons are to be found varying in their color, origin and character, from the native ma.s.s. But this anomaly creates no inquietude or apprehension, because the exotics, from the smallness of their number, are known to be utterly incapable of disturbing the general tranquillity. Here, on the contrary, the African part of our population bears so large a proportion to the residue of European origin, as to create the most lively apprehension, especially in some quarters of the Union. Any project, therefore, by which, in a material degree, the dangerous element in the general ma.s.s, can be diminished or rendered stationary, deserves deliberate consideration.'--[African Repository, vol.

ii. pp. 27, 338.]

'Made up, for the most part, either of slaves or of their immediate descendants; elevated above the cla.s.s from which it has sprung, only by its exemption from domestic restraint; and effectually debarred by the law, from every prospect of equality with the actual freemen of the country; it is a source of perpetual uneasiness to the master, and of envy and corruption to the slave.' * * 'To remove these persons from among us, will increase the _usefulness_, and improve the moral character of those who remain in servitude, and _with whose labors the country is unable to dispense_. That instances are to be found of colored free persons, upright and industrious, is not to be denied. But the greater portion, as is well known, are a source of malignant depravity to the slaves on the one hand, and of corrupt habits to many of our white population on the other. The arts of subsistence with many of them, are incompatible with the security of property.' * * * 'I am a Virginian--I dread for her the corroding evil of this numerous caste, and I tremble for the danger of a disaffection spreading through their seductions, among our servants.' * * * 'Are they vipers, who are sucking our blood? we will hurl them from us. It is not sympathy alone,--not sickly sympathy, no, nor manly sympathy either,--which is to act on us; but vital policy, self-interest, are also enlisting themselves on the humane side in our b.r.e.a.s.t.s.'--[African Repository, vol. iii. pp. 10, 67, 197, 201.]

'All must concur in regarding the present condition of the free colored race in America as inconsistent with its future social and political advancement, and, where slavery exists at all, as calculated to aggravate its evils without any atoning good.

Among those evils, the most obvious is the restraint imposed upon emanc.i.p.ation by the laws of so many of the slaveholding States: laws, deriving their recent origin from the obvious manifestation which the increase of the free colored population has furnished, of the inconvenience and danger of multiplying their number where slavery exists at all.' * * * 'By the success of this scheme, our country will be enriched. The free blacks const.i.tute a material spoke in that wheel which is crus.h.i.+ng down the wealth of our land. The moment we carry this plan into vigorous prosecution, we shall call many of our countrymen to a state of comparative wealth. The removal of the annual increase of our colored population, would give to our mariners a considerable scope of employment, whilst the trade of the Colony would be a source of profit.' * * 'It places the attainment of the grand object in view, that is, to withdraw from the United States annually, so many of the colored population, and provide them a comfortable home and all the advantages of civilization in Africa, _as will make the number here remain stationary_.'

* * * 'Let us recur to the principle abovementioned--that every black family occupies the room of a white family. On this principle we are lost, if we suffer the colored population to multiply, unchecked, upon our hands; because they will increase faster than the whites, and will crowd them out of all the Southern country. But on the same principle we are saved, if by any means of colonization, we can r.e.t.a.r.d the increase of the blacks, and gain ground on them in the South. That we can do with ease, if our people will unite in prosecuting the scheme.

Every family taken from the blacks, will add also a family to the whites, and make an actual difference of two families in our favor. This exchange will leave fewer blacks to remove, while it will increase our ability to remove them. Self-interest and self-preservation furnish motives enough to excite our exertions.' * * 'By thus repressing the rapid increase of blacks, the white population would be enabled to reach and soon overtop them. The consequence would be security.'--[African Repository, vol. iv. pp. 53, 141, 271, 276, 344.]

'The existence of a cla.s.s of men in the bosom of the community, who occupy a middle rank between the citizen and the slave--who encountering every positive evil incident to each condition, share none of the benefits peculiar to either, has been long clearly seen and deeply deplored by every man of observation.

