m to assume that the
mass of the people of this island would remain in the state of political
indifference to which poverty and slavery had reduced them. They were
now free, every man to rise as rapidly as he could; and the day was not
very distant when it would be demonstrated by the change of
representatives that would be seen in that house. It did appear to him,
that under the pretext of extending the privileges of freemen to the
mass of the people of this country, the government was about to deprive
them of those privileges, by curtailing the power of the representative
Assembly of those very people. He could not bring himself to admit, with
any regard for truth, that the late apprentices could now be oppressed;
they were quite alive to their own interests, and were now capable of
taking care of themselves. So long as labor was marketable, so long they
could resist oppression, while on the other hand, the proprietor, for
his own interest's sake, would be compelled to deal fairly with them."

Though it is evidently all important that the same public opinion which
has wrested the whip from the master should continue to watch his
proceedings as an employer of freemen, there is much truth in the speech
of this black representative and alderman of Kingston. The brutalized
and reckless attorneys and managers, _may_ possibly succeed in driving
the negroes from the estates by exorbitant rent and low wages. They
_may_ succeed in their effort to buy in property at half its value. But
when they have effected that, they will be totally dependent for the
profits of their ill-gotten gains upon the _free laboring people_. They
may produce what they call idleness now, and a great deal of vexation
and suffering. But land is plenty, and the laborers, if thrust from the
estates, will take it up, and become still more independent. Reasonable
wages they will be able to command, and for such they are willing to
labor. The few thousand whites of Jamaica will never be able to
establish slavery, or any thing like it, over its 300,000 blacks.

Already they are fain to swallow their prejudice against color. Mr.
Jordon, member for Kingston and "free nigger," was listened to with
respect. Nay more, his argument was copied into the "Protest" which the
legislature proudly flung back in the face of Parliament, along with the
abolition of the apprenticeship, in return for Lord Glenelg's Bill. Let
all in the United States read and ponder it who asse