C. Perry Patterson

“ We most sincerely believe, and declare it as our opinion, that slavery is a moral evil. But as the laws of our country do not admit of emancipation without a special act of the Legislature, in some places, nor admit of the slave so liberated to enjoy freedom, we cannot adopt any rule by which we can compel our members to liberate their slaves; and as the nature of cases in buying and selling are various and complex, we do not think it possible to devise any rule sufficiently specific to meet them. ”

“ He justified the restrictions on emancipation by saying it meant “adopting into the body politic a new member; a vastly important measure in every community, and especially in ours, where the majority of free men over twenty-one years of age govern the balance of the people together with themselves; where the free negro’s vote at the polls is as of high value as that of any man.... The highest act of sovereignty a government can perform is to adopt a new member, with all the privileges and duties of citizenship. To permit an individual to do this at pleasure would be wholly inadmissible.” ”

“ The Manumission Society of Tennessee wish to address you again on the important subject of slavery. In calling your attention to this subject, in which we feel a most serious concern, we wish to use that sincerity and candor which become friends travelling through a world of error and sin, in which they are to make preparation for eternity. We therefore beg you to pause a moment, and let us compare the principles of slavery, as it exists among us, with the holy religion we profess, and the divine precepts of our common Lord. What is our religion? ”

“ It appreciated the fact that only a small part of the slave population was ready for freedom and a responsible place in the body politic. The Cumberland Presbyterians believed that slavery was an evil, but denied responsibility for it. They thought that slavery was an educating institution, that the rights of the slave should be restored to him as fast as his evolution would permit, but that in this process the welfare of society as a whole was the major consideration. ”

“ Philanthropic individuals and societies could have emancipated a great many slaves, if the state had not made its consent a necessary part of such manumission. When one considers how the benevolence of slave owners or the generosity of societies might have flooded a community with stupid, ignorant, and vicious negroes, he can easily see why society asserted the right to regulate the ownership of this kind of property. ”

“ We, whose names are hereunto subscribed, having met for the purpose of taking into consideration the case of the people of color held in bondage in an highly favored land, are of opinion that their case calls aloud for the attention and sympathy of Columbia’s free born sons, and for their exertions in endeavoring, by means calculated to promote and preserve the good of government to procure for that oppressed part of the community that inestimable jewel, freedom, the distinguishing glory of our country; without which all other enjoyments of life must become insignificant. ”

“ He has mental capacities, and an immortal principle in his nature, that constitutes him equal to his owner but for the accidental position in which fortune has placed him. The owner has acquired conventional rights to him, but the laws under which he is held as a slave have not and can not extinguish his high-born nature nor deprive him of many rights which are inherent in man. Thus while he is a slave, he can make a contract for his freedom, and by the same will he can take personal or real estate. ”

“ This people who were born free and lived as free persons, will preach rebellion everywhere that they may be driven to by this unjust law, whether it be amongst us here in Tennessee or South of us on the cotton and sugar plantations, or in the abolition meetings of the free states. Nor will the women be the least effective in preaching a crusade, when begging money in the North, to relieve their children, left behind in this State, in bondage. ”

“ Poverty, ignorance, oppression, discrimination, and hostility of both slave and white man made his position in actual life much worse than his legal status. In the industrial world there was no place for him. The labor was done by slaves. There was no factory work for him. He could farm if he could rent or buy land. He was usually not wanted in the community.
The black man, in the United States, said Judge Catron, is degraded by his color, and sinks into vice and worthlessness from want of motive to virtuous and elevated conduct. The black man in these states may have the power of volition. ”

“ It was generally believed that paganism was the basis of slavery, that a Christian slave was a paradox, that Christianizing the slave would destroy his humble qualities and lessen his economic value, that it would add an element in the cost of maintaining the institution, that an idea of equality prevailed in the slave’s attending church and participating in communion with the master, and that this idea would add to the difficulty of governing him. ”

“ A great man has fallen, one of the brightest stars in the galaxy of American philanthropists has set, has set to rise no more, James Jones, President of the Manumission Society of Tennessee—the steady, ardent and persevering friend of universal emancipation, is numbered among the dead.... No language can impress upon the mind an adequate idea of his many virtues. Suffice it to say that few men living can fill the station that he held, with equal honor and usefulness. Long shall the poor oppressed African mourn for his irreparable loss. [26] ”

“ He may go and come when it pleases him, without a domestic master to control the actions of his person; but to be politically free, to be the peer and equal to the white man, to enjoy the offices, trusts, and privileges our institutions confer on the white [175] men, is hopeless now and ever. The slave who receives the protection and care of a tolerable master holds a condition here superior to the negro who is freed from domestic slavery. ”

“ The only theory conceivable that can relieve the conference of the accomplishment of a solemn mockery is the supposition that they, having confidence in the justice of the future, must have believed themselves to be anticipating civil legislation—that the legal emancipation of the slave was an event which the immediate future must produce. ”

“ The Emancipator, Embree’s publication, referring to these emigrations to the North, said:
Thousands of first-rate citizens, men remarkable for their piety and virtue, have within twenty years past removed from this and other slave states, to Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, that their eyes may be hid from seeing the cruel oppressor lacerate the back of his slaves, and that their ears may not hear the bitter cries of the oppressed. ”