The master feels it in the unhappy influence which the free blacks have upon the slave population. The slave feels it in the restless, discontented spirit which his a.s.sociation with the free black engenders.' * * * * 'But, there is yet a more important and alarming view, in which this subject necessarily presents itself to the mind of every Virginian. A community of the character that has been described, with this additional peculiarity, that it differs from the cla.s.s from which it has sprung, only in its exemption from _the wholesome restraints of domestic authority_, is found in the midst of a numerous and rapidly increasing slave population; and while its partial freedom, trammelled, as it is, by the necessary rigors of the law, is nevertheless sufficiently attractive, to be a source of uneasiness and dissatisfaction to those who have not attained to its questionable privileges, its exemption from the prompt and efficient inquisition appertaining to slavery, makes it an important instrument in the corruption and seduction of those, who yet remain the property of their masters.' * * * 'Who would not rejoice to see our country liberated from her black population? Who would not partic.i.p.ate in any efforts to restore those children of misfortune to their native sh.o.r.es, and kindle the lights of science and civilization through Africa? Who that has reflection, does not tremble for the political and moral well-being of a country, that has within its bosom, a growing population, bound to its inst.i.tutions by no common sympathies, and ready to fall in with any faction that may threaten its liberties?' * * * 'The existence of this race among us; a race that can neither share our blessings nor incorporate in our society, is already felt to be a curse; and though the only curse entailed on us, if left to take its course, it will become the greatest that could befal the nation.

'Shall we then cling to it, and by refusing the timely expedient now offered for deliverance, retain and foster the _alien enemies_, till they have multiplied into such greater numbers, and risen into such mightier consequence as will for ever bar the possibility of their departure, and by barring it, bar also the possibility of fulfilling our own high destiny?' * * 'The object of this Society is two-fold; for while it immediately and ostensibly directs its energies to the amelioration of the condition of the free people of color, it relieves our country from an unprofitable burden, and which, if much longer submitted to, may record upon our history the dreadful cries of vengeance that but a few years since were registered in characters of blood at St. Domingo.' * * 'It is the removal of the _free_ blacks from among us, that is to save us, sooner or later, from those dreadful events foreboded by Mr Jefferson, or from the horrors of St. Domingo. The present number of this unfortunate, degraded, and anomalous cla.s.s of inhabitants cannot be much short of half a million; and the number is fast increasing. They are emphatically a mildew upon our fields, a scourge to our backs, and a stain upon our escutcheon. To remove them is mercy to ourselves, and justice to them.'--[African Repository, vol.

v. pp. 28, 51, 88, 278, 304, 348.]

'All admit the utility of the separation of the free people of color from the residue of the population of the United States, if it be practicable. It is desirable for them, _for the slaves of the United States_, and for the white race. The vices of this cla.s.s do not spring from any inherent depravity in their natural const.i.tution, but from their unfortunate situation. Social intercourse is a want which we are prompted to gratify by all the properties of our nature. And as they cannot obtain it in the better circles of society, nor always among themselves, they resort to slaves and to the most debased and worthless of the whites. Corruption, and all the train of petty offences, are the consequences. Proprietors of slaves in whose neighborhood any free colored family is situated, know how infectious and pernicious this intercourse is.' * * * 'Who, if this promiscuous residence of whites and blacks, of freemen and slaves, is for ever to continue, can imagine the servile wars, the carnage and the crimes which will be its probable consequences, without shuddering with horror?' * * 'It were madness to shut our eyes to these facts and conclusions. This rapid increase of the blacks is as certain as the progress of time. The fatal consequences of that increase, if it be not checked, are equally so. Something must be done. The American Colonization Society proposes a remedy--the removal to Africa of the blacks who are free, or shall hereafter become so, with their consent.' * *

'The colored population is considered by the people of Tennessee and Alabama in general, as an immense evil to the country--but the free part of it, by all, as the greatest of all evils....

They feel severely the effects of the deleterious influence which the free negroes exert upon the slaves--and they look, moreover, into futurity, and there they behold an appalling scene--in less than one hundred years, (a short time, we should hope, in the life of this republic,) 16,000,000 of blacks.'

* * * * 'Since the recent revolution in the island of St. Domingo, which has placed it in the hands of the African race, it was thought by some that there an asylum might be found for this part of our population. But to that place there were also serious objections, which would prevent its adoption to any considerable extent. The nearness of that Island to our southern borders, and the evil consequences that might result from embodying the free persons of color in the vicinity of those parts of the United States, where slaves are so numerous, forbade the friends of humanity to provide a home for them in that Island.'--[African Repository, vol. vi. pp. 17, 23, 68, 77, 226.]