Mr. Snavely counts among the causes of the migration from Alabama and North Carolina, the changed conditions incident to the transition from the old system of cotton planting to stock raising and the diversification of crops. Mr. Williams undertakes to estimate the size of the exodus, some of its effects and the initial remedies for keeping the Negroes in the South. Some of these are better pay, greater care for the employees, better educational facilities, the opportunity to rent and purchase sanitary homes, justice in the courts, the abolition of "jim crowism" and segregation.

One of the most interesting parts of the report is that which deals with the Negro migrant in the North. It is doubtful, however, that the author has done his task so well as Mr. Epstein did in treating intensively the same situation in Pittsburgh. This part of the report is too brief to cover the field adequately. There are few statistics taken from the censuses of 1900 and 1910 to show the increase of Negro population in the North during this period. Then comes a rapid survey of the districts receiving large numbers of Negroes during the migration. Attention is directed also to the adjustment of the Negroes to northern industry, race friction and the bearing of the Negro migration on the labor movement culminating in the riot of East St. Louis. Delinquency in the migrant population and the reports on the crime, health and housing conditions of the Negroes in the North are also discussed. That part of the report on constructive efforts toward adjustment of the migrant population in the North gives much information as to how the leading citizens of both races have cooeperated in trying to solve the problems resulting from this sudden shifting of large groups of people.

* * * * *

Twenty-Five Years in the Black Belt. By WILLIAM J. EDWARDS. The Cornhill Company, Boston, 1918. Pp. 143.

This is a valuable biographical work in that the reader gets a view of conditions in the South as experienced and viewed by a Negro educated at Tuskegee and inspired thereby to spend his life in another part of the State of Alabama, doing what he learned at this institution. The author mentions his growth, the founding of the Snow Hill School, the assistance of the Jeannes Fund, and the ultimate solutions of his more difficult problems. The book becomes more interesting when he discusses the Negro problem, the exodus of the blacks and the World War.

The aim of the author, however, is to acquaint the public with the problems and difficulties confronting those who labor for the future of the Negro race. He complains of the land tenure, the credit system by which the Negroes become indebted to their landlords, the lack of educational facilities, and the consequent ignorance of the masses of the race. To enlist support to remedy these evils wherever this condition obtains, the life of the author who for twenty-five years has had to struggle against hardships is hereby presented as typical of the thousands of teachers white and black now suffering all but martyrdom in the South that the Negroes may after all have a chance to toil upward.

The book is not highly literary. The style is generally rough. Interesting facts appear here and there, but they did not reach the stage of organization in passing through the author's mind. The value of the book, however, is not materially diminished by its style. It certainly reflects the feelings and chronicles the deeds of a large group of the American people during one of the most critical periods of our history and must therefore be read with profit by those interested in the strivings of the people of low estate. Persons primarily concerned with industrial education will find this sketch unusually valuable. To throw further light on this systematic effort to elevate the Negroes of Alabama the author has given numerous illustrations. Among these are Uncle Charles Lee and His Home in the Black Belt, Partial View of the Snow Hill Institute, A New Type of Home in the Black Belt, Typical Log Cabin in the Black Belt, the Home of a Snow Hill Graduate, Graduates of Snow Hill Institute and Teachers of Snow Hill Institute.

* * * * *

Women of Achievement. By BENJAMIN BRAWLEY. Woman's American Baptist Home Mission Society, Chicago, 1919. Pp. 92.

Glancing at the title of this volume one would expect to find therein the sketches of a number of women of color known to be useful in the uplift of the Negro race. Instead of this, however, there is the disappointment in tho restriction of these sketches to Harriet Tubman, Nora Gordon, Meta Warrick Fuller, Mary McLeod Bethune, and Mary Church Terrell. No one will question the claims of some of these women to honorable mention, but when Nora Gordon, an unknown but successful missionary to Africa, is given precedence to the hundreds of women of color who have influenced thought and contributed to the common good of the race and country the historian must call for an explanation.

It is equally clear that in choosing the other four of these women as representative of the achievements of their race the biographer has done other distinguished women of the Negro race considerable injustice, if his book is to be taken seriously. Harriet Tubman was truly a great character and her life is an interesting chapter in the history of this country. Whether Meta Warrick Fuller, Mary McLeod Bethune and Mary Church Terrell deserve special consideration to the exclusion of others, however, is debatable. Meta Warrick Fuller has distinguished herself in art and so have several other women of color. Mary McLeod Bethune is generally considered an enterprising educator and public spirited woman, but one can here raise the question as to whether she leads her companions. Mary Church Terrell has very well established herself as an acceptable speaker on the race problem and so have many others.

In giving the facts which entitle these characters to honorable mention the author did not do his task well. He mentioned too few incidents in the lives of these persons to make them interesting. In other words, instead of presenting facts to speak for themselves the author too easily yielded to the temptation to indulge in mere eulogy. These mistakes cannot be excused, even if the book is intended for children. On the whole, however, the work indicates effort in the right direction and it is hoped that more extensive and numerous sketches of women of achievement of the Negro race may be found in the literature of our day.



NOTES

At the close of this the fourth year of its existence the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History convened in biennial session in Washington, D. C., on the 17th and 18th of June at the 12th Street Branch Y. M. C. A. The reports for the year were heard, new officers were elected, and the plans for the coming year were formulated. The proceedings in full will appear in the October number.

The chief interest of the meeting centered around the informing addresses on the Negro in the World War. Every phase of the war history which the Negro helped to make was treated.

The Association worked out also the plans by which it will collect data to write a scientific History of the Negro in the World War just as soon as the treaty of peace is signed and documents now inaccessible because of the proximity to the conflict become available. The cooeperation of all seekers after the truth is earnestly solicited.

During the past two years the Association has been able to move steadily forward in spite of the difficulties incident to the war. The subscriptions to the JOURNAL OF NEGRO HISTORY have gradually increased and a number of philanthropists have liberally contributed to the fund now being used to extend the work into all parts of the country. This work is being done by a Field Agent who organizes clubs for the study of Negro life and history and, through local agents, sells the publications of the Association and solicits subscriptions to the JOURNAL OF NEGRO HISTORY.

In addition to publishing for four years the JOURNAL OF NEGRO HISTORY, a repository of truth now available in bound form, the association has brought out also Slavery in Kentucky, an interesting portraiture of the institution in that State; The Royal Adventurers Trading into Africa, one of the best studies of the early slave trade; and A Century of Negro Migration, the only scientific treatment of this movement hitherto published.

The circulation of these publications has been extensive. They are read in North America, South America, Europe, Asia, and Africa; they reach more than three hundred college and public libraries; they are found in all Negro homes where learning is an objective; they are used by most social workers to get light on the solution of the problems of humanity; they are referred to by students and professors conducting classes carrying on research; and they reach members of the cabinet and the President of the United States.

* * * * *

Carter G. Woodson is not a contributor to the Official History of the Negro in the World War by Mr. Emmett J. Scott as has been reported throughout the country. He has given the author several suggestions, however, and such editorial assistance as the many tasks and obligations of the Director permitted.



THE JOURNAL

OF

NEGRO HISTORY

VOL. IV—OCTOBER, 1919—NO. 4



LABOR CONDITIONS IN JAMAICA PRIOR TO 1917

To show the lack of progress in Jamaica since the abolition of slavery by the gradual process inaugurated in 1833 and its final extermination in 1838, nothing will better serve the purpose than the review of the system of apprenticeship established as a substitute for that institution. According to the portraiture given by Sturge and Harvey in their work entitled The West Indies in 1837 and the conditions now obtaining in the island, very little progress in the condition of the laboring man has been made since that time.

For scarcely any remuneration the Negroes were required by a compulsory arrangement between their overseers and the Special Magistrates to give during the crop the time granted them under the law for their own use and they were on many estates obliged to work a greater number of hours than was required by law. The apprentices were compelled to work by spells of eight hours in the field on one day, and for sixteen hours in and about the boiling house on the next day, giving up their half Friday, for which amount of extra labor they received two shillings and one penny or 50 cents a week. On one estate the wages paid for extra labor during crop was two pence or 4 cents an hour. The working hours were generally from four to eleven and from one to five, and it is interesting to note that while it was expected that on each half Friday given to the apprentices, sufficient food should be provided by them to last for the succeeding week, yet when that half day was taken from them five or six herrings were the only compensation.

The following case is taken from an agreement made in 1836 by certain cane hole diggers. Every laborer agreed to dig 405 cane holes in four and one half days due his master, and to receive ten pounds of salt fish and a daily allowance of sugar and rum, the salt fish to be diminished in the ratio of one pound for every forty holes short of 405. In the one day and a half of his own time he was paid three shillings and four pence or 80 cents for every ninety cane holes. Under this agreement the maximum work performed was that of an apprentice who in three weeks of thirteen and one half days dug in his own time 1,017 holes, for which he received 28 pounds of fish, and in cash one pound and fifteen shillings or $8.40. By this means it was possible for the master to have 58 acres of land worked at a total cost of L147 10s 0d or $708. The cost to him, if the work had been given out to jobbers, would have been L8 an acre or L464, $2,227.20. His apprentices were therefore the means of saving for him the sum of L316 l0d or $1,519.20.

