Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 2.djvu/100

80 There is another view to be taken of that subject. I solemnly declare here that if by the abolition of slavery the development of the resources of the tropical countries was impaired, and if the organization of labor has a tendency to run in the direction of slavery there, I would much rather do without the products of the tropical countries than reintroduce slavery or anything akin to it. Is the Senator answered?

But does he deny the fact which I have just stated? He says that but recently every negro there was a slave. Is that true? Does he know when slavery was abolished in San Domingo? The abolition of slavery in San Domingo is nearly as old as the Constitution of the United States.

That is recent in the history of man.

Several generations have arisen and disappeared since, and there has been abundant time during which all the faculties of freemen under the tropical sun might have developed themselves and produced results which the Senator might wish to be more potent in opposition to my argument. No; certainly, sir, in me there lives not the faintest thought in favor of anything like slavery. I would continue to fight against it, as I have fought against it, to my last breath. But I am dealing with facts; stubborn facts, abominable facts, facts I detest, but ; and if the Senator is able to deny them let him speak!

I do not know whether it might be improper to suggest to him to study the history of those countries, to investigate the working of causes and effects. Such studies might perhaps clip the wings of that youthful enthusiasm which here and there throws such a brilliant gloss upon the periods of public speakers. But it would at the same time bring them to a sober appreciation of the problems they