The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Slavery Question, by John Lawrence This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. Title: The Slavery Question Author: John Lawrence Release Date: October 5, 2014 [EBook #47050] Language: English Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SLAVERY QUESTION *** Produced by deaurider, Paul Clark and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
BY
JOHN LAWRENCE,
AUTHOR OF “PLAIN THOUGHTS ON SECRET SOCIETIES,” AND “BRIEF
TREATIES ON AMERICAN SLAVERY.”
THIRD EDITION.
THE DISCUSSION OF SLAVERY WILL PROCEED, WHEREVER TWO OR
THREE ARE GATHERED TOGETHER—BY THE FIRESIDE, ON THE HIGHWAY,
AT THE PUBLIC MEETING, IN THE CHURCH. THE MOVEMENT
AGAINST SLAVERY IS FROM THE EVERLASTING ARM.
CHARLES SUMNER.
DAYTON, O.,
PUBLISHED BY ORDER OF THE TRUSTEES OF THE CONFERENCE PRINTING
ESTABLISHMENT OF THE UNITED BRETHREN IN CHRIST.
VONNIEDA & KUMLER, AGENTS.
1854.
Entered according to act of Congress, in the year 1854, by
VONNIEDA & KUMLER,
in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of Ohio.
American slavery is a great sin—a complicated iniquity—a gigantic barbarism—and it “is evil, only evil, and that continually.” But the depth of this wickedness is not very frequently sounded, if, indeed it can be sounded. The magnitude of this crime is not often measured, if, indeed it is possible to determine its dimensions.
Slavery has narcoticized the consciences of the American people to a most alarming extent. A deep sleep has come over the moral sense, which it would seem cannot be broken by the cries and entreaties of three millions of wretched bondmen. Are we not in imminent danger of being cursed with Pharaoh’s hardness of heart? May we not be visited speedily with judicial blindness such as was inflicted upon the doomed nations and cities of antiquity?
The standard of national morality has been degraded to the level of an infamous lower law enacted by scheming political traders.
Our national government, in all its departments—Executive, Judicial and Legislative—has been transformed into a pliant tool in the hands of an unscrupulous oligarchy.
The powerful American Churches have ceased to be asylums for the oppressed, defenders of the down trodden, uncompromising foes of tyranny, and they have become, on the contrary, the apologists of oppressors, a terror to the oppressed, and the only reliable bulwark of American slavery.
The author has aimed to present in the following pages such a discussion of the general subject of slavery as would be cal[Pg iv]culated to awaken the thoughts, and feelings, especially of those who have not had an opportunity of examining this question in larger and more ably written productions. There are thousands of honest people who would take a decided position on a Christian anti-slavery platform, and throw their whole influence in the right direction if they were made acquainted with slavery as it is, and with their duties religiously and politically in relation to it. It is with the design of benefiting the common people—the people of plain sense—who are not offended at plain talk and plain facts, that the following work is published. If the workingmen of the free and slave States can be aroused into action, slavery must fly from the churches and perish from the nation.
With this purpose in view, we have sketched a history of the African slave trade, showing how slavery originated; have defined slavery—proving that its essential principle is property in a human being; and laws, facts and incidents have been adduced to illustrate the system so that even a child may see and feel its enormity.
And, as a corrupt moral sense has been still more corrupted by efforts to bring revealed religion to the support of slavery, particular pains have been taken to prove that not a single word, nor precept, nor example can be adduced from the Bible which sanctions any such system; and that the whole spirit of religion as revealed under the old economy and the new, is utterly and irreconcilably opposed to all slavery.
It has been thought proper to present a concise view of the position occupied by the American Churches upon this question. No church can complain when its ecclesiastical action on so grave a subject is re-published. And besides, it is quite necessary for honest people to know on what platforms the religious denominations of the country stand.
The true position of a religious society or church in relation to slavery is exhibited. This is a point of more than ordinary importance. The doctrine is maintained that the honor of the Bible, the purity, power, peace, and success of the Church, its duty to God, to freedom, to slaveholders and especially to slaves, demand that it have no fellowship with slaveholding.
Particular pains have been taken to point out the political duties of Christians in relation to slavery.
The inquiry, “how are we to get rid of slavery?” is taken up, and the position assumed and defended that it ought to be abolished immediately.
The book closes with a glance at the prospects. The watchman tells us that the sky from many points of observation is dark, but still that there are some very encouraging indications. The uncorrupted conscience, reason, truth, Christianity and prayer, are on the side of the oppressed; and God, who is love, is their hope, and cannot fail to come to their help and bring them forth with a mighty hand and an out-stretched arm.
Quite a number of works on slavery have been consulted in the preparation of this discussion, among which may be mentioned, “American Slave Code” by Mr. Goodell; “Barnes on Slavery;” “Bible Servitude,” by E. Smith; “Elliott on American Slavery;” “Slavery and the Church,” by Mr. Hosmer; “Debate on Slavery by Blanchard & Rice;” “Non-fellowship with Slaveholders,” by Mr. Fee; “Sermon on the Slave Trade” by Jonathan Edwards; and “Thirteenth Annual Report of the American and Foreign Anti-slavery Society.”
No “mealy words” have been used in this book. I have only aimed to present the plain truth, and shall be rewarded in whatever mite of influence it may cast on the side of liberty.
Seven millions of slaves in America—Slavery originated in the African slave trade—Slave-trade unprovoked—Excited by lust for gold—Commenced by the Portuguese in 1434—Spaniards in 1511—English in 1556—President Edwards quoted—100,000 annually destroyed—Report made to the British House of Commons—Startling statistics—A slave ship described—Slave-trade declared to be piracy and abolishedpage 13
A slave is a chattel—Authorities quoted—Advertised and sold as property—Facts adduced—sale of a boy—a woman with an infant in her arms—a mother—American slave-code identical in principle with the Romanpage 30[Pg viii]
Slaves denied an education—Laws—Instances—Slavery disregards matrimonial connections—Painful factspage 41
Slavery disregards the parental and filial relations—Facts—Slave-mother’s lamentpage 56
Slavery utterly impoverishes its victims—Exposes them to unbridled lust—unrestrained passion—irresponsible tyranny—Heart-rending incidents!page 64
Severity of laws against slaves—partial—unreasonable and cruel—Practice worse than the laws—Burning of slaves—Horrible examplespage 80[Pg ix]
Curse of Canaan—Doubtful authority—Did not allude to slavery—A mere prediction at best—Africans not the descendants of Canaanpage 88
Patriarchal servitude and slavery—No patriarch ever owned a slave—Slavery had no existence in the time of the patriarchs—Diodorus, Athenĉus and Rollin quoted—The Hebrew word SERVANT not equivalent to the English word SLAVE—Abraham’s servants converts from idolatrypage 94
Law of Moses and slavery—Levitical statutes not perfect—Allowed what it would now be wrong to practice—Dr. Stowe quoted—Servitude under the law of Moses essentially different from American slavery—Meaning of “buy,” “heathen,” “bondmen,” and “forever,”—Servants not stolen—Voluntary—Provision for religious improvement—Kind treatment—Could not be sold—Equal to their masters—Certain emancipation—Salvation of the heathen the primary design of introducing foreign servantspage 107[Pg x]
New Testament and slavery—Servants mentioned but not SLAVES—Doulos does not mean SLAVE—New Testament does not regulate slavery because it cannot be regulated—Slaveholders not addressed by the Apostles—Onesimus not a slave—Character of Roman slavery—Contrary to the fundamental principles of revealed religion—The character of God—Common origin of man—General Redemption—Moral precepts—And is necessarily unjust and unequalpage 124
Presbyterians (O. S. and N. S.)—Congregational—Methodist Episcopal, North and South—Methodist Protestant—Wesleyan Methodist Connection—Baptist, Regular—Freewill—Seventh Day—Evangelical Association—United Brethren—Various Churches—Summary Viewpage 149
Scriptural view—Church must keep slaveholders out—If they get in, it must expel them—If the Church sanction slavery officially or practically, withdraw from it—Non-slaveholding required that it may be holy—The pillar of truth—That it may honor the Scriptures—Convert the world—Be faithful to slaveholders and to slaves—Non-fellowship required by decency—humanity—If fellowshiped, we shall have slaveholding preachers, and women-sellers and cradle-plunderers for class-mates—Cases givenpage 169[Pg xi]
Kind slaveholders—Examples—Excusable slaveholders—Slavery a political matter—Fault of the public corruption—Fault of the laws—Slaveholders from necessity—Slaves their property—All right ONLY this one thing—Take them in to convince them of the wrong—Mr. Fee’s opinionpage 184
Necessity of government—Obligation of political action—Voters responsible for slavery—United States Constitution does not endorse slavery—Founders of the Republic intended that slavery should die out speedily—Character of the government changed—Great work for Christian citizens—Slavery in the District—Territories—Slave States—Throughout the worldpage 195
The duty plain and scriptural—Break every yoke—proclaim a year of Jubilee—Slavery cannot be reformed—Slaves prepared for freedom—Free people of color—Fugitives in Canada—West India emancipation—Colored people not dangerous when free—Amalgamation—Our fears originate in our guilt—Colonization scheme impracticable—Wrong—Watkins quoted—All objections mere excuses—We must emancipate to escape the judgments of God—Too long delayed—A good examplepage 206[Pg xii]
The government intensely pro-slavery—Political horizon lowering—The great denominations and benevolent societies heartily supporting slavery—Ecclesiastical heavens dark—Deep prejudices in the masses of the people—Douglass quoted—God is on the side of the oppressed—He is stirring the nation—Question cannot rest—Agitation goes on—Truth is on the side of the slave—Literature coming to his aid—A pure Church arising to plead his cause—“Toil and trust.”page 219
On the continent of America and adjacent Islands there are more than seven millions of slaves. Between three and four millions of these are enslaved by the most liberal, enlightened and prosperous nation on the Globe. The American Republic is a great slaveholding nation, and, viewed in its slaveholding character, might fitly be termed also, the American Despotism. The highest form of freedom is here enjoyed by about twenty millions of persons and the lowest type of slavery suffered by more than three millions. One seventh of all born under our Democratic Constitution and under our world-renowned stars and stripes, are hereditary slaves.
American slavery has flourished three hundred years, being coeval with the Reformation, and running back over one twentieth part of[Pg 14] the whole period of time since Adam. Nine generations of slaves, under a crushing weight of despotism, have toiled and suffered on through a wretched life, and have gone murmuring down to the grave.
We shall now inquire into the origin of this immense iniquity. American slavery originated directly in the African slave trade; a trade most dishonorable to human nature, bad as that nature is admitted to be, and most disgraceful to christian civilization. Its history, although not fully written, except by heaven’s recording angel, cannot be read by a humane person, even in its fragmentary form, without the deepest sorrow. It is a history of villainy, of relentless cruelty, of raging, hollow-hearted avarice and of unmitigated diabolism on the one side; and of wrongs, wretchedness and writhing anguish on the other.
Nothing had occurred to provoke a marauding attack upon the Africans. They were a peaceable and harmless people, and had no means of exciting either the jealousy or the displeasure of Europeans. They had not violated treaties, nor declared wars. The bloody wars among the African tribes, of which we hear so much from those who would palliate the atrocities of the slave trade, were excited by the traders themselves, and so far from palliating,[Pg 15] only add blackness to the darkness of their crimes. The old Roman soldier, who enslaved a national enemy whom he valiantly met and conquered in what is called honorable warfare, might have claimed, with the semblance of plausibility, that the life he had spared legitimately belonged to him. But the African slave trader could not plead even this unmanly and unmerciful apology. The Africans were not national enemies, and were not in arms.
