Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 2.djvu/120

100 I claim the attention of the Senator from Indiana again—thank heaven we have abolished slavery there in spite of the natural influences which seemed to be working in its favor; and I trust the attempt will never be made to reëstablish it. And if the Senator from Indiana ever misunderstood my feelings in that respect, I will console him with the solemn assurance that he would no more zealously struggle against it than I.

I desire to say to my friend that I do not distrust his purpose or distrust his hostility to slavery; but I do desire to say to him that every argument he has made goes to show that it was wrong to abolish slavery in the South and especially in the West Indies.

No, sir; that is a misconstruction of what I said. I did not argue that the abolition of slavery was wrong there, for the abolition of a great wrong cannot be a wrong anywhere. But I did say that the organization of labor by which it was sought to develop the resources of those tropical countries ran in the direction of slavery, and that this tendency is characteristic of tropical latitudes. I challenged the Senator from Indiana to deny it and he failed. I stated facts as such; ugly facts, which I deplore, but facts; I did not argue a theory; and I said further, and I repeat it again, that rather than reintroduce any organization of labor in the remotest degree akin to slavery anywhere I would much rather and with gladness abandon the enjoyment of any and all of the tropical luxuries which we are now so fond of enjoying. The question of freedom or slavery stands far above the question of coffee or no coffee. But whatever our feelings may be, they do not alter the facts of history which I have stated, nor do they neutralize the natural influences under which those facts have arisen.

Sir, our semi-tropical States we have, and we must keep them; it is a continental necessity; and I indulge in the