among the more rigid, some scruples of conscience
began to be entertained of the propriety and himianity
of the trade. Elizabeth, during wjiose reign this ex-
pedition had been fitted out, ordered Hawkins to
appear before her, and interrogated him as to his mode
of conducting it. He assured her that his motives were
those of the most disinterested humanity, and promised
his Royal Mistress, "that in no ex})cdition where hr
had the command, should any Africans be carried away
without their own free will and consent, except such
capiives as were taken in war, and doomed to death;
and that he had no scruples about the justice of bring-
ing human creatures from that barren wilderness, to
a condition where they might be both happy them-
selves, and beneficial to the world." Elizabetht
19
expressed licrsclf perfectly satisfied witli the relation
she had heard, and promised Hawkins her protection
and assistance. Soon after this interview with the
Queen, he projected a second voyage to the Coast, and
she offered him the convoy of a man of war; but he
declined the offer, alleging as a reason, that the pro*
fits arising from the trade were amply sufficient to
remunerate him for the dangers and expense which
attended it. "Tn his passage, however," says the
historian, to whom we have already referred, " he fell
in with the Minion, man of war, which accompanied
him to the Coast of Africa. After his arrival he began,
as formerly, to traffic with the Negroes, endeavouring
by persuasion and promises, and the prospects of
reward, to induce them to go with him ; but now they
were more reserved, and jealous of his designs, and
as none of their neighbours had returned, they were
apprehensive he had killed and ate them. The crew of
the man of war, observing the Africans backward and
suspicious, began to laugh at his gentle and dilatory
method of proceeding, and proposed having recourse
to force and comjiulsion; the sailors belonging to his
own fleet joined those of the man of war, and applaud-
ed tiie proposal. But Hawkins, considered it as ciuel
and unjust, and tried by persuasion, promises and
threats, to prevail on them, to desist, from a purpose,
so unwan-antable and cruel, urging at the same time
his authority, and instructions from the Queen. But
the bold and headstrong sailors, would hear of no
restraints ; they pursued their violent design, and
after several unsuccessful attacks, in which many of
them lost their lives, the carft'o was completed by force
and barbarity." Thus ended an enterprise in which
avarice, cl^-^'- - ""' e a saint, violated all the privileges
to
of liumanity, while a keen and cunning policy, oil the
part of government, foreseeing the prodigious advan-
tages that would necessarily arise from the prosecu-
tion of the trade, cautiously winked at, and secretly
encouraged it. Hawkins, notwithstanding the elabo-
rate effort of Hewitt to vindicate his motives, must
stand adjudged in the eyes of the civilized world, a
prolound and impious hypocrite, and Elizabeth, the
secret protector of a schetne of conunercial barbarity,
that must forever tarnish the glory of her reign. As
a proof of the sincerity of both parties, we find
Hawkins, upon his return to England from his second
voyage, knighted by Elizabeth, and made Treasurer of
the Navy; and in less than a twelve month after, he
was appointed to the command of a man of war,
which, with three other vessels of a lesser class, set
sail for the Coast, on the same " iraf/m«- expedition."
Whatever may have been the motives of the one, how-
ever, who undertook the prosecution of this newly
discovered commerce, or of the other, who, by a
refined and deep-sighted policy, protected and encour-
aged it ; both arc equally guilty of having paved the
way to the violence, barl)arity, and bloodshed, that
have stained the subsequent history of the Slave
Trade.
When once the spirit of commercial avarice had
been excited in England, there were no bounds to its
voracious appetite. Justice was deaf and conscience
itself was dumb. Private adventures nmltiplied and
Africa swarmed witli the thousands who were now
engaged in the trade. In little more than twenty years
from the date of Hawkins' first voyage to the Coast,
it became so profitable a source of vv<^alth, that the
government no longer preserved the cautious attitudti
■,";^saB5«=4,lWM , '^■^'P'"^. ,'l':-.."'"/'V
21
it had hitherto assumed, but throwing off the mask,
openly, by Patents from the Crown, sanctioned and
encouraged it. In 1585 and 1588, two several Pa-
tents were granted to "certain rich merchants in
London," to trade to the Coast of Guinea, within
certain Latitudes. In 1 592, a third Patent was granted
to the same Company, greatly extending tlieir privi-
leges, and ealarging the territory of their trade. The
Company, however, either from want of funds, igno-
rance of the mode of conducting the trade, or an expira-
tion of titeir charter, became extinct, and the trade w as
in a great measure abandoned. It was revived and
prosecuted with renewed activity in the reign of
Janies I. In 1608, a Patent was granted to another
company of merchants, with an extensive right to the
trade, and "of more validity and extent than any of
the former grants." During the period of the Com-
m(>n\\ ealth also, inl 65 1 , si uiilar privileges were granted
to other merchants in London, but the unsettled state
of tiie country, rendered the Patent of little or no
advantage to them. The commerce fell into ruin, but
was still |>rosecuted by some few private individuals.