No, it was not revenge, ambition, or patriotism, but CUPIDITY which prompted the slave trade—
Avaricious men launched and manned the slave ship, unfurled the sails and stood at the helm. In their perilous voyage over the wide ocean, amid storms and tempests, not one noble impulse swelled their bosoms; not one philanthropic purpose strengthened their courage; not one humane pulsation throbbed in their hearts. The slaver went on its long voyage under the patronage of the Prince of darkness, for the one and only purpose of making gold out of the sale of the bodies and souls of men; of distilling wealth from blood and tears and agony. Montgomery said truly—
But it was not avarice in the crew of the slave ship alone which incited and drove this iniquitous business. The prime movers were the owners of the estates to be worked. Had those men been unwilling to grow rich upon unrewarded toil, the slaver never would have sailed to Africa and plundered its shores. But the piratical crew and the purchasers of the victims of their nefarious traffic were in a villainous co-partnership.
When the slaver had reached its destination and had anchored off the slave coast, the following methods were employed in securing a cargo. 1st. Declarations of friendship were made and many of the unsuspecting natives were induced, out of curiosity or for trade, to go aboard the vessel, and when there were suddenly confined and permitted no more to return. 2d. Parties of the crew were sent out to surprise and carry off innocent children and youth as they went to the fields or gathered in groups to play in the groves. Think of the anguish of those African mothers and of the distress of their affrighted children! 3d. Villages were[Pg 17] fired in the night, and as many of the defenseless inhabitants as could be captured by force of arms were carried off. 4th. The chiefs of different tribes were hired to act as the agents of the slaver in procuring slaves. Rum, of which all savages are extremely fond, was the principal incentive. Inflamed by this demon, the native chiefs made war upon each other, and sold the prisoners captured to the traders for a fresh supply of rum.
The African slave trade was commenced on a small scale a few years before the discovery of America. We learn from the Encyclopedia Americana “that, in 1434, a Portuguese captain name Alonzo Gonzales, landed in Guinea, and carried away some colored lads, whom he sold advantageously to Moorish families settled in the South of Spain. Six years after, he committed a similar robbery, and many merchants imitated the practice, and built a fort to protect the traffic.”
After a discovery of the Gold Mines of America, quite a number of negroes were imported, first by the Portuguese then by the Spaniards, to labor in those mines. In 1511 Ferdinand, King of Spain, authorized the importation of a large number. About this period it is said, and generally believed that Bartolomeo las Cas, a Catholic Priest, influenced by[Pg 18] a feeling of pity toward the Indians, whom the Spaniards were enslaving, proposed to Ximenes the regular importation of negroes. Whether this be true or not, Charles the V. in 1517, granted the privilege to Lebresa, of importing 4000 slaves to America annually. Lebresa sold his right to import to Genoese merchants, for about $25,000. These merchants now commenced the slave trade in earnest.
Sir John Hawkins has the honor of being the first English captain who engaged in the business of stealing negroes. In 1556 he made an unsuccessful effort at negro catching near Cape Verd. He made another effort at a different point; and after burning the towns, was so bravely resisted by the inhabitants, that he lost seven men, and only captured ten. He continued his depredations until his ship was loaded with human beings, which he sold in America.[1] The trade was now vigorously prosecuted by the christian nations of Europe. It is said that Charles the V., Louis XIII. and Queen Elizabeth had some trouble with their consciences about this horrible trade, but they were quieted by the argument that it brought the African into a good situation to be converted! Pope Leo X. declared that “not only the[Pg 19] christian religion but nature itself cried out against a State of slavery.”
These feeble expressions of disapprobation were scarcely heard and the trade went on vigorously—cupidity triumphing over conscience and silencing almost, for many years, the voice of humanity and religion.
An extract from a sermon preached on the slave trade by President Edwards, in the year 1791 will now be quoted. At the time this good man lifted his voice against this traffic, it will be remembered that it was authorized by the Constitution of the United States, and was a source of great profit to those engaged in it.
“The slave trade is wicked and abominable on account of the cruel manner in which it is carried on. Beside the stealing or kidnapping of men, women and children, in the first instance, and the instigation of others to this abominable practice, the inhuman manner in which they are transported to America, and in which they are treated on the passage and in their subsequent slavery, is such as ought forever to deter every man from acting any part in this business, who has any regard to justice or humanity. They are crowded so closely into the holds and between the decks of vessels, that they have room scarcely to lie down, and[Pg 20] some times not room to sit up in an erect posture, the men at the same time fastened together with irons, by two and two: and all this in the most sultry climate. The consequence of the whole is, that the most dangerous and fatal diseases are soon bred among them, whereby vast numbers of those exported from Africa perish in the voyage; others in dread of that slavery which is before them, and in distress and despair from the loss of their parents, their children, their husbands, their wives, all their dear connections, and their dear native country itself, starve themselves to death, or plunge themselves into the ocean. Those who attempt in the former of those ways to escape from their persecutors, are tortured by live coals placed to their mouths. Those who attempt an escape in the latter and fail, are equally tortured by the most cruel beating. If any of them make an attempt as they sometimes do, to recover their liberty, some, and as the circumstance may be, many, are put to immediate death, others, beaten, bruised, cut and mangled in a most inhuman and shocking manner, are in this situation, exhibited to the rest, to terrify them from the like attempt in future: and some are delivered up to every species of torment, whether by the application of the whip, or of any other instrument, even of fire[Pg 21] itself, as the ingenuity of the ship master, or of his crew is able to suggest, or their situation will admit; and these torments are purposely continued for several days before death is permitted to afford relief to these objects of vengeance.
“By these means, according to the common computation, twenty-five thousand, which is a fourth part of those who are exported from Africa, and by the concession of all, twenty thousand, annually perish, before they arrive at the places of their destination in America.”
The same writer computed that of the one hundred thousand slaves annually exported, 60,000 were captives taken in war, and that ten persons were killed in the capture of one. Sixty thousand then in the time of Jonathan Edwards were slain in battle, 40,000 destroyed on the voyage and in the seasoning, making an annual destruction of 100,000 men, woman and children, in order to procure 60,000 slaves! This computation may be relied upon, as Jonathan Edwards was a careful writer, and no enthusiast.
For three hundred years this horrible traffic had been prosecuted before Mr. Edwards delivered the sermon from which we have quoted, and at that period the annual slaughter was 100,000, and the annual enslave[Pg 22]ment 60,000! How many perished during those three hundred years God only knows. Rum had excited wars among the natives, and the whole coast, and far into the interior was turned into a battle field. No one was safe. The poor African could not lie down securely at night, for men-stealers were ransacking the country watching for their prey like hungry tigers; villages were burned, property destroyed, and the wretched inhabitants, either captured, killed, or caused to fly from their homes, and perish perhaps with famine.
In a report made to the British House of Commons, it was estimated that from 1807 to 1847, including a period of only forty years, ten millions of persons had been made the victims of this traffic! Ten millions; one-half of whom were murdered in Africa; one fourth during the “middle passage;” and the remaining fourth reduced to property and doomed, with their posterity, to a life of degradation, suffering and toil! And all this gigantic robbery and murder perpetrated in the favored nineteenth century!
Permit me to direct your attention to a single slave ship which sailed only a few years ago. This ship was examined by the officers of a British man-of-war. The follow[Pg 23]ing is from the pen of Mr. Walsh, an eye witness of what he relates.
“The ship had taken in, on the coast of Africa, 336 males and 226 females, making in all 562, and had been out 17 days, during which she had thrown overboard fifty five!
“The slaves were all enclosed under grated hatchways between decks. The space was so low, that they sat between each other’s legs, and they were stowed so close together, that there was no possibility of their lying down, or at all changing their position by night or day. As they belonged to, and were shipped on account of different individuals, they were all branded like sheep, with the owner’s marks of different forms. These were impressed under their breasts or on their arms, and as the mate informed me, with perfect indifference, quiemados pelo ferro quento—burnt with the red hot iron. Over the hatchway stood a ferocious looking fellow with a scourge of many twisted thongs in his hand, who was the slave driver of the ship; and whenever he heard the slightest noise below, he shook it over them, and seemed eager to exercise it. As soon as the poor creatures saw us looking down at them their dark and melancholy visages brightened up. They perceived something of sympathy and kindness in our looks which they had not been[Pg 24] accustomed to, and feeling instinctively, that we were friends, they immediately began to shout and clap their hands. One or two had picked up a few Portuguese words, and cried out Viva! viva! The women were particularly excited. They all held up their arms; and when we bent down and shook hands with them, they could not contain their delight, they endeavored to scramble upon their knees, stretching up to kiss our hands; and we understood that they knew we had come to liberate them. Some, however, hung down their heads, in apparently hopeless dejection, some were greatly emaciated, and some, particularly children, seemed dying. But the circumstance which struck us most forcibly, was, how it was possible for such a number of human beings to exist, packed up and wedged together as tight as they could cram, in low cells, three feet high, the greater part of which, except that immediately under the hatchways, was shut out from light or air, and this when the thermometer, exposed to the open sky, was stand-in the shade, on our deck at 89°. The space between the decks was divided into two compartments, three feet, three inches high; the size of one was 16 feet by 18 feet, and of the other 40 feet by 21 feet; into the first there were crammed the women and girls, into the[Pg 25] second the men and boys; 226 fellow beings were thus thrust into one space 288 feet square, and 336 into another 800 feet square, giving to the whole an average of 23 inches, and to each of the women, not more than thirteen. The heat of these horrid places was so great and the odor so offensive, that it was quite impossible to enter them even had there been room. They were measured as above when the slaves had left them. The officers insisted that the poor suffering creatures should be admitted on deck to get air and water. This was opposed by the mate of the slaver, who, from a feeling that they deserved it, declared they would murder them all. The officers (of the Eng. ship,) however, persisted, and the poor beings were all turned up together. It is impossible to conceive the effect of this eruption; 507 fellow creatures of all ages and sizes, some children, some adults, old men and women, all in a state of total nudity, scrambling out together to taste a little pure air and water. They came swarming up like bees from the aperture of a hive, till the whole deck was crowded to suffocation, from stem to stern; so that it was impossible to imagine where they could all have come from, or how they could all have been stowed away. On looking into the places where they had been crammed, there were[Pg 26] found some children next the sides of the ship, in the places most remote from light and air; they were lying in nearly a torpid state, after the rest had turned out. The little creatures seemed indifferent as to life or death; and when they were carried on deck, many of them could not stand. After enjoying, for a short time, the unusual luxury of air, some water was brought; it was then that the extent of their sufferings was exposed in a fearful manner. They all rushed like maniacs toward it. No entreaties, or threats, or blows could restrain them; they shrieked, and struggled, and fought with one another, for a drop of this precious liquid, as if they grew rabid at the sight of it. When the poor creatures were ordered down again, several of them came, and pressed their heads against our knees, with looks of the greatest anguish, at the prospect of returning to the horrid place of suffering below.”[2]
But the English ship was obliged to release the slaver and abandon to despair those defenseless victims, as it was found upon examination that it had not violated a vile privilege then allowed Brazilian ships to obtain slaves south of a certain line.
It is a humiliating fact that for a period of three centuries the whole christian world was[Pg 27] engaged in plundering a heathen shore of its inhabitants, speculating in their bodies and souls and spreading amongst them intemperance, war and all unutterable woes. The history of this wickedness will never be fully known until the general judgment. Then will the ocean have a tale to tell of the thousands who were smothered in the slave prisons which floated upon her bosom, and of the multiplied thousands who were famished and buried in her deeps. The sea will send up her witnesses, and Africa, wet with tears and blood, will bear a testimony before God in that day which will make the ears of all that hear it to tingle!
