The Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 3, March, 1864: Devoted to Literature and National PolicyVarious
History
The Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 3, March, 1864: Devoted to Literature and National Policy
Various
Literature, Modern -- 19th century -- Periodicals; United States -- Politics and government -- 19th century -- Periodicals
national wealth than the whole deduction made by the war debt. Our total
wealth, by the Census of 1860, being, by Table 35, $16,159,616,068, one
per cent. taken annually to pay the interest and gradually extinguish
the war debt, would be $161,596,160; whereas, judging by Virginia and
New York, the diminished increase of the annual product of capital, as
the result of slavery, is 2.10 per cent., or $453,469,250 per annum,
equal in a decade, without compounding the annual results, to
$4,534,692,500.
That our population would have reached in 1860 nearly 40,000,000, and
our wealth have been more than doubled, if slavery had been extinguished
in 1790, is one of the revelations made by the Census; while in science,
in education, and national power, the advance would have been still more
rapid, and the moral force of our example and success would have
controlled for the benefit of mankind the institutions of the world.
By Table 36, page 196, of the Census of 1860, the _cash_ value of the
farms of Virginia was $371,096,211, being $11.91 per acre, and of New
York $803,343,593, being $38.26 per acre. Now, by the Table, the number
of acres embraced in these farms of New York was 20,992,950, and in
Virginia 31,014,950, the difference of value per acre being $25.36, or
much more than 3 to 1 in favor of New York. Now, if we multiply this
number of acres of farm lands of Virginia by the New York value, it
would make the total value of the farm lands of Virginia,
$1,186,942,136, and the _additional_ value caused by emancipation
$815,845,925. But, stupendous as is this result in regard to lands, it
is far below the reality. We have seen that the farm lands of Virginia,
improved and unimproved, constituted 31,014,950 acres. By the Census and
the Land Office Tables, the area of Virginia is 39,265,280 acres. Deduct
the farm lands, and there remain unoccupied 8,250,330 acres. Now,
Virginia's population to the square mile being 26.02, and that of New
York 84.36, with an equal density in Virginia, more than two thirds of
these Virginia lands, as in New York, must have been occupied as farms.
This would have been equivalent, at two thirds, to 5,500,000 acres,
which, at their present average value of $2 per acre, would be worth
$11,000,000; but, at the value per acre of the New York lands, these
5,500,000 acres would be worth $206,430,000. Deduct from this their
present value, $11,000,000, and the remainder, $195,430,000, is the sum
by which the unoccupied lands of Virginia, converted into farms, would
have been increased in value by emancipation. Add this to the enhanced
value of their present farms, $815,845,925, and the result would be
$1,011,275,925, as the gain of Virginia in the value of lands by
emancipation. To these we should add, from the same cause, the
enhancement of the town and city property in Virginia to the extent of
several hundred millions of dollars. In order to realize the truth, we
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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