The War And Slavery

The extent to which emancipation will result from the civil war depends almost entirely upon the course of future events, and little can be done by talk or legislation to direct or influence it in any way.  It is manifest that there are no worse enemies to slavery, if we look at practical results, than the men who have rebelled against the government professedly in behalf of the interests of the Southern institution.  Whether success or failure shall follow their treasonable enterprise, this will prove true, and there is no intelligent slaveholder who fails to see by this time that the rebellion is a mistake, so far as the interests of Slavery are concerned.  It is making Free States of Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky and Missouri, with a rapidity greater than could have been possible by any other process – partly by the escape of the slaves to the North, partly by the emancipation that attends the progress of our armies, and partly by the removal of the slaves to the far South by their masters.  How this is indicated in the following statement made by a Kentucky correspondent of the Boston Journal: –

“On board the Storm, the steamer which is conveying us up Green river, are several men who have been driven from their homes by the secessionists.  There is a gentleman and his wife – a farmer and a slaveholder from the little town of Volney, between Hopkinsville and the Cumberland river.  All of his property has been taken, his negroes, if they are not sold, are roaming at will.  He has two brothers in the rebel army.  He is a plain, practical common sense, well informed farmer.  He lives close upon the Tennessee line, and is acquainted with the Southern country.  The views of such a man as to what the rebellion will come to are worthy of record, and I present them in brief.  He says that slavery is a doomed institution. – From Kentucky, from Missouri, from Maryland and Virginia, the slaves have been pouring southward.  There has been a great condensation of slaves at the South, where they are not wanted, and where they cannot be supported if the blockade continues.  The South never has raised its own provisions.  She could do it if she put forth her energies; but she never has and she will not now.  The time will come if the blockaded continues, when the masters will be compelled to say to the slaves; ‘Get your living where you can,’ and then the system, being rolled back upon itself, will be broken up.  As for himself, he would like to keep his slaves, but as the secessionists had taken all he had it did not make much difference whether the system was to continue or not.”

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, February 22, 1862, p. 2