But let us glance at a more hopeful view of the subject. In 1783 a petition was addressed to the house of Parliament, Great Britain, for the abolition of this trade. Thomas Clarkson was the mover, and the great champion of the cause. In 1788 Mr. Pitt presented a petition against the trade and introduced the subject of its abolition into the house of Commons. The opposition to this measure was united, powerful and violent. At length in 1792 the house of Commons passed a bill for the abolition of the slave trade to take place in 1795. This bill was rejected in the House of Lords. About this time the National Assembly in France, de[Pg 28]clared all the slaves in the French colonies free. Mr. Wilberforce brought into the British Parliament another bill in 1796, which provided that this trade should be abolished forever after 1797—but this bill was lost also. The efforts of the friends of humanity were redoubled, and in “1806 Fox moved that the House of Commons should declare the slave trade inconsistent with justice, humanity and sound policy, and immediately take effective measures for its abolition.” This measure passed by a large majority—and Jan. 1808 was fixed as the time for its abolition. In 1824 a law was passed declaring the trade to be piracy. Portugal provided for the total abolition of this trade in 1823. France in 1815—Spain in 1820—Netherlands in 1818—Sweden in 1813—Brazil in 1830—Denmark in 1804. The United States prohibited it by Constitution in 1809—and in 1814 engaged by the treaty of Ghent to do all in her power for its entire suppression.
But, notwithstanding these praiseworthy efforts, the trade continued, and with increased barbarity, and is even yet carried on to some extent in defiance of all the navies of the world.
We have now seen that avarice was at the bottom of the slave trade; that it was an unprovoked and unparalleled outrage upon the Africans; that it was prosecuted without the[Pg 29] slightest regard to the comfort or lives of the captured; that the whole civilized world, after an experience of centuries, became horrified at its terrible iniquity; that now the trade is declared to be PIRACY; that the slave-ship can be protected by no flag under heaven; and that all who engage in the trade may be captured and hanged up by the neck as the most execrable wretches.
Thus a traffic which received the sanction of the Pope of Rome, and was prosecuted under the immediate auspices of Christian kings and governments for three centuries, was attacked by Clarkson, Wilberforce and other agitators, and, though powerfully defended by avarice and interest; though hoary with age; though protected by statesmen, by the commercial and planting interests, that attack was vigorously followed up until reason, religion and humanity felt outraged by it, and demanded in a voice which rulers dared not refuse to hear, that it be at once and forever abolished. So much for agitation! Thank God for this progress!
That we may proceed intelligently in the discussion of the subject upon which we have entered, it is important to understand precisely what American slavery is. Some learned men have confused this subject by confounding the relation of the slave with other relations from which it essentially differs. An apprentice, a miner, hired laborer, serf or a villein is not a slave. All these relations lack, as we shall see, the distinguishing feature of slavery. The slave is placed in a condition far removed from any other class of human beings in enlightened, civilized, or savage society. He stands in a legal relation below all others.
The American slave code describes the slave and slavery with remarkable precision and horrible distinctness. According to that code a slave is a CHATTEL. He is, body, soul and spirit, to all intents and purposes whatsoever, PROPERTY—the property of the master to whom he belongs; and slavery is that “peculiar institution” which, originating in piracy, systematically despoils human beings of their manhood[Pg 31]—of all inborn rights, degrades them to the state of chattelhood, and forcibly detains them in that degradation. Property in a human creature is the essential and peculiar principle of slavery. This is the basis of the system, and all laws, regulations, usages, deprivations, wrongs, sins, sufferings and miseries which belong to the system are built upon this foundation. Numerous and cruel systems of oppression have existed but not one of them has ventured to lay sacrilegious hands upon “the image of God,” and convert it into a thing to be bought, sold, executed for debt, willed, and used as an article of merchandise. Slavery alone has done this. Some authorities will now be cited to prove the correctness of this definition.
“The cardinal principle of slavery, that the slave is not to be ranked among sentient beings but among things, obtains in all these (slave) states.” (Judge Stroud.)
“Slaves shall be claimed, held, taken, reputed, and adjudged in law, to be chattels personal in the hands of their owners and possessors, and their executors, administrators and assigns to all intents and purposes whatsoever.” (Law of South Carolina.)
“A slave is one who is in the power of the master to whom he belongs; the master may[Pg 32] sell him, dispose of his person, his industry, and his labor; he can do nothing, possess nothing nor acquire anything but what must belong to his master.” (Law of Louisiana.)
“A slave is in absolute bondage; he has no civil rights, and can hold no property, except at the will and pleasure of his master; a slave is a rational being, endowed with understanding like the rest of mankind; and whatever he lawfully acquires, and gains possession of by finding or otherwise, is the acquirement and possession of his master.” (Wheeler.)
A law of Mississippi reads thus: “When any sheriff or other officer shall serve an attachment upon slaves, horses, or other live stock,” etc. “Being property, slaves may be bought and sold by persons capable of buying and selling other property.” (Hon. J. K. Paulding.)
Henry Clay said—“I know that there is a visionary dogma which holds that negro slaves cannot be the subject of property. I shall not dwell on the speculative abstraction. That is property which the law declares to be property. Two hundred years of legislation have sanctified and sanctioned negro slaves as property.”
Any one who will take up a southern newspaper will soon discover from the manner in which slaves are advertised for sale, that the laws which reduce them to chattels are not[Pg 33] dead statutes. An advertisement in the Richmond (Va.) Whig, is headed thus:
“Large sale of negroes, horses mules and cattle.” Among the articles to be sold are, 175 negroes, among whom are some carpenters and blacksmiths, 10 horses, 33 mules, 100 head of cattle, 100 sheep and 200 hogs. “The negroes will be sold for cash, the other property on a credit of nine months.”[3]
Whole volumes of such advertisements might be collected from the most respectable and widely circulated southern journals, and I have seen a few advertisements for the sale of men women and children, hogs, corn and cattle promiscuously, in respectable religious papers, sustained by churches whose leading avowed object is, to “spread scriptural holiness over these lands.”
And slaves are not only advertised but actually sold as property is sold. Raising slaves for the market, selling them, speculating upon them and driving them from one State to another, creates an extensive and lucrative trade. The Virginia Times estimated that in 1836 the number of slaves exported from Virginia alone was forty thousand—worth $24,000,000. The Natchez Courier estimated that in 1836 two hundred and fifty thousand slaves had been imported into Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Arkansas, from the more Northern States. The Baltimore Register said, “Dealing in slaves has become a large business; establishments are made in several places in Md. and Va. at which they are sold like cattle.” Prof. Dew said in 1831; “Virginia is in fact a negro raising State for the other states.” Judge Upshur of Va. said in the Va. Convention, 1831; “The value of slaves as an article of property, de[Pg 35]pends much on the state of the market abroad. If it should be our lot, as I trust it will be, to acquire the country of Texas, their price will rise again.” “From the single port of Baltimore,” says Mrs. Stowe “in the last two years, a thousand and thirty slaves have been shipped to the southern market.” Slaves now bring a very high price in cash. Only the other day a brick-layer in S. C. sold for $1,905; three others at the same sale brought over $1000 each.
In the prosecution of this traffic the feelings and interests, the parental, connubial and filial relations of slaves are utterly disregarded. They are sold for the benefit of the master, as a horse is sold, and bought to suit the purchaser. To all intents and purposes slaves are daily bought and sold like cattle. Alas, that my pen is compelled to write this fact.
A respectable gentleman (Dr. Elwood) was an eye witness to a sale of slaves in Petersburg, Va., in 1846. He saw some old men and women go upon the auctioneer’s stand to be sold to the highest bidder. The case of a beautiful youth affected him most deeply. “His hair,” said Mr. E. “was brown and straight, his skin exactly the hue of white persons, and no discernible trace of negro features in his countenance. Some vulgar jests were passed[Pg 36] on his color, and 00 was bid for him; but the audience remarked that was not enough to begin on for such a likely young negro; some said a white negro was more trouble than he was worth. Before he was sold his mother rushed from the house upon the portico, crying in frantic grief, ‘My son, O! my boy, they will take away my dear’—Here her voice was lost as she was rudely pushed back and the door closed. The sale was not for a moment interrupted, and none of the crowd appeared to be affected by the scene. The poor boy trembled and wiped the tears from his cheeks with his sleeves. He was sold for about 250 dollars.”
After this boy was sold a woman was called upon the stand. She had an infant in her arms, but she dared not take it with her. “She gave it one wild embrace, before leaving it with an old woman, and hastened mechanically to obey the call; but stopped, threw up her arms, screamed and was unable to move!” Those who know a mother’s love can understand the agony which raged in her maternal bosom.
The following is from the pen of an aged preacher, now living in Canada, who escaped from slavery some years since. When the master to whom he belonged died, he, with his fellow slaves, were put up for sale. Said he—
“My brothers and sisters were bid off one by[Pg 37] one, while my mother, holding my hand, looked on in an agony of grief, the cause of which I but ill understood at first, but which dawned on my mind with dreadful clearness as the sale proceeded. My mother was then separated from me, and put up in her turn. She was bought by a man named Isaac R——, in Montgomery county, Md., and then I was offered to the assembled purchasers. My mother half distracted with the parting forever from all her children pushed through the crowd, while the bidding for me was going on, to the spot where R. was standing. She fell at his feet and clung to his knees, entreating him in tones that a mother only could command, to buy her baby as well as herself, and spare to her one of her little ones at least.” But this man thus appealed to “disengaged himself from her with such violent kicks and blows as to reduce her to the necessity of creeping out of his reach and mingling the groan of bodily suffering with the sob of a broken heart.”
These cases are presented as examples to show the meaning and intent of the code which declares that a slave is property—and has no rights or interests; and they are not rare and extreme cases brought in here only for effect, but are such as occur daily in all the slave states; and they are perfectly in keeping[Pg 38] with the spirit of American slavery. Those persons were sold precisely as other property is sold.
From these authorities and facts it is clear that a slave occupies a relation as far beneath the apprentice, miner, hired laborer, or even the villein of the Feudal Age, or the Russian serf, as mere property is beneath manhood with all its possessions and God-like powers—as far as a brute is below a man “made in the image of God.”
The American slave code is almost an exact copy of the old savage Roman slave code, which was conceived in the dark night of heathenism, and brought forth reeking with blood in the unholy travail of sanguinary wars, before that empire had been enlightened and conquered by the peaceful and just Gospel of Christ. That it may be seen where English and American law-makers obtained the spirit of the American slave code, the following synopsis of the Roman law on slavery is inserted.
“By the Roman civil law, slaves were esteemed merely as chattels of their masters; they had no name but what the master was pleased to give them for convenience. They were not capable of personal injuries cognizable by the law. They could take neither by purchase nor descent, could have no heirs,[Pg 39] could make no will. The fruits of their labor and industry belonged to their masters. They could not plead nor be impleaded, and were utterly excluded from all civil concerns. They were incapable of marriage, not being entitled to the considerations thereof. The laws of adultery did not (among themselves) effect them. They might be sold, transferred, mortgaged, pawned. Partus sequitur ventrem was the rule indiscriminately applied to slaves and cattle.” (Harris and McHenry.)[4]
At a glance it will be seen that the Roman and American slave codes are identical in spirit—that the distinguishing principle of both is property in man. Our christian legislators therefore must acknowledge themselves indebted to Pagan Rome for the type of slavery which they have instituted and maintained in Christian America. All the main features of cruelty, injustice and savageness, inherent in that ancient system of oppression, have been faithfully copied, and not in the slightest degree modified or softened.
