April 24, 1863, The New York Herald
We perceive by the letters of our correspondents in Louisiana that Adjutant General Thomas has recently arrived out West, ostensibly to look after the welfare of the army, but really to undertake the serious business of organizing negro regiments and brigades of the federal service. As an initiatory step in this direction, we are told that four regiments are already in formation at Lake Providence, and that in other places officers were recruiting […..] some degree of success.” We think it is high time that the government should look into this absurd and dangerous matter. It is nothing but an absolute waste of time and money to attempt anything so Quixotic as the formation of negro military forces. In the first place, there is no necessity whatever for such auxiliaries; and in the next, the idea can never be carried out to any practical result. So far as the experiment has been tried it has not only ended in lamentable failure, but it has brought about some of the most deplorable disasters of the war. For two years past our disorganizing and bloodthirsty abolitionists have been incessantly prating about the invincibility of black soldiers, and yet every attempt to solve the question by the organization of a single useful regiment has ended in complete failure. If our generals in North Carolina, Florida, South Carolina, Louisiana and other places had always confined themselves to the care and discipline of the regular white army, and had left the foolish illusion of negro regiments alone, we should certainly have had fewer reverses and more victories to record. The failure of the late attack upon Charleston is principally to be attributed to the extraordinary notions of our generals on the negro question. Instead of looking boldly at the difficulties attendant on military operations against that almost impregnable rebel city, General Hunter spent nearly all his time drumming up negro recruits for regiments which never had and never will have any positive existence. Everywhere else where the same scheme has been put in operation it has miserably failed. With an army of trained white soldiers in the field more than sufficient to overrun the whole South, we go on from day to day procrastinating and disputing about the organization of a handful of poor negroes, who, instead of being useful, would be a positive obstacle to the progress of our arms. If we had not soldiers enough to fight our battles there would be some excuse for this fanatical delusion; but with a magnificent army in the field – such and army as the world has never before seen – and with millions yet ready and willing to fill the places of those who may fall in battle, it is worse than ridiculous to talk of arming ignorant negro slaves, who have neither inclination nor intelligence for so important a work.
The duty which rests upon our government and army is to defeat the rebel forces in the field, as the surest, and, in fact, the only means of crushing the rebellion. It is not their interest nor their duty to interfere with the established laws of labor in the States in which they happen to come. With this we have nothing to do. The President’s proclamation of general emancipation has had no effect upon these immutable laws, and it is idle to suppose that the enrolment of a few negro regiments could effect such a sweeping change. Different kinds of labor are suitable to different climes and countries, and it is sheer folly to attempt to subvert the lessons of long and salutary experience. We may as well attempt to overturn the laws of marriage, of civil rights, of property, of gravitation itself, as to strike at the foundation of the laws that regulate labor. The slaves of the South for a hundred years have been in the condition of dependents on the superior intelligence of the white race; they have been cared for and kindly guarded in sickness and in health; and, though there have been some instances in which brutal owners have brought odium on the patriarchal relations of master and servant, in the majority of cases the negro has been largely benefited. Any interference on our party with this long established system of Southern labor can only bring disaster to ourselves, and more misery and wretchedness to the unfortunate slaves than they have ever dreamt of in their masters’ service.
Let the government, therefore, set its face firmly against the further organization of negro regiments, and let our generals and other officers turn their attention to the solemn duties now resting upon them – to defeat the rebels and scatter their armies. We know that with the gradual advance of the federal army large numbers of negroes will be thrown upon their hands; but these people can be serviceably employed in a variety of ways – on the trenches, in erecting fortifications, in ploughing up the fields for cultivation, and in ministering to the many other wants of the advancing army. Let their services be employed in any way; but to enroll them as soldiers is to demoralize the regular army and to increase the difficulties we would avoid.
When the rebellion is over; when the rebel armies are destroyed, if it must be so; when peace returns to the land, and the calm, sober second thought of the people shall take the place of the dreadful passions now agitating North and South, then the States themselves can coolly take up the question of labor, and discuss and decide it; for there is no power out of the independent States to pass upon it.