The Slave Trade, Domestic and Foreign: Why It Exists, and How It May Be ExtinguishedCarey, Henry Charles
History
The Slave Trade, Domestic and Foreign: Why It Exists, and How It May Be Extinguished
Carey, Henry Charles
Labor; Slave trade; Slavery; Slavery -- United States; Tariff -- United States; Working class
would soon find men becoming less abundant and more valuable, and it
would then become necessary to try to retain their subjects. Every man
that came would desire to have his wife and children follow him, and
it would soon come to be seen that population and wealth were
synonymous, as was once supposed to be the case in Europe. By degrees,
roads would be made into the interior, and civilized black men would
return to their old homes, carrying with them habits of industry and
intelligence, a knowledge of agriculture and of the processes of the
coarser manufactures, and with every step in this direction labour
would acquire new value, and men would everywhere become more free.
To accomplish these things alone and unassisted might, however,
require almost centuries, and to render assistance would be to
repudiate altogether the doctrine of cheap labour, cheap sugar, and
cheap cotton. Let us suppose that on his last visit to England,
President Roberts should have invoked the aid of the English Premier
in an address to the following effect, and then see what must have
been the reply:--
"My Lord:
"We have in our young republic a population of 150,000, scattered over
a surface capable of supporting the whole population of England, and
all engaged in producing the same commodities,--as a consequence of
which we have, and can have, but little trade among ourselves. During
a large portion of the year our men have little to do, and they waste
much time, and our women and children are limited altogether to the
labours of the field, to the great neglect of education. Widely
scattered, we have much need of roads, but are too poor to make them,
and therefore much produce perishes on the ground. We cannot cultivate
bulky articles, because the cost of transportation would be greater
than their product at market; and of those that we do cultivate nearly
the whole must be sent to a distance, with steady diminution in the
fertility of the soil. We need machinery and mechanics. With them we
could convert our cotton and our indigo into cloth, and thus find
employment for women and children. Mechanics would need houses, and
carpenters and blacksmiths would find employment, and gradually towns
would arise and our people would be from day to day more enabled to
make their exchanges at home, while acquiring increased power to make
roads, and land would become valuable, while men would become from day
to day more free. Immigration from the interior would be large, and
from year to year we should be enabled to extend our relations with
the distant tribes, giving value to their labour and disseminating
knowledge, and thus should we, at no distant period, be enabled not
only to put an end to the slave trade, but also to place millions of
barbarians on the road to wealth and civilization. To accomplish these
things, however, we need the aid and countenance of Great Britain."
The reply to this would necessarily have been--
"Mr. President:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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