In 1662, under the reign of Charles II, another
Company was erected into a corporation, by a Patent
from the Crown, under the name of the "Royal Com-
pany of England trading to Africa." The war which
{Succeeded, with the Dutch, iuunediately after, utterly
ruined the trade, and the Company surrendered their
charter to the Crown, upon payment of a sum of money.
The King immediately (1672) erected another corpo-
ration under the name of the "Royal African Compa-
ny." This Company continued to exist from this period
with a continual enlargement of its privileges, until
the final abolition of the Slave Trade in En-rjand, in
n
the year 1807. We think it unnecessary to jjroceed
any farther in our account of the progress of this de-
testable traffic. The Parliamentary History of the
English Empire, since the year 1672, is so easy of
access, that little or no difficulty can be encountered
by those who are anxious to continue the chronolog}'
of the Trade. Our object, so iar as it is connected
with our general design, is sufticiently obtained by
the abstract we have already given.
If then, we are unhappily afllicted with an evil, the
curse of which is felt and acknowledged by every
enlightened man in the Slave-holding States, it should
be a matter of sympathy, rather than of rebuke,
particularly when it is recollected that it was not of our
own creation. It must be conceded by every fair and
candid reasoner, who is at all acquainted with the
liistory of our country, that the introduction of this
njischievous and unhappy institution is not imputable
to the present generation, nor are we answerable either
to heaven, or to earth, for its existence. "Slavery"
said Mr. King (ami dcs noirs) "unha})pily exists in the
United States; enlightened men in the States, even
where it is permitted, and every where out of them,
regret its existence â– amon<( us, and seek for the means of
mitigating it. The first introduction of Slaves is not
imputable to tlie present generation, nor to their ances-
tors. Before the year 1G42, the trade and ports of the
Colonies were o])en to foreigners, equally as those of
the mother country, and as early as the year 1620, a
few years after |)lanting the Colony of V irginia, and
the same in which the first settlement was made in the
old Colony of riyniouth, a cargo of Negroes was
brought into and sold as slaves, in Virginia, by a
foreign s\i\p\ ivoin this beginning the importation was
23
continued for nearly two centuries. To her honor ,
Virginia, while a Colony, opposed the importation of
slaves, and was the first State to prohibit the same by
a law passed for this purpose in 1778, thirty yean^
before the general prohibition, enacted by Congress
in 1808." Admitting, for a moment, however, that the
existence of slavery among us was an institution of
our own voluntary adoption, and not forced upon us,
let us inquire how far the people of the South and
West can be called to the bar of public opinion, by
those of the North and East, and what proportion-
ate or relative agency, each of these sections of our
empire had, in the introduction of the very evil, of
which both complain^ and to the dangers of which
the former are most sensibly alive.
