EDWIN MCMASTERS STANTON GIDEON WELLES From the painting by H. Uhlke in the From the painting by Matthew Wilson in the their preservation. The slaveholders, and the members of that society which clustered round them, took the offices. It was extremely rare that a man who had ever labored with his hands was sent to Congress from the South, or even chosen to one of the prominent positions in the State. "The political system of the South was an oligarchy under the republican form. The slaveholders were in a very disproportionate minority in every State. "Two hundred thousand men with pure white skins in South Carolina,' said Broderick to the senators, 'are now degraded and despised by thirty thousand aristocratic slaveholders.' The government of South Carolina was in favor of doing something to elevate their poor, but feared that they were 'hopelessly doomed to ignorance, poverty, and crime.' In 1850, there were 347,525 slaveholders, who with their families may have numbered two millions. The total population of the slave States was 6,125,000, so that less than one-third of the white people of the South could possibly have derived any benefit from the institution of slavery. In other words, this imperial domain, covering more square miles than there were in the free States, was given up to two million people; and more than seven millions, bond and free, labored for them or were subservient to their interests. Yet these figures by no means represent the exclusive character of the slaveholding oligarchy. In the enumeration of slaveholders were included many men from the laboring class who by unusual industry or economy had become possessed of one slave or perhaps more, but who politically and socially belonged only to the class from which they had sprung. Of the large planters owning more than fifty slaves, whose elegance, luxury, and hospitality are recited in tales of travellers, over whose estates and lives has shone the lustre of romance and poetry, there were less than eight thousand. They were the true centre of the oligarchy. Around them clustered the few educated people of the country, also the high societies of the cities, composed of merchants, doctors, lawyers and politicians; which society was seen to the best advantage in New Orleans, Charleston, and Richmond. Including all these, the total number must have been small; but it was for them that slavery existed. What has been here adduced is sufficient to show that slavery was certainly not for the advantage of the negro. No one seriously maintained that there were any benefits in the system for the poor whites; since it degraded labor, and therefore degraded the white man who had to work with his hands. It is one of the striking facts of our history that these despised people fought bravely and endured much for a cause adverse to their own interests, following Lee and Stonewall Jackson with a devotion that called to mind the deeds of a more heroic age. "It was then for a small aristocracy that slavery continued to be, and it is among them that we must look for its advantages. An apologist of the institution, who was himself one of the select few, maintained that by the existence of slavery they had greater leisure for intellectual pursuits and better means of attaining a liberal education. 'It is better,' he declares, 'that a part (of the community) should be fully and highly cultivated, and the rest utterly ignorant.' "The South did, indeed, produce good lawyers and able politicians. Their training was excellent. The sons of the wealthy almost always went to college, and there they began to acquire the knack at public speaking which seemed natural to the Southerner. The political life of their State was early opened to them, and by the time the promising young men were sent to Congress they had learned experience and adroitness in public affairs. If they made their mark in the national House or the Senate, they were kept there, and each year added to their usefulness and influence. The aspirants for political honors being almost wholly from the small privileged class, it was not difficult to provide places for those eminently fitted. Moreover, the men who wielded the power were convinced that continuance in office was the proper reward of those who had shown capacity and honesty. The absurd practice which prevailed at the North, of |
