Kitabı oku: «The Journal of Negro History, Volume 5, 1920», sayfa 14

This resolution aptly describes the situation resulting after the prolonged discussion. A majority of the members believed that slavery was an evil, but no one was willing to pay the cost of exterminating it. It was easily shown that because of unprofitable slave labor the commonwealth was lagging behind the free States and that the free labor essential to the rebuilding of the waste places in the State would never come to the commonwealth as long as there would be competition with slave labor. It was soon apparent, however, that a State with such a diversity of interests, one-half slave and one-half free could not legislate on slavery. This compromising resolution of procrastination, therefore, was adopted as the best Virginia could under the circumstances be induced to do for the extermination³³⁷ of its worst evil.

The debate proved to be valuable to the abolitionists. In the course of his remarks Mr. Brodnax declared that the confidence of the people seemed to be gone. "Under such circumstances life becomes a burthen and it is better to seek a home in some distant realm and leave the graves of our fathers than endure so precarious a condition." It was evident, he thought, that something must be done; and although measures for the removal of this evil might not, perhaps be arrived at immediately yet some plan for its gradual eradication would probably be hit upon. A system might be concocted by degrees to embrace the whole subject and it was therefore necessary to consider it in all its bearings.³³⁸

Mr. Chandler said that he in common with his constituents looked forward to the passage of a law for the removal of the free blacks. He was also in favor of the consideration of any plan which might remove entirely at some future time, the greatest curse that had ever been inflicted upon this State. He would look upon the day on which the deliverance of the commonwealth from the burden of slavery should be accomplished as the most glorious in the annals of Virginia since the fourth of July, 1776.³³⁹ Mr. Moore did not wish to entangle the committee on the subject of getting rid of the free black population of this State. That population, he knew, was a nuisance which the interests of the people required to remove, but there was another and a greater nuisance, slavery itself. He wished that it should be considered and if it were possible to devise any plan for the ultimate extinction of slavery, he would rejoice.³⁴⁰

Mr. Bolling rose in his remarks to a height of moral sublimity. "We talk of freedom," said he, "while slavery exists in this land; and speak with horror of the tyranny of the Turk. We foster an evil which the highest interests of the community require should be removed, which was denounced as the bans of our happiness by the Father of the Commonwealth and to which we trace the cause of the lamentable depression of Eastern Virginia. Every intelligent individual admits that slavery is the most pernicious evil with which a body politic can be afflicted."³⁴¹

Mr. Randolph, the grandson of Thomas Jefferson, said that it was the dark, the appalling, the despairing future that had awakened the public mind rather than the Southampton Insurrection. He asked whether silence would restore the death-like apathy of the Negro's mind. It might be wise to let it sleep in its torpor; "but has not," he asked, "its dark chaos been illumined? Does it not move, and feel and think? The hour of the eradication of the evil is advancing, it must come. Whether it is affected by the energy of our minds or by the bloody scenes of Southampton and San Domingo is a tale for future history."³⁴² Mr. Faulkner addressed the House in favor of the gradual extinction of slavery, concluding with these words: "Tax our lands, vilify our country, carry the sword of extermination through our defenceless villages but spare us the curse of slavery, that bitterest drop from the chalice of the destroying angel."³⁴³

Mr. MacDowell, referring to the insurrection, thus described its terror and its awful lesson: "It drove families from their homes, assembled women and children in crowds in every condition of weakness and infirmity, and every suffering that want and terror could inflict, to escape the terrible dread of domestic assassination. It erected a peaceful and confiding State into a military camp which outlawed from pity the unfortunate beings whose brothers had offended; which barred every door, penetrated every bosom with fear or suspicion, which so banished every sense of security from every man's dwelling; that, let but a hoof or horn break upon the silence of the night, and an aching throb would be driven to the heart. The husband would look to his weapon and the mother would shudder and weep upon her cradle. Was it the fear of Nat Turner and his deluded drunken handful of followers, which produced such effects? Was it this that induced distant counties where the very name of Southampton was strange to arm and equip for a struggle? No sir, it was the suspicion eternally attached to the slave himself, a suspicion that a Nat Turner might be in every family, that the same bloody deed might be acted over at any time and in any place, that the materials for it were spread through the land and were always ready for a like explosion."³⁴⁴

