25 It would be war, do not deceive yourselves. After having contended with the masters, you would set to work to contend with the slaves. And this would come of itself, without deliberate purpose. Deprived of all rights, and incapable of resistance, the negroes would suffer brutality and insult. You cannot expect that they would accept as freemen what they accepted as slaves. Complaints, irritation, and bloodshed would ensue, and finally negro insurrection. Already, Mr. President, insurrectionary movements, the inevitable consequence of a badly-regulated state of affairs, threaten, it is said, to break out here and there. By-and-by this will no longer be a threat, but a reality. What will you do, then ? Of these despised blacks, and these whites, your brethren—which will you support ? Happen what will, atrocious repression will be necessary. Between open repression and the obscure iniquities of daily recurrence, between refusals of justice and refusals of labor, between acts of violence and the continual dripping of oppression, the black race will perish. Slowly or swiftly, destruction will pursue its work. The destruction is terrible which is accomplished in this wise by virtue of the force of events, and, so to speak, with a good conscience. Must we not repress insurrections ? Shall we leave the white population of the South to be massacred ? Are we not, moreover, serving the negroes in impelling them, by force of loathing, towards that expatriation which is their true destiny ? Then, is not the inferior race inevitably destined to yield to the superior race ? In inducing them to yield, in exterminating them, if need be, are we not the servants of Providence ? We do not shrink from this role of agents of Providence. In obeying our worst passions we like to assure ourselves that we are accomplishing God’s designs. I do not know of a single one of the great crimes of history, beginning with the religious persecutions from wrhich your Pilgrims proceeded, that was not persuaded that it was doing the work of God. You, Mr. President, whose intellect discerns the great 4
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