Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker volume 6.djvu/46

Rh the slave States amounted to 9,719,779 ; the free States and territories, not including Oregon and California, had 13,348,371 souls. The population of the free States has increased about six hundred per cent., that of the slave only about four hundred per cent.

Let us compare a free and a slave State which lie side by side. In soil and climate, Kentucky is superior to Ohio—only the stream separates them. Slavery is on one side, freedom on the other; and what a difference!

Kentucky contains 37,680 square miles. It is well watered with navigable rivers—the Ohio, Cumberland, Kentucky, Green, and Salt. The soil is admirable, producing abundantly; the climate mild and salubrious. It abounds in minerals—coal, iron, lead. The salt springs were famous even with the French and Indians. Rice, cotton, and the sugar-cane grow in Kentucky.

Ohio contains 39,964 square miles of land, no better watered, with a soil not superior, less favoured with mineral riches, yet also abounding in iron and coal ; the climate is sterner, the water power less copious.

In 1790, Kentucky had 73,077 inhabitants; Ohio not a white man. In 1800, Kentucky had 220,959; Ohio only 45,365. But in 1850, Kentucky had only 982,405; while Ohio had grown to 1,980,427 souls. To-day, Kentucky has not 775,000 freemen, while Ohio has more than 2,000,000.

In 1810, Louisville, the capital of Kentucky, numbered 4,012 persons; Cincinnati, the chief town of Ohio, contained 9,644. Now Louisville has less than 50,000, and Cincinnati more than 150,000; while Cleveland and Columbus, in the same State, have risen from nothing to cities each containing 20,000 inhabitants.

Look next at the effect of these different institutions on the productive industry, of the different sections of the land. In the North, labour is respected. In 1845, there were in Boston 19,037 private families ; there were 15,744 who kept no servant, and only 1,069 who had more than one. Is Boston poor? In 1854, the property of her citizens, taxable on the spot, is more than $225,000,000. In 1847, the real property in Boston was valued at $97,764,500,— $45,271,120 more than the value of all the