His One Best-Seller
Inflamed the Nation
But Hinton Helper’s own people
banned The Impending Crisis and de¬
spised its Tar Heel author.
By OWE N BISHOP
One of the most influential writers
North Carolina has ever produced was
damned by his own home state at the
peak of his career.
Called a “poor traitor to his native
sod and native skies . . . and beneath
the level of contempt and infamy,”
by a Southern newspaper, he was the
author of only one best seller.
The one book, though, brought on
him both Southern disdain and North¬
ern acclaim. Published in 1858, it had
sold more than 142,000 copies by
1860 — few of them in the South.
In the South it was subjected to the
stringent state laws regarding incendi¬
ary literature, and its circulation
resulted in arrests, imprisonments,
fines and deaths.
Bonk Influenced Election
In the North it was a powerful in¬
fluence in Lincoln’s election and en¬
joyed a sale and distribution second
only to Uncle Tom’s Cabin in the
field of anti-slavery literature.
This book, The Impending Crisis:
How to Meet It by Hinton Rowan
Helper, was a striking contrast to Miss
Howe’s novel. According to its author,
it was an appeal to the “head and in¬
telligence and not to the heart and
sentimentality of the country.”
In the book, Helper dealt with a
side of the slavery question which had
been untouched — that of the effect
of slavery upon the Southern whites
who owned no slaves.
He thought this question important
because three-fourths of the Southern
whites owned no slaves and, there¬
fore, could not benefit from the slave
system.
Economic Consequences of Slavery
The book was addressed to this non¬
slaveholding white class, which Helper
himself represented. Because of the
widespread illiteracy of that class,
THE STATE, May 1,
19ЙВ
however, the book was never to be
read by the majority of the people for
whom it was intended.
By using official figures, Helper set
out in his book to “prove that slavery
was heading the South toward economic
destruction.” He used statistics to com¬
pare the “free” and “slave” states, al¬
together to the advantage of the
former. In fact, he omitted those
which showed the South to an advan¬
tage.
“Of all the experiments that have
been tried by the people of America,”
he wrote, “slavery has proved the
most fatal; and the sooner it is
abolished the better it will be for us,
for posterity and for the world.”
He saw slavery as the root of “all
the shame, ignorance, poverty, tyran¬
ny and imbecility of the South” and
felt that nothing short of its complete
abolition could save the region from
utter min.
Helper’s Solution
Helper had hoped his book would
stimulate discontent among the five
million “forgotten men” of the South —
those who owned no slaves. He pro¬
posed that they organize politically
and take advantage of their numeri¬
cal superiority by imposing a tax of
$60 on every slaveholder for each
slave in his possession. He also favored
using the money raised by this tax to
ship the freed blacks back to Africa.
Emerging as it did after the passage
of the Kansas-Nebraska bill, when the
controversy over slavery in the ter¬
ritories was becoming heated, Helper’s
book was a godsend to the Northern
abolitionists.
Here was a vitriolic attack on
slavery by a Southerner of the small
farm class. What could have had bet¬
ter potential for their purposes?
Actually, the book received only
scattered and inconsequential atten¬
Hinton Rowan Helper
tion until the spring of 2859. At that
time a group of Northern Republi¬
can politicians, realizing the value of
the book as a campaign argument,
organized themselves to raise money
for printing a compendium of it. They
printed and distributed 100,000 copies
of the compendium in the doubtful
states. Its effect was startling — it
swung them easily to the Republican
ticket.
Fierce Controversy
When Congress assembled in De¬
cember, 1859, the book triggered one
of the fiercest debates in Congres¬
sional history. John Sherman, the Re¬
publican candidate for the House
speakership, was denounced for en¬
dorsing Helper’s book. This touched
off a debate which lasted two months,
during which members on each side
went armed. At the end of the debate,
Sherman was finally defeated.
The attention the book received in
Congress stimulated interest and ex¬
citement throughout the country. Its
circulation grew as swiftly in the North
as did its condemnation in the South.
In the North, Helper was pro¬
claimed a “new Moses” who was to
lead America out of slaver}'. In his
native North Carolina, the reaction
was typical of that throughout the
South. A mob in High Point made a
bonfire of several copies of his book,
and persons in two counties were im¬
prisoned for possessing it.
Helper, of course, had long since
left the South for a safer haven in the
North.
Boyhood In Davie
Born in 1829, in Davie (then
Rowan) County, N. C, Helper was
the youngest of seven children in a
small farm family. He went to school
1 1