Applying  ourselves  to  the  comparison  at  distant  points  —  to  South
Carolina  and  Massachusetts,  for  instance  —  it  may  be  asserted,  as
impossible  to  establish  northern  equality  at  the  South,  under  pro-
visions and  laws  of  nature  which  produce  inequality ;  which  would
have  produced  it  if  social  equality  had  existed  at  first,  and  which
would  reproduce  and  maintain  it  over  any  enactments  to  the  con-
trary. Mr.  Webster  stated  the  case  at  Rochester  in  1843,  bringing
the  West  Indies  into  comparison  with  New  York.  The  nature  of
the  crops,  the  production  in  one  climate  of  what  is  wanted  in  all
climates,  and  therefore  requiring  to  be  exchanged  for  the  necessa-
ries of  life,  destine  them  to  commercial  purposes,  and  not  to  imme-
diate use.  There  must  be  cultivation  and  disposal  on  a  large  scale,
with  capital  and  proprietorship  on  the  one  hand,  and  employment
and  dependence,  in  a  word,  with  service,  on  the  other.  If  the  South
had  been  settled  like  the  North,  chiefly  by  one  race ;  and  had  it
begun  its  agriculture  on  the  same  scale  of  small  proprietorship,  the
nature  of  the  case  would  at  length  have  brought  to  pass,  in  degree,  the
distinction  which  now  prevails  —  capital  and  proprietorship  on  the
one  hand,  and  dependent  service  on  the  other ;  of  masters  and  ser-
vants. This  distinction  will  not  vanish  by  any  change  in  the  insti-
tution of  slavery,  and  any  method  of  relief  must  regard  it  as  un-
changeable. Even  if  the  African  race  could  become  sole  possessors
of  the  soil,  by  an  equal  subdivision,  and  with  the  energy  and  skill


20

of  the  European  race,  the  consequence  would  not  be  northern
equality,  but  southern  inequality.  The  smaller  number  would  be-
come proprietors,  and  the  larger  number  dependent  laborers,  and
the  distinction  would  obtain  among  them  of  masters  to  be  honored,
and  servants  to  honor,  as  in  degree  in  all  lands,  and  the  special
necessity  in  the  culture  and  disposal  of  southern  productions.  Even
the  North  does  not,  cannot  carry  its  equalizing  principle  through  soci-
ety, but  makes  and  shows  like  distinctions  in  proportion  as  it  be-
comes in  like  circumstances ;  i.  e.,  wherever  capital  and  proprie-
torship have  scope,  as  in  the  great  commercial  and  manufacturing
arrangements.
