USA/CC
Pro-Slavery Testimony
George Fitzhugh
But the chief and far most important enquiry is, how does slavery affect the condition of the slave? We provide for each slave, in old age and in infancy, in sickness and in health, not according to his labor, but according to his wants. The master's wants are more costly and refined, and he therefore gets a larger share of of the profits. A southern farm is the beau ideal of Communism; it is a joint concern, in which the slave consumes more than the master, of the coarse products, and is far happier, because although the concern may fail, he is always sure of a support; he is only transferred to another master to participate in the profits of another concern; he marries when he pleases, because he knows he will have to work no more with a family than without one, and whether he live or die, that family will be taken care of; he exhibits all the pride of ownership, despises a partner in a smaller concern, "a poor man's negro," boasts of "our crops, horses, fields and cattle;" and is as happy a human being can-be. And why should he not? He enjoys as much of the fruits of the farm as he is capable of doing, and the wealthiest can do no more.
(Source:McKitrick, Eric L., ed. Slavery Defended: The Views of the Old South Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1963.)
George Fitzhugh (#2)
His [the slaveholder] whole life is spent in providing for the minutest wants of others, in taking care of them in sickness and in health. Hence he is the least selfish of men. Is not the old bachelor who retires to seclusion, always selfish? Is not the head of a large family almost always kind and benevolent? And is not the slaveholder the head of the largest family? Nature compels master and slaves to be friends; nature makes employers and free laborers enemies. Every social structure must have its substratum. In free society this substratum, the weak, poor and ignorant, is borne down upon and oppressed with continually increasing weight by all above. The slaves are the substratum, and the master's feelings and interests alike prevent him from bearing-down upon and oppressing them.
(Source:McKitrick, Eric L., ed. Slavery Defended: The Views of the Old South Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1963.)
Thornton Stringfellow
I Propose.....to examine the sacred volume briefly, and if I am not greatly mistaken, I shall be able to make it appear that the institution-of slavery has received in the first place,
1st. The sanction of the Almighty in the Patriarchal age.
2d. That it was incorporated into the only National Constitution which ever emanated from God.
3d. That its legality was recognized, and its relative duties regulated, by Jesus Christ in his kingdom.....
The first recorded language which was ever uttered in relation to slavery, is the inspired language of Noah. In God's stead he says, "Cursed be Canaan;" a servant of servants shall he be to his brethren." Blessed be the Lord God of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servants."
(Source:McKitrick, Eric L., ed. Slavery Defended: The Views of the Old South Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1963.)
David Christy
KING COTTON cares not whether he employs slaves or freemen. It is the cotton, not the slaves, upon which his throne is based. Let freemen do his work as well, and he will not object to the change. Thus far the experiments in this respect have failed, and they will not soon be renewed. The efforts of this most powerful ally, Great Britain, to promote that object, have already cost her people many hundreds of millions of dollars: with total failure as a reward for her zeal. One-sixth of the colored people of the United States are free; but they shun the cotton regions, and have been instructed to detest emigration to Liberia. Their improvement has not been such as was anticipated; and their more rapid advancement cannot be expected, while they remain in the country.
(Source:McKitrick, Eric L., ed. Slavery Defended: The Views of the Old South Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1963.)
Samuel Cartwright
Negro children and white children are alike at birth in one remarkable particular -- they are both born white, and so much alike, as far as color is concerned, as scarcely to be distinguished from each other. In a very short time, however, the skin of the negro infant begins to darken and continues to grow darker until it becomes of a shining black color, provided the child be healthy. The skin will become black whether exposed to the air and light or not. The blackness is not of as deep a shade during the first years of life, as afterward. The black color is not so deep in the female as in the male, nor in the feeble, sickly negro as in the robust and healthy.
The typical negroes themselves are more or less superior or inferior to one another precisely as they approximate to or recede from the typical standard in color and form, due allowance being made for age and sex. The standard is an oily, shining black...the negro approximates the monkey anatomically more than he does the true Caucasian....
(Source:McKitrick, Eric L., ed. Slavery Defended: The Views of the Old South Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1963.)