The following was the scale of wages for transient labor:

Prime headman 3 pence or 6 cents. Inferior headman 2 pence or 4 cents. First gang—able-bodied 1-1/2 pence or 3 cents. First gang—weakly 1-1/4 pence or 2-1/2 cents. Second gang—able-bodied 1-1/4 pence or 2-1/2 cents. Second gang—weakly 1 penny or 2 cents. Third gang—active 3/4 penny or 1-1/2 cents. Third gang—lazy 1/2 penny or 1 cent.

The apprentices were permitted under the law to make application to be valued, and on the basis of the valuation were entitled to purchase their freedom. Here again was the system grossly abused. The slaves or apprentices, as they were at that time called, became at the hour of valuation very desirable assets; and, in many instances, so valuable did they suddenly become that it was quite out of their power to carry out their intention. The system became for this reason a premium on all the bad qualities of the Negroes and a tax upon all the good. In spite of this, however, so great was the desire for freedom that within a period of twenty-eight months, from 1st August, 1834, to 30th November, 1836, 1,580 apprentices purchased their freedom by valuation at a cost of L52,215 or $250,632, an average of L33 or $158.40 a head.

Although seventy-eight years have passed since the total abolition of slavery, however, the condition of the laborers of Jamaica remains practically the same as it was then. There has been beyond doubt much improvement in the island, but the unfortunate fact is this, that the laborer living in a country much improved in many respects, is himself no better or very little better off than his forefathers in slavery. In truth, he is still an economic slave. The conditions under which he lives and works are such as destroy whatever ambition he may possess, and reduce his life to a mere drudgery, to a mere animal existence.

Some progress has been made and there are signs of improvement, but the majority of laborers, the men and women and children who till the banana fields and work on the sugar plantations, are no better off than previously. These are still beasts of burden, still the victims of an economic system under which they labor not as human beings with bodies to be fed or clothed, with minds to be cultivated and aspiring souls to be ministered unto, but as living machines designed only to plant so many banana suckers in an hour, or to carry so many loads of canes in a day. After seventy-eight years in this fair island, side by side, with the progress and improvements above referred to, there are still hundreds and hundreds of men and women who live like savages in unfloored huts, huddled together like beasts of the field, without regard to health or comfort. And they live thus, not because they are worthless or because they are wholly without ambition or desire to live otherwise, but because they must thus continue as economic slaves receiving still the miserable pittance of a wage of eighteen pence or 36 cents a day that was paid to their forefathers at the dawn of emancipation. The system is now so well established that the employers apparently regard it as their sacred right and privilege to exploit the laborers, and the laborers themselves have been led by long submission and faulty teaching to believe that the system is a part of the natural order, a result of divine ordainment.

This attitude of the poor down-trodden laborers is one of the most effective blocks in the way of his improvement. But the despair of every one who dares to tackle this problem of improving the economic and therefore the social and moral condition of the laborers of this island is based on the inertness which almost amounts to callous indifference of the local Government.

The following letters addressed to me by the Colonial Secretary of Jamaica deserves to be put on record as evidence of the mind of the government, in 1913,—of its inability or unwillingness to take the first step. Letter A was written at the direction of Sir Sydney Olivier, K.C.M.G., then Governor of Jamaica, who recently expressed the opinion that the laborers in this island should receive one dollar a day. That letter is valuable in that it is an official statement of the maximum wages paid by the government of Jamaica to its own laborers. Letter B was written at the direction of the then Colonial Secretary, Mr. P. Cork, and is even more valuable as an official pronouncement on the important question of a living wage.

LETTER A.

"17th January, 1913.

No. 787/15568

With reference to the letter from this office No. 13099/15568 dated the 6th November last and to previous correspondence in connection with your suggestion that the Government should raise the wages of their laborers, I am directed by the Governor to inform you that it appears from enquiries made by His Excellency's direction that the average wage now earned by laborers under the Public Works Department is approximately one shilling and eight pence half penny (41 cents) for an average day of ten hours, so that in an average day of ten hours the laborers would at the same rate of pay earn two shillings and one penny half penny" (51 cents).

LETTER B.

"8th March, 1913.

No. 2926/3268

The Acting Governor directs me to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 26th ultimo on the subject of the amount of wages paid to native laborers in the employment of the Government, and in reply to say that no acknowledgement of the correctness of your contention that one shilling and sixpence per diem is not a fair living wage for any laborer to receive, and that the minimum he ought reasonably to expect to enable him to meet the ordinary demands of existence is two shillings per diem (48 cents), is to be inferred from the letter from this office, No. 737/15568 dated the 17th of January, 1913.

"2. I am to add that His Excellency is not in a position to comply with your request that steps should be taken to ensure to all laborers working under the Public Works Department a minimum wage of two shillings per diem (48 cents) as from 1st April next."

The problem becomes real and serious when the ruling authorities are unwilling to admit what is absolutely clear to every one who is not hopelessly prejudiced, namely, that eighteen pence or thirty-six cents a day, the amount which was paid to the emancipated slaves in 1838, is not a living wage for his descendants in the year 1913, and when they are either unable or unwilling to set the pace for other employers of labor by paying their own laborers a minimum wage of two shillings or forty-eight cents a day.

With the labor problem of Jamaica the question of East Indian Immigration is intimately connected. While, on the one hand, we have the able-bodied native laborers miserably and cruelly underpaid, and having in consequence to emigrate in large numbers to other countries, on the other hand, we have the importation into the island of indentured immigrants under the conditions which make the economic improvement of the native laborers an impossibility. On the one side, the available records inform us that from April 1, 1905, to March 31, 1908, laborers numbering 39,060 emigrated from this island and deposited with the local Government the sum of L22,217 or $106,641.60 as required by law. The exodus to Cuba is at present a very serious comment upon the existing labor conditions. During the month of December, 1916, 761 persons emigrated from the island, 580 to Cuba and 181 to other places.

The figures, on the other side, reveal the fact that since the introduction of East Indian Immigration in 1845 to the present time 35,933 East Indians have been brought into the island; and it is estimated that there are to-day resident in the island over 20,000 East Indians, 3,000 of whom are indentured and 17,000 have completed their term of indenture. These immigrants are distributed to the several estates by the government at a cost of L20.10.0, or $90.42, paid in installments: L2 or $9.60, paid on allottment, L2.2.0 or $10.08 at the end of the first year, and L4.2.0 or $19.68 at the end of each of the succeeding four years.

For the years 1891-1908 the cost of this system to the colony is officially reported as follows:

Cost of importation L129,692.2.2 $622,522.12 Administrative expenses L 37,377.0.2 179,409.64 Return passages 1901-8 L 27,254.5.11 130,820.62 Gross cost L194,323.83 $932,752.38 Receipts in hand L143,171.1.1 $687,221.06 Net cost to colony L 51,152.7.2 $245,531.32

or an average of over L3,000 or $14,400 per annum.

The immigrants are indentured for five years, and are entitled after a continuous residence of ten years in the colony to one half of the value of their passage money in the case of men and of one third in the case of women. For a working day of nine hours the men are paid one shilling or 24 cents and the women nine pence or 18 cents. A deduction of two shillings and sixpence or 60 cents a week is made for rations supplied. They receive free hospital treatment which cost the Government on the average of two pounds or $9.60 each per annum.

The system of immigration is a factor contributing to the present unsatisfactory condition of the labor market in this island. The immigrants are unfair competitors of the natives. They accept lower wages, and they lower the standard of life. They are practically modern slaves. It is not then reasonable with such competitors for the native laborer to expect a favorable response to his appeal for fairer treatment. It is asserted that the importation of East Indians is necessary because the native laborers will not give that reliable and continuous service which is necessary for the profitable working of the estates. The answer to this is that these same laborers emigrate and give their foreign employers the reliable and continuous service which they consistently withhold from the employer at home because they are paid more and treated better abroad.

The solution of the problem in so far as the first steps are concerned is then two fold. First, the government must at once determine that this systematic immigration of cheap labor must cease, and must set about without delay to make the necessary arrangements and adjustments which will be preparatory to an early discontinuance of the system. Next, the employers of labor must either by persuasion or legal coercion be led to induce the native laborers by the offer of better wages to remain at home.

With reference to the first it has been discovered that the government supports the fiction that the importation of East Indians is necessary. In a report dated October 1, 1908, the Acting Protector of Immigrants, with the apparent approval of the Governor, wrote: "As a result of having a nucleus of reliable labor in the shape of indentured coolies owners of estates have felt themselves justified in spending large sums of money in extending their cultivations, and in installing expensive machinery. This has had the effect of providing employment for a much larger number of creole laborers than formerly, and of putting a great deal more money in circulation. I think that instead of the coolie being cursed by the native laborer for taking away his work he should be blessed for having been the means of providing employment for him."

The substance of the statement given above is incorporated by Sir Sydney Olivier, K.C.M.G., in a chapter of his book entitled White Capital and Colored Labor, in which there occurs this remarkable assertion: "In Jamaica wages are higher in those districts where indentured coolies are employed on banana plantations." Coolies who receive a maximum wage of one shilling or 24 cents a day are introduced to the world as the wage-raising factor in Jamaica!