The Northern and Eastern sections of our Union,
then, in common with ourselves. Colonies of the Bri-
tish Empire, were at a very early period, actively and
industriously engaged in the very traffic to which is to
be attributed the introduction and existence of the sin
of which they have since so loudly and clamorously
complained. The "atrocious crime" of slavery among
us as a people, of which, their own agency was, in a
great degree, the proximate cause, ought, in strict jus-
tice, therefore to be attributed to them, or, as will be
shown, is less imj)utable to us. Great Britain, and the
then Northern and Eastern Colonies of her American
possessions, were the first dealers in the odious and re-
proachful commerce that has entailed upon our coun-
try, the evil which we all lament, and if the latter made
any early or obviously direct efforts, to abolish the
trade, it was not so much from any " compunctious
visitings" of conscience, or from any more enlightened
feelings of philanthropy, as from the opcratioji of the
24
acts of the British Parliament, which, from time to time
granted peculiar and exclusive privileges to British
merchants, that amounted to a virtual prohibition, and
debarred her Colonies from any participation in the
trade. When the latter found that they were to be
inundated by a class of people, from the introduction
of which, they no longer were to derive the commer-
cial advantages they had hitherto possessed, exertions
were then made to abolish the traffic, or to lay it under
heavy imposts. It was not until the period to which
we have referred, that any very serious disposition was
shown by them to interrupt the stream of wealth that
poured its riches into their laps, or to divert it from the
channels in which it had hitherto flowed. The history
of the times is emphatic upon this point. The first ex-
pression of the Legislation in the then North-American
Colonies which took place upon this subject, was that
of the " General Court of Massachusetts," in 1645, in
whicli they prohibited the buying and selling of slaves,
"except those who were condemned to servitude by
tho sentence of a court of justice, or those who were
taken in time of wary In 170,^, more than half a
century after the ({ualified provisions of the act which
we have just quoted, another ctTort was made to
restrict the importation of slaves, by subjecting it to
a heavy impost, ly/iic/t /ttiVed From the complexion
of these historical documents, it would appear that it
was from no very nice and scrupulous abhorrence of
the "odious crime" of slavery, on the part of the
Northern and Eastern Colonies, that they interdicted
the trade in hmnan flesh, but a necessary result of ihe
commercial avarice of the mother country, which
closed the door of the trade upon her Colonies, and
shut up the gates of its African commerce to all but
25
native born British merchants, and consequently
destroyed all prospects of advantage on the part
of the Colonies in this respect. It was not, then, so
much the generous result of a more enlarged and en-
lightened philanthropy on the part of these Colonies, as
it was a calculating policy which dictated the steps
that they took, in relation to tiie iuiportation of slaves.
If it were not, why delay the expression of tlieir abhor-
rence of what they deemed a curse and a scourge upon
the country, from the year 1&45 to 1703, in the years
intermediate between the two periods of which, the
exclusive privile^jes to which we have referred were
granted bv the crown ; or whv the distinction between
the situation of the individual who may have been iairly
purchased on the Coast of Africa, and brought into the
country, and tliat of him who was taken prisoner iw
lawful war, fighting boldly against the enemies of his
race, and manfully exerting all the energies which God
and nature gave him, to repel the notorious and unin-
terrupted aggressions of the Colonists upon his liberty
and life. The red man of the woods, who was the ori-
ginal proprietor of the soil on which thoy had settled, if
taken captive while resisting the encroachments of his
more civilized and unwelcome neighbors, was declared
to be n slave, and could be bought and sold as such, at
the discretion or caprice of those into whose hands
the fortune of war may have thrown him ; while the
black man was no sooner landed on their shores, than
he became invested with the privileges of a higher and
more fortunate condition. And yet these Colonies
now arrogate to themselves, the proud and peculiar
distinction of having first interdicted the traffic in hu-
man flesh, and of having, from the purest and most dis-
interested humanity, first exhibited to the world tiie
4'
' 26
b
features of a system of legislation dignifud by all that
can ennoble humanity.
We claim, on tiie part of the Colonists of the South,
no particular exemption from the charge of having
participaied in this commerce and in the reception in
common wiih the Northern and Eastern Provinces, of
the slaves that were imported in British ships; but
they are certainly enlitled to as nuich credit, on the
score of hum-mity, as any portion of the Colonies, for
the early and active exertions which were made to
suppress the growth of an evil, the frightful character
of which appeared so evideiit. Virginia began her
system of legislation at a period almost at the same
time with Massachusetts, and followed it up with the
most unrelaxing assiduity. Long before the expira-
tion of the seventeenth century, she had made great
progress in restraining the importation of slaves into
her territory, by laying such heavy imposts upon their
introduction, as virtually amounted to a prohibition.
No less than twenty-three Acts, imposing a duty of
from five to ten, and finally to tiventij per cent, may be
found in her statute book, from the year 1699 to 1772,
" the real design of all of which was not revenue, but
the repression of importation^ Brougham, in his
" Colonial Policy," has a passage upon this subject,
that places the character of Virginia in an elevated and
distinguished point of view.
