Page:Boissonnas, Un Vaincu, English, 1875.djvu/47

 people, set thernselves up as states that sent to Congress members who increased the strength of the northern party.

It was not so for the scates in the South. Not only did their climate and the nature of their products fail to attract the Europeans, but an institution -- with reason, called a cursed institution -- drove away the labor of free men.

Slavery, shameful source of an antique prosperity, fatal legacy that England [who has repented since] had made to her colonies, was accepted and lawful in the whole region where cotton was cultivated. To depict the state of abject misery of the black race would be a heart-rending task upon which we will not embark. Besides, everything has already been said about the most odious iniquity ever perpetrated.

What one knows less, is that by God′s righteous justice, the oppressors were to receive their punishment from their crime itself. The ruin of the influence of the South was the consequence of slavery -- and of slavery alone.

The Blacks, not being considered citizens, did not vote. And, though an extra number of votes was given to their masters, the presence of Negroes, keeping away free workers, deprived the masters of the political help that immigration would have brought them. Thus, the power, for long the attribute of the ancient Southern states, worked its way gradually, naturally, and legally to the Northern states.