Raynors HCA 2016-10
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 10/21/2016
Printed Speech, 16p, 6” x 9.5”. Titled: “Speech / of / Hon. J.P. Benjamin, of La., / on the / Acquisition of Cuba. / Delivered in Senate U.S., Friday, February 11, 1859.” Four folded 12” x 9.5” sheets, front & verso, bound at the centerfold with a straight pin. Split expertly mended on last sheet. Unevenly cut and folded. Very Good condition. Accompanied by the original envelope, 7.25” x 3.75”, free franked in the upper right “Jn Thomson / USS.” The bill discussed was S. 497 “Making appropriation to facilitate the acquisition of the Island of Cuba by negotiation.” Photocopy of the bill is present. On the floor of the Senate, on February 11, 1859, Judah P. Benjamin of Louisiana spoke in favor of the acquisition of Cuba by the United States. In part, “…the population, wealth, and prosperity of Cuba, are dependent solely on a supply of compulsory labor … I now proceed to inquire from what source an adequate supply of the compulsory labor can be obtained. I know, sir, of but three possible methods: 1. The actual increase of the slaves already there. 2. The introduction of persons bound to service under the name of apprentices, or coolies, or colonists. 3. The African slave-trade, which is the present method … If annexed to our country, the system now prevalent under which her entire agricultural population perishes in a generation, would, by the force of interest and example, be exchanged for ours, under which the southern laborers are more than doubled in the same lapse of time…”
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