Just prior to the World War the labor question was a very live one in Jamaica. The weekly exodus of hundreds of laborers to the neighboring island of Cuba, the murmuring of dissatisfaction among the immigrants, friction in the working of the Immigration Department,—all have served to bring this labor problem prominently to public notice. At a meeting held in the interest of the sugar industry in January, 1917, there was adopted a suggestive resolution moved by Mr. A. W. Farquharson, a prominent and successful legal practitioner, and a man who, though the descendant of an old family of planters, is deeply interested in the improvement of the laborers. The resolution was: "That this committee is convinced that the continuous and increasing exodus of laborers from the colony to seek work in foreign countries is impeding the development of the resources of the island, and that it is of urgent importance that early measures should be adopted to arrest such exodus, by the creation of conditions which will induce an improvement in the status of the laboring population."

The Daily Chronicle of that date comments thus on the question:

"The Sugar Committee has pointed out clearly the precise measures that are certain to produce better remuneration for the laborer, and this, as we have been insisting from the start, is the very essence of the scheme. According to the recommendations forwarded to the Government and turned down by the Privy Council—some of whose members have evidently made up their minds that something akin to the feudal system must, in the interest of a few, be forever maintained in Jamaica—the Government would go into the business for the protection of the community against the avidity of the private capitalist; in other words, to insure a fair distribution in this island, of the profits derived from the rehabilitated industry. Under this arrangement the Government factories would be in a position to set the pace in the matter of payment of wages to the laborer. Think of what this would mean! A higher standard of living, better health, more happiness—the very things which the peasant is being forced to go abroad to obtain. But the mandamus will have none of this socialism; it is too broad, too comprehensive, too human for minds unaccustomed to look beyond self. So they have rejected the Sugar Committee's proposals, compelling Mr. Farquharson and his friends to appeal to the Secretary of State for the Colonies. His Excellency the Governor and his advisors have thus shown their utter inability to understand the economic needs of the island. Deliberately—we do not say with malice aforethought—have they decided to perpetuate conditions which in the past have served to disintegrate the population of this colony, and will in the future continue to do this with even more harmful effects than hitherto unless some well-considered attempt is made to produce more wealth from our soil for the benefit, not of a few capitalists, but of the nine hundred thousand inhabitants of Jamaica."

One might not wholly endorse this criticism, but it should be represented that the inaction of the government, whether due to inability or indifference or to whatever cause, has been the prime preventing cause of an earlier solution of a long standing problem. It seemed, however, as if an attempt was at last to be made to do something. A news article in The Daily Gleaner, February, 1917, announced that the Government had at last realized the urgent need of improved barrack accommodation on the estates, and of proper medical supervision of the laborers. It desired to stem the exodus of laborers, but from its own statement given out to the press in the article referred to, not so much for the benefit of the ill-paid laborers, but in consideration for the employers who would soon have to face a labor market relieved of imported coolies. And so, for the sake of the employers, it was proposed to ask the native laborer to agree to be indentured for twelve months at the same miserable wages of eighteen pence or 36 cents a day, with the addition of a tempting (?) bonus of two pounds or $9.60 at the end of the term. And this paternal suggestion was made in order "to improve the local sources of labor supply that were available" at a time when Cuba was offering from one dollar to one dollar and a half a day!

The Labor Problem of Jamaica may then be briefly stated thus: After seventy-eight years of freedom the laboring population was economically no better off in 1916 than their forefathers who lived in the early days of emancipation. The laborers received a daily wage which was but a small pittance, and they worked under conditions that were appalling, and that were a disgrace to any community pretending to be civilized. The government instead of taking steps to improve these conditions and thus to induce the laborer to give in Jamaica that reliable and continuous service which hundreds so willingly and efficiently gave abroad, promoted the perpetuation of those conditions by spending each year over L3,000 or $14,400 of the taxpayers' money in establishing and maintaining a system of immigration which demoralized the best labor market by providing the employers with an undesirable class of laborers whose standard of life is abnormally low, and to whom twenty-four cents a day is a considerable sum, and thereby compelled the native laborer either to accept the unsatisfactory conditions or to emigrate.

The following extract from an article entitled, "What Feeding Him Means," which appeared in The Daily Gleaner of February 7, 1917, throws more light on the problem:

"Captain Fist tells us that what the peasant needs to make him a better worker is better feeding. He also suggests that decent dwelling places should be put up on the estates and plantations for the people, and that a small lot of land should be allowed each family for the cultivation of ground provisions. All this and more is being done for the Jamaican in Panama. But when we hear of living places here, it is always 'barracks' that are spoken of,—a long range of wretched structures where comfort and privacy are out of the question, and where, as a rule, only single men can live. But men are not going to work and live as bachelors to oblige other people. We do not want laborers merely, we want decent families of men and women and children, and if the economic situation in this country cannot provide us with these, so much the worse for the situation and for the whole country. The fact is that the Jamaica peasant, if he has been decently fed and is free from disease, is a good worker. Our Government, therefore, if it is to justify any claim to being intelligent, progressive and far seeing must take up the question of disease with a degree of thoroughness never shown before; while the employer of labor must provide decent living places for his workers and pay a sufficient wage to enable them to eat enough nutritious food and become better workers and improved human beings. Unless something of the sort is done, Jamaica will continue to lose her best able bodied population. There can be no restriction of emigration here unless the Government fixes that minimum at an amount not less than two shillings a day (48 cents) and then the Government would have to see that the worker got his money, and also obtained sufficient work to do. Nothing is to be expected from any scheme of local indenture: the laborer who indentured himself to work for a year at one shilling and sixpence a day, (36 cents) even with a bonus of less than a shilling a week thrown in at the end of a year would be an exceptional person, a man with no intention of keeping the contract and what would you do if he did not keep the contract? No; these schemes are merely moonshine: we might as well dismiss them from our minds at once. The only way in which the Government can directly help the laborer is for the Government to start industries and pay a decent daily or weekly wage. But the intelligent employer can do a great deal to help himself where labor is concerned, if he will but understand that better pay and better conditions are what his workers want and must have; and he will find that so long as his undertakings pay him well—that so long as sugar, coconuts and other things bring him a large profit (as they are doing today) it will be profitable to him to make the lot of the worker a better one than it is. Now is the time for employers to set to work on these necessary reforms. They can afford to do so, and they decidedly ought to do so.

E. ETHELRED BROWN.



THE LIFE OF CHARLES B. RAY

Charles Bennett Ray was born in Falmouth, Massachusetts, December 25, 1807, and died August 15, 1886. He first attended the school and academy of his native town and then studied theology at the Wesleyan Academy of Wilbraham, Massachusetts, and later at Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut. He became a Congregational minister. His chief work, however, was in connection with the anti-slavery movement, the Underground Railroad and as editor of The Colored American from 1839 to 1842. As a national character he did not measure up to the stature of Ward, Remond and Douglass, and for that reason he is too often neglected in the study of the history of the Negro prior to the Civil War. But he was one of the useful workers in behalf of the Negroes and accomplished much worthy of mention.[1]

Ray became connected with the anti-slavery movement in 1833, in the early winter of which the American Anti-Slavery Society was formed. He proved his fidelity to the sacred cause of liberty by lending practical aid which men in high places often had neither the time nor the patience to give and contributed much to the final overthrow of slavery. "Many a midnight hour," said he, "have I with others walked the streets, their leader and guide and my home was an almost daily receptacle for numbers of them at a time."[2] In those days when so many matters of importance touching the subject of slavery had to be adjusted, the advocates of freedom often met for an interchange of views; and Mr. Ray's home became, on several occasions, the scene of such gatherings where Lewis Tappan, Simeon S. Jocelyn, Joseph Sturge, the celebrated English philanthropist, and others discussed with great earnestness the inner workings of that grand moral conflict.

In cooeperation with wealthy abolitionists whose purse strings were wont to be loosed at the call of humanity, he assisted in enabling many a slave to see the light of freedom. Several were taken by him to the Plymouth Church in Brooklyn, which under the inspiration of Henry Ward Beecher, the fearless champion of the cause, contributed liberally toward the succor of the oppressed. In 1850, fifteen years after the formation of the Vigilance Committee of the city of New York, of which Theodore S. Wright was president, the New York State Committee was formed with a plan and object similar to those of the more local organizations. Of this new association Gerrit Smith was president and Ray, a member of the executive board as well as corresponding secretary, an office he held also in the older society. While Ray was not every time the moving spirit of these organizations, he figured largely in carrying out the plans agreed upon by these bodies. In the discharge of the trust committed to his hands he usually acquitted himself with an honorable record.[3]

In advancing the anti-slavery cause, Ray was among the first to work with the circle of radical free Negroes who, through the conventions of the free people of color meeting in Philadelphia and in other cities of the North from 1830 until the Civil War,[4] did much to make the freedman stand out as worthy objects of the philanthropy of the anti-slavery societies. During this period the American Colonization Society was doing its best to convince free Negroes of their lack of opportunity in this country to induce them to try their fortunes in Africa and because of the rapidity with which some free Negroes yielded to this heresy, there was a strong probability that the anti-slavery movement might be weakened by such adherence to faith in colonization to the extent that the ardor of the militant abolitionists would be considerably dampened. While not among the first to start the convention movement among Negroes, Ray in the course of time became one of its most ardent supporters and no convention of the free people of color was considered complete without him.

