A Review of Uncle Toms Cabin | Page 6

the public gaze, as long as the good Lord will vouchsafe
to us health and strength sufficient to sit in our seats, and hold a pen in
our hands. Your conduct is a reproach to the Christian name, a stigma
on the Christian character.
SECTION II.
There are nearly four millions of slaves in the United States; and the
question now presents itself to every free born American citizen; what
are we to do with them? The abolition party demand their immediate
emancipation. Is it practicable, safe, or proper? What would be the
consequences? What would be the consequence of turning loose upon
ourselves four millions of human beings, to prowl about like wild
beasts without restraint, or control, and commit depredations on the
white population? Four millions of human beings without property or
character, and utterly devoid of all sense of honor and shame, or any
other restraining motive or influence whatever! And they too, under the
ban of a prejudice, as firm, as fixed as the laws which govern the
material universe. In that event, is it not probable; is it not almost
certain, that there would be either a general massacre of the slaves, or
otherwise that the white population would be forced to abandon the soil?
Will any one pretend to deny that either entire extinction of the African
race would be likely to result from universal emancipation, supposing
the manumitted slaves should remain in our midst, or that otherwise the
consequences would be disastrous to the white population? None, I
presume. What then shall we do? The slaves are among us; they must
be governed and provided for, and is it not our duty in making
provisions for them, to act with reference to the general welfare of all
concerned--white and black? Is there an intelligent man in this nation,
who has reflected on the subject, that really believes that the condition
of the African race in the United States, would be bettered or improved

in any respect, by immediate emancipation? I have clearly shown in the
following pages that it would not. Facts prove the contrary. Yes,
stubborn undeniable facts, that none but a knave or a fool will gainsay.
We know that improvidence, idleness, vagrancy, and crime, are the
fruits of emancipation; not only in the United States, but also in the
West Indies. We have already stated on good English authority, (Lord
Brougham), that the West India free negroes, are rapidly retrograding
into their original barbarism and brutality; and the London Times quite
recently asserted, that the British emancipation experiment was a
failure; that the negro would not work; that his freedom was little better
than that of a brute; that the island was going to the dogs, and the
negroes would have to be removed, &c. Have we any reason to believe,
that a different result would follow emancipation in the United States?
No, we have none, for it is a notorious fact, that free negroes are
everywhere idle and vicious in this country, and that crime among them
is ten-fold more common than it is among Southern slaves.
We hear a great deal about emancipation--the freedom of the African
race--free negroes, &c. It is all sheer nonsense. Strictly speaking, there
is not a free negro in the limits of the United States! There never has
been, and there never will be. The white and the black races have never
co-existed under the same government, on equal footing, and never can.
Their liberty is only nominal! "It is all a lie and a cheat!" Is the negro
free any where in the Northern States? No, he is not. There is no
sympathy between the two races. Northern people loathe and despise
free negroes. They cannot bear the sight or smell of them. The negro
then is not free anywhere in the Northern States. Not only the
prejudices, but also the laws of the free states proclaim it impossible:
and the prejudices of the whites against the African race is stronger in
the free states, than it is in the slave states. Every free state in this
Union is disposed to cast them off as a nuisance. They cannot bear their
presence. Their very color renders them odious; and this aversion to the
African race, is daily becoming stronger and stronger in every free state
in this union. Nothing can counteract it--nothing can overcome it. It is
in the very nature of things impossible. No, no! Negro novels piled
mountain high in every street and alley, in every city and village in this
Union, will accomplish nothing for the poor despised African. "Can the
Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots," then may ye who

are accustomed to loathe, shun, and cast off the African race, receive
them to your kind embraces.