Although no agreement on the extinction of slavery could be reached, the question of removing the free people of color was decidedly another matter. Many who were unwilling to legislate with reference to slavery did not object to the proposal to remove the free Negroes from the State. Yet there were others who looked upon this as a political by-play. The Southampton Insurrection was not the work of free Negroes but that of slaves. Only two of the many free Negroes in Southampton county took a part in the insurrection and these two had slave wives. The North Carolina plot, moreover, was revealed by a free Negro. Many citizens agreed too with a Richmond Enquirer correspondent of Hanover, who in speaking for the free people of color pointed out the good they had been to the community,³⁴⁵ and the Governor who in his annual message raised the question as to propriety of removing them, said that the laws of the State had theretofore treated the free people of color with "indulgent kindness" and that "many instances of solicitude for their welfare" had "marked the progress of legislation."³⁴⁶

A bill for removal, however, was promptly offered on the twenty-seventh of January.³⁴⁷ On the first of February there was presented an additional report deeming it expedient to set apart for the removal of the free colored population so much of the claims of Virginia on the General Government as may come into and belong to the treasury of the State.³⁴⁸ A few days later Mr. Moore submitted a resolution covering the same ground and calling upon the Senators and Representatives of Virginia in Congress to use their best efforts to promote this project.³⁴⁹ The Matter was tabled but on the 6th of February the House resolved itself into a committee of the whole to take this bill into consideration. After prolonged discussion the matter was again tabled with a view to future consideration. The feeling of the majority seemed to be that, if the Negroes were removed, no coercion should be employed except in the case of those who remained in the State contrary to the law of 1806.³⁵⁰ $35,000 for 1832 and $90,000 for 1833 was to be appropriated for transportation. A central board consisting of the governor, treasurer, and members of the Council of State was to decide the place to which these Negroes were to be expatriated and the agents to carry out the law would also be named by the same board.³⁵¹ The bill for the removal of free Negroes was indefinitely postponed in the Senate by a vote of 18 to 14 and therefore was never taken up.

The next effort of the legislature in dealing with the Negroes was to strengthen the black code as it then existed so as to provide for a more adequate supervision and rigid control of the slaves and free people of color. There was offered thereafter a bill to amend an act entitled "an act to revise under one the several acts concerning slaves, free Negroes and mulattoes." The important provisions of the bill were that slaves and free Negroes should not conduct religious exercises nor attend meetings held at night by white preachers unless granted written permission by their masters or overseers. Thereafter no free Negro should be capable of purchase or otherwise acquiring permanent ownership, except by descent, of any slave, other than his or her husband, wife or children. Further penalties, moreover, were provided for persons writing or printing anything intended to incite the Negroes to insurrection. The State had already enacted a law prohibiting the teaching of slaves, free Negroes and mulattoes.³⁵² The other petitions requiring that Negroes be restricted in the higher pursuits of labor and in the ownership of hogs and dogs were, because of the spirit which existed after the excitement had subsided, rejected as unnecessary. The law providing for burning in the hand was repealed. The immigration of free Negroes into the State, however, was prohibited in 1834.³⁵³

The effect of this insurrection and this debate extended far beyond the borders of Virginia and the South. Governor McArthur of Ohio in a message to his legislature called special attention to the outbreak and the necessity for prohibitive legislation against the influx within that commonwealth of the free people of color who naturally sought an asylum in the free States. The effect in Southern States was far more significant. Many of them already had sufficient regulations to meet such emergencies as that of an insurrection but others found it necessary to revise their black codes.

Maryland passed, at the session of its legislature in 1831-1832, a law providing a board of managers to use a fund appropriated for the purpose of removing the free people of color to Liberia in connection with the State colonization society.³⁵⁴ Another act forbade the introduction of slaves either for sale or resident and the immigration of free Negroes. It imposed many disabilities on the resident free people of color so as to force them to emigrate.³⁵⁵ Delaware, which had by its constitution of 1831, restricted the right of franchise to whites³⁵⁶ enacted in 1832 an act preventing the use of firearms by free Negroes and provided also for the enforcement of the law of 1811 against the immigration of free Negroes and mulattoes, prohibited meetings of blacks after ten o'clock and forbade non-resident blacks to preach.³⁵⁷

