Jubal Anderson Early

“ It is hard to conceive how the glory or prosperity of a nation could be advanced by giving currency to fallacies, or suppressing the truth in regard to the actual condition of African slavery in the Southern states.
It would seem that as Great Britain had had so much to do with fostering the institution in those states, it would be rather gratifying, than otherwise, to its ministers and its people, to know that the descendants of those who had been ravished from their native country by the cupidity of their predecessors, were in a contented and comfortable condition. ”

“ In the year 1763, the celebrated case of Somerset, a slave who had been carried to England by his master from one of the British West India Islands, came up before Lord Mansfield in Westminster Hall on a writ of habeas corpus, and that distinguished Chief Justice of the King's Bench, in delivering his opinion discharging the petition, said: "The air of England has long been too pure for a slave, and every man who breathes it is free." ”

“ We spurn the idea that the free, sovereign and independent State of Massachusetts is reduced to a mere municipal corporation, without the power to protect its people or to defend them from oppression from whatever quarter it comes. Whenever the national compact is violated and the citizens of this state are oppressed by cruel and unauthorized enactments, this legislature is bound to interpose its power and to wrest from the oppressor its victim. ”

“ The truth is, that several of the statesmen of the South and especially of Virginia, deplored slavery as an evil and expressed the hope that at some future time, in some way that might be desired, the institution might be abolished in such manner as to secure the welfare of both races, but none of them could suggest any mode for doing so, and though perfectly sincere, they contented themselves with expressing the hope that the way might be discovered. ”

“ Let any one compare the condition of the African in his native land, with that of the slaves of the South before the violent abolition of slavery, and then say whether that institution, which had produced such a vast improvement in his condition was so great a wrong after all. ”

“ In the year 1834, the British parliament passed an act for the abolition of slavery in the British West Indies, her colonies in those islands being all of the slave colonies left to Great Britain. These colonies had dwindled into insignificance and formed but a very inconsiderable part of her gigantic colonial system. Canada, Australia, New Zealand and her possessions in the East Indies furnished an ample field for British settlement and colonial trade, which dwarfed into very diminutive proportions the British interests in the West Indies. ”

“ On the other hand, New England had made no sacrifices for the Union, and had received only benefits from it. To that section the Union had been a "paying operation" in every way: its fisheries, commerce and factories had been fostered and protected by high bounties and duties until its comparatively sterile soil bloomed as a garden, while its surplus population found homes in the fertile region surrendered by Virginia. Descendants of the Puritans did not undertake to become "philanthropists" until the slave trade with the South ceased to be profitable. ”

“ In no sense can they be said to have submitted any of their rights to the arbitrament of arms any more than the traveller on the highway submits his money to the arbitrament of arms between himself and the robber, and the result of the war decided no question of principle, but simply furnished another instance of the fact that in this world, the truth does not always prevail and that might is often more powerful than right. ”

“ Such is, and perhaps ever will be, the character of human philanthropy, that it troubles itself more about the sufferings which exist a long way off or only in imagination, than those which are before its eyes. ”

“ The idea that any of the Southern states resorted to secession because of the loss of the power and patronage of the government is not founded on fact, as neither had ever been used for their special benefit even when in the hands of Southern men, but it was the Northern states whose trade and factories had grown up under the fostering care of the government throughout its whole history, while the schools of the Northwest had been richly endowed from the public lands and the gigantic system of railroads in the same quarter had been built up mainly from grants of this common property. ”

“ If on the contrary that institution has kept him in utter ignorance of moral and Christian duty and made him the cringing, degraded creature he has been represented, what a monster must be he who proposes to vest in the untutored savage the power of governing others while the white man is disfranchised. ”

“ They were bound to respect and abide by them not only in the capacity of states, but they were bound by the exercise of their just powers of legislation and restraint, to compel their citizens to respect and abide by them. This obligation extended not merely to abstaining from all violent interference and active measures of wrong, but from all agitation or incitement to others to do wrong, by disturbing the peace, property or rights of other states and the citizens thereof. ”

“ The territory thus ceded, embraced as claimed by the United States, all of the territory west of the Mississippi and south of the 31st degree of latitude to the western boundary of the old Spanish province of Florida. Slavery existed in Louisiana at the time of its acquisition, having been established there by the French government, and there could be no question as to the meaning of the guarantee to the inhabitants of security in their property, as the right of property in slaves was universally acknowledged in all of the civilized world, and both of the contracting parties recognized it. ”

“ When the right to discuss, deliberate and decide, exists, those possessing it, must necessarily be the sole judges of how it is to be exercised. The Southern states did deliberate and did decide that they could no longer remain in the Union with safety, and therefore they determined to withdraw from it. If the Southern people had been hurried into secession by their leaders, they are the parties to complain and to hold the guilty ones responsible. ”

