PREFACE. No allusion has been made, in the following pages, to certain popular objections to the Colonization Society; nor have any cases of individual cruelty been cited, to illustrate the evils of slavery. It is proper, that the reasons for this departure from the ordinary mode of discussing these two subjects, should be given, that they may not be misunderstood. The objections I have omitted to notice, are, the mortality to which the emigrants are exposed, in consequence of the climate of Liberia; the demoralizing traftic, which the colonists have carried on with the natives, in rum and military stores; and the improvident application of the funds of the Society, which has rendered it bankrupt. These objections, serious as they are in themselves, are not inseparable from the system of Colonization. Another and more salubrious site, may be selected; the traffic complained of, may be discontinued; and the fiscal affairs of the Society, may hereafter be managed with prudence and economy. But there are inherent evils in the system, and it is important that the public attention should not be diverted from these evils, by the contemplation of others, which are only accidental, So, also, it is important, that the sinfulness of slavery, should not be merged in that of its unauthorized abuses. Many contend for the lawfulness of slavery who readily admit the sinfulness of insulated cases of cruelty. It has, therefore, been my object to show, that admitting the slaves to be treated as a prudent farmer treats his cattle —that they have enough to eat—are sheltered from the inclemency of the weather, and are not subjected to a greater degree of severity than is necessary, to extort from them a due amount of labor-American slavery is, nevertheless, a heinous sin, and, like every other sin, ought to be immediately abandoned. February, 1835. PART I. AMERICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY. INTRODUCTION. On the 1st of January, 1835, there were in the United States, 2,245,144 slaves.* This number about equals the population of Holland, and exceeds that of Scotland, of the Danish Dominions, of the Swiss Confederation, and of various Republics in South America. These millions of human beings, are held as chattels by a people professing to acknowledge, that "all men are created equal, and endowed with certain unalienable rights, among which are, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness:"-they are, moreover, kept in ignorance, and compelled to live without God, and to die without hope, by a people professing to reverence the obligations of Christianity. But slavery has ceased in other countries, where it formerly prevailed; and may we not hope that it is gradually expiring in this? Such a hope is, alas, forbidden by the following statement of our slave population, at different periods: United States, 1790, 697,697, 1835, 2,345,144 Kentucky, do. 12,430 Mississippi and Alabama, Louisiana, Missouri, 1830, 165,350 1800, 3,489 do. 182,953 Perhaps, however, the political evils of slavery may be gradually mitigated, and finally removed, by an increas • According to the ratio of increase between 1820 and 1830. ing preponderance in the white population. Unfortunately, we are compelled by facts to anticipate a very different result. A comparison of the census of 1830, with that of 1820, affords us the following ratio of increase in the free and slave population, for the intermediate ten years: N. Carolina, Free 13.4 per ct. 8.7 Slave 20.2 per ct. S. Carolina, Alabama, 124. 22.1 180.4 100.1 58.7.5 144.7 77.7 30.4 180. Arkansas Territory, 104.3 It is obvious, from these details, that, if the present system be continued, the time cannot be far distant, when the slaves will possess a frightful numerical superiority over their masters. Already do they bear to the whites, in the slave States and Territories, the proportion of 1, to 2.79. In South-Carolina, and Louisiana, they are now a majority. But in our contemplation of slavery, the sufferings of the slaves claim our consideration, no less than the dangers to which the whites are exposed. The ordinary evils of slavery are in this country greatly aggravated, by a cruel and extensive slave trade. Various circumstances have of late years combined, to lessen the demand for slave labour in the more northern, and to increase it in the more southern and western portions of the slave region; while the enlarged consumption of sugar and cotton is enhancing the market value of slaves. The most profitable employment of this species of labour, is unfortunately found in those States, which, from their recent settlement, possess immense tracts which are still to be brought into cultivation, and in which, consequently, there now is, and will long continue to be, an urgent demand for slaves. Hence has arisen a prodigious and annually increasing transportation of slaves to the south and west. There are no official data, from which the amount of this transportation can be ascertained; but from facts that have transpired, and from estimates made at the South, |