His career as a journalist in connection with The Colored American was highly creditable. This paper was established in 1837 as the Weekly Advocate with Samuel E. Cornish as editor and Phillip A. Bell as proprietor. After two months it was decided to change the name of the publication to The Colored American, under the caption of which it appeared March 4, 1837. Bell then called to his assistance Charles B. Ray who served him as general agent. Traveling as such he went through all parts of the North, East, and West writing letters to present to the public his observations and experiences and lecturing while speaking of the claims of his paper as the champion of the slave and the organ of thought for the free Negro.[5]

Ray rose to the position of one of the proprietors of The Colored American in 1838 and upon the withdrawal of Bell from the enterprise the following year, he became the sole editor and continued in that capacity until 1842 when he suspended publication. He was regarded by his contemporary, William Wells Brown, as a terse and vigorous writer and an able and eloquent speaker well informed upon all subjects of the day. "Blameless in his family relations, guided by the highest moral rectitude, a true friend to everything that tends to better the moral, social, religious and political condition of man. Dr. Ray," says Brown, "may be looked upon as one of the foremost of the leading men of his race."[6]

That the paper ceased to be was no reflection on Ray's ability to conduct the journal, for he manifested evidences of unusual editorial ability and his writings were always strong in the advocacy of liberty and justice. The failure of the enterprise was due to the fact that there were not quite 400,000 free Negroes in the United States at that time and the small number of readers among them were so unhappily dispersed throughout the country that it was difficult to secure enough support for such an enterprise. At this time The Colored American was the only paper in the United States devoted to the interest of the Negro published by a man of color. Its objects were the "more directly moral, social, and political elevation and improvement of the free colored people; and the peaceful emancipation of the enslaved." It, therefore, advocated "all lawful as well as moral measures to accomplish those objects."[7] Feeling that this journal should not be narrow in restricting its efforts to better the condition of the people of color in this country, the editor proclaimed his interest in behalf of such people of all countries of the universe and his concern in the reforms of the age and whatever related to common humanity.

Concerning this paper the Herald of Freedom said the following:

"The Colored American, we are glad to see, has reappeared in the field, under the conduct of our enterprising and talented Brother Ray. It will maintain a very handsome rank among the antislavery periodicals, and we hope will be well sustained and kept up by both, colored and uncolored patronage.

"It must be a matter of pride to our colored friends, as it is to us, that they are already able to vindicate the claims our enterprise has always made in their behalf,—to an equal intellectual rank in this heterogeneous (but 'homogeneous') community.

"It is no longer necessary for abolitionists to contend against the blunder of pro-slavery,—that the colored people are inferior to the whites; for these people are practically demonstrating its falseness. They have men enough in action now, to maintain the anti-slavery enterprise, and to win their liberty, and that of their enslaved brethren,—if every white abolitionist were drawn from the field: McCune Smith, and Cornish, and Wright and Ray and a host of others,—not to mention our eloquent brother, Remond, of Maine, and Brother Lewis who is the stay and staff of field antislavery in New Hampshire.

"The people of such men as these cannot be held in slavery. They have got their pens drawn and tried their voices, and they are seen to be the pens and voices of human genius; and they will neither lay down the one, nor will they hush the other, till their brethren are free.

"The Calhouns and Clays may display their vain oratory and metaphysics, but they tremble when they behold the colored man is in the intellectual field. The time is at hand, when this terrible denunciation shall thunder in their own race."[8]

The Christian Witness said the following:

"The Colored American. Returning from the country, we are glad to find upon our table several copies of this excellent paper, which has waked up with renewed strength and beauty. It is now under the exclusive control of Charles B. Ray, a gentleman in every manner competent to the duties devolving upon him in the station he occupies. Our colored friends generally, and all those who can do so, would bestow their patronage worthily by giving it to The Colored American."[9]

As to the sort of editor Charles B. Ray was, we can best observe by reading two of his striking editorials on Prejudice and This Country, our only Home.

PREJUDICE

"'Prejudice,' said a noble man, 'is an aristocratic hatred of humble life.'

"Prejudice, of every character, and existing against whom it may, is hatred. It is a fruit of our corrupt nature, and has its being in the depravity of the human heart. It is sin.

"To hate a man, for any consideration whatever, is murderous; and to hate him, in any degree, is, in the same degree murderous; and to hate a man for no cause whatever, magnifies the evil. 'Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer,' says Holy Writ.

"There is a kind of aristocracy in our country, as in nearly all others, a looking down with disdain upon humble life and a disregard of it. Still, we hear little about prejudice against any class among us, excepting against color, or against the colored population of this Union, which so monopolizes this state of feeling in our country that we hear less of it in its operations upon others, than in other countries. It is the only sense in which there is equality; here, the democratic principle is adopted and all come together as equals, and unite the rich and the poor, the high and the low, in an equal right to hate the colored man; and its operations upon the mind and character are cruel and disastrous, as it is murderous and wicked in itself. One needs to feel it, and to wither under its effects, to know it: and the colored men of the United States, wherever found, and in whatever circumstances, are living epistles, which may be read by all men in proof of all that is paralyzing to enterprise, destructive to ambition, ruinous to character, crushing to mind, and painful to the soul, in the monster, Prejudice. For it is found equally malignant, active, and strong—associated with the mechanical arts, in the work-shop, in the mercantile houses, in the commercial affairs of the country, in the halls of learning, in the temple of God; and in the highways and hedges. It almost possesses ubiquity; it is every where, doing its deleterious work wherever one of the proscribed class lives and moves.

"Yet prejudice against color, prevalent as it is in the minds of one class of our community against another, is unnatural, though habitual. If it were natural, children would manifest it with the first signs of consciousness; but with them, all are alike affectionate and beloved. They have not the feeling, because it is a creature of education and habit.

"While we write, there are now playing at our right, a few steps away, a colored and white child, with all the affection and harmony of feeling, as though prejudice had always been unknown.

"Prejudice overlooks all that is noble and grand in man's being. It forgets that, housed in a dark complexion is, equally alike with the whites, all that is lofty in mind and noble in soul, that there lies an equal immortality. It reaches to grade mind and soul, either by the texture of the hair, or the form of the features, or the color of the skin. This is an education fostered by prejudice; consequently, an education almost universally prevalent in our country; an education, too, subverting the principles of our humanity, and turning away the dictates of our noble being from what is important, to meaner things.[10]

"THIS COUNTRY, OUR ONLY HOME.

"When we say, 'our home,' we refer to the colored community. When we say, 'our only home,' we speak in a general sense, and do not suppose but in individual cases some may, and will take up a residence under another government, and perhaps in some other quarter of the globe. We are disposed to say something upon this subject now, in refutation of certain positions that have been assumed by a class of men, as the American people are too well aware, and to the reproach of the Christian church and the Christian religion, too, viz.: that we never can rise here, and that no power whatsoever is sufficient to correct the American spirit, and equalize the laws in reference to our people, so as to give them power and influence in this country.

"If we cannot be an elevated people here, in a country the resort of almost all nations to improve their condition; a country of which we are native, constituent members; our native home, (as we shall attempt to show) and where there are more means available to bring the people into power and influence, and more territory to extend to them than in any other country; also the spirit and genius of whose institution we so well understand, being completely Americanized, as it will be found most of our people are,—we say, if we can not be raised up in this country, we are at great loss to know where, all things considered, we can be.

"If the Colored Americans are citizens of this country, it follows, of course, that, in the broadest sense, this country is our home. If we are not citizens of this country, then we cannot see of what country we are, or can be, citizens; for Blackstone who is quoted, we believe, as the standard of civil law, tells us that the strongest claim to citizenship is birthplace. We understand him to say, that in whatever country or place you may be born of that country or place you are, in the highest sense, a citizen; in fine, this appears to us to be too self-evident to require argument to prove it.

"Now, probably three-fourths of the present colored people are American born, and therefore American citizens. Suppose we should remove to some other country, and claim a foothold there, could we not be rejected on the ground that we were not of them, because not born among them? Even in Africa, identity of complexion would be nothing, neither would it weigh anything because our ancestry was of that country; the fact of our not having been born there would be sufficient ground for any civil power to refuse us citizenship. If this principle were carried out, it would be seen that we could not be even a cosmopolite, but must be of nowhere, and of no section of the globe. This is so absurd that it is as clear as day that we must revert to the country which gave us birth, as being, in the highest sense, citizens of it.

"These points, it appears to us, are true, indisputably true. We are satisfied as to our claims as citizens here, and as to this being the virtual and destined home of colored Americans.

"We reflect upon this subject now, on account of the frequent agitations, introduced among us, in reference to our emigrating to some other country, each of which, embodies more or less of the colonizing principle, and all of which are of bad tendency, throwing our people into an unsettled state; and turning away our attention in this country, to uncertain things under another government, and evidently putting us back. All such agitations introduced among us, with a view to our emigrating, ought to be frowned upon by us, and we ought to teach the people that they may as well come here and agitate the emigration of the Jays, the Rings, the Adamses, the Otises, the Hancocks, et al., as to agitate our removal. We are all alike constituents of the same government, and members of the same rising family. Although we come up much more slowly, our rise is to be none the less sure. This subject is pressed upon us, because we not infrequently meet some of our brethren in this unsettled state of mind, who, though by no means colonizationists yet adopt the colonization motto, and say they can not see how or when we are going to rise here. Perhaps, if we looked only to the selfishness of man, and to him as absolute, we should think so, too. But while we know that God lives and governs, and always will; that He is just, and has declared that righteousness shall prevail; and that one day with Him is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day; we believe that, despite all corruption and caste, we shall yet be elevated with the American people here.

"It appears to us most conclusive, that our destinies in this country are for the better, not for the worse, in view of the many schemes introduced to our notice for emigrating to other countries having failed; thus teaching us that our rights, hopes, and prospects, are in this country; and it is a waste of time and of power to look for them under another government; and also, that God, in His providence, is instructing us to remain at home, where are all our interests and claims and to adopt proper measures and pursue them, and we yet shall participate in all the immunities and privileges the American nation holds out to her citizens, and be happy. We are also strongly American in our character and disposition.

"We believe, therefore, in view of all the facts, that it is our duty and privilege to claim an equal place among the American people; to identify ourselves with American interests, and to exert all the power and influence we have, to break down all the disabilities under which we labor, and thus look to become a happy people in this extensive country."[11]

Ray rendered equally as valuable services to the Negroes as a promoter of the Underground Railroad. In fact he was approaching the climax of his career when the Underground Railroad became an efficient agency in offering relief to the large number of Negro slaves who found themselves reduced to the plane of beasts in the rapidly growing cotton kingdom. One of the striking cases in which he figured was that of the escape of the Weims family, so well known for the almost unparalleled deliverance from bondage of the entire family with one exception.

Exactly how the freedom of these slaves was obtained appears to better effect in the language of Ray himself. "But I must say a word about the younger girl, the price of whom they held as high as we gave for Catherine. We proposed another method for her freedom and carried it out, in which the mother acted a good part, as she could; we proposed to run her off. I was written to, to know whether a draft for three hundred dollars would be forwarded, conditioned upon the appearance of Ann Maria in my house or hands—the sum being appropriated to compensate the one who should deliver her safely in the North. I answered, of course, in the affirmative."[12]

The escape of Ann Maria, as proposed by this new plan, can best be explained by the correspondence between Mr. Ray and Mr. Bigelow in Washington, who, writing according to a method often adopted in those days in order the more effectually to secure concealment, designates Ann Maria as the parcel sent.[13] The letter reads thus:

"WASHINGTON, D. C., Nov. 17, 1855.

"REV. CHAS. B. RAY,

"Dear Sir: I have a friend passing through the city on his way to New York, and I mean to avail myself of his kindness to send to your lady the little parcel she has been so long expecting. You can name it to her, and I now suggest that as soon as you find it convenient, you send me by express the wrapper and covering in which the valuables are packed, for I have another similar parcel to send and shall find these things exactly convenient for that purpose. My friend intends to leave here on Monday morning, with his own conveyance, taking it leisurely, and may not reach New York before about Thursday, but of this I speak more exactly before I close. I need not suggest to you how anxious I shall be to get the earliest news of the arrival of the package without breakage or injury."

Also he adds as follows:

"WASHINGTON, D. C., November 22, 1855.

"REV. CHAS. B. RAY, "Dear Sir:

"My last letter will lead you to expect to see the boy Joe to-day but it was afterwards calculated that he will not arrive till sometime to-morrow. I am requested for the gratification of Joe's mother that you will be pleased on his arrival and before he changes his sex, to have his daguerrotype taken for her use. It will make up a part of the Record."

Mr. Ray's narration continues thus:

"Accordingly, one afternoon upon arriving home I found, sitting on the sofa at my home, a little boy about ten years old in appearance and looking rather feminine. I knew at once who it was, that it was Ann Maria. Upon her arrival I was to take her to Mr. Tappan, in whose hands the balance of the money was placed. This I did, and the little boy Joe was taken to her uncle or to where he could obtain her and finally reached Canada."

The following incident has often been told in Mr. Ray's family. "One summer morning, a loud rap with the knocker at the front door arrested the attention and the door being opened, a man entered, who after asking, 'Does the Rev. Mr. Ray live here?' and receiving an affirmative answer, whistled as a signal to attract the notice of his comrades, then cried out, 'Come on, boys!' and forthwith fourteen men in all entered, quite alarming the inmates of the house on seeing such a train of fugitives."

In the midst of these busy days Mr. Ray also served as a minister. For twenty years he was the pastor of the Bethesda Congregational Church in New York City where many learned to wait upon his ministry. He lived until 1886, long enough to enjoy some of that liberty for which he so patiently toiled. His more valuable services to his race, however, were rendered during the period prior to the Civil War. Although in the midst of this struggle of the subsequent period there came forward men who towered higher in the public opinion than he did, the valuable work which he did as an abolitionist, and an editor, should not be neglected.

M. N. WORK

FOOTNOTES:

[1] A very good account of C. B. Ray's literary efforts is given in I. Garland Penn's The Afro-American Press, pp. 32-47.

[2] Papers in the possession of Ray's family.

[3] For further information see manuscripts in the possession of Ray's family.

[4] This convention movement is well treated in J. W. Cromwell's The Negro in American History, pp. 27-46.

[5] Penn, The Afro-American Press, p. 35.

[6] Brown, The Rising Son, p. 473.

[7] Penn, The Afro-American Press, p. 38.

[8] Penn, The Afro-American Press, pp. 39-40.

[9] Ibid., p. 41.

[10] Penn, The Afro-American Press, pp. 42-43.

[11] Penn, The Afro-American Press, pp. 43-46.

[12] From papers in the possession of Ray's family.

[13] These letters are in the possession of the author.



THE SLAVE IN UPPER CANADA[A]

The dictum of Lord Chief Justice Holt: "As soon as a slave enters England he becomes free"[1] was succeeded by the decision of the Court of King's Bench to the same effect in the celebrated case of Somerset v. Stewart[2] where Lord Mansfield is reported to have said: "The air of England has long been too pure for a slave and every man is free who breathes it."[3]

James Somerest,[4] a Negro slave of Charles Stewart in Jamaica, had been brought by his master to England "to attend and abide with him and to carry him back as soon as his business should be transacted." The Negro refused to go back, whereupon he was put in irons and taken on board the ship Ann and Mary lying in the Thames and bound for Jamaica. Lord Mansfield granted a writ of habeas corpus requiring Captain Knowles to produce Somerset before him with the cause of the detainer. On the motion, the cause being stated as above indicated, Lord Mansfield referred the matter to the Full Court of King's Bench; whereupon, on June 22, 1772, judgment was given for the Negro. The basis of the decision, the theme of the argument, was that the only kind of slavery known to English law was villeinage, that the Statute of Tenures (1660) (12 Car. 11, c. 24) expressly abolished villeins regardant to a manor and by implication villeins in gross. The reasons for the decision would hardly stand fire at the present day. The investigation of Paul Vinogradoff and others have conclusively established that there was not a real difference in status between the so-called villein regardant and villein in gross, and that in any case the villein was not properly a slave but rather a serf.[5] Moreover, the Statute of Tenures deals solely with tenure and not with status.

But what seems to have been taken for granted, namely that slavery, personal slavery, had never existed in England and that the only unfree person was the villein, who, by the way was real property, is certainly not correct. Slaves were known in England as mere personal goods and chattels, bought and sold, at least as late as the middle of the twelfth century.[6] However weak the reasons given for the decision, its authority has never been questioned and it is good law. But it is good law for England, for even in the Somerset case it was admitted that a concurrence of unhappy circumstances had rendered slavery necessary[7] in the American colonies: and Parliament had recognized the right of property in slaves there.[8]

When Canada was conquered in 1760, slavery existed in that country. There were not only Panis[9] or Indian Slaves, but also Negro slaves. These were not enfranchised by the conqueror, but retained their servile status. When the united empire loyalists came to this northern land after the acknowledgment by Britain of the independence of the revolted colonies, some of them brought their slaves with them: and the Parliament of Great Britain in 1790 passed an Act authorizing any "subject of ... the United States of America" to bring into Canada "any negroes" free of duty having first obtained a license from the Lieutenant Governor.[10]

An immense territory formerly Canada was erected into a Government or Province of Quebec by Royal Proclamation in 1763 and the limits of the province were extended by the Quebec Act in 1774.[11] This province was divided into two provinces, Upper Canada and Lower Canada in 1791.[12] At this time the whole country was under the French Canadian law in civil matters. The law of England had been introduced into the old Government of the Province of Quebec by the Royal Proclamation of 1763; but the former French Canadian law had been reintroduced in 1774 by the Quebec Act in matters of property and civil rights, leaving the English criminal law in full force. The law, civil and criminal, had been modified in certain details (not of importance here) by Ordinances of the Governor and Council of Quebec.

The very first act of the first Parliament of Upper Canada reintroduced the English civil law.[13] This did not destroy slavery, nor did it ameliorate the condition of the slave. Rather the reverse, for as the English law did not, like the civil law of Rome and the systems founded on it, recognize the status of the slave at all, when it was forced by grim fact to acknowledge slavery it had no room for the slave except as a mere piece of property. Instead of giving him rights like those of the "servus," he was deprived of all rights, marital, parental, proprietary, even the right to live. In the English law and systems founded on it, the slave had no rights which the master was bound to respect.[14]

The first Lieutenant-Governor of Upper Canada was Col. John Graves Simcoe. He hated slavery and had spoken against it in the House of Commons in England. Arriving in Upper Canada in the summer of 1792, he was soon made fully aware that the horrors of slavery were not unknown in his new Province. The following is a report of a meeting of his Executive Council:

"At the Council Chamber, Navy Hall, in the County of Lincoln, Wednesday, March 21st, 1793.

"PRESENT

"His Excellency, J. G. Simcoe, Esq., Lieut.-Governor, &c., &c., The Honble Wm. Osgoode, Chief Justice The Honble Peter Russell.

"Peter Martin (a negro in the service of Col. Butler) attended the Board for the purpose of informing them of a violent outrage committed by one —— Fromand, an Inhabitant of this Province, residing near Queens Town, or the West Landing, on the person of Chloe Cooley a Negro girl in his service, by binding her, and violently and forcibly transporting her across the River, and delivering her against her will to certain persons unknown; to prove the truth of his Allegation he produced Wm. Grisley (or Crisley).

"William Grisley an Inhabitant near Mississague Point in this Province says: that on Wednesday evening last he was at work at Mr. Froomans near Queens Town, who in conversation told him, he was going to sell his Negro Wench to some persons in the States, that in the Evening he saw the said Negro girl, tied with a rope, that afterwards a Boat was brought, and the said Frooman with his Brother and one Vanevery, forced the said Negro Girl into it, that he was desired to come into the boat, which he did, but did not assist or was otherwise concerned in carrying off the said Negro Girl, but that all the others were, and carried the Boat across the River; that the said Negro Girl was then taken and delivered to a man upon the Bank of the River by —— Froomand, that she screamed violently and made resistance, but was tied in the same manner as when the said William Grisley first saw her, and in that situation delivered to the man.... Wm. Grisley farther says that he saw a negro at a distance, he believes to be tied in the same manner, and has heard that many other People mean to do the same by their Negroes

"Resolved.—That it is necessary to take immediate steps to prevent the continuance of such violent breaches of the Public Peace, and for that purpose, that His Majesty's Attorney-General, be forthwith directed to prosecute the said Fromond.

"Adjourned."[15]



The Attorney-General was John White[16] an accomplished English lawyer. He knew that the brutal master was well within his rights in acting as he did. He had the same right to bind, export, and sell his slave as to bind, export, and sell his cow. Chloe Cooley had no rights which Vrooman was bound to respect: and it was no more a breach of the peace than if he had been dealing with his heifer. Nothing came of the direction to prosecute and nothing could be done.

It is probable that it was this circumstance which brought about legislation. At the Second Session of the First Parliament which met at Newark, May 31, 1793, a bill was introduced and unanimously passed the House of Assembly. The trifling amendments introduced by the Legislative Council were speedily concurred in, the royal assent was given July 9, 1793, and the bill became law.[17] It recited that it was unjust that a people who enjoy freedom by law should encourage the introduction of slaves, and that it was highly expedient to abolish slavery in the Province so far as it could be done gradually without violating private property; and proceeded to repeal the Imperial Statute of 1790 so far as it related to Upper Canada, and to enact that from and after the passing of the Act, "No Negro or other person who shall come or be brought into this Province ... shall be subject to the condition of a slave or to" bounden involuntary service for life. With that regard for property characteristic of the English-speaking peoples, the act contained an important proviso which continued the slavery of every "negroe or other person subjected to such service" who has been lawfully brought into the Province. It then enacted that every child born after the passing of the act, of a Negro mother or other woman subjected to such service should become absolutely free on attaining the age of twenty-five, the master in the meantime to provide "proper nourishment and cloathing" for the child, but to be entitled to put him to work, all issue of such children to be free whenever born. It further declared any voluntary contract of service or indenture should not be binding longer than nine years. Upper Canada was the first British possession to provide for the abolition of slavery.[18]

It will be seen that the Statute did not put an end to slavery at once. Those who were lawfully slaves remained slaves for life unless manumitted and the statute rather discouraged manumission, as it provided that the master on liberating a slave must give good and sufficient security that the freed man would not become a public charge. But, defective as it was, it was not long without attack. In 1798, Simcoe had left the province never to return,[19] and while the government was being administered by the time-serving Peter Russell, a bill was introduced into the Lower House to enable persons "migrating into the province to bring their negro slaves with them." The bill was contested at every stage but finally passed on a vote of eight to four. In the Legislative Council it received the three months' hoist and was never heard of again.[20] The argument in favor of the bill was based on the scarcity of labor which all contemporary writers speak of, the inducement to intending settlers to come to Upper Canada where they would have the same privileges in respect of slavery as in New York and elsewhere; in other words the inevitable appeals to greed.

After this bill became law, slavery gradually disappeared. Public opinion favored manumission and while there were not many manumissions inter vivos,[21] in some measure owing to the provisions of the act requiring security to be given in such case against the freed man becoming a public charge, there were not a few liberations by will.[22]

The number of slaves in Upper Canada was also diminished by what seems at first sight paradoxical, that is, their flight across the Detroit River into American territory. So long as Detroit and its vicinity were British in fact and even for some years later, Section 6 of the Ordinance of 1787 "that there shall be neither slavery not involuntary servitude in the said territory otherwise than as the punishment of crime" was in great measure a dead letter: but when Michigan was incorporated as a territory in 1805, the ordinance became effective. Many slaves made their way from Canada to Detroit, a real land of the free; so many, indeed, that we find that a company of Negro militia was formed in Detroit in 1806 to assist in the general defence of the territory, composed entirely of escaped slaves from Canada.[23]

Almost from the passing of the Canada Act, however, runaway Negroes began to come to Upper Canada, fleeing from slavery; this influx increased and never ceased until the American Civil War gave its death blow to slavery in the United States. Hundreds of blacks thus obtained their freedom, some having been brought by their masters near to the international boundary and then clandestinely or by force effecting a passage; some coming from far to the South, guided by the North Star; many assisted by friends more or less secretly. The Underground Railroad was kept constantly running.[24] These refugees joined settlements with other people of color freeborn or freed in the western part of the Peninsula, in the counties of Essex and Kent and elsewhere.[25] Some of them settled in other parts of the province, either together or more usually sporadically.

At the time of the outbreak of the Civil War there were many thousands of black refugees in the province.[26] More than half of these were manumitted slaves who in consequence of unjust laws had been forced to leave their State. While some of such freedmen went to the Northern States, most came to Canada, some returning to the Northern States. The Negro refugees were superior to most of their race, for none but those with more than ordinary qualities could reach Canada.[27]

The masters of runaway slaves did not always remain quiet when their slave reached this province. Sometimes they followed him in an attempt to take him back. There are said to have been a few instances of actual kidnapping, a few of attempted kidnapping.[28] There have been cases in which criminal charges have been laid against escaped slaves, and their extradition sought, ostensibly to answer the criminal charges. It has always been the theory in this province that the governor has the power independently of statute or treaty to deliver up alien refugees charged with crime.[29] To make it clear, the Parliament of Upper Canada in 1833 passed an Act for the apprehension of fugitive offenders from foreign countries, and delivering them up to justice.[30] This provides that on the requisition of the executive of any foreign country the governor of the province on the advice of his executive council may deliver up any person in the province charged with "Murder, Forgery, Larceny or other crime which if committed within the Province would have been punishable with death, corporal punishment, the Pillory, whipping or confinement at hard labour." The person charged might be arrested and detained for inquiry. The Act was permissive only and the delivery up was at the discretion of the governor.

When this act was in force Solomon Mosely or Moseby, a Negro slave, came to the Province across the Niagara River from Buffalo which he had reached after many days' travel from Louisville, Kentucky. His master followed him and charged him with the larceny of a horse which the slave took to assist him in his flight. That he had taken the horse there was no doubt, and as little that after days of hard riding he had sold it. The Negro was arrested and placed in Niagara jail; a prima facie case was made out and an order sent for his extradition.

The people of color of the Niagara region made Mosely's case their own and determined to prevent his delivery up to the American authorities to be taken to the land of the free and the home of the brave, knowing that there for him to be brave meant torture and death, and that death alone could set him free. Under the leadership of Herbert Holmes, a yellow man,[31] a teacher and preacher, they lay around the jail night and day to the number of from two to four hundred to prevent the prisoner's delivery up. At length the deputy sheriff with a military guard brought out the unfortunate man shackled in a wagon from the jail yard, to go to the ferry across the Niagara River. Holmes and a man of color named Green grabbed the lines. Deputy Sheriff McLeod from his horse gave the order to fire and charge. One soldier shot Holmes dead and another bayoneted Green, so that he died almost at once. Mosely, who was very athletic, leaped from the wagon and made his escape. He went to Montreal and afterwards to England, finally returning to Niagara, where he was joined by his wife, who also escaped from slavery.