Let us recapitulate. A slave is property. His bones and sinews, genius, skill, virtue, mind, soul; all he is, all he may be, all he acquires in this life, belongs to his master and is put down in his ledger as worth so many dollars. He is without choice as to what he will do, what amount of labor he will perform, or for whom he shall toil. He can own nothing, inherit nothing, will nothing. He cannot make a contract for himself, nor claim the protection of the laws as a man. He is wholly in the power of his master and totally defenseless against his lusts, avarice, or brutality. I defy human ingenuity, nay, if I may be so bold, I challenge Lucifer himself to invent a system of oppression which leaves a man more completely destitute, defenseless and degraded.
We will now enter more definitely into an examination of that terrible institution which practically justifies the African slave-trade by holding on to its victims and substituting in its stead an inter-state slave-trade in moral turpitude fully equaling it; which, in a land of free institutions, holds in galling chains more than three millions of our dear fellow creatures; annually robs a hundred thousand American mothers of their babes; and despoils one hundred thousand children every year of that precious freedom which is their birthright and reduces them to a level with unreasoning beasts. Our task will be painful, but let us proceed.
1. Slaves are denied an education. I think it is universally admitted that education and slavery are utterly incompatible, and that total ignorance of letters and general imbecility of intellect are essential to its successful continuance, and indeed, its very existence in any country. Hence in the United States, where millions of dollars are annually expended for schools and colleges, and where it is almost[Pg 42] universally believed that a sound education is conducive to good morals, the spread of civilization, the preservation of liberty and the progress of Christianity, even here nothing is done for the education of slaves. While millions of free children are annually gathered into schools and diligently instructed, the children of slaves, although equally capable, are permitted to grow up without the least attention to their mental culture. But this, though bad enough, is not the worst. If slaves were at liberty to follow out their own inclinations, they might many of them, even without encouragement or help, acquire a respectable education. But the laws punish the slave with great severity who, with any motive or under any circumstances, may attempt to learn to read or write, and also any person who may teach him.
Some of the laws and opinions relating to the education of slaves, (free negroes generally included) will now be cited. “Virginia Revised Code of 1819. That all meetings or assemblages of slaves or free negroes, or free negroes and mulattoes mixing and associating with such slaves at any meeting house or houses &c., in the night; or at any school or schools for teaching them reading or writing either in the day or night, under whatsoever pretext, shall be deemed and considered an UNLAWFUL ASSEM[Pg 43]BLY; and any justice of a county wherein such assemblage shall be, shall issue his warrant, directed to any sworn officer or officers, authorizing him or them to enter the house or houses where such unlawful assemblages may be, for the purpose of apprehending or dispersing such slaves, and to inflict corporal punishment on the offender or offenders, at the discretion of any justice of the peace not exceeding twenty lashes.” (Goodell’s American Slave Code.)
No person in Virginia is allowed to open a school for the instruction of colored persons or to teach them to read and write under a penalty of $100 and six months imprisonment. It may be thought that these laws are not now enforced and stand as a dead letter upon the statute book. But the following cool item of news published in the Richmond Examiner under date of May 12th, 1853, will satisfy any one that they are enforced.
“Breaking up a Negro School.—The officers at Norfolk made a descent on Tuesday upon a negro school, kept in the neighborhood of the Stone Bridge, by a Mrs. Douglass and her daughter, and the teachers, together with their sable pupils, were taken before his Honor. They acknowledged their guilt, but pleaded ignorance of the law, and were discharged, on a promise to do so no more; a very convenient[Pg 44] way of getting out of the scrape. The law of this State imposes a fine of one hundred dollars, and imprisonment for six months, for such offenses; is positive, and allows no discretion in the committing magistrate.”
If a free negro in North Carolina attempt to teach a slave to read, or if he give to a slave a religious tract, a spelling book or the bible, he may be imprisoned or take thirty-nine lashes! If a white person attempt to teach a slave the laws subject him to a fine of $200 for each offense.
“In Georgia, if a white teach a free negro or a slave to write he is fined $500, and imprisoned at the discretion of the Court; if the offender be a colored man, bond or free, he may be fined or whipped at the discretion of the Court. This law was enacted in 1829.” (Jay’s Inquiry.)
“In Louisiana the penalty for teaching slaves to read and write is one year’s imprisonment.”
“In North Carolina, the patrols were ordered to search every negro house for books or prints of every kind. Bibles and hymn books were particularly mentioned.” (Goodell.)
“We have,” said Mr. Berry in the Va. House of Delegates, “as far as possible closed every avenue by which light may enter their minds. If we could extinguish the capacity to see the light,[Pg 45] our work would be completed; they would then be on a level with the beasts of the field and we would be safe! I am not certain that we would not do it, if we could find out the process, and that on the plea of necessity.”
When Frederick Douglass was a slave and belonged to Mr. Auld, his mistress, who had been lately married, manifested toward him true womanly kindness and commenced to teach him the art of reading. “But when my master heard of it,” says Douglass in his Narrative, “he at once forbade Mrs. Auld to instruct me further, telling her among other things, that it was unlawful, as well as unsafe to teach a slave to read. To use his own words further he said, ‘If you give a nigger an inch he will take an ell. A nigger should know nothing but to obey his master—to do as he is told to do. Learning would spoil the best negro in the world. Now, said he, if you teach that nigger (speaking of myself,) how to read there would be no keeping him. It would forever unfit him to be a slave. He would at once become unmanageable, and of no value to his master. As to himself it would do him no good, but a great deal of harm. It would make him discontented and unhappy.’”
Is not that a terrible institution which can only be sustained by enchaining the immortal[Pg 46] mind and withholding entirely the advantages of education? Think of it. A slave’s soul, as is often the case, is possessed with an unquenchable passion for improvement. He has a mind in constant unrest—active, elastic, aspiring. A benevolent friend engages to instruct him at night in the rudiments of learning, but while engaged in this good work the law seizes them, and hurries the slave to the whipping-post and the friend to prison. Twenty, thirty or forty lashes on the bare back are rather poor encouragement to the student, and a heavy fine and long imprisonment with felons hard pay for a teacher. But slavery makes it a crime to learn to read even the bible, and a penitentiary offense to teach a slave the alphabet!
The object of this is plainly declared by Mr. Berry of Va., viz: to close every avenue of light from the slave’s mind—to debase him as low as possible—and thus put resistance out of his power—that he may become a docile and profitable chattel.
These laws are a bold defiance of the Almighty who constructed the marvelous powers of the human mind for improvement and activity and who revealed in written language his word for the comfort and guidance of all his creatures. They interpose a barrier between[Pg 47] the slave and his Maker and thus hinder his salvation. Even convicts in prison are taught to read the scriptures, and in this respect slavery is more severe with its victims than justice is with the worst criminals.
2. Slavery does not recognize the matrimonial connections of slaves. As slaves are to be put as nearly as possible upon a level with “other property” the slave code with singular meanness, but perfect consistency, refuses to the slave a lawful marriage, subjects him to conditions which are inconsistent with that sacred relation, and exposes slave wives to the unbridled lust of masters and overseers!
“With the consent of their masters slaves may marry * * * but whilst in a state of slavery it cannot produce any civil effect, because slaves are deprived of all civil rights.” (Judge Mathews.)
“A slave cannot even contract matrimony, the association which takes place among slaves and is called marriage, being properly designated by the word contubernium, a relation which has no sanctity, and to which no civil rights are attached.” (Judge Stroud.)
“A slave has never maintained an action against the violator of his bed.” (Daniel Dulany, Att’y Gen. Md.)
“Slaves were not entitled to the conditions[Pg 48] of matrimony, and therefore they had no relief in cases of adultery.” (Dr. Taylor.)
“Marriage is a civil ordinance they cannot enjoy. Our laws do not recognize this relation as existing among them, and of course, do not enforce by any sanction, the observance of its duties. Indeed, until slavery waxeth old and tendeth to decay, there cannot be any legal recognition of the marriage rite, or the enforcement of its consequent duties. For all the regulations on this subject would limit the master’s absolute right of property in the slaves. In his disposal of them he could no longer be at liberty to consult merely his own interests. He could no longer separate the wife and the husband to suit the convenience or interest of the purchaser.” (Address of the Synod of Ky.)
The laws intend to make slaves absolute property, and hence no relation is legalized which would detract from the value of that property. The interest of the owner alone is consulted. These laws, horrible as they appear, are entirely consistent with chattel slavery. And the general practice upon these laws comes up fully to their spirit. Whenever the convenience, interest or passion of a master requires it, slaves are sold and scattered abroad without the slightest regard to those dear and sacred connections, which they regard, and[Pg 49] which God, no doubt, regards as marriage. In newspaper advertisements for runaway slaves it is frequently stated that the fugitive property was bought at a certain place “where he has a wife,” and the probability is that he is “lurking about that place.” An advertisement in a New Orleans paper, after describing the slave Charles, as “six feet high,” “copper color,” rather “pleasing appearance,” adds, in order that the pursuers may have some clue to his whereabouts, “it is more than probable that he will make his way to Tennessee, as he has a wife now living there.”
Another advertises the runaway “Ned,” of “copper color, full forehead.” “Ned,” continues the notice, “was purchased in Richmond of Mr. Goodin, and has a wife in that vicinity.”
Another describes a runaway woman, and suggests that she may be lurking about “in the country where her husband is owned.”
These are very natural suggestions. A husband, though a slave, and bound to his wife by no legal tie, is not unfrequently to the slave wife all that husband means, and if that wife escape from her unfeeling oppressors, who have carried her away to a distant State, it is quite natural that she should bend her steps toward the partner of her bosom, and subject herself to incredible hardships and dangers that[Pg 50] she might see his face once more, and unburden to him her sorrow-ladened heart.
And that wife, though a slave, unprotected by the laws, driven by the shameful lash, insulted, disgraced and neglected, is a wife still. And when “Ned,” as he is called, runs away, it is quite natural that he should, impelled by a husband’s love, seek out the hut where years before he had been suddenly separated from her. These advertisements for husbands who are supposed to be “lurking about” in search of their wives, and of wives hunting for their husbands, tell a sad tale. What husband or wife can read them without deep sorrow?
The following statement from the pen of an eye witness will illustrate scenes which are being enacted continually in the prosecution of the inter-state slave trade.
“As I went on board the steamboat I noticed eight colored men, handcuffed and chained together in pairs, four women and eight or ten children of the apparent ages of from four to ten years, all standing together in the bow of the boat, in charge of a man standing near them. * * * Coming near them, I perceived they were all greatly agitated; and, on inquiry I found they were all slaves, who had been born and raised in North Carolina and had just been sold to a speculator, who was[Pg 51] now taking them to the Charleston market. Upon the shore there was a number of colored persons, women and children, awaiting the departure of the boat; and my attention was particularly attracted by two colored females of uncommonly respectable appearance, neatly attired, who stood together, a little distance from the crowd, and upon whose countenance was depicted the keenest sorrow. As the last bell was tolling, I saw the tears gushing from their eyes, and they raised their neat cotton aprons and wiped their faces under the cutting anguish of severed affection. They were the wives of two of the men in chains. There, too, were mothers and sisters, weeping at the departure of their sons and brothers; and there, too, were fathers, taking the last look of their wives and children. My whole attention was directed to those on shore, as they seemed to stand in solemn and submissive silence, occasionally giving utterance to the intensity of their feelings by a sigh or a stifled groan. As the boat was loosed from her moorings, they cast a distressed, lingering look to those on board, and turned away in silence. My eye now turned to those in the boat; and although I had tried to control my feelings amidst my sympathies for those on shore, I could conceal them no longer, and I found myself literally[Pg 52] ‘weeping with those that wept.’ I stood near them, and when one of the husbands saw his wife upon the shore wave her hand for the last time, in token of her affection, his manly efforts to restrain his feelings gave way, and fixing his watery eyes upon her, he exclaimed, ‘This is the most distressing thing of all! My dear wife and children, farewell!’ The husband of the other wife stood weeping in silence, and with his manacled hands raised to his face, as he looked upon her for the last time. Of the poor women on board; three of them had husbands whom they left behind. One of them had three children, another had two, and the third had none. These husbands and fathers were among the throng upon the shore, witnessing the departure of their wives and children, and as they took their leave of them, they were sitting together upon the floor of the boat sobbing in silence, but giving utterance to no complaint. But the distressing scene was not yet ended. Sailing down the Cape Fear river twenty-five miles, we touched at the little village of Smithport, on the south side of the river. It was at this place that one of these slaves lived, and here was his wife and five children; and while at work on Monday last, his purchaser took him away from his family, carried him in chains to Wilmington, where he[Pg 53] had since remained in jail. As we approached the wharf, a flood of tears gushed from his eyes, and anguish seemed to have pierced his heart. The boat stopped but a moment, and as she left, he bid farewell to some of his acquaintances whom he saw upon the shore, exclaiming, ‘Boys, I wish you well; tell Molly (meaning his wife) and the children I wish them well, and hope God will bless them.’ At that moment he espied his wife on the stoop of a house some rods from the shore, and with one hand which was not in the handcuffs, he pulled off his old hat, and waving it toward her, exclaimed, ‘Farewell!’ As he saw by the waving of her apron that she recognized him, he leaned back upon the railing, and with a faltering voice repeated, ‘Farewell, forever.’ After a moment’s silence, conflicting passions seemed to tear open his heart, and he exclaimed, ‘What have I done that I should suffer this doom? Oh, my wife and children, I want to live no longer!’ and then the big tear rolled down his cheek, which he wiped away with the palm of his unchained hand, looked once more upon the mother of his five children, and the turning of the boat hid her face from him forever.”
