n the slave states increased, in the
same period, thirty five per cent;--and this, too, notwithstanding the
operation of those oppressive and cruel laws, whose enactment was
dictated by the settled policy of expelling the free blacks from
the South.

That, in the event of the abolition of southern slavery, the emancipated
slaves would migrate to the North, rather than elsewhere, is very
improbable. Whilst our climate would be unfriendly to them, and whilst
they would be strangers to our modes of agriculture, the sugar and
cotton fields of Texas, the West Indies, and other portions of the
earth, would invite them to congenial employments beneath congenial
skies. That, in case southern slavery is abolished, the colored
population of the North would be drawn off to unite with their race at
the South, is, for reasons too obvious to mention, far more probable
than the reverse.

It will be difficult for you to persuade the North, that she would
suffer in a pecuniary point of view by the extirpation of slavery. The
consumption of the laborers at the South would keep pace with the
improvement and elevation of their condition, and would very soon impart
a powerful impulse to many branches of Northern industry.

Another of your charges is in the following words: "The subject of
slavery within the District of Florida," and that "of the right of
Congress to prohibit the removal of slaves from one state to another,"
are, with abolitionists, "but so many masked batteries, concealing the
real and ultimate point of attack. That point of attack is the
institution of domestic slavery, as it exists in those states."

If you mean by this charge, that abolitionists think that the abolition
of slavery in the District of Columbia and in Florida, and the
suppression of the interstate traffic in human beings are, in
themselves, of but little moment, you mistake. If you mean, that they
think them of less importance than the abolition of slavery in the slave
states, you are right; and if you further mean, that they prize those
objects more highly, and pursue them more zealously, because they think,
that success in them will set in motion very powerful, if not indeed
resistless influences against slavery in the slave states, you are right
in this also. I am aware, that the latter concession brings
abolitionists under the condemnation of that celebrated book, written by
a _modern_ limiter of "human responsibility"--not by the _ancient_ one,
wh