“ And as we send out no domestics, or servants, such an event as a missionary taking slaves with him, were it morally right, could not, in accordance with all our past arrangements and present plans, possibly occur. If, however, anyone should offer himself as a missionary, having slaves, and should insist on retaining them as his property, we can never be a party to any arrangements which would imply approbation of slavery. ”

“ Judge Catron said the reasons for the policy of exclusion were fear of rebellion among the slaves incited by free negroes, the immoral influence of free negroes among slaves, the injustice of forcing free negroes upon either the slave or free states, and, finally, justice to the negro. He said:
All the slaveholding states, it is believed, as well as many non-slaveholding, like ourselves, have adopted the policy of exclusion. ”

“ The dreadful answer is, that hosts of the disembodied spirits of unoffending Africans have taken their flight to eternity from the dark holds of American slave ships, and their last quivering groans have descended on high to call for vengeance on the murderous deed, that stained the earth and ocean with their blood. ”

“ While, then the heralds of salvation go forth in the name and strength of their Divine Master, to preach the Gospel to every creature, we ardently wish that your exertions and the best influence of all philanthropists may be united, to ameliorate the condition of human society, and especially of its most degraded classes, till liberty, religion, and happiness shall be the enjoyment of the whole family of man.” Tenth Annual Report of American Colonization Society, 67-8. ”

“ Jones not only saw the injury that slavery was causing to society, socially, economically, and politically, but he also foresaw what the final catastrophe would be unless some constructive policy of abolition was instituted for the nation. He said in a letter in 1830 to Benjamin Lundy: “For if Congress will not listen to the voice of humanity until destruction cometh, I wish posterity to know that some among us now are desirous to have justice done.” ”

“ Manumission: Manumission was the door of escape from slavery that was constantly open to the slave. At common law, a master could free his slaves on the basis of any agreement that he might make with them. The owner [17] of a slave could dispose of him like any other piece of property. The spirit of manumission was so promoted by the churches and by the doctrine of natural rights of the American Revolution that the State, in self defense, placed a limitation on the common law method of manumission. ”

“ It was wise to have an employed preacher for the slaves. Religion appealed to the negro’s character, and it was a psychological factor in his control.
One of the most interesting features of plantation life was the raising of poultry by the old slaves who were incapacitated for hard work. An old negro man, giving most zealous attention to his brood, his negro assistants careful to please him in every detail, and the “happy family,” consisting of everything from a bob white and turkey gobbler [68] to a mockingbird, made one of the most beautiful pictures of plantation life. ”

“ The convention in its various discussions used the terms, “freemen,” “freeholders,” “all citizens,” “all persons,” and “free white persons.” This clearly shows that the convention was carefully discriminating between these terms when it used them. Why did the convention use “free white persons” as the basis of representation? It knew that the term, “freemen,” would give representation to free negroes. The Constitution of the United States gave representation to three-fifths of the slaves. ”

“ The legislation of the Territory on slavery consists of one act, relating to the negro’s participation in court procedure. Negroes, whether bond or free, were permitted to be witnesses for and against each other, but denied this privilege in cases to which a white man was a party. Persons of mixed blood, descended from negroes or Indians, inclusive of the third generation, suffered a similar restriction. No person of mixed blood to any degree whatever, who had been held in slavery, could be a witness against a white person within twelve months of his liberation. ”

“ No feature of the slave code shows more progressively the attitude of the whites toward the negro than the law on runaways. As the slaves developed the means for evading the law, it was made increasingly rigid. White men could be sold into temporary servitude to pay fines for persuading the slave to run away. [70] Anyone convicted for attempting to steal and convey a slave out of the colony was required to pay the owner twenty-five pounds. If he could not pay this fine he was forced to serve the master for five years. ”

“ Their influence manifested itself [202] in charity, in marriage ceremonies, at the sick-bed, in manumission societies, in the halls of legislation, and in the benevolent philosophy of the Christian judge. Efforts at harsh legislation were either defeated at the time or modified later by more considered enactments. It has been abundantly shown, however, that it was the courts of Tennessee that constituted the bulwark of protection for the slave. They dealt with him not as a chattel but as a man. The slave code became in their hands an opportunity and a means to humanize the institution. ”

“ The runaway was one of the most difficult problems of slave government. The wild life of the slave in Africa, and the hardships of frontier American slavery naturally created a disposition in the slave to run away from his master’s plantation. Organized bands of slave-stealers, poor whites, and free negroes constantly took advantage of this attitude of the slave. ”

“ The distribution of the slaves over the state was determined by the crops raised. In East Tennessee the ratio of slaves to whites was about 1 to 12; in Middle Tennessee, 1 to 3; and in West Tennessee, 3 to 5. In no county in East Tennessee was the ratio greater than 1 to 6, while in several counties it was 1 to 60, and in two-thirds of them it ranged from 1 to 20, to 1 to 60. [12] This, of course, was a matter of the soil. These factors reflected themselves in social life, education, religion, and politics. Slavery produced aristocracy and classes of society wherever it appeared. ”