In 1831 Tennessee forbade free persons of color to immigrate into that State under the penalty of fine for remaining and imprisonment in default of payment. Persons emancipating slaves had to give bond for their removal to some point outside of the State³⁵⁸ and additional penalties were provided for slaves found assembling or engaged in conspiracy. Georgia enacted a measure to the effect that none might give credit to free persons of color without order from their guardian required by law and, if insolvent, they might be bound out. It further provided that neither free Negroes nor slaves might preach or exhort an assembly of more than seven unless licensed by justices on certificate of three ordained ministers. They were also forbidden to carry firearms.³⁵⁹ North Carolina, in which Negroes voted until 1834, enacted in 1831 a special law prohibiting free Negroes from preaching and slaves from keeping house or going at large as free men. To collect fines of free Negroes the law authorized that they might be sold.³⁶⁰ The new constitution of the State in 1835 restricted the right of suffrage to white men. South Carolina passed in 1836 a law prohibiting the teaching of slaves to read and write under penalties, forbidding too the employment of a person of color as salesman in any house, store or shop used for trading. Mississippi had already met most of these requirements in the slave code in the year 1830.³⁶¹

In Louisiana it was deemed necessary to strengthen the slave code. An act relative to the introduction of slaves provided that slaves should not be introduced except by persons immigrating to reside and citizens who might become owners.³⁶² Previous legislation had already provided severe penalties for persons teaching Negroes to read and write and also had made provision for compelling free colored persons to leave the State.³⁶³ In 1832 the State of Alabama enacted a law making it unlawful for any free person of color to settle within that commonwealth. Slaves or free persons of color should not be taught to spell, read or write. It provided penalties for Negroes writing passes and for free blacks associating or trading with slaves. More than five male slaves were declared an unlawful assembly but slaves could attend worship conducted by whites yet neither slaves nor free Negroes were permitted to preach unless before five respectable slaveholders and the Negroes so preaching were to be licensed by some neighboring religious society. It was provided, however, that these sections of the article did not apply to or affect any free person of color who, by the treaty between the United States and Spain, became citizens of the United States.³⁶⁴

So many ills of the Negro followed, therefore, that one is inclined to question the wisdom of the insurgent leader. Whether Nat Turner hastened or postponed the day of the abolition of slavery, however, is a question that admits of little or much discussion in accordance with opinions concerning the law of necessity and free will in national life. Considered in the light of its immediate effect upon its participants, it was a failure, an egregious failure, a wanton crime. Considered in its necessary relation to slavery and as contributory to making it a national issue by the deepening and stirring of the then weak local forces, that finally led to the Emancipation Proclamation and the Thirteenth Amendment, the insurrection was a moral success and Nat Turner deserves to be ranked with the greatest reformers of his day.

This insurrection may be considered an effort of the Negro to help himself rather than depend on other human agencies for the protection which could come through his own strong arm; for the spirit of Nat Turner never was completely quelled. He struck ruthlessly, mercilessly, it may be said, in cold blood, innocent women and children; but the system of which he was the victim had less mercy in subjecting his race to the horrors of the "middle passages" and the endless crimes against justice, humanity and virtue, then perpetrated throughout America. The brutality of his onslaught was a reflex of slavery, the object lesson which he gave brought the question home to every fireside until public conscience, once callous, became quickened and slavery was doomed.

John W. Cromwell

DOCUMENTS

The publication of the list of names of Negroes who served in some of the Reconstruction conventions and legislatures elicited a number of comments which furnish desirable information. It is earnestly hoped that any one in a position to supply other missing information will follow the example of our friends whose correspondence we give below.

February 24th, 1920.

Mr. Carter G. Woodson,

1216 You St., N.W.,

Washington, D. C.

Sir:

In the Journal of Negro History for Jan., 1920, in giving the names of Negroes who were members of the reconstruction convention to frame a constitution for North Carolina in 1867-68, you omit Cumberland county. Permit me to say that the late Bishop James W. Hood represented that county and played a most prominent part and afterward became Ass't Superintendent of Public Instruction of the State. I was a boy at the time but I remember it. That you may know that I am not an adventurer, I enclose you a sketch of myself which was prepared by request for other purposes and show that I speak somewhat from authority. You will kindly return the same. At the same time you are at liberty to use any part of it that may suit your purpose should you so desire.

