Page:Notices of Negro slavery as connected with Pennsylvania.djvu/12

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375

bettle's notices of

Spain by permission of King Ferdinand V After his death, the proposal was made to the Regent of Spain, Cardinal Ximenes, by Las Casas,^[1] Bishop of Chiapa, to establish a regular commerce in African slaves, under the plausible and well-intentioned, but fallacious pretext of substituting their labor in the colonies for that of the native Indians, who were rapidly becoming exterminated by the severity of their labor and the cruel treatment of their Spanish masters. To the immortal honor of Cardinal Ximenes, he rejected the proposition on the ground of the iniquity of slavery itself in the abstract, and also the great injustice of making slaves of one nation for the liberation of another. The Cardinal appears, therefore, to have been the first avowed opponent of this traffic in men.^[2]

↑ It is said that Las Casas' proposal was first acted on in Cuba in 1523-4, at which time three hundred negroes were introduced from Spain.—Answers of Senor———, of Havana, to Questions addressed by R.R. Madden, M.D., London, 1840. But Bancroft (vol. i., p. 109) says that it was not Las Casas who first suggested the plan of transporting African slaves to Hispaniola. There is no doubt, however, that such a proposal was made by him. See the documents brought to light by Quintana. The proof is so full, from his own writings and other authentic documents not difficult of access, that it would be quite out of place, and would take too much space, even to refer to them here.—Quintana, vol. iii., p. 467, as cited by Madden.
↑ "It is in vain to deny that Las Casas committed this most lamentable error (his suggestion in favor of the importation of African slaves into Cuba), as many have asserted, and amongst others, the Abbe Gregoire. Quintana has produced the original documents in which this suggestion is made by Las Casas; but they who claim Las Casas for an advocate of the slave trade are little aware that he himself, heartily repenting of his proposal, condemns it in his own history (lib. iii., chap. 101), and in his own words: 'Because they (the negreos) had the same rights as the Indians.'

[1] It is said that Las Casas' proposal was first acted on in Cuba in 1523-4, at which time three hundred negroes were introduced from Spain.—Answers of Senor———, of Havana, to Questions addressed by R.R. Madden, M.D., London, 1840. But Bancroft (vol. i., p. 109) says that it was not Las Casas who first suggested the plan of transporting African slaves to Hispaniola. There is no doubt, however, that such a proposal was made by him. See the documents brought to light by Quintana. The proof is so full, from his own writings and other authentic documents not difficult of access, that it would be quite out of place, and would take too much space, even to refer to them here.—Quintana, vol. iii., p. 467, as cited by Madden.

[2] "It is in vain to deny that Las Casas committed this most lamentable error (his suggestion in favor of the importation of African slaves into Cuba), as many have asserted, and amongst others, the Abbe Gregoire. Quintana has produced the original documents in which this suggestion is made by Las Casas; but they who claim Las Casas for an advocate of the slave trade are little aware that he himself, heartily repenting of his proposal, condemns it in his own history (lib. iii., chap. 101), and in his own words: 'Because they (the negreos) had the same rights as the Indians.'

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