The Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 5, May, 1864 Devoted To Literature And National Policy

Excerpt

In my third and fourth letters on American finances and resources, the following comparisons were instituted: Massachusetts and New Jersey, Free States, with Maryland and South Carolina, Slave States; New York and Pennsylvania, Free States, with Virginia, Slave State; Rhode Island, Free State, with Delaware, Slave State; Illinois, Free State, with Missouri, Slave State; the Free States of 1790, with the Slave States of that day; the Free States of 1860, with the Slave States of that date. These comparisons were based on the official returns of the Census of the United States, and exhibited in each case and in the aggregate the same invariable result, the vastly superior progress of the Free States in wealth, population, and education.

I will now institute one other comparison, Kentucky, slaveholding, with Ohio, a Free State.

Kentucky—population in 1790, 73,077; Ohio, none. 1800: Kentucky, 220,955; Ohio, 45,365. 1860: Kentucky, 1,155,684; Ohio, 2,339,502. We must institute the comparison from 1800, as Ohio was a wilderness in 1790, when Kentucky had a population of 73,077. In Kentucky, the ratio of increase of population from 1800 to 1860 was 527.98 per cent., and in the same period in Ohio 5,057.08. (Table 1, Census 1860.) Thus from 1800 to 1860 Ohio increased in nearly tenfold the ratio of Kentucky.

Wealth.—By Tables 33 and 36, Census of 1860, the value of the product of 1859 was as follows:

Thus is it, that, while in 1790 and 1800 Kentucky was so very far in advance of Ohio, yet, in 1860, so vast was the advance of Ohio as compared with Kentucky, that the value of the product of Ohio was nearly triple that of Kentucky, and, per capita, much more than one third greater. No reason can be assigned for these remarkable results, except that Kentucky was slaveholding, and Ohio a Free State.

Their area is nearly the same, and they are adjacent States; the soil of Kentucky is quite equal to that of Ohio, the climate better for crops and stock, and the products more various.

We have seen the actual results in 1860, but if Kentucky had increased in population from 1800 to 1860 in the same ratio as Ohio, Kentucky then would have numbered 11,175,970, or nearly ten times her present population; and if the product had been the same as in Ohio, per capita, the value would have been $1,612,804,230, or more than fourteen times greater than the result. Thus it is demonstrated by the official Tables of the Census of the United States, that if Kentucky had increased in wealth and population from 1800 to 1860 in the same ratio as Ohio, the results would have been as follows:

Kentucky: population in 1860, 11,175,970; actual population in 1860, 1,155,684; value of products in 1860, $1,612,804,230; actual value in 1860, $115,408,000.

Some attempt has been made to account for these marvellous results, by stating that Ohio has a border on one of the lakes, and Kentucky has not. But to this it may be replied, that Kentucky borders for twice the distance on the Ohio River, has a large front on the Mississippi River, and embraces within her limits those noble streams, the Cumberland and Tennessee Rivers, making, together with the Big Sandy, Licking, Kentucky, Green, and Barren Rivers, the natural advantages of Kentucky for navigation, superior to those of Ohio. But a conclusive answer to this argument is found in the fact that, omitting all the counties of Ohio within the lake region, the remainder, within the valley of the Ohio River, contain a population more than one half greater than that of the whole State of Kentucky.

Lands.-The farm lands, improved and unimproved, of Ohio, in 1860, were worth $666,564,171. The number of acres 20,741,138, value per acre $32.13....