The Evansville Daily Journal

The Daily Journal.
Published By
JAMES H. McNEELY.
R. M. Thayer.
JNO. H. MCNEELY.
EVANSVILLE JOURNAL COMPANY.
Journal Buildings, Locust St.,
Between 5th and 6th
REGULATIONS FOR 1862.
All Advertisements amounting to $3 or less must invariably be paid in advance to secure attention
All Job Work must be paid for on delivery. Transient Work must be pre-paid.
The War and Peace Policy.
BY T. ABBOTT. NO. 2.
In a previous paper, we have written some views upon the above topic, necessarily embracing the subject of American Slavery, and have suggested a course of Government Policy toward purchased and contraband slaves. We now proceed to briefly define the process which should be employed in the practical operation of the system:
1. For the purchase of such slaves as might be offered, the Government should issue Three Hundred Millions of dollars of United States bonds, having ten, twenty and thirty years for their maturity, payable in equal installments, and drawing five per cent annually. These bonds should form the financial basis of the system; and if the above sum should not prove sufficient to purchase all the slaves that might be offered, it should be increased to the amount required, whenever the demand should arise.
2. All purchased, escaped, contraband or confiscated slaves, who might thus come under the control of the United States Government, should be either apprenticed to responsible parties, they giving bond and security for the performance of the terms of indenture, or they should be employed by the Government in such avocations as might best comport with the nature and requirements of the case.
3. For the purpose of purchasing, valuing, apprenticing and employing these servants, suitable commissioners should be provided, according to the demands of the business; and their salaries should be paid by charging a fee of one dollar each for every indenture made or contract drawn; this fee to be paid by the individual to whom the servant might be indentured or hired. And these should be required to give bond and security for the true and faithful performance of the conditions and obligations of their office.
4. The laws regulating the conduct and obligations of masters and servants-the civil and domestic metes and bounds to them respectively applying, should be left to the discretion of State legislation and law, obtaining in the States where this system might go into practical effect.
5. A fair and equitable valuation should, by the before named Commissioners, be placed upon all purchased, escaped, confiscated or contraband servants, who might thus come under Government control, and they should be held bound to do service to the Government, in the manner herein named, to the amount of their estimated value, without interest. To this end, an exact account should be kept of the proceeds of their labor; and when having thus refunded to the Government the said amount of their value, they should be discharged from all obligation to perform involuntary service in the premises; and certificates of discharge should be given to that effect.
6. Minors, born after the parents have come under Government control, should not be bound to service for a period of time extending beyond the twenty-second year of their age; and those born before, who are under the age of fourteen years, should not be bound for a period of time extending beyond the twenty-fourth year of their age. This difference of three years in the term of service should be made because the last, it is supposed, might be purchased, while the first are supposed to cost the Government nothing.
7. Should any of these escaped or contraband servants, be at any time, by satisfactory proof, as in law provided, shown to have been the property of any true and loyal citizen of the United States, at the time of his escape from the custody of his owner, the Government should pay to the said owner the amount of his slave as estimated at the time he came under the Government control, with five per cent. interest thereon for the term of service which might then have expired.
8. It should be imperatively settled by the terms of this liberating purchase that all Government servants, so soon as they shall obtain their certificates of discharge, shall, under the direction of the before named Commissioners, depart without delay to such country as may be provided for them. And to aid in establishing them in their new home, the said Commissioners should be authorized to procure their passage to, and provide them with one month's subsistence to apply on their arrival at their point of destination; the same to be furnished out of the Government funds accruing from the service of these servants.
9. Should any of these servants on obtaining their liberty, be at any time able and desirous, they should have the privilege of purchasing their kindred and friends, paying therefor in the ratio of their estimated value according to the times of service remaining due to the government, without interest thereon.
10. The fortieth year from the establishment of this government policy should be declared a year of "jubilee" to all remaining servants under its control, making them forever free from all involuntary servitude; they should receive their certificates of discharge, and be conveyed to their new country and homes, under the same provisions as contained in section eight.
11. A good beginning is already made for this humane, and politically and socially necessary move, by liberal officers of the Haytian Government. Valuable assistance is now being given to such persons as will emigrate to that island. That government offers land to settlers, and holds out other inducements to such as will make a little effort to secure their homes in a most desirable country.
Negotiations should be entered into between this government and that with a view to co-operate in the carrying into effect, this, the ultimate condition in the establishment of this system. Arrangements might be made which would answer all the purposes for the next ten years, so far as providing a country is involved; and that too, with but little expense.
12. If, however, no such arrangements could be made as above; or if made and in process of time Hayti should become too populous to admit of more foreign emigration, then the government should purchase a suitable country-say some portion of Central or South America or some convenient island for the accommodation of all future subjects of this liberating system.
The country designed for the future abode of the subjects of this liberating system, should be purchased with a view to economy and to its adaptation to the constitution, circumstances and habits of the race for which it is intended. 1. The land should be surveyed, and graded with reference to the soil, minerals, timber and locations which it might contain; and should be furnished to settlers at the cheapest rate allowable; the purchase price being the graduating standard. 2. To enable the settlers to pay for their lands, a magnanimous preemption law should apply under which no one settler should be permitted to claim more than one quarter section or any one person be permitted to purchase of the Government more than one section of land. 3. A Provisional Government should be maintained over the country, till such time as the inhabitants might become competent to conduct their own Government affairs; when in the peaceful exercise and enjoyment of this right, the United States should protect their institutions and commerce. 4. It should further be at the option of the New Government to take possession of the unsold lands at any time they might be able to pay the United States the principal and interest of original purchase, together with the incidental cost therein involved.
Thus we have furnished a brief synopsis of a general system, for the settlement of the most perplexing subject which has ever agitated the councils of a nation. We know it is exposed to many objections and difficulties. It is natural that this should be the case. The views and plans of short-sighted man are all imperfect and limited, even upon the common affairs of life; much less, should perfection be demanded or expected upon a matter laden with so many hindrances and bounds, as the one under consideration. Especially so, when appearing as the product of a single mind without opportunity or time, to devote research or study, to the maturity of the system offered. Yet in making up the catalogue of our objections, we venture the prediction that the sum total will not prove so considerable as the one great evil which necessitates these objections.
We think the maxim should here have its full force, "of two evils choose the less."
Supposing this system to prove practicable under any circumstances, the most weighty objection that occurs to the mind is, that after all this expense and trouble, we fail in the important item-do not totally rid the country of slavery and the negro.
This system, it is true, does not propose to make an end of slavery, and banish the negro at once; nor is this desirable. Yet it proposes to do it, at least in part, and in a judicious way by a gradually progressive work; perhaps, opening up the way in the future for the accomplishment of the above desired end.
The plan, however, in its more immediate provision contemplates, in themselves considered, no less than five benevolent and praise-worthy objects. 1. It proposes greatly to diminish the number of life-long slaves in the United States. 2. It proposes to rid the country of a very considerable number of the here degraded and proscribed race. 3. It proposes to make them free men, giving them the control of their own persons and time. 4. It proposes to provide them a government, country and homes of their own, where they can "sit under their own vine and fig tree," on an equality with their neighbors and countrymen. 5. It redeems so much of our own soil to free white labor relieved in the ratio of the controversy and hostility engendered by the presence of the black slave. These are all blessings, in themselves considered, sufficient to justify vigorous effort for the establishment of this system.