“I shall never forget the scene which took[Pg 54] place in the city of St. Louis while I was yet in slavery. A man and his wife, both slaves, were brought from the country to the city for sale. They were taken to the rooms of Austin & Savage, auctioneers. Several slave speculators, who are always to be found at auctions where slaves are to be sold, were present. The man was first put up and sold to the highest bidder. The wife was next ordered to ascend the platform. I was present. She slowly obeyed the order. The auctioneer commenced, and soon several hundred dollars were bid. My eyes were intensely fixed on the face of the woman, whose cheeks were wet with tears. But a conversation between the slave and his new master soon arrested my attention. I drew near them to listen. The slave was begging his new master to purchase his wife. Said he, ‘Master, if you will only buy Fanny I know you will get the worth of your money. She is a good cook, a good washer, and her mistress liked her very much. If you will only buy her how happy I will be!’ The new master replied that he did not want her, but, if she sold cheap, he would purchase her. I watched the countenance of the man while the different persons were bidding on his wife. When his new master bid you could see the smile on his countenance, and the tears stop,[Pg 55] but as another would, you could see the countenance change, and the tears start afresh. * * But this suspense did not last long. The wife was struck off to the highest bidder, who proved to be not the owner of her husband. As soon as they became aware that they were to be separated, they both burst into tears; and as she descended from the auction stand, the husband walking up to her and taking her by the hand, said, ‘Well, Fanny we are to part forever on earth. You have been a good wife to me. I did all I could to get my new master to buy you but he did not want you. I hope you will try to meet me in heaven. I shall try to meet you there.’ The wife made no reply but her sobs and cries told too well her own feelings.” (Narrative of William Brown.)
3. Slavery disregards the parental and filial relations. The family is a type of heaven. It is the foundation of the social system—of social order, refinement and happiness. Destroy this relation and the most enlightened people will speedily relapse into barbarism. It is a God-instituted relation, and around it Jesus Christ has thrown the solemn sanction of his authority. Nature implants in the hearts of parents an affection for their offspring which is sweeter than life and stronger than death; and this affection, when associated with intelligence and religion, eminently fits them to care for helpless infancy, to guide the feet of inexperienced youth, and to lead the opening heart and expanding mind to virtue and to God. Without the soothing, ennobling and virtue-inspiring influences which emanate from the domestic hearth, this world, I fear, would become a pandemonium.
But slavery, true to its leading principle, utterly disregards and ruthlessly tramples upon the parental and filial relations. As soon as a child is born of a slave-mother it is put down on the table of stock and is henceforth subject[Pg 57] to the conditions of property. The father cannot say—“This is my son. I will train him up in the fear of God, bestow upon him a liberal education and by help divine make a true man of him, that he may be my staff in old age.” No, the slaveholder has a usurped claim upon the boy, which, in the code of the “lower law,” annihilates entirely the father’s claim. The mother is not permitted to press the new born babe to her throbbing bosom and rejoice over it, saying—“This is my daughter—I will by the assistance of grace give her tender mind a pious inclination, encourage her to walk in the path of virtue and religion, to seek the ‘good part,’ chosen by Mary of old, that she may become an ornament of her sex.” No, that female child is a valuable part of the planter’s stock, and the mother is encouraged to nurse it well that it may bring a high price in the market! Parents have no more to say as to the disposition of their children than animals have as to what shall be done with their young. There is not a law in any State, if we may except Louisiana, which imposes the slightest restraint upon masters who may be disposed to sell the children of slaves. In Louisiana an old law prohibits the separation of slave children from their mothers before they are ten years of age. But this law, were it not a dead letter[Pg 58] as we are assured it is, would afford but a trifling mitigation of the wrong. At any time the master may gather up all the saleable children on his plantation, submit them to the inspection of a trader, strike a bargain for the lot, and then start them off like a drove of young cattle, without saying one word about it to the fathers or mothers of those children. And it often occurs that when the slave mother returns from the field, weary with the toils of the day, she finds her hut desolate. Where are my children? she asks. She calls—no answer—and is presently informed by a fellow-slave that they are sold and gone! Yes—a christian (?) master has taken advantage of her absence and sent them off without giving her a parting word with them! They shall never more return! And yet this distressed mother has no redress.
Maternal love flows in a slave-mother’s bosom with all its wonted depth and intensity, and the total disregard of this affection is the occasion of the deepest sorrows recorded in the annals of slavery.
“In slaveholding States, except in Louisiana no law exists to prevent the violent separation of parents from their children.” (Stroud.) A slave has no more legal authority over his child than a cow has over her calf. (Jay.) John Davis, a dealer in slaves at Hamburg, S. C., ad[Pg 59]vertises that he has on hands, direct from Va., “one hundred and twenty likely young negroes of both sexes; among them small girls, suitable for nurses, and several small boys without their mothers.”
Frederick Douglass relates that “when he was three years old his mother was sent to work on a plantation eight or ten miles distant, and after that he never saw her except in the night. After her days toil she would occasionally walk over to her child, lie down with him in her arms, hush him to sleep in her bosom, then rise up and walk back again to be ready for her field work by daylight.”—Key to Uncle Tom’s Cabin.
The following incident occurred within the present year (1853.) We copy from the Cleveland True Democrat.
“It will be remembered by some of our citizens that about two or three months since, a colored man visited our city for the purpose of obtaining money enough to buy his child that was held as a slave in Kentucky. Through the generosity of J. H. Smith and his congregation, with some added by private individuals, the amount was raised, and the happy negro went on his way rejoicing. Now comes the saddest part of the tale. When the poor colored man arrived at his home, he immediately handed the money, to obtain which had cost[Pg 60] him so much labor, over to a friend, who started immediately to Kentucky. Arriving there, the money was laid before the master by the gentleman, when to the utter astonishment of the latter, the slaveholder burst into a fiendish laugh, and said ‘he’d be —— if he would sell the boy at any price.’ He refused all terms, laughed at all exhortations, and finally ordered the gentleman who wished to purchase the boy out of the house. He left sorrowfully, knowing how his bad success would affect the father, who was in a delirium of joy at the idea of seeing his long lost son. Imagine the feeling of that man when it was communicated to him that his boy was lost forever. Our informant tells us that he said not a word, nor wept; but any one familiar with a human heart, could tell what agony that poor black man was in. He seems to have grown ten years older, and it is feared, unless some change takes place, that he will soon die. His life seems worse than death, and he loudly prays for the latter to come.”
The holder of that boy only did what the laws allowed him to do, and his conduct was in perfect consistency with chattel slavery. Men can do as they like about selling the property which the law allows them.
Scenes of the most provoking and heart-rend[Pg 61]ing character, scenes in which humanity is outraged, scenes which would bring the blood to the cheek of a savage, even to behold, are enacted in all the Southern States from day to day, with seeming unconcern! The most bitter cries pierce the skies and go up to heaven apparently unheard by man. “Here is a man, a slave-trader, driving before him two boys with a hickory stick, and carrying a child under his arm. At a little distance is the mother with chains on her wrists, stretching out her hand toward the babe; but is prevented, because a strong man holds her while she endeavors to follow her shrieking babe and her sobbing boys. The owner who sold the two boys, stands calmly, unmoved, smoking a cigar, while the overseer holds the mother, and the trader whips off the boys and carries with him the screaming child.” This is precisely the way that other live stock is sold, and those dealers are only doing what the law allows. No one is surprised at them. They may be respectable citizens and good church members!
Christian reader, pass not over these facts with a light heart. I beseech you to think upon them as a man and a christian ought. You love home, you esteem family relations the dearest and most sacred upon earth, and you would resist with all your power a tyranny[Pg 62] which would invade your own family circle and carry away your children for the exclusive benefit of others. For humanity’s sake let your sympathies go out in behalf of the millions of your fellow creatures who are deprived of all the blessings of family and home. Have you not a heart to bleed for those mothers whose children, in tender youth, are ruthlessly torn away from them for no higher object than the pecuniary advantage of their masters? J. G. Whittier, the “slave’s poet,” represents in mournful strains the Virginia slave mother’s lament for her daughters, sold and gone to the far South.
4. Slavery utterly impoverishes its victims. The earth is an inheritance bestowed upon man by the common Father of all; hence every human being has an indefeasible right to live upon it and to acquire a possession in it. This right is not simply conventional, but it belongs to man as man.
Now slavery is directly opposed to this law of nature. It strips a slave of everything, and of the power to acquire anything. No one is so poor as a slave. He cannot own a coat, or a pair of shoes, a house, or a foot of land. No industry, economy, skill or patriotism can release him from this state of destitu[Pg 65]tion, because it is a logical result of the relation in which he is placed by the slave code. Being himself a chattel, whatever he acquires or in any way gains possession of, is, as a matter of course, the acquirement and possession of his master. Hence, while living in a land of universal plenty, and toiling incessantly upon the fruitful earth, created and adorned for the use of every man, no alms-house pauper is so wretchedly impoverished as the American slave.
“Slaves have no legal rights in things, real or personal; but whatever they may acquire, belongs in point of law to their masters.” (Stroud.) “Slaves are incapable of inheriting or transmitting property.” (Civil Code.)
Here is a case which will illustrate the point in hand. A slave by the name of Frederick enlisted and fought bravely through the American Revolution. In 1821 his name was found on the muster roll, and a warrant was issued granting him the soldier’s bounty of a thousand acres of land. Now whose land was that? Reason and justice would answer, it belonged to the black veteran and his heirs forever. But the heirs of Frederick’s old master understood something about slave law, and brought the case into court that it might be legally determined who owned the bounty land. After[Pg 66] much learned argument, Judge Catron delivered the following decision:—“Frederick, the slave of Col. Patton, earned this warrant by his services in the continental line. What is earned by the slave belongs to the master, by the common law, the civil law, and the recognized rules of property in the slaveholding States of this Union.”
This was an extreme case, and as Pres. Blanchard observes, “if Shylock’s bond of human flesh might have been relaxed, if ever the laws of slavery might have been mitigated in practice, it ought to have been in the case of this veteran soldier.” But the “pound of flesh” was exacted. The law reducing slaves to utter pauperism is inexorable. Poor Frederick had no more claim to that land than Col. Patton’s horse had.
