316 MIGRATIONS OF THE COLOURED PEOPLE. 



But into the slave States Delaware, Maryland, Vir 

 ginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia they have not gone. 

 All these States are too anxious to expel those they have 

 among them already to give any facilities for immigra 

 tion. In these States, in consequence, the increase has 

 only been about one per cent, or half the natural increase ; 

 in other words, large numbers have been forced to 

 migrate. The tendency is therefore to expel them from 

 the whole of the Atlantic borders an irresistible 

 result, probably, in some of the States, of the vast immi 

 grations of white labour, chiefly Irish, which are con 

 stantly pouring into all the Atlantic harbours ; in others, 

 of the fear of evil consequences from the intermingling 

 of slaves and free men of the same blood. 



Their refuge has been in the north-west, where the 

 world is new, and labour of all kinds in demand. To 

 Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, their migrations have been 

 directed. In 1830 these three states north of the Ohio 

 River contained only 15,000 free coloured inhabitants. 

 They now contain about 50,000, and of these Ohio alone 

 has 30,000. In this direction, therefore, the surplus 

 has gone from all the other States and towards the 

 valley of the Ohio still, and that of the Upper Mississippi, 

 an outlet for the stream will probably be found for many 

 years to come.* 



An insight into the causes of social changes and migra 

 tion movements, such as this, is very interesting. It is 

 a hard thing for the poor coloured men to be driven from 

 their employment and natural homes by a foreign immi 

 gration, as is the case at this moment in Philadelphia and 

 elsewhere, and it is natural that opposition and dislike 

 and disturbance should be the consequence. But a 

 similar immigration has brought similar scarcity of food 



* The State of Indiana has recently become jealous of the free blacks, 

 and has proposed measures for preventing their increase, or of altogether 

 removing them. 