“ Jefferson, to the inalienable right of communities to alter or abolish forms of government that have become injurious or oppressive, and if the Cotton States shall decide that they can do better out of the Union than in it, we insist upon letting them go in peace. The right to secede may be a revolutionary one but it exists nevertheless, and we do not see how one party can have a right to do what another party has a right to prevent. We must ever resist the asserted right of any state to coercion in the Union, and nullify and defy the laws thereof ”

“ Slavery was continued as it before existed until after the Revolution. Vessels were fitted out in the port of New York (first called New Amsterdam) , for the slave trade at an early period, and the merchants of that city engaged in it without scruple; some of them continued to be so engaged until the traffic was prohibited by Congressional enactment.
The settlement next in point of time was that of Plymouth, in the year 1620, within the present limits of the State of Massachusetts. Slavery of the Indians and also of negroes existed in this province from the beginning. ”

“ In order to understand the status of the slave trade and slavery in the United States after their independence was achieved, it is necessary to glance at the progress of the Revolution and the adoption of the new form of government after its close. ”

“ It was this settlement which gave tone and character to Massachusetts, as well as to all the other New England provinces, which were chiefly offshoots from Massachusetts.
Though professing to be seeking a home in this wilderness for the purpose of enjoying and establishing religious liberty, the settlers of Massachusetts established as proscriptive and despotic a theocracy as the world has ever seen. A celebrated humorist has aptly said that their idea of religious liberty consisted in enjoying their own opinions to the fullest extent and preventing any body else from enjoying theirs. ”

“ Art. II. "Each State retains its sovereignty, freedom and independence, and every power, jurisdiction and right, which is not by this confederation expressly delegated to the United States in Congress assembled." ”

“ If slavery did not have its evils and its wrongs, it would not be a human institution, and as long as "man's inhumanity to man makes countless thousands mourn," so long will evils and wrongs exist in every relation of human society. These exist in the relation of governor and governed, parent and child, husband and wife, master and servant, employer and employed, neighbor and neighbor, and are not excluded even from the church. ”

“ Southern statesmen, while willing to accept the line of 36° 30 ́ for the sake of peace, did not claim the right to foster slavery even upon the territory south of that line, by the action of Congress, but they claimed that the question should be left where the Constitution of the United States left it, that is, that the people settling in the territories should be allowed freedom to adopt their own institutions when they came to form state governments, and that Congress in the meantime should adopt no measures to forestall their action. ”

“ The manufacture of New England rum, which was in progress, furnished a very easy means of prosecuting the trade, as that article was freely exchanged on the coast of Africa with the natives for slaves. One part of the inhabitants being imbruited by the detestable liquor, while the other was carried off into bondage. The traders of New England, composed of all classes, including church dignitaries, participated largely in the profits resulting from the impulse given to the slave trade in 1698, and it was sustained by public sentiment in those colonies as well as in the mother country. ”

“ There were many politicians by trade, whose aspirations had been unsuccessful and who cared nothing for the negro or the cause of freedom, but who fell in with the "free-soil" movement, as it was called with the selfish hope of building up a great sectional party under the auspices of which they could obtain and retain that power which they had failed to acquire otherwise. ”

“ Too lazy, except when severely pressed, to attend to the labors of the field, he compels his wives to plant the roots or seeds, and gather the scanty harvest. In hunting and in war, his main occupation, he relies upon cunning and will follow his prey with surprising agility, crawling like a snake prone upon the ground. ”

“ Originally acquired as a necessity, the slave's value lessened and the burden on his master increased, as other interests divided his attention. Legislation was resorted to without success in the enactment of measures for the abolishment of a system so firmly rooted.
In 1805, Mr. Jefferson wrote "I have given up all expectation of any early, provision for the extinguishment of slavery among us. There are many virtuous men who would make any sacrifices to effect it, many equally virtuous who believe it cannot be remedied." In 1814, however, Mr. Jefferson again urged the policy of emancipation. ”

“ From drums of goat-skins, from harps and gourds, he extracts their melancholy sounds and disturbs the nocturnal African forests with his plaintive melodies.
"It has been affirmed by those who have known them well, that the equatorial negro tribes do not increase but tend to die out spontaneously. This is attributed to infanticide and to the ravages of miasmic fever, which in its most malignant form will often destroy its victim in a single day. Even though quinine be taken as a prophylactic no white man can enter their country with impunity. The night dews are absolutely mortal." ”

“ In this company Queen Anne and the King of Spain became stockholders, as did a large portion of the nobility, gentry, churchmen, and merchants of England. England thus sought a monopoly of the entire slave trade, at least so far as her own and the Spanish colonies were concerned. The exclusive privileges granted to the Royal African Company having expired, in the year 1750 the British Government undertook to maintain the forts and factories on the African coast at its own expense, and the slave trade was thrown open to free competition on the part of its citizens. ”

“ When peace was finally made with Great Britain, that power recognized the sovereignty and independence of the several States of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia by name, and not the sovereignty and independence of the United States. ”