5. Slavery authorizes the violation of the most solemn contracts. Strictly speaking, a slave cannot become a party to a legal contract. His inability to do so arises out of his relation to society, and the evil genius which presides at all times over legislation for slaves is very careful to permit nothing to be enacted, unless from absolute necessity, that can be construed into an acknowledgment that the slave is a man and has rights which he is authorized to maintain. Hence a contract with a slave may be[Pg 67] violated with impunity. He may suffer the most flagrant wrongs, but is barred from courts of justice and can obtain no relief.
On this point the following authorities are quoted.
“Chancery cannot enforce a contract between a master and his slave though the slave perform his part.” (Wheeler.) “One principle prevails in all the States * * and that is that a slave cannot make a contract, not even the contract of marriage.” (ib.)
“In the case of Sawney vs. Carter the court refused to enforce a promise by a master to emancipate his slave where the conditions of the promise had been partly complied with. The court proceeded upon the principle that it was not competent to a court in Chancery to enforce a contract between a master and slave, even though the contract should be fully complied with on the part of the slave.” (Goodell.)
In numerous instances masters and other white persons have taken advantage of this unjust and malicious feature of slave law. It is no uncommon occurrence for a slave to contract with his master for freedom. He agrees to raise, by extra labor, a specified sum of money which is to be the price of his liberty. Animated with the hope of obtaining that precious right for which he has long sighed, he endures[Pg 68] incredible hardships, toils night after night, and, at the end of many weary years, lays before his master a part or the whole of the price agreed upon. Now when this is done, the master may, in perfect accordance with American slave law, pocket the hard-earned money and sell the slave to the next trader, or keep him until death in his own service. If the slave repine at this treatment, he may be whipped into submission. If he run away, he may be pursued with revolvers and blood-hounds, and we are all required by the Fugitive Slave Law to help catch him and carry him back to his faithless master. A case occurred within the present year in Ky., which illustrates this odious feature of slave law. Here is a brief statement of the facts.
“Sam Norris, a colored man, has been living in Covington about five years, has married a free colored woman and has had by her several children. He belongs to a Mr. J. N. Patton, of Virginia, who permitted him to come to Covington, and engage in whatever services he saw proper, on condition that Sam would pay him out of his earnings, a stipulated sum per annum, we believe, about $100. The surplus, whatever it might be, was to belong to the slave. Sam was punctual for several years. He was sober and industrious, and[Pg 69] in his humble way, very prosperous. About two years ago Mr. Patton came west on a visit and agreed with Sam that if he would pay him the sum of $400 he would give him his freedom. Sam gratefully accepted the proposal, and at once paid down out of his hard earnings $135 and has since given his master some $40 or $50 more.
“Patton now comes forward to rescind the contract and claim his slave. The case was yesterday decided by the Hon. Judge Pryor, in favor of Patton. In delivering his decision, his Honor stated the following facts:
“1st. That the laws of Kentucky recognize but two modes of liberating slaves, by will and by deeds of emancipation.
“2d. That a slave cannot make a contract.
“3d. That the contract was executory, and at the time fixed for the negro’s freedom, future and contingent.
“4th. That so long as Sam was a slave, the master was entitled to his services, and the money he (Patton) had received was in law his own.
“The opinion was able and elaborate, and the authorities numerous and decided. His Honor characterized the case as one of great “hardship and cruelty,” and every one in the[Pg 70] court room seemed to sympathize deeply with the poor negro.”
A lady at St. Louis, Mo., related to Mrs. F. D. Gage the following circumstance, which transpired in that city a short time ago.
“I had, said the lady, an old colored woman washing for me a few years ago, for four or five years—one of the most faithful, truthful, and pious women, I ever knew—black or white. She was once a slave, belonging to Davenport. But he was a kinder man than other men, and gave her the privilege of buying her freedom for one thousand dollars! This sum the old and faithful creature earned and paid herself. Only think of it!—one thousand dollars for the privilege of buying what our wise statesmen call the “inalienable right of men,” bestowed by the Creator. When free she stipulated for the freedom of her son, and this, with years of toil, she earned; and when he came to manhood he too was free.
“Think of this, fair mothers of our land! Ye who hug to your heart the children of your love, and feel a mother’s love and this for them. You work to clothe, to school and make comfortable those dependent upon your care; but which of you can measure the toil that this poor, stricken mother had to bear, ere[Pg 71] she filed away the galling chains from the limbs of her child!
“Well, when the mother and son were free, they pledged themselves to the owner of another plantation, to pay another thousand for the wife and child of the ransomed son. The master allowed the woman to come to the city, and live with her husband, and work on her own hook—paying him so much per month. Three hundred dollars has been paid. Some time in April, this oppressed class had a public tea-party and fair, to gather funds to furnish their church, a neat edifice on —— St. The mother, son, and wife were there, returned home, or started home, about midnight—the horses ran away, and George, attempting to get off the carriage to assist the driver, fell, and his head was dashed to pieces against the corner of a curb-stone.
“He died instantly, and the morning papers announced the fact, and spoke of him as “highly worthy and respectable, and a member of ---- Church.” But no sooner had the owner of Susan, the wife, heard of George’s death, than he hurried to the city post-haste, and took the afflicted wife from their house, drove her to the Slave auction, and sold her to southern traders.
“Thus were the three hundred dollars lost to[Pg 72] those who earned it, the old, toiling mother left childless; and the young wife, but yesterday rejoicing in the strength and hope of freedom and love, suddenly turned into a chattel, and sold “away down South,” to be a beast of burden—perhaps for a Legree.”
“When did it happen inquired Mrs. Gage?”
“Why, here, lately. I met the old mother as I came from the “Fourth” Pic nic. She was dressed in deep mourning. I had not seen her for a long time, for they had got them a home, and she did not wash any more. I asked her what had happened, and she told me all. O! Mrs. G., how it made me feel! I celebrating our liberty, she, a woman—a wife—a mother mourning over enslaved and doubly-wronged children.
““I know there is a God, Mrs. Lilly,” the poor bowed creature said to me, “I know there is a good God, and a Jesus, or I should give up in despair, and sometimes I do; I look up and down and all round, and there is no light!””
Slavery leaves its victims a prey to unchecked avarice. What protection has a slave against the avarice of his master? Let us see. A law of South Carolina provides that slaves shall “not labor to exceed fifteen hours” out of twenty four. This is called protection!
“The slave is driven to the field in the morn[Pg 73]ing about four o’clock. The general calculation is to get them to work by day-light. The time for breakfast is between nine and ten o’clock. This meal is sometimes eaten ‘bite and work,’ others allow fifteen minutes, and this is the only rest the slave has while in the field.” (G. W. Westgate.)
“In North Carolina, the legal standard of food for a slave must not be less than a quart of corn per day. In Louisiana the legal standard is one barrel of Indian corn—or the equivalent thereof in rice, beans or other grain, and a pint of salt, every month.” “The quantity allowed by custom,” said T. S. Clay of Georgia, “is a peck of corn per week.”
When they return to their miserable huts at night, they find not there the means of comfortable rest, but on the cold ground they must lie, without covering, and shiver while they slumber.
“The clothing of slaves by day, and their covering by night, are inadequate either for comfort or decency, in any or most of the slaveholding States.” (Elliott.)
It is notorious that slaves, on large plantations especially, are miserably fed, clothed and lodged, and during busy seasons of the year, most unmercifully worked.
6. Slavery abandons its victims to unbridled lust. Against a master’s lusts a slave has no protection. It is an established principle of the slave code that the testimony of a slave against a white person cannot be received in a court of justice. A slave woman who may be abused cannot resort to the law. To whom can she appeal? To God only. The master may torture her in any way, so that he take not her life, in order to force a compliance with his base designs!
“A very beautiful girl belonging to the estate of John French, a deceased gambler of New Orleans, was sold a few days since, for the round sum of seven thousand dollars! An ugly old bachelor, named Gouch, was the purchaser. The Picayune says that she was remarkable for her beauty and intelligence; and that there was considerable strife as to who should be the purchaser.” (Elliott.)
Any one can understand why that beautiful, intelligent slave girl brought SEVEN THOUSAND DOLLARS! She was bought for a sacrifice to lust! And the law gave her no protection. It required her to submit unresistingly to the will of her owner and that owner was a base libertine!
7. Slavery exposes its victims to the fury of unrestrained passion. A master in a violent[Pg 75] passion may fall upon his slave, and beat him unmercifully without the slightest provocation and the slave has no redress.
“The master is not liable for an assault and battery committed upon the person of his slave.” (Wheeler.)
A Methodist minister, Rev. J. Boucher, relates the following incident:
“While on the Alabama circuit I spent the Sabbath with an old circuit preacher, who was also a doctor, living near ‘the horse shoe,’ celebrated as Gen. Jackson’s battle ground. On Monday morning early, he was reading Pope’s Messiah to me, when his wife called him out. I glanced my eye out of the window, and saw a slave man standing by, and they consulting over him. Presently the doctor took a rawhide from under his coat, and began to cut up the half-naked back of the slave. I saw six or seven inches of the skin turn up perfectly white at every stroke, till the whole back was red with gore. The lacerated man cried out some at first; but at every blow the doctor cried, ‘won’t ye hush? won’t ye hush?’ till the slave finally stood still and groaned. As soon as he had done, the doctor came in panting, almost out of breath, and, addressing me, said, ‘Won’t you go to prayer with us, sir?’ I fell on my knees[Pg 76] and prayed, but what I said I knew not. When I came out the poor creature had crept up and knelt by the door during prayer; and his back was a gore of blood quite to his heels.”
Now this slave could not appeal to the law for redress or protection; and the same cruel beating might have been repeated every week until death had come to his relief, and the poor wretch must only bear it—that is all. He was wholly at the mercy of the passions of his master.
8. Slavery subjects its victims to uncontrolled and irresponsible tyranny. Irresponsible power cannot be safely entrusted with the wisest and most humane persons. It is always liable to great abuses. But when all sorts of men are invested with it, when it can be purchased with money, terrible beyond conception are its results. Woe to the unhappy man who is put absolutely into the power of a hard hearted villain. But slaves are property and are exposed to the irresponsible power of their masters.
A master or overseer may, with impunity inflict upon a slave, without the slightest provocation, any kind of torture, which can be endured, and impose upon him all kinds of sufferings, hardships and insults.
He may clothe him in rags, feed him upon corn, lodge him in a mere pen of poles, work him beyond his ability, kick him, cuff him, knock him down, put him in stocks, strip him, tie him to a stake, and with a keen lash lay on his bare back until the blood runs in a stream to his heels. The laws not only allow this to be done, but it is done continually. Women, yes, tender, delicate women; daughters, sisters and mothers are unprotected by the laws. They may be, and are tied to the whipping post; every day that we live, this is done, and their quivering flesh mangled by the cow-skin.
