it costs
$500,000 to transport 300 Negroes, it would certainly cost
$6,668,000,000 to send away the 4,000,000 of Negroes in the United
States. Add to this the value of the Negroes, to be paid in
remuneration to the owners for their property, $2,000,000,000, and the
total cost of purchase and transportation, based upon the experience
and the statistics of the State of Maryland, would be $8,668,000,000!
or more than forty times the amount of all the gold and silver in the
United States! It will be seen that my own is a low estimate compared
with this, and either of those estimates shows the utter futility of
the advocacy of emancipation. That Report says:--

"The passage of the act of 1831, ch. 281, was framed with the design
of removing our free Negroes beyond the limits of this State. But
experience has shown that they will not willingly leave us. That act
has been in operation for twenty-seven years, at an expense to the
State of about $280,000, raised by taxation upon our citizen
population. It is safe to say that $75,000 more has been cleared by
the profits in trade to the coast of Africa in that time; and that
$145,000 has probably been bestowed by voluntary contribution for the
same object--making in all the sum of $500,000. And yet, with all this
vast outlay of money, not over _three hundred free Negroes_ have been
removed. Slaves to a larger number have been set free and sent to
Africa. During the last year not one single free Negro was sent to
Africa from this State. When this law went into effect, we had 52,000
free Negroes in the State; and after a trial of twenty-seven years, we
now have 90,000 or 100,000. The inefficiency of this enterprise being
so obvious to every one of the least reflection, your committee
propose the repeal of all laws taxing the people for colonization
purposes."

[6] Scroeder's Max. of Washington, p. 256.

* * * * *

[Transcriber's Notes:

Every effort has been made to replicate this text as faithfully as
possible, including obsolete and variant spellings and other
inconsistencies.

The transcriber noted the following issues and made changes as
indicated to the text to correct obvious errors:

1. p. 14, "sieze" changed to "seize"
2. p. 30, "Iagas" changed to "Jagas"
3. p. 30, "Iaga" changed to "Jaga"
4. p. 31, "Macoco" partially illegible, changed to "Macaco"
5. p. 41, "retrogaded" changed to "retrograded"
6. p. 42, "psuedo-" chan