" Every measure proposetl by the Colonial Legisla-
tures that did not meet the entire concurrence of the
British Cabinet, was sure to be rejected in the last
instance by the crown. If examples were required,
wc might refer to the history of the abolition of the
slave trade in Virginia. A duty on the importation of
negroes had been imposed amounting to a prohibition.
27
One Assembly, inducecl by a temporary peculiarity of
cirrumstances, repealed this law by a bill which re-
ceived ihe immediate sanction of the crown. But
never afterwards could the Royal assent be obtained
to a renewal of (he duty, although as we are told by
Mr. JefKerson, all manner of expedients were tried for
this purpose by almost every subsequent Legislature
thf^t met under the Colonial Government. The very
find Assembly that met mider the new Constitution
finally prohibited the traflic." In 1772, very active
exertions were made by Virginia to repress the trade.
The "duties previously impos(.'d were re-enacted," and
the Assembly,, at the same time, in a petition to the
throne, " earnestly implore" the interposition of the
croAvij, in checking the importation of slaves from the
Coast of Africa, rejiresenting that " it had long been
considered as a trade of great inhumanity^'''' tlie future
progress and encouragement of which would, in the
end, endanger the security and happiness of the Colo-
ny. The language of the petition breathes a deep and
emphatic tone of feeling upon the subject, that evident-
ly demonstrates the sincerity with which it was pre-
sented. The petition, however, was unattended to,
and the Colony was still stocked by the mother coun-
try, with a class of population, against the introduc-
tion of which, it hud long previously declared its dis-
gust and abhorrence. " That the inclination (says
Mr. Walsh, in his " Appeal" from tiie Judgments of
Great Britain, respecting the United States) to im-
pose the yoke of perpetual bondage on any part of
their fellow creatures if it ever existed ^mo\\^t\\Q. majo-
rity of the Virginia planters soon subsided, is manifest
from an Act which is traced to 1662, declaring that
" no Englishmattj trader, or other, who should bring
in any Indians as servants, and assign tlietn over to
any other, should sell them for slaves, nor for any other
time than English of like age, could serve by x\ct of
Assembly." Thus early was tfip state of slavery prohibi-
ted, where it was not exacted by the higher authority ;
and the first opportunity was taken after the Declara-
tion of Independence, to extinguish the detestable com-
merce so long forced upon the Province. In October
1778, during the tumult and anxiety of revolution, the
General Assembly passed a Law, prohibiting, under
heavy penalties, the further importation of slaves, and
declaring that every slave imported thereafter, should
be inmiediately free. The example of Virginia was
followed at different times before the date of the Fede-
ral Constitution by most of the other States." These
historical facts, added to others that we shall produce,
furnish the most abundant and unequivocal testimony
of the early and sincere desire on the part of the
Southern States to repress a traffic, to the dangers and
inhumanity of which they were most sensibly alive.
There is another valuable piece of Colonial history
that gives additional weight to the argument. In the
year 1711, Governor Gibbes, in his speech to the As-
sembly of the State of South-Carolina, after represent-
ing the flourishing condition of the Province, and its
general happiness and prosperity, recommends to the
serious and solemn consideration of the Assembly the
necessity of interdicting the importation of slaves, and
deprecates in the most emj)hatic manner, the further
introduction of them. The following is an extract
from his Speech, 15th May 1711. We give it with all
the raciness of its ancient phraseology.
