es equals or
exceeds that of the whites, as exposed to very great dangers; and they
refrain from turning their activity in that direction.

Thus the inhabitants of the South would not be able, like their Northern
countrymen, to initiate the slaves gradually into a state of freedom by
abolishing slavery; they have no means of perceptibly diminishing the
black population, and they would remain unsupported to repress its
excesses. So that in the course of a few years, a great people of free
negroes would exist in the heart of a white nation of equal size.

The same abuses of power which still maintain slavery, would then become
the source of the most alarming perils which the white population of the
South might have to apprehend. At the present time the descendants of
the Europeans are the sole owners of the land; the absolute masters of
all labor; and the only persons who are possessed of wealth, knowledge,
and arms. The black is destitute of all these advantages, but he
subsists without them because he is a slave. If he were free, and
obliged to provide for his own subsistence, would it be possible for
him to remain without these things and to support life? Or would not the
very instruments of the present superiority of the white, whilst slavery
exists, expose him to a thousand dangers if it were abolished?

As long as the negro remains a slave, he may be kept in a condition
not very far removed from that of the brutes; but, with his liberty,
he cannot but acquire a degree of instruction which will enable him to
appreciate his misfortunes, and to discern a remedy for them. Moreover,
there exists a singular principle of relative justice which is very
firmly implanted in the human heart. Men are much more forcibly struck
by those inequalities which exist within the circle of the same class,
than with those which may be remarked between different classes. It is
more easy for them to admit slavery, than to allow several millions
of citizens to exist under a load of eternal infamy and hereditary
wretchedness. In the North the population of freed negroes feels these
hardships and resents these indignities; but its numbers and its powers
are small, whilst in the South it would be numerous and strong.

As soon as it is admitted that the whites and the emancipated blacks
are placed upon the same territory in the situation of two alien
communities, it will readily be understood that there are but two
alternatives for the future