70 



FARMERS' REGISTER 



[No. 2. 



and slave labor, there is no question, but that free 

 labor, produced by sudden emancipation of slaves, 

 is the most worthless and inefficient labor in the 

 world. Let us take upon this subject the testi- 

 mony of one who has favored emancipation in 

 the West Indies, and who has already reaped 

 some of the traits of his lolly. Lord Brougham 

 in his Colonial Policy, says: "the free negroes in 

 the West Indies are (with very lew exceptions 

 chiefly in the Spanish and Portuguese settlements) 

 equally averse to all sorts ol labor which do not 

 contribute to the supply of their immediate and 

 most urgent wants. Improvident, and careless 

 of the future, they are not actuated by that prin- 

 ciple which inclines more civilized men to equal- 

 ize their exertions at all times, and to work after 

 the necessaries of the day have been procured, in 

 order to make up lor the possible deficiencies of 

 the morrow. Nor has their intercourse, with the 

 whites taught them to consider any gratification 

 as worth obtaining, which cannot be procured by 

 slight exertion of desultory and capricious indus- 

 try." The report ol the committee of the Privy 

 Council of Great Britain in 178S, of Mr. Braith- 

 waite, the agent for Barbadoes, and of M. Ma- 

 louet who bore a special commission to examine 

 the habits and character of the Maroons in Dutch 

 Guiana, all agree in asserting that free negroes 

 are idle and worthless, and will never provide for 

 the morrow with the foresight of civilized beings. 

 The latter, M. Malouet says, "Le repos et I'oisi- 

 vete sont devenus dansleur etat social leur unique 

 passion." Does not our own experience in this 

 country prove the truth of his assertion? Do we 

 not find the i'vaa ne<zro the pest of the society 

 wherever he is seen? He is the same idle worth- 

 less creature in the north as in the south and west 

 of our country. Have not the. colonies at Sierra 

 Leone and Liberia most conclusively proven the 

 same fact? Does not the example of St. Domin- 

 go, whieh is now but a wreck of its former self, 

 speak volumes on the same subject? Well then, 

 with all these facts and evidences before them, 

 what could British statesmen have foreseen from 

 the emancipation of slaves in the West Indies, 

 but idleness and worthliness of the whole popula- 

 tion? and is not this actually the result? Do not 

 all the statements agree in asserting, that the sys- 

 tem of apprenticeship has failed to realize the an- 

 ticipated advantages? and the state of things will 

 be. still more deplorable if ever the negro shall ob- 

 tain his perfect liberty. Now what will be the 

 consequence of all this? Why, that the British 

 West Indies will soon cease to produce sugar for 

 exportation, and will therefore throw the monopoly 

 of its production into the hands of the slave-hold- 

 ing islands, and of Louisiana and the Floridas in 

 our own country; and this will contribute at once 

 to a rapid rise in slave property. 



When St. Domingo was first liberated, the im- 

 aginations of mere speculative statesmen led them 

 to behold a belt of black republics stretching 

 through the West India Islands, diffusing their 

 moral influence by commerce and social inter- 

 course throughout the habitable globe. Now what 

 was the fact? Why that St. Domingo was soon 

 found to have such an idle, worthless population 

 in her newly emancipated blacks, that her com- 

 merce was at once destroyed: she has entirely 

 ceased to export sugar, although formerly the most 

 productive sugar growing island in the world. 



Under these circumstances, to talk of moral influ- 

 ence, is perfectly absurd. Those black islanders 

 have been by the effects of their own laziness and 

 vices, as effectually cut off from the rest of the 

 world, as if St. Domingo had been enclosed by 

 Bishop Berkeley's forty foot wall of brass. The 

 London Quarterly Review in one of its most pow- 

 erful articles, asserts, that nothing but the condi- 

 tion of St. Domingo would have enabled the Brit- 

 ish West Indies to have borne the oppression of 

 the mother country as long as they did; that St. 

 Domingo being thrown out of the competition in 

 the production of sugar, gave a sort of monopoly 

 to the British Islands which enabled them to bear 

 the oppressive regulating legislation of the par- 

 liament. Provided we are let alone by the busy 

 meddling philanthropists who can attend to every 

 body's business but their own, every negro that 

 gets his liberty in the West. Indies, or in South 

 America, will contribute to a rise, upon precisely, 

 the same principles, in slave property in our coun- 

 try. The liberation of the slaves in the British 

 West India Islands, is already producing that ef- 

 fect. If the French, Spaniards, Portuguese, 

 Danes, &c. shall be unwise enough to follow this 

 lead, the southern states of our union will most 

 assuredly reap the benefit; and if Brazil too should 

 follow the example, the effect would be almost, 

 complete. It would give us a monopoly in both 

 sugar and cotton. Sugar is not made by free labor 

 any where in the world. Even in China all the 

 sugar and cotton districts are cultivated by slave 

 labor, which, in my opinion, basset to rest forever, 

 in warm countries, the question about the relative 

 advantages offree and slave labor. The cultiva- 

 tion of sugar requires a great deal of hard labor 

 which can be expected of the slave alone. In 

 warm countries the principle of idleness triumphs 

 over that of accumulation, and hence slave labor 

 is universally the most efficient in warm and trop- 

 ical latitudes. If all the slaves in the West In- 

 dies shall ever be liberated, Louisiana will become 

 an .Eldorado. 



Effect of the rise of the price of cotton and slaves, 

 on corn, wheat, tobacco, 8fc. 



The rise in the price of cotton and of slaves is of 

 itself calculated to give an impulse not only to all 

 the agricultural products of the south, but of the 

 north and west likewise, particularly of the west. 

 Corn, which is the great staple of the middle 

 states, is soon raised in value by high prices for 

 cotton; because all the southern country, which 

 is better adapted to the raising of corn than the 

 middle states, raise cotton exclusively, and thus 

 become purchasers of corn. The cultivation of 

 cotton likewise, gradually extends itself even into 

 the middle stales, and thus diminishes the quantity 

 of corn raised still farther. In addition to these 

 circumstances, there has been a deficient corn 

 crop for the last two years, in consequence of dis- 

 tressing droughts in the latter part of the season, 

 and too much rain in the commencement. Now 

 we must recollect that in any necessary of life 

 like corn, whose price is dependent on the home 

 demand, if a deficit occur, the price will rise great- 

 ly more, than in proportion to the deficit. 



The high price of cotton and corn will quickly 

 communicate itself to horses, mules, hogs, cattle, 

 &c, which constitute the great staples of the 



