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1 George M. Weston, The Poor Whites of the South 1 (1856)

handle is hein.slavery/powhits0001 and id is 1 raw text is: A careful perusal of the following is commended to all who fMel all interest in the'eleva- tion of the white as well as the colored race. It is a very clear exhibition of the condition of the mass of the white population in the Slave States. Mr. WESTON, the author, was for some time the editor of The Age, the leading Democratic paper in the State of Maine. THE POOR WHITES OF THE SOUTH. BY GEORGE M. WESTON. Be the sin, the dangers, and evils of Slavery all our own. We compel', we ask, none to share them with us. [Letter of Governor Hammond of South Carolina to Thomas Clcrkson. The number of sJaveholders in the slave States of this Union, as ascertained by the cen- sus returns of 1850, was three hundred and forty-seven thousand five hundred and twenty- five. An average of five persons and seven tenths to a family, as assumed by the Superin- tendent of the Census, would give 1,980,894 as the number of persons interested as slaveholders in their own right, or by family relation. The whole number of whites in the slaveholding States being 6,222,418, the slaveholding pro- portion is a fraction short of 32 per cent. The Superintendent of the Census, Professor De Bow, says of the number, 347,525, returned as slaveholders : The number includes slave-hirers, but is exclu- sive of those who are interested conjointly with oth- ers in slave property. The two will about balance each other, for the whole South, and leave the slave- owners as stated. Where the party owns slaves in different Coun- ties, or in different States, he will be entered more than once. This will disturb the calculation very little, being only the case among the larger proper- ties. The addition of those who are slave-hirers merely, to the category of slave-owners, must, I think, swell their number much more than it is diminished by the exclusion of those who are interested conjointly with others in sltve property. , Such instances of. conjoint interest will occur most frequently in the family rela- tions, already taken into the account, when we multiplied the number of slaveholders returned by five and seven tenths. A comparison of the returns frqm Maryland, the District of Colum- bia, and Virginia, where slave-hiring is much practiced, with Alabama, Mississippi, and Lou- siana, where it is less practiced, shows the fol- lowing results: Maryland, Virginia, and the District of Co- lumbia, with 566,583 slaves, return 72,584 slave-owners. A'abama, Mississippi, and Lou- isiana, with 897,531 slaves, return 73,081 slave- owners. The relative excess of slave-owners returned in Virginia, Maryland, and the District' of Columbia, must be attributed, in part, to the inclusion of a relatively larger number of slave-hirers. Upon the whole, it may safely be concluded that at least seven tenths of the whites in the slave States, are not slive-owners, either in their own right or by family relation. The number of white males in the slave States. aged twenty-one years and upward, in 1850, was 1,490,892. Considering that the number of 347,525, re- turned as slave-owners, is subject to some de- ductions, and considering that of the slave- owners many are females and minors, it is probable' that not exceeding one fifth of the white male adults of the slave States own slaves. I The non-siaveholding wites of the South, being not less than seven tenths of the whole number of whites, would seem to be entitled to some inquiry into their actual condition; and especially, as they have no real political weight or consideration in the country, and little op-- portunity to speak for theinselves. I have beer. for twenty years a reader of Southern news- papers, and a reader and hearer of Congression. al debates; but, in all that time, I do not recolk lect ever, to have seen or heard these non-slave - holding whites refejred to by Southern gentle- men, as constituting any part of what they call the South. When the rights of the South, or its wrongs, or its polici, or its interests, or its institutions, are spoken of, reference is always intended to the rights, wrongs, policy, interests, and institutions, of the three hundred and forty

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