Dr. Howe visited a prison in New Orleans, in which fugitive slaves are confined, and to which many slaves are brought by their masters to be whipped, for which punishment a small fee is paid. In a letter to Hon. Charles Sumner, he says:
“Entering a large paved court-yard, around which ran galleries filled with slaves of all ages, sexes and colors, I heard the snap of a whip, every stroke of which sounded like the sharp crack of a pistol. I turned my head, and beheld a sight which absolutely chilled me to the marrow of my bones, and gave me, for the first time in my life, the sensation of my hair stiffening at the roots. There lay a black[Pg 78] girl flat upon her face, on a board, her two thumbs tied, and fastened to one end, her feet tied, and drawn tightly to the other end, while a strap passed over the small of her back, and, fastened around the board, compressed her closely to it. Below the strap she was entirely naked. By her side, and six feet off, stood a huge monster with a long whip, which he applied with dreadful power and wonderful precision. Every stroke brought away a strip of skin, which clung to the lash, or fell quivering on the pavement, while the blood followed after it. The poor creature writhed and shrieked, and in a voice which showed alike her fear of death and her dreadful agony, screamed to her master, who stood at her head, ‘O, spare my life! don’t cut my soul out!’ But still fell the horrid lash; still strip after strip peeled off from the skin; gash after gash was cut in her living flesh, until it became a livid and bloody mass of raw and quivering muscle. It was with the greatest difficulty I refrained from springing upon the torturer, and arresting his lash; but, alas! what could I do, but turn aside and hide my tears for the sufferer, and my blushes for humanity? This was in a public and regularly-organized prison; the punishment was one recognized and authorized by the law. But think you that the poor wretch had committed a[Pg 79] heinous offense, and had been convicted thereof and sentenced to the lash? Not at all. She was brought by her master to be whipped by the common executioner, without trial, judge or jury, just at his beck or nod, for some real or supposed offense, or to gratify his own whim or malice. And he may bring her day after day, without cause assigned, and inflict any number of lashes he pleases, short of twenty-five, provided only he pays the fee. Or, if he choose, he may have a private whipping board on his own premises, and brutalize himself there.”
All this is done according to law. “We cannot allow,” said Judge Ruffin, “the right of the master to be brought into discussion in the courts of justice. The slave, to remain a slave, must be made sensible that there is NO APPEAL FROM HIS MASTER.” The same Judge decided—that “THE POWER OF THE MASTER MUST BE ABSOLUTE IN ORDER TO RENDER THE SUBMISSION OF THE SLAVE PERFECT.” How dreadful is this tyranny!
As the laws provide for the degradation of the slave to a state of the most stupid ignorance, it would naturally be supposed that little would be required in the way of obedience, and that when a slave did trespass a very light punishment would be meted out to him. Evidently this would be the humane and just course, for where little is given little should be required. In this, however, as in most other things slavery is precisely contrary to nature, humanity and reason.
Slaves are punished by the laws for numerous acts which are in themselves perfectly right.
“For seeking liberty a slave is proclaimed an outlaw and may be lawfully killed.” (Goodell.) “He may be punished for attending religious meetings at night. He may be publicly whipped for keeping a gun, or a pistol. For visiting a wife or child without a written pass, he may be whipped. For striking a white person, no matter how great the provocation, whipping—and for the second or third offence, DEATH.” (Goodell.) These are but specimens of[Pg 81] the cruel and vexatious laws by which the slave’s life is embittered. He, poor wretch, must have so many lashes on the bare back for almost every thing which his manhood prompts him to do. He must always be on the look out to act and feel as a mere brute—he must crouch and bend in constant abjectness or his back shall pay the penalty. But for actual crimes the disproportion between the punishment of slaves and white persons is very great.
“In Va., by the revised code of 1819, there are seventy-one offenses for which the penalty is death when committed by slaves and imprisonment when committed by the whites.” (Jay’s Inquiry.)
“In Mississippi there are seventeen offenses punishable with death when committed by slaves, which, if committed by white persons, are either punished by fines or imprisonment, or punishment not provided for by the statute or at common law.” (Goodell.)
A law of Md., provides that—“Any slave for rambling in the night, or riding on horseback or running away, may be punished by whipping, cropping and branding in the cheeks or otherwise, not rendering him unfit for labor.”
And yet, notwithstanding the extreme and unreasonable partiality and severity of these[Pg 82] laws, it is not unusual for the barbarous spirit of slavery to overleap them in its unmerciful punishment of the slave. When the slave commits a high crime, not unfrequently does a furious mob seize him, and hang him up without trial as if he were a mean dog. Calmness and solemnity, which should always characterize the punishment of the greatest criminals in christian countries, give place to the most violent and cruel passions. Judgment, mercy, law, humanity, God and Christianity, are all forgotten in the hasty and insane desire to have the wretched bondman pushed out of the world. And perhaps the crime which has so violently stirred up the community against him was committed under the greatest provocations. His soul may have been writhing under a crushing sense of repeated wrongs. His wife may have been abused before his eyes while he was not permitted to defend her. His daughter may have been dishonored, and he, without appeal for her protection to church or State, compelled to suffer it in silence. And his own back may have been smarting from the maddening lash—and in a moment of frenzy or despair he may have smitten his oppressor to the earth.
And, for this crime he is treated as a prince of criminals, is hung up without trial, or perhaps burned alive!
Our souls have been harrowed up by a circumstance which transpired during the present year (1853) in the State of Mo. Two negro men for the commission of murder were arrested and tied to a tree, near the county seat of Jasper co., a fire was kindled around them, and in the presence of two thousand persons, they were burned to death! No time for reflection or repentance was allowed. Not a word of warning or exhortation was permitted. Even a humane mode of being killed was denied. But they were, in this year, during the Presidency of Pierce, in the State of Missouri, burned without trial!
In 1842 a negro was burned at Union Point, Mississippi. The Natchez Free Trader gives the following account of the horrible work.
“The body was taken and chained to a tree immediately on the bank of the Mississippi, on what is called Union Point. Fagots were then collected, and piled around him to which he appeared quite indifferent. When the work was completed, he was asked what he had to say. He then warned all to take example by him, and asked the prayers of all around; he then called for a drink of water, which was handed to him; he drank it, and said, ‘Now set fire—I am ready to go in peace!’ The torches were lighted and placed in the pile, which soon[Pg 84] ignited. He watched unmoved the curling flame, that grew until it began to entwine itself around and feed upon his body: then he sent forth cries of agony painful to the ear, begging some one to blow his brains out; at the same time surging with almost superhuman strength, until the staple with which the chain was fastened to the tree (not being well secured) drew out, and he leaped from the burning pile. At that moment the sharp ringing of several rifles was heard: the body of the negro fell a corpse on the ground. He was picked up by some two or three, and again thrown into the fire and consumed—not a vestige remaining to show that such a being ever existed.”
A colored man was burned in St. Louis, Mo., in 1836, in presence of an immense throng of spectators. The Alton Telegraph gives the following description of the scene.
“All was silent as death while the executioners were piling wood around their victim. He said not a word, until feeling that the flames had seized upon him. He then uttered an awful howl, attempting to sing and pray, then hung his head, and suffered in silence, except in the following instance: After the flames had surrounded their prey, his eyes burnt out of his head, and his mouth seemingly parched to a cinder, some one in the crowd, more com[Pg 85]passionate than the rest, proposed to put an end to his misery by shooting him, when it was replied, “that would be of no use, since he was already out of pain.” “No, no,” said the wretch, “I am not. I am suffering as much as ever; shoot me, shoot me.” “No,” said one of the fiends, who was standing about the sacrifice they were roasting, “he shall not be shot. I would sooner slacken the fire, if that would increase his misery.””[5]
It may be said that we have in these illustrations of slavery, exaggerated. But this can not be the case, for we have given the laws and the practice together, and have furnished the testimony of eye-witnesses. And we could bring forward a thousand witnesses from the midst of slavery, whose testimony would confirm all we have said. Yea more; they would declare that half the extent of the evils of this horrible institution are unknown. Hear if you please, a voice from North Carolina—Mr. Swain:
“Let any man of spirit and feeling for a moment cast his thoughts over this land of slavery—think of the nakedness of some, the hungry yearnings of others, the flowing tears and heaving sighs of parting relations, the wailings of[Pg 86] woe, the bloody cut of the keen lash, and the frightful scream that rends the very skies—and all this to gratify ambition, lust, pride, avarice, vanity, and other depraved feelings of the human heart. The worst is not generally known. Were all the miseries, the horrors of slavery, to burst at once into view, a peal of seven fold thunder could scarce strike greater alarm.”
Hear the venerable John Rankin, a native and long resident of Tennessee. (See Elliot pp. 225.)
“Many poor slaves are stripped naked, stretched and tied across barrels, or large bags, and tortured with the lash during hours, and even whole days, till their flesh is mangled to the very bones. Others are stripped and hung up by the arms, their feet are tied together, and the end of a heavy piece of timber is put between their legs in order to stretch their bodies, and so prepare them for the torturing lash—and in this situation they are often whipped till their bodies are covered with blood and mangled flesh—and, in order to add the greatest keenness to their sufferings, their wounds are washed with liquid salt! And some of the miserable creatures are permitted to hang in that position till they actually expire; some die under the lash, others linger about for a time, and at length die of their wounds, and many survive, and endure again[Pg 87] similar torture. These bloody scenes are constantly exhibiting in every slaveholding country—thousands of whips are every day stained in African blood! Even the poor females are not permitted to escape these shocking cruelties.”
And finally listen dispassionately to the Presbyterian Synod of Kentucky, composed of those whose interest it was to present slavery in as favorable a light as possible. (See Elliot pp. 225.)
“This system licenses and produces great cruelty. Mangling, imprisonment, starvation, every species of torture, may be inflicted upon him, [the slave,] and he has no redress. There are now in our whole land two millions of human beings, exposed, defenseless, to every insult, and every injury short of maiming or death, which their fellow-men may choose to inflict. They suffer all that can be inflicted by wanton caprice, by grasping avarice, by brutal lust, by malignant spite, and by insane anger. Their happiness is the sport of every whim, and the prey of every passion that may, occasionally or habitually, infest the master’s bosom. If we could calculate the amount of woe endured by ill-treated slaves, it would overwhelm every compassionate heart—it would move even the obdurate to sympathy. There is also a vast sum of suffering inflicted upon the slave by hu[Pg 88]mane masters, as a punishment for that idleness and misconduct which slavery naturally produces. Brutal stripes and all the varied kinds of personal indignities, are not the only species of cruelty which slavery licenses.”
Many slaveholders and their apologists have sought to find authority for the “enormity and crime” of slavery, in the Holy Bible. And we are not surprised that the vile oppressor, smarting under the lashings of a guilty conscience, and condemned by the united voice of reason and humanity, should fly for refuge from public scorn and condemnation, to a shelter, however insecure, erected by a perversion of the writings and example of those remarkable men, who fill a prominent place in sacred history. How consoling it must be to the slaveholder, while standing upon the neck of an unresisting[Pg 89] brother, and crushing his humanity into the dust with heartless cruelty, to hear from a doctor of divinity that Noah countenanced the enslavement of a part of his posterity, that Abraham was an extensive slaveholder, that Moses incorporated the system into the only government ever instituted by direct authority from Heaven, and that it received, in its very worst form, under the Roman government, the tacit, if not positive sanction of Jesus and the apostles.
My observation sustains me in saying that no class of slaveholders are more pertinacious and incorrigible than the religious class—the scripture-quoting class. If we are to believe them, slaveholding is not a sin PER SE, but of itself is a perfectly innocent thing. The very best of men hold slaves, yea, it is, they tell us, the duty of good men under some circumstances to hold slaves. To be sure THEY do not hold slaves for “gain,” but from motives of pure “charity,” or from stern “necessity.” They and their slaves are ALWAYS in such peculiar cases that emancipation would be impolitic, impracticable, even a sin! Still, from all appearances, they are as careful to keep their slaves from running off as common sinners are—their slaves are fed, clothed, whipped, worked, robbed and used up precisely as are the slaves of the most notorious publicans.
After having seen how slavery originated, and what it is in theory and practice, it may seem useless if not impious to inquire seriously whether a system so manifestly unjust, cruel and diabolical, is sanctioned in the Bible; but the confidence with which slaveholders and their apologists quote it in defense of slavery, and the recklessness with which it is denounced by a class of infidel abolitionists, impel us to enter into this inquiry; and in pursuing it we shall endeavor to examine carefully all the arguments relied upon by the advocates of human bondage. The first passage in order is found in Genesis 9: 25. “And he said, cursed be Canaan, a servant of servants shall he be to his brethren.”