An inquest was held on the bodies of Holmes and Green. The jury found "justifiable homicide" in the case of Holmes; "whether justifiable or unjustifiable there was not sufficient evidence before the jury to decide" in the case of Green. The verdict in the case of Holmes was the only possible verdict on the admitted facts. Holmes was forcibly resisting an officer of the law in executing a legal order of the proper authority. In the case of Green the doubt arose from the uncertainty whether he was bayoneted while resisting the officers or after Mosely had made his escape. The evidence was conflicting and the fact has never been made quite clear. No proceedings were taken against the deputy sheriff; but a score or more of the people of color were arrested and placed in prison for a time. The troublous times of the Mackenzie Rebellion came on, the men of color were released, many of them joining a Negro militia company which took part in protecting the border.

The affair attracted much attention in the province and opinions differed. While there were exceptions on both sides, it may fairly be said that the conservative and government element reprobated the conduct of the blacks in the strongest terms, being as little fond of mob law as of slavery, and that the radicals, including the followers of Mackenzie, looked upon Holmes and Green as martyrs in the cause of liberty. That Holmes and Green and their fellows violated the law there is no doubt, but so did Oliver Cromwell, George Washington and John Brown. Every one must decide for himself whether the occasion justified in the courts of Heaven an act which must needs be condemned in the courts of earth.[32]

In 1842 the well-known Ashburton Treaty was concluded[33] between Britain and the United States. This by Article X provides that "the United States and Her Britannic Majesty shall, upon mutual requisitions ... deliver up to justice all persons ... charged with murder or assault with intent to commit murder, or piracy or arson or robbery or forgery or the utterance of forged paper.... Power was given to judges and other magistrates to issue warrants of arrest, to hear evidence and if "the evidence be deemed sufficient ... it shall be the duty of the ... judge or magistrate to certify the same to the proper executive authority that a warrant may issue for the surrender of such fugitive."

It will be seen that this treaty made two important changes so far as the United States was concerned: (1) It made it the duty of the executive to order extradition in a proper case and took away the discretion, (2) it gave the courts jurisdiction to determine whether a case was made out for extradition.[34] These changes made it more difficult in many instances for a refugee to escape: but as ever the courts were astute in finding reasons against the return of slaves.

The case of John Anderson is well known. He was born a slave in Missouri. As his master was Moses Burton, he was known as Jack Burton. He married a slave woman in Howard County, the property of one Brown. In 1853 Burton sold him to one McDonald living some thirty miles away and his new master took him to his plantation. In September, 1853, he was seen near the farm of Brown, when apparently he was visiting his wife. A neighbor, Seneca T. P. Diggs, became suspicious of him and questioned him. As his answers were not satisfactory he ordered his four Negro slaves to seize him, according to the law in the State of Missouri. The Negro fled, pursued by Diggs and his slaves. In his attempt to escape the fugitive stabbed Diggs in the breast and Diggs died in a few hours. Effecting his escape to this province, he was in 1860 apprehended in Brant County, where he had been living under the name of John Anderson, and three local justices of the peace committed him under the Ashburton Treaty. A writ of habeas corpus was granted by the Court of Queen's Bench at Toronto, under which the prisoner was brought before the Court of Michaelmas Term of 1860.

The motion was heard by the Full Court.[35] Much of the argument was on the facts and on the law apart from the form of the papers, but that was hopeless from the beginning. The law and the facts were too clear, although Mr. Justice McLean thought the evidence defective. The case turned on the form of the information and warrant, a somewhat technical and refined point. The Chief Justice, Sir John Beverley Robinson, and Mr. Justice Burns agreed that the warrant was not strictly correct, but that it could be amended: Mr. Justice McLean thought it could not and should not be amended.

The case attracted great attention throughout the province, especially among the Negro population. On the day on which judgment was to be delivered, a large number of people of color with some whites assembled in front of Osgoode Hall.[36] While the adverse decision was announced, there were some mutterings of violence but counsel for the prisoner[37] addressed them seriously and impressively, reminding them "It is the law and we must obey it." The melancholy gathering melted away one by one in sadness and despair. Anderson was recommitted to the Brantford jail.[38] The case came to the knowledge of many in England. It was taken up by the British and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society and many persons of more or less note. An application was made to the Court of Queen's Bench of England for a writ of habeas corpus, notwithstanding the Upper Canadian decision, and while Anderson was in the jail at Toronto, the court after anxious deliberation granted the writ,[39] but it became unnecessary, owing to further proceedings in Upper Canada.

In those days the decision of any court or of any judge in habeas corpus proceedings was not final. An applicant might go from judge to judge, court to court[40] and the last applied to might grant the relief refused by all those previously applied to. A writ of habeas corpus was taken out from the other Common Law Court in Upper Canada, the Court of Common Pleas. This was argued in Hilary Term, 1861, and the court unanimously decided that the warrant of commitment was bad and that the court could not remand the prisoner to have it amended.[41] The prisoner was discharged. No other attempts were made to extradite him or any other escaped slave and Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation put an end to any chance of such an attempt being ever repeated.

W. R. RIDDELL.

FOOTNOTES:

[A] This paper has appeared in Transactions of the Royal Society of Canada, May, 1919.

[1] Per Hargrave arguendo, Somerset v. Stewart (1772), Lofft 1, at p. 4; the speech in the State Trials Report was never actually delivered.

[2] (1772) Lofft 1; (1772) 20 St. Trials 1.

[3] These words are not in Lofft or in the State Trials but will be found in Campbell's Lives of the Chief Justices, Vol. II, p. 419, where the words are added: "Every man who comes into England is entitled to the protection of the English law, whatever oppression he may heretofore have suffered and whatever may be the colour of his skin. 'Quamvis ille niger, quamvis tu candidus esses'" and certainly Vergil's verse was never used on a nobler occasion or to nobler purpose. Verg. E. 2, 19.

William Cowper in The Task, written 1783-1785, imitated this in his well-known lines:

"Slaves cannot breathe in England; if their lungs Receive our air, that moment they are free. They touch our country and their shackles fall."

[4] I use the spelling in Lofft; the State Trials and Lord Campbell have "Somersett" and "Steuart."

[5] See, e. g., Vinogradoff, Villeinage in England, passim; Hallam's Middle Ages (ed. 1827), Vol. 3, p. 256; Pollock & Maitland, History of English Law, Vol. 1, pp. 395 sqq. Holdsworth's History of English Law, Vol. 2, pp. 33, 63, 131; Vol. 3, pp. 167, 377-393.

[6] See Pollock & Maitland's History Eng. Law, Vol. 1, pp. 1-13, 395, 415; Holdworth's Hist. Eng. Law, Vol. 2, pp. 17, 27, 30-33, 131, 160, 216.

[7] "So spake the fiend and with necessity, The tyrant's plea, excused his devilish deeds." Paradise Lost, Bk. 4, ll. 393, 394.

Milton a true lover of freedom well knew the peril of an argument based upon supposed necessity. Necessity is generally but another name for greed or worse.

[8] E. g., the Statute of (1732) 5 Geo. II, C. 7, enacted, sec. 4, "that from and after the said 29th. September, 1732, the Houses, Lands, Negroes and other Hereditaments and real Estates situate or being within any of the said (British) Plantations (in America) shall be liable" to be sold under execution. Note that the Negroes are "Hereditaments and Real Estate."

[9] The name Pani or Panis, Anglicized into Pawnee, was used generally in Canada as synonymous with "Indian Slave" because these slaves were usually taken from the Pawnee tribe. Those who would further pursue this matter will find material in the Wisconsin Historical Collections, Vol. XVIII, p. 103 (note); Lafontaine, L'Esclavage in Canada cited in the above; Michigan Pioneer and Historical Collections, Vol. XXVII, p. 613 (n); Vol. XXX, pp. 402, 596. Vol. XXXV, p. 548; Vol. XXXVII, p. 541. From Vol. XXX, p. 546, we learn that Dr. Anthon, father of Prof. Anthon of Classical Text-book fame, had a "Panie Wench" who when the family had the smallpox "had them very severe" along with Dr. Anthon's little girl and his "aeltest boy" "whoever they got all safe over it and are not disfigured."

Dr. Kingsford in his History of Canada, Vol. V, p. 30 (n), cites from the Documents of the Montreal Historical Society, Vol. I, p. 5, an "ordonnance au sujet des Negres et des sauvages appeles panis, du 15 avril 1709" by "Jacques Raudot, Intendant." "Nous sous le bon plaisir de Sa Majeste ordonnons, que tous les Panis et Negres qui ont ete achetes et qui le seront dans la suite, appartiendront en pleine propriete a ceux qui les ont achetes comme etant leurs esclaves." "We with the consent of His Majesty enact that all the Panis and Negroes who heretofore have been or who hereafter shall be bought shall be the absolute property as their slaves of those who bought them." This ordinance is quoted (Mich. Hist. Coll., XII, p. 511), and its language ascribed to a (nonexistent) "wise and humane statute of Upper Canada of May 31, 1798"—a curious mistake, perhaps in copying or printing.

