Xx.
In manufactures, mining, and the mechanic arts the failure of the Slave States is greater still. It appears at all points,—in the capital [331] employed, in the value of the raw material, in the annual wages, and in the annual product. A short table will show the contrast.
Free States. Slave States. Capital $430,240,051 $95,029,877 Value of raw material 465,844,092 86,190,639 Annual wages 195,436,453 33,247,560 Annual product 842,586,058 165,423,027
This might be illustrated by details with regard to different manufactures,—as shoes, cotton, woollens, pig iron, wrought iron, and iron castings,—all showing the contrast. It might also be illustrated by comparison between different States,—showing for instance, that the manufactures of Massachusetts during the last year, exceeded those of all the Slave States combined.
In commerce the failure of the Slave States is on a yet larger scale. Under this head the census does not supply proper statistics, and we are left to approximations from other sources; but these are enough for our purpose. It appears, that, of products which enter into commerce, the Free States had an amount valued at $1,377,199,968, the Slave States an amount valued only at $410,754,992; that, of persons engaged in trade, the Free States had 136,856, and the Slave States 52,662; and that, of tonnage employed, the Free State had 2,791,096 tons, and the Slaves States only 726,284. This was in 1850. But in 1855 the disproportion was still greater, the Free States having 4,320,768 tons, and the Slave States 855,510 tons, being a difference of five to one,—and the tonnage of Massachusetts alone being 979,210 tons, an amount larger than that of all the Slave States together. The tonnage built during this year by the Free States was 528,844 tons, by the Slave States 52,938 tons. Maine alone built 215,905 tons, or more than four times the whole built in the Slave States.
The foreign commerce of the Free States, in 1855, as indicated by exports and imports, was $404,365,503; of the Slave States, $132,062,196. The exports of the Free States were $167,520,693; of the Slave States, including the vaunted cotton crop, $107,475,668. The imports of the Free States were $236,844,810; of the Slave States, $24,586,528. The foreign commerce of New York alone was more than twice as large as that of all the Slave States; her imports were larger, and her exports were larger also. Add to this evidence of figures the testimony of a Virginian, Mr. Loudon, in a letter written just before the sitting of a Southern Commercial Convention. Thus he complains and testifies:— [332]
‘There are not half a dozen vessels engaged in our own trade that are owned in Virginia; and I have been unable to find a vessel at Liverpool loading for Virginia within three years, during the height of our busy season.’
