7977. SLAVES (Emancipation), Certain.—[continued].
It was found that the
public mind would not bear the proposition
[gradual emancipation], nor will it bear it even
at this day (1821). Yet the day is not distant,
when it must bear and adopt it, or worse will
follow. Nothing is more certainly written in
the book of fate, than that these people are to
be free; nor is it less certain, that the two
races, equally free, cannot live in the same government.
Nature, habit, opinion have drawn
indelible lines of distinction between them. It
is still in our power to direct the process of
emancipation and deportation, peaceably, and
in such slow degree, as that the evil will wear
off insensibly, and their place be, pari passu,
filled up by free white laborers. If, on the
contrary, it is left to force itself on, human
nature must shudder at the prospect held up.
We should in vain look for an example in the
Spanish deportation, or deletion of the Moors.
This precedent would fall far short of our case.—
Jefferson MSS.
Rayner,164.