There does not seem to have been any distinction in status or rights or anything but race between the Panis and the other slaves. I do not know of an account of the numbers of slaves in Canada at the time; in Detroit, March 31, 1779, there were 60 male and 78 female slaves in a population of about 2,550 (Mich. Hist. Coll., X, p. 326); Nov. 1, 1780, 79 male and 96 female slaves in a somewhat smaller population (Mich. Hist. Coll., XIII, p. 53); in 1778, 127 in a population of 2,144 (Mich. Hist. Coll., IX, p. 469); 85 in 1773, 179 in 1782 (Mich. Hist. Coll., VII, p. 524); 78 male and 101 female (Mich. Hist. Coll., XIII, p. 54). The Ordinance of Congress July 13, 1787, forbidding slavery "northwest of the Ohio River" (passed with but one dissenting voice, that of a Delegate from New York) was quite disregarded in Detroit (Mich. Hist. Coll., I, 415); and indeed Detroit and the neighboring country remained British (de facto) until August, 1796, and part of Upper Canada from 1791 till that date.

[10] This Act (1790) 30 Geo. III, c. 27, was intended to encourage "new settlers in His Majesty's Colonies and Plantations in America" and applied to all "subjects of the United States." It allowed an importation into any of the Bahama, Bermuda or Somers Islands, the Province of Quebec (then including all Canada), Nova Scotia and every other British territory in North America. It allowed the importation by such American subjects of "negros, household furniture, utensils of husbandry or cloathing free of duty," the "household furniture, utensils of husbandry and cloathing" not to exceed in value L50 for every white person in the family and L2 for each negro, any sale of negro or goods within a year of the importation to be void.

[11] The Royal Proclamation is dated 7th October, 1763; it will be found in Shortt & Doughty, Documents relating to the Constitutional History of Canada published by the Archives of Canada, Ottawa, 1907, pp. 119 sqq. The Proclamation fixes the western boundary of the (Province or) Government at a line drawn from the south end of Lake Nipissing to where the present international boundary crosses the River St. Lawrence.

The Quebec Act is (1774) 14 Geo. III, C. 83. It extends Quebec south to the Ohio and west to the Mississippi; Shortt & Doughty, pp. 401 sqq.

[12] The division of the Province of Quebec into two provinces, i. e., Upper Canada and Lower Canada, was effected by the Royal Prerogative, Sec. 31 George III, c. 31, the celebrated Canada of Constitutional Act. The Message sent to Parliament expressing the Royal intention is to be found copied in the Ont. Arch. Reports for 1906, p. 158. After the passing of the Canada Act, an Order in Council was passed August 24, 1791 (Ont. Arch. Rep., 1906, pp. 158 et seq.), dividing the Province of Quebec into two provinces and under the provisions of sec. 48 of the act directing a royal warrant to authorize the Governor or Lieutenant-Governor of the Province of Quebec or the person administering the government there, to fix and declare such day as he shall judge most advisable for the commencement of the effect of the legislation in the new provinces not later than December 31, 1791. Lord Dorchester (Sir Guy Carleton) was appointed, September 12, 1791, Captain General and Governor-in-Chief of both provinces and he received a Royal warrant empowering him to fix a day for the legislation becoming effective in the new provinces (Ont. Arch. Rep., 1906, p. 168). In the absence of Dorchester, General Alured Clarke, Lieutenant Governor of the Province of Quebec, issued November 18, 1791, a proclamation fixing Monday, December 26, 1791, as the day for the commencement of the said legislation (Ont. Arch. Rep., 1906, pp. 169-171). Accordingly technically and in law, the new province was formed by Order in Council, August 24, 1791, but there was no change in administration until December 26, 1791.

[13] The first session of the First Parliament of Upper Canada was held at Newark (now Niagara-on-the-Lake) September 17 to October 15, 1792; the statute referred to is (1792) 32 Geo. III, c. 1 (U. C.).

[14] Everyone will remember the words of the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States in the celebrated Dred Scott case. In Dred Scott v. Sandford, 1856 (19 How. 354, pp. 404, 405), Chief Justice Roger B. Taney, speaking of the view taken of the Negro when the Constitution was framed, says: "They were at that time considered as a subordinate and inferior class of beings who had been subjugated by the dominant race and whether emancipated or not, yet remained subject to their authority and had no rights or privileges but such as those who held the power and the Government might choose to grant them" (p. 407). "They had no more than a century before been regarded as beings of an inferior order ... and so far inferior that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect, and that the negro might justly and lawfully be reduced to slavery for his benefit. He was bought and sold and treated as an ordinary article of merchandise and traffic" (p. 411). "All of them had been brought here as articles of merchandise."

This repulsive subject now chiefly of historical interest is treated at large in such works as Cobb's Law of Slavery, Philadelphia, 1858; Hurd's Law of Freedom and Bondage, Boston, 1858; Von Holst's Const. Hist. U. S. (1750-1833), Chicago, 1877; the judgments of all the Judges in the Dred Scott case are well worth reading, especially that of Mr. Justice Curtis.

[15] This is copied from the Canadian Archives Collection, Q. 282, pt. I, pp. 212 sqq.; taken from the official report sent to Westminster by Simcoe. There is the usual amount of uncertainty in spelling names Grisley or Crisly, Fromand, Frooman, Froomond or Fromond (in reality Vrooman).

Osgoode was an Englishman, the first Chief Justice of Upper Canada. Arriving in this Province in the summer of 1792, he left to become Chief Justice of Lower Canada in the summer of 1794. Resigning in 1801, he returned to England on a pension which he enjoyed until his death in 1824. He left no mark on our jurisprudence and never sat in any but trial courts of criminal jurisdiction. Osgoode Hall, our Ontario Palais de Justice, is called after him.

Russell came to Upper Canada also in 1792 as Receiver-General and Legislative Councillor; he was an Executive Councillor and when Simcoe left Canada in 1796, he acted as Administrator until the coming of the new Lieutenant Governor Peter Hunter in 1799. Russell was not noted for anything but his acquisitiveness but he was a faithful servant of the Crown in his own way.

Col. John Butler, born in Connecticut in 1728, became a noted leader of Indians. He took the Loyalist side, raising the celebrated Butler's Rangers; he settled at Niagara after the Revolutionary war and proved himself a useful citizen; he died in 1796. See Cruikshanks' Butler's Rangers, Lundy's Lane Historical Society's publication; Robertson's Free Masonry in Canada, Vol. I, p. 470; Riddell's edition of La Rochefoucauld's Travels in Canada, 1795, published by the Ontario Archives, 1917, p. 177.

Navy Hall was in the little town which Simcoe named "Newark," which before this had been called Niagara, West Niagara, Nassau, Lenox and Butlersburg, now called Niagara or Niagara-on-the-lake. Navy Hall was the seat of government from 1792 to 1797. Queens Town is the present Queenston; Mississagua Point is at the embouchure of the Niagara River; it is still known by the same name, spelled generally however with a final "a." Nothing seems to be known of the subsequent fate of Chloe Cooley.

The Vroomans and Cryslers (or Chrystlers or Chryslers) the same family as Chrystler of Chrystler's Farm, the scene of an American defeat, November 11, 1813, were well-known residents. I am indebted to General E.A. Cruikshank for the following note:

"The Vrooman Farm is situated on the west bank of the Niagara, in the township of Niagara, about a mile below the village of Queenston, and includes that feature of the river bank generally known as Vrooman's Point; it was still in the possession of the Vrooman family when I last visited the place about twelve years ago. The remains of a small half-moon or redan battery on the point which had been constructed in the War of 1812, and played a considerable part in the battle of Queenston were then quite well marked. One of the Vrooraans of that time was in the militia artillery, and assisted to serve the gun mounted on the battery. The possessor of the farm was then, I think, more than eighty years of age, but he was active and in possession of his memory and other faculties. He stated to me the exact number of shots which he had been informed by his father, or the Vrooman engaged in the action, had been fired from this gun, which of course, may or may not be correct. An Adam Chrysler, who was a lieutenant in the Indian Department in the Revolutionary War, and before that, a resident in the Scoharie district, of the Mohawk country, received lands either in the township of Niagara or the township of Stamford, near the village of Queenston. His grandson, John Chrysler, some twenty years ago, then being quite an old man, who is now dead, loaned me some very interesting documents which had been preserved in the family, and belonged to this Adam Chrysler. One of them, I remember, was the original instructions issued to him, and signed by Lieut.-Colonel John Butler, the deputy superintendent general, strictly enjoining him to restrain the Indians, with whom he was acting, from all acts of cruelty upon prisoners and non-combatants. Some members of his family, ladies, were residing at Niagara Falls, Ontario, ten years ago, and I presume still are there. I have no doubt that it was some member of Adam Crysler's family who took part in the abduction of the Cooley girl. The original spelling of this name was Kreisler, which is a fairly common German name in the Rhine Palatinate, from which this family came."