But the question was, could it so continue? And by 1855 there were ominous signs of a change. Agitation began for the re-opening of the slave trade. What a frightful moral injury to the South this would have been, is evidenced by the statement alone of those who advocated this course, and at the same time had the courage to express their views on the inadequacy of the laws then in existence for the proper protection of those of the inferior race, who were then in the South, improved as they had been by years of training. In 1856, Governor James H. Adams, of South Carolina, had thus expressed himself: “If we cannot supply the demand for slave labor, then we must expect to be supplied with a species of labor, we do not want, and which from the very nature of things is antagonistic to our institutions. It is much better that our drays should be driven by slaves—that our factories should be worked by slaves—that our hotels should be served by slaves—that our locomotives should be served by slaves, than that we should be exposed to the introduction, from any quarter, of a population alien to us by birth, training and education, and which, in the process of time, must lead to that conflict between capital and labor, which makes it so difficult to maintain free institutions in all wealthy and highly cultivated nations, where such institutions as ours do not exist.” In all slave holding States true policy dictates, that the superior race should direct, and the inferior perform all menial service. Competition between the white and the black man for this service may not disturb Northern sensibility, but it does not suit our latitude. Irrespective, however, of interest, the Act of Congress declaring the slave trade piracy, is a brand upon us, which I think it important to remove. If the trade be piracy, the slave must be plunder; and no ingenuity can avoid the logical necessity of such conclusion. My hopes and fortunes are indissolubly associated with this form of society. I feel that I should be wanting in duty, if I did not urge you to withdraw your assent to an Act which is itself a direct condemnation of your institutions.”[160] That was the true, the honest, the intelligent and the reasonable statement of the case; the hopes and fortunes of those in control were indissolubly associated with the form of society which slavery had erected in the South.