With very great respect, I am

Respectfully,

(Signed)   Geo. C. Scurlock

The sketch of this participant in the Reconstruction follows:

Mr. George C. Scurlock, from the year 1874 was a prominent figure in the Republican party in North Carolina. In the year above stated, when he had barely reached his majority, he was nominated for member of the Board of Education, at a time when all the schools, white and colored, were under the same board. His opponent was one of the most prominent Democrats in the city and a majority of the electorate was white. So popular was Mr. Scurlock that he defeated his Democratic opponent at the polls by a handsome majority and served out his term to the satisfaction of his constituents.

In 1876 he was a delegate to the State Convention that nominated the late Judge Settle for Governor and canvassed the State for him. He was again a delegate to the State Convention in each succeeding four years up to and including the year 1896. In the latter year he headed the delegation. In the campaign of that year, at the request of the State Executive Committee, he canvassed 21 counties in the State for McKinley and Hobart, all of which were carried for the Republican ticket. So pleased was the Committee with the canvass he was making, he was highly commended in letters from the Chairman while still canvassing.

In 1890 he was urged by leading Republicans of his district, including such men as ex-Governor Brogden, to become the Republican candidate for Congress. Long before the convention convened it was evident that he was the strongest man in the field. When the convention met and was organized, ex-Governor Brogden took the platform and in a ringing speech paying a high tribute to the subject of this sketch, placed him in nomination. Before the end of the roll call of counties his nomination was made unanimous. In his canvass for election he had the hearty support of the State organization and many of the leading colored and white Republicans in and without his district and State. In 1892 he was unanimously chosen as a delegate to the Republican National Convention, which met in Minneapolis.

As far back as 1883 he was appointed a clerk in one of the Departments at Washington by Secretary Teller. He held this position until under a Democratic administration he was for partisan reasons asked to resign. President Harrison, recognizing his ability, appointed him Postmaster of his city, Fayetteville.

For more than 20 years he was a leader in the party and so recognized by the late Judge Buxton and such men as the late ex-Congressman O. H. Dockery, and Judges Boyd and Pritchard, now on the bench. Outside his State his ability as an organizer and canvasser was recognized by Hon. J.S. Clarkson and the late William E. Chandler and M.S. Quay.

In a letter of April 8, 1919, Bishop N.H. Heard says:

I was born and raised in Elbert County, Georgia (born a slave), June 25th, 1850. I taught school in '69, 70, '71, and '72. Was a candidate for the Legislature of Georgia in 1872. Attorney General Amos J. Ackerman, of Grant's Cabinet, was in the convention that nominated me, and he canvassed and voted for me. In 1873 I went to Abbeville County, S.C., and taught '73, '74, and '75. Was Deputy U.S. Marshall in 1876 and elected to the South Carolina Legislature.

Mr. M.N. Work has discovered the following:

In the ten years 1876-1886, Negroes were elected to the South Carolina Legislature as Democrats. The Columbia (South Carolina) State in its issue of December 24, 1918, advised that an effort be made to have Negroes enroll in Democratic precinct clubs and participate in the primaries of the State along with white men. As a precedent for this, it was pointed out that: "In 1876 when the Democrats redeemed the State from misrule, they appealed to the Negroes to join their party, and a minority of Negroes, more numerous, perhaps than is generally supposed, wore the 'red shirt.' Many of them did valuable service in behalf of respectable government. During the ten years following that time, until the primary election took the place of the convention system in all but two or three of the counties, the Democratic Negroes were given political recognition. From Barnwell, Colleton, Orangeburg, and Charleston Negro Democrats were elected to the legislature and in a number of counties other Negroes were elected to such offices as coroner and county commissioner.

"With the extension of the primary system a racial line came to be drawn in the Democratic organization and it was made very nearly impossible for a Negro to participate in it. An exception in the party law provided that Negroes who voted for General Hampton in 1876 and who continued to vote the Democratic ticket in succeeding years be allowed to vote in the primaries, but the rules applying to these cases were in a form so rigid that they reduced the Negro Democratic vote."³⁶⁵