" And, Gentlemen, I desire you will consider the
' great quantities of negroes that are dayly brought into^
* this government, and the small number of whites that
* comes amongst us, and how many are lately dead and
' gon o(T. How insolent and mischeivous the negroes
* are become, and to consider the Negro Act already
' made, doth not reach up to some of the crimes they
< have lately been guilty off; therefore it might be con-
' venient by sotne additional clause of said Negro Act
' to appoint either by gibbets, or some such like way^
' that, after executed, they may remain more exem-
' plary, than any punishment hitherto hath been in-
* Aided on them ; and also that masters of negroes,
' may be obliged to provide and allow their negroes
' sufficient dyet and cloathing, and that their worke
' and correction may be with moderation, that they
' may be comfortable, which may the better encour-
' age them to live peaceably and honestly with their
* masters." We shall make further use of this docu-
ment in a subsequent stage of our proceedings. In
the mean time, however, we would remark, that
from the testimony we have already produced, it is
abundantly clear that the Colonies of the South were
as eager as those of the North to suppress an evil of
the enormity of which both were equally convinced,
and to the dangers of which the former were more
intimately exposed. While we appeal to the records
of the several States, we would point also to the
journals of Congress, to show, that the earliest oppor-
tunities were warmly embraced by the people of the
South, to express their abhorrence of this odious
trafKic. "In truth," says Mr. Walsh in the work
which we have already quoted, " the Representatives
from our Southern States, have been foremost in tes-
tifying their abhorrence of the traffic ; an abhorrence,
springing from a deep sense, not merely, of it^ inlqui-
30
ty, but of the magnitude of the evil it has entailed
upon their country. It was only at the last session of
Congress, (1819) that a rue mber from Virginia pro-
posed the following regulation, to which the House of
Representatives agreed, Avithout a division."
"Every person, who shall imj)ort into the United
Slates, or, knowingly, aid or abet the importation,
into the United States, of any African Negro, or other
person, with intent to sell or use such ISegro, or other
person, as a slave, or shall purchase any such slave,
knowing him or her to be thus imported, shall, on
conviction thereof, hi any Circuit Court of the United
States, be jmnished with deata.^''
Abundant testimony, then, we think, can be col-
lected from the statements we have produced, that the
Colonies at the South were at as early a period as
those of the North, efficieiuly and actively engaged in
legislating upon the introduction of Negro Slaves,
and that since the Declaration of Independence, they
have manifested the same disposition. They are,
therefore, entitled to the same credit on the score of
humanity.
We have now arrived at the period of the De-
claration of Inde})endence. Let us look into the
history of the times, and observe the comparative
agency of the different sections of the Union in the
importation of slaves since the year 1 776. In the year
1803, the State of South-Carolina opened her ports
to the reception of slaves from the Coast of Africa,
agreeably to the provisio-is of the Constitution of tiic
United States. In 1!){>.3, one of her members on tlie
floor of Congress, submitted a resohuion, censuring
her conduct in thus throwing open her ports and
inviting the in){)orlation of African Slaves into her
31
Temtory; and, but for the interposition ol' Congresi?
that repealed the Act of 1804, which prohibited the
introduction of slaves into the Territory of Louisiana,
by an Act at the succeeding session of 1805, the
ports of the Southern States would have been closed
against the trade. This repeal was effected by the
influence of the Northern and Eastern States, who,
while (hey affected to denounce the "inhumanity" of
the trade, entered fidly into it, and shared, from their
immense amount of tonnage afloat, almost exclusively
the profits of it. Possessing, as they did, so decided
an advantage in the shipping interest, they became,
in conjunction with foreigners, the carrit^-s for the
world, and stocked the Southern sections of the Union
with a class of population, of the existence of which
they now so unjustly complain. After they had n ap-
ed the profits of the trade from the year 1805 to the
year 1807, when it was interdicted, it was then, and
not until then, that the "odiousness" of it became
so obnoxious to the "humanity" of the North and
East, and that they began the cry against it. Unable
any longer from the prohibitory statutes of the Gene-
ral Government to import, and having effected a sale
of those they had already imported, they then became
very fastidious, and their ^'•consciences,'''^ very conveni-
ently, took the alarm. All the opprobrium, therefore,
"that they have heaped upon us, niijst be returned dou-
ble fold on the heads of our calumniators. They were
unquestionably the most active in the traffic. Mr.
Smith, a senator from this State, in the Congress
of the United States, demonstrates in the most lumi-
nous manner the inferences drawn from diis view of
our subject. His speech upon the " Missouri Question,"
in the year 1820, is too valuable to pass unnoticed-— it
presents the best coup d^ailoi' the nature of the " Ques-
tion*' that we remember to have seen.
" About the 20th December 1803, the Legislature of
the State of Soutli-Carolina, passed a law to open the
African Slave Trade under the authority of the provi-
sions of the Constitution of the United States. About