“It had been properly observed by the Chairman, as well as by the gentlemen from this District (meaning Messrs. Clay and Caldwell) that there was nothing in the proposition submitted to consideration which in the smallest degree touches another very important and delicate question, which ought to be left as much out of view as possible, (Negro Slavery.)[20]

“There was no fear, Mr. R. said, that this proposition would alarm the slave-holders; they had been accustomed to think seriously of the subject.  There was a popular work on agriculture, by John Taylor of Carolina, which was widely circulated, and much confided in, in Virginia.  In that book, much read because coming from a practical man, this description of people, [referring to us half free ones,] were pointed out as a great evil.  They had indeed been held up as the greater bug-bear to every man who feels an inclination to emancipate his slaves, not to create in the bosom of his country so great a nuisance.  If a place could be provided for their reception, and a mode of sending them hence, there were hundreds, nay thousands of citizens, who would, by manumitting their slaves, relieve themselves from the cares attendant on their possession.  The great slave-holder, Mr. R. said, was frequently a mere sentry at his own door—­bound to stay on his plantation to see that his slaves were properly treated, &c.  Mr. R. concluded by saying that he had thought it necessary to make these remarks, being a slave-holder himself, to show that, so far from being connected with abolition of slavery, the measure proposed would prove one of greatest securities to enable the master to keep in possession his own property.”

Here is a demonstrative proof, of a plan got up by a gang of slave-holders to select the free people of colour from among the slaves, that our more miserable brethren may be the better secured in ignorance and wretchedness, to work their farms and dig their mines, and thus go on enriching the christians with their blood and groans.  What our brethren could have been thinking about, who have left their native land and home and gone away to Africa I am unable to say.  This country is as much ours as it is the whites, whether they will admit it now or not, they will see and believe it by and by.  They tell us about prejudice—­what have we to do with it?  Their prejudices will be obliged to fall like lightning to the ground, in succeeding generations; not, however with the will and consent of all the whites, for some will be obliged to hold on to the old adage, viz.:  the blacks are not men, but were made to be an inheritance to us and our children forever!!!!!!  I hope the residue of the coloured people will stand still and see the salvation of God, and the miracle which he will work for our delivery from wretchedness under the christians!!!!!!