There were also four against abolition. The
first of these was from certain persons at Derby in opposition to the other
from that town. The second was from Stephen Fuller, esquire, as agent for
Jamaica. The third from J. Dawson, esquire, a slave-merchant at Liverpool.
And the fourth from the merchants, planters, mortgagees, annuitants, and
others concerned in the West Indian colonies. Taking in all these
statements, the account stood thus. For regulation there was one; against
all abolition there were four; and for the total abolition of the trade
five hundred and nineteen.
On the second of April Mr. Wilberforce moved the order of the day; which
having been agreed to, Sir William Dolben was put into the chair.
He then began by soliciting the candid attention of the West Indians to
what he was going to deliver to the House. However others might have
censured them indiscriminately, he had always himself made a distinction
between them and their system. It was the latter only, which he reprobated.
If aristocracy had been thought a worse form of government than monarchy,
because the people had many tyrants instead of one, how objectionable must
be that form of it, which existed in our colonies! Arbitrary power could be
bought there by any one, who could buy a slave.
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