It is assumed that this curse was pronounced by divine authority; that the servitude here mentioned is identical with slavery; that the prediction of the oppression of a people justifies their oppressors; and finally, that American slaves are the identical posterity of Canaan.
1. As it respects the authority of this curse, there is a circumstance intimately associated with its utterance which excites a shadow of doubt with regard to its inspiration. “And Noah awoke from his wine” and pronounced this malediction. Is it not possible that these words were the hasty expression of excited feel[Pg 91]ing and not the solemn enunciation of a divine anathema?
2. But in order to prove the validity of the argument, it must be proved that servitude and slavery are relations of essentially the same character, and this cannot be done. Neither philology nor history affords the slightest proof of the assumption that to be a servant of servants is equivalent to being a slave of slaves.
3. But does the prediction of the oppression of a people justify that oppression? Verily it does not. The Lord said unto Abraham that his seed should be afflicted in a strange land four hundred years. But who will pretend to justify the Egyptian task-masters on the plea that the affliction of Israel had been predicted? The divine prescience sees all things at one glance, and may inspire men to prophesy, but prophecy touches not the moral agency of men. When our Lord was crucified, the “scripture was fulfilled,” but they who crucified him were murderers, nevertheless. Hence, even should we admit that the curse pronounced on Canaan was of divine authority, and that it meant slavery, no stronger apology for slaveholding could be derived therefrom than Egyptian oppressors might have drawn from the words of Jehovah, for the affliction of Israel in Egypt four hundred years. The cases are parallel.
4. But the argument is utterly baseless because American slaves are not the posterity of Canaan, upon whom the curse was pronounced, and hence that anathema affords just as good an apology for the enslavement of Englishmen as colored Americans. Ham had four sons,—Cush, Misriam, Phut, and Canaan, and the curse was directed against Canaan or Canaan’s posterity. But, says one, are not the negroes children of Canaan? By no means. No scholar has ever pretended that Canaan was the progenitor of the negro race.
The sacred penman is very careful to put this matter beyond dispute. He says: “And Canaan begat Sidon his first born, and Heth, and the Jubisite, and the Amorite, and the Girgasite, and the Hivite, and the Arkite, and the Sinite, and the Arvadite, and the Zemarite, and the Hamathite; and afterward were the families of the Canaanites spread abroad. And the border of the Canaanites was from Sidon, as thou comest to Gerar, unto Gaza; as thou goest unto Sodom and Gomorrah, and Admah and Zeboim, even unto Lasha.” Gen. 10: 15-19. Now these nations and boundaries were all located in Asia, and we have no evidence of the subsequent removal of any of the posterity of Canaan to Africa except it be the founders of Carthage,—a city which was long mistress of[Pg 93] the sea, and the proud rival of imperial Rome. The Carthaginians were supposed to be the descendants of Canaan.
This curse, therefore, did not allude to slavery, but servitude; and as it is a mere prediction of what would be the relation of Canaan’s posterity it afforded no apology for the oppression of that posterity;[6] and finally the Africans and colored Americans are not the descendants of Canaan, and hence, the passage can have no application to them; and affords just as good authority for the enslavement of Englishmen, Dutchmen and Frenchmen as negroes.
How absurd is the attempt to take this anathema, construe it to mean and justify chattel slavery, and then stretch it over the posterity, not of Canaan, but of Cush even after the blood of the Cushites (Moses’ wife was a Cushite) has been mingled with the blood of the “first families” of Virginia, and of all the Southern states. A large number of slaves are white—much whiter than their masters and mistresses. The first Bible argument for slavery appears, when weighed,
“Light as a puff of empty air.”
Have slaveholders no better? We will see.
The next Bible argument for slavery, usually adduced, is founded upon the assumption that the patriarchs were slaveholders, and particular stress is placed upon the example of Abraham, “the friend of God,” who, it is confidently asserted, was an extensive slaveholder.
The Harmony Presbytery, South Carolina, “Resolved, that slavery has existed from the days of those good old slaveholders and patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”
The Presbytery of Tombecbee said: “In the Bible the state of slavery is clearly recognized. Abraham the friend of God had slaves born in his house and bought with his money.”
Dr. Fuller, in his controversy with Dr. Wayland, assumed that father Abraham was a slaveholder, and that his example was a sufficient warrant for slaveholding in all ages. The same position was taken by Dr. Rice in his debate[Pg 95] with Mr. Blanchard. Mr. Fletcher, author of a late voluminous defense of slavery, takes the same position.
It will be perceived that in this argument two things are assumed. 1st That the patriarchs did hold slaves. 2d That the example of a patriarch is conclusive evidence in the case. If it should appear after an examination of the case, that none of the patriarchs owned slaves, or that the example of a patriarch is not conclusive evidence on all moral questions, and may not, in every case, be safely followed, then this argument will also be found wanting.
Now, I assume the position that neither Abraham, nor any other patriarch, ever owned a slave; and as evidence in support of this position submit the following facts and considerations.
1. The Bible does not record such a fact. In no chapter or verse is Abraham, Isaac or Jacob called a slaveholder, slave-driver, slave-trader, or by any other name indicative of such a relation. Nor is any man, or woman in their employ, either in the house or field, or in any way associated with them, called a slave or by any name indicative of that relation.
2. The Bible records in connection with the history of the patriarchs, no circumstance from[Pg 96] which slaveholding may be legitimately inferred. Those inseparable concomitants of slavery, the whip, coffle, chain-gang, whipping-post and overseer, are not named in patriarchal history.
3. Some circumstances are recorded from which we obtain presumptive evidence that they did not own slaves. Take for example, an incident in the life of Abraham. He was sitting in his tent door in the cool of the day and saw at a little distance three strangers whom he immediately approached and invited, in the spirit of genuine hospitality, to tarry with him and partake of some refreshments. When he had obtained their consent, he hastened unto the tent to Sarah and requested her to bake some cakes with all possible dispatch, while he should run to the herd and fetch a calf tender and good and have it dressed. The repast was soon provided, the guests were seated around the wholesome meal, and Abraham stood by them under the tree while they ate. Now, I submit, had this patriarch been a slaveholder, he would have ordered “Cuffee” to the flock after the calf, and had Sarah been a mistress of slaves she would have ordered “Dinah” to the kneading trough. In this incident there is no mention of slaves. A “young man” is respectfully noticed without the slightest hint that he was a slave. Abraham and Sarah went[Pg 97] about preparing this entertainment precisely as good people do, who attend to their own work, and have no slaves to order around.
4. We have good reasons for believing that chattel slavery had no existence in the world at the time the patriarchs referred to, flourished. Abraham was born only two years after the death of Noah, and when as yet the postdiluvian world was in its infancy, and it is not probable, leaving history out of view, that slavery could have been instituted at so early a period. But the most ancient and reliable history furnishes evidence that for a period after the flood, reaching down far this side the patriarchal age, universal freedom was preserved.[7]
On the authority of Diodorus, Shuckford says, that “the nations planted by Noah and his descendants, had a law against slavery; for no person among them could absolutely lose his freedom and become a bondsman.” (Shuckford’s Connections, Vol. II, pp. 80.)
“Athenaus, a Greek historian of great merit, observes that the Babylonians, Persians, as well as the Greeks, and divers other nations, celebrated annually a sort of Saturnalia, or feast,[Pg 98] instituted most probably in commemoration of the original state of freedom, in which men lived before servitude was introduced; and as Moses revived several of Noah’s institutions, so there are appointments in the law to preserve the freedom of the Israelites.”
From these authorities to which others might be added, we conclude that slavery had no existence among the nations which arose immediately after the flood. Noah, it seems was a good democrat, and gave existence to institutions which secured the personal freedom of his descendants; and absolutely prohibited their enslavement. And it also appears that those institutions were for a long period observed, and finally incorporated by Moses into the Law for the preservation of the liberties of the Israelites. Now, Abraham was contemporary with the sons of Noah, and was a governor of one of the very earliest nations alluded to by the historians above quoted; hence it is clear, that slavery had no existence in his day, and consequently he could not have been a slaveholder.
Against this view it may be urged that slavery existed in Egypt in the time of Joseph, that Joseph was sold as a slave, and that the Israelites were slaves when in Egypt. To this objection we answer:
1. The assumption that slavery existed in Egypt in the time of the patriarchs is without foundation. Herodotus, gives a “true and full” account of the ancient Egyptians, specifies with great care the various classes of men, but does not mention slaves. Diodorus, gives a careful statement of the ancient Egyptian constitution, but is silent respecting slavery.
Rollin says: “Husbandmen, shepherds, and artificers formed the three lower classes of lower life in Egypt, but were nevertheless had in very great esteem, particularly husbandmen and shepherds.” We have the best of reasons, therefore, for believing that the wholesome institutions of Noah were preserved for a long time in Egypt. That a system of servitude existed in that country is true, but absolute slavery was not permitted. Parents possessed great authority over their children, and might sell them or their services, for a limited time, but this was not slavery. A year of release was provided for all, so that no one could, as Diodorus observes, “absolutely lose his freedom and become a bondsman!”
2. Joseph was not a slave. He was doubtless sold as a servant for a limited period, and evidently that period had expired before he arose to the high station of Steward of Potipher’s house.
3. The Israelites were not slaves in Egypt. They maintained their nationality, preserved their family relations, owned property, and were not distributed throughout the country, as chattel slaves are. Their servitude was national. Their task masters were appointed by the government, and they labored for the public benefit. They were not domestic slaves.
The position I think is invulnerable, that in the nations which arose and peopled the earth, immediately after the flood, slavery had no existence; and as the patriarchs flourished in that period, the inference is clear that they did not own slaves, and were not slaveholders. Those holy men would hardly be the first to violate the free institutions of Noah, and disgrace the golden age of freedom, by the enslavement of their brothers.
But it is asserted with a show of confidence that the word servant, as applied in the scriptures to a class of persons, means precisely what our word slave means. Hence, when it is said that Abraham had servants, it is assumed that he had SLAVES. Now, although what has been proved, is altogether sufficient to exculpate that good man and all the patriarchs from the charge of slaveholding, we deem it important that the word translated servant be well understood; and with the aid of the best[Pg 101] authorities we shall now proceed to make it plain.
The Hebrew words translated servant, service, and servants, are derived from abadh, meaning to labor, to work, to do work. This word occurs in the Hebrew scriptures some hundreds of times, in various forms of the word, and is never rendered slaves. Occasionally, our translators have prefixed the word bond, and made it read bond-servant, but this was done without authority, as precisely the same word is used in the original. The original word is used to denote the following kinds of service: To work for another; Gen. 29: 20. To serve or be servants of a king; 2d Sam., 16: 19. To serve as a soldier; 2d Sam., 2: 12, 13, 15, 30, 31. To serve as an ambassador; 2d Sam., 10: 2, 4. It is applied to a worshipper of the true God; Nehemiah, 1: 10. To a minister; Isaiah, 49: 6. It is also applied to king Rehoboam; 1st Kings, 11: 7, and to the Messiah, Isaiah, 42: 1.[8]
It is used in Gen. 2: 15. And the Lord God took the man, and put him in the garden of Eden to DRESS IT. Adam was put into Eden, not to serve or dress the garden as a SLAVE, but as a man. The same word is used to express the service performed for Laban by Jacob.[Pg 102] The relation of Joshua to Moses is expressed by the same word; Ex., 33: 21. It is also used in the fourth commandment. Six days shalt thou labor, etc.
From these examