SOUTH CAROLINA. (Hansard, 13 June 1853)

§ MR. FITZSTEPHEN FRENCH

said, that in calling the attention of Her Majesty's Government to the habitual imprisonment of shipwrecked sailors and other British subjects, being persons of colour, by the authorities of South Carolina, he begged to move for copies of all correspondence on the subject with Her Majesty's Consul at Charleston. The law of South Carolina was, that no free person of colour should by any pretence enter that State; if they did, they were to be brought before a magistrate and give bail to quit the country within fifteen days. If they did not, they were then subject to corporal punishment, or to be sold as slaves. This and other equally stringent enactments, were, in his opinion, an outrage not only against the usages but against the rights of man as recognised by the universal world. It was not for the honour of a nation holding itself so high as America did, that it should act towards other nations in the spirit in which South Carolina acted. But this conduct was not only against the law of civilised nations, but was in direct contravention of treaties entered into between the Supreme Government of the United States and of Canada. The British Government had several times remonstrated strongly against the continuance of this law; and in 1850 Mr. Mathew was appointed consul at Charleston, and that gentleman, in his representations to the authorities of South Carolina, had dwelt strongly upon the injustice to which British subjects were exposed in consequence. What they asked of the State of South Carolina, had already been accorded by another State, and he was inclined to think that the Legislature of South Carolina had to a certain extent admitted the justice of the demand, and, if properly pressed, would doubtless grant the request made to them. The correspondence for which he moved would show that Mr, Mathew had discharged the duties he had been called upon to perform in connexion with this subject with great credit to himself and honour to the country which employed him.