As already mentioned, the states are entitled by the constitution to send members to the house of representatives, in proportion to the number of their inhabitants. The slaves being more than one sixth part of the whole population, on their account one sixth of that legislative assembly is returned. But whom do those members represent? whose cause do they plead in Congress? The interests—the cause of the negroes? Far otherwise. The negroes are counted as so many men in determining the number of members to be returned to Congress; but they are only reckoned as so much property, when the question is, who are to be their representatives? In the free institutions of America, the slaves are represented by the owners, who keep them in bondage; and he must be an honest and fearless representative of any state, who dares to plead for their emancipation.

Freedom of speech and debate is a cherished constitutional privilege of the British parliament, declared by statute, (1 Wm. and Mary, st. 2, c. 2.) and essential to liberty. But in the American house of representatives, even the important privilege of freedom of debate is limited, as regards slavery, by the will of the majority, influencing the members of the legislature.

The Washington correspondent of the Boston Atlas newspaper stated in April, 1842, that Mr. Giddings, a representative of Ohio, had the courage and honesty to propose a series of resolutions condemnatory of slavery, and declaring that the territorial law of the slave holding states could not apply to slaves on the high seas,and that consequently, the slaves on board the Creole, who had gained their liberty and taken the vessel into a British port, in resuming their natural rights of freedom, violated no law of the United States, and were liable to no punishment. Whereupon Mr. Botts, of Virginia, had a resolution proposed, censuring Mr.

Giddings for presuming to advocate the cause of the slaves, and then moved the previous question, in order to prevent Mr. Giddings from being heard. The speaker decided that Mr. Giddings, being accused, had a right to be heard in his defence. But the house of representatives reversed this decision, and adopted the resolution of censure, without giving Mr. Giddings an opportunity of saying one word in his defence. The American writer remarks: "The moment a man from the free states says any thing which touches the subject of slavery, he must be censured by the house. A more direct attempt to destroy freedom of debate was never made in a deliberative assembly. New England herself contributed to this act of despotism, by the votes of the locos of New Hampshire and Maine! O shame, where is thy blush!" There are doubtless many individuals in the northern states, and some few in the south, who are sincerely desirous that slavery should be abolished; but the laws, prejudices, and customs of the country are generally in favour of the negro's degradation.

In Washington, any justice of peace may imprison a negro, and advertise him in the newspapers, that he may be claimed by his owner. Should he be a black who has bought his freedom, might he not assert a free man's rights, and obtain redress in a court of justice ? On the contrary, this friendless man may be sold to pay the cost of his own unjust imprisonment. The same is the law in Alabama. It is the common testimony of travellers in America, that in all public places and conveyances, negroes are set apart by themselves; nay, it is even so in the places of worship, as if the soul of a man took its hue from his complexion. Mr. Buckingham says that in a house of refuge for juvenile offenders which he visited, the coloured delinquents

were placed in a separate part of the room; no doubt from a tender regard to the exquisite moral feelings and refinement of the white young vagabonds.

The Author of Men and Manners in America mentions that the son of a general of Hayti, a mulatto, of gentlemanly education and manners, accustomed to be treated in his country as became his rank, visited New York, was refused admittance at all the hotels, could only find shelter in a miserable lodging kept by a negro woman, had his money returned by the box keeper at the theatre, who ordered him to go to the upper gallery; and finding that he was every where shunned and rudely treated, he left the United States as soon as possible, in disgust.

It were easy to multiply examples of the cruelty and injustice caused by slavery, and of which we heard enough before it was abolished in our own colonies. Mr. Dickens has made a collection from American newspapers, of advertisements for runaway slaves, giving a painfully graphic view of their maltreatment by masters who abuse their power. Both men and women are described by the iron clogs and collars they wore-by their marks of lashing and burning with a hot iron— by scars and gunshot wounds and mutilation. These business-like announcements for the purpose of recapturing the slaves, tell their tale of misery, in characters engraven on their very bodies, by the hand of the

oppressor.

"There are slave auctions," says an author already quoted, "almost every day in the New Orleans Exchange..........One of the first human beings whom I happened to see thus sold, was a poor woman apparently dying of a consumption. She was emaciated, her voice was husky and feeble, and her proper place was evidently the hospital. It was with difficulty she was raised on the table. Now, gentlemen, here is Mary,'

said the auctioneer,

a clever house servant and an

excellent cook. Bid me something for this valuable lot. She has only one fault, gentlemen, that is, shamming sick. She pretends to be ill; but there is nothing more the matter with her, than with me at this moment. Put her up, gentlemen; shall I say a hundred dollars to begin with? Well, fifty dollars is bid for her.' Here the auctioneer stopped, while several men began feeling the poor woman's ribs, and putting questions as to her health. Are you well?' asked one 'Oh no, I am very ill.' What is the matter with you?' I have a bad cough and pain in my side.” 'How long have you had it?' 'Three months and more.' The auctioneer proceeded :—'Give her a touch or two of the cow-hide, and I'll warrant she'll do your work.' She was sold for seventy dollars, amid sundry jests at the purchaser."

man.

The author most properly remarks, on this disgusting and disgraceful scene:If such scenes are acted in a Christian country, it is the duty of every traveller to take care at least, that they shall not be done in a corner, that they shall be proclaimed loudly to the world, and that those who perpetrate the enormities shall receive the due meed of indignation and contempt."— Men and Manners in America.

The same writer relates that he travelled in a steam boat, on the Mississippi, with a slave dealer, whose gang of slaves were on the deck, the men loaded with heavy chains, and the women in rags. This slave dealer's manners were as coarse and brutal as his occupation. "I remember, however, that no one on board talked about freedom so loudly or so long as this slave dealer. He at length left us, and the sky seemed brighter, and the earth greener, after his departure."

But slavery exists even at Washington, the seat of government. "The waiters in the hotels," observes

the same author, "the servants in private families, and many of the lower classes of artisans are slaves. While the orators in Congress are rounding periods about liberty in one part of the city, proclaiming alto voce that all men are equal, and that resistance to tyranny is obedience to God,' the auctioneer is exposing human flesh to sale in another!"

*

The demoralizing influence of slavery on the white, the coloured, and the negro races, is a painful and disgusting subject. There are various details of licentious depravity given by Miss Martineau, in her chapter on "Morals of Slavery," which I have no inclination to repeat. She states, "Much that is dreadful ensues from the negro being subject to toil and the lash; but I am confident that the licentiousness of the masters is the proximate cause of society in the south and south-west being in such a state, that nothing else is to be looked for than its being dissolved into its elements, if man does not soon cease to be called the property of man. This dissolution will never take place through the insurrection of the negroes, but by the natural operation of vice. It is well known that the most savage violences that are now heard of in the world, take place in the southern and western states of America. Burning alive, cutting the heart out, and sticking it on the point of a knife, and other such diabolical deeds, the result of the deepest hatred of

* "Jefferson, continually talking about liberty, brought his own children to the hammer, and made money of his debaucheries. Even at his death he did not liberate them. A daughter of his was sold some years ago by public auction, at New Orleans, and bought by a society of gentlemen, who wished to testify, by her liberation, their admiration of the statesman!"--Men and Manners in America.

It may be said, this is dreadful, but surely it is a solitary example. Miss Martineau, in her " Society in America," testifies that such is far from being the case.