A Review of Uncle Toms Cabin | Page 6

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.
It is true that abolitionists affect to have a great deal of sympathy for them while they are slaves in the South, but they have none for the ignorant, degraded, half starved, ill clad, free negroes in the North. No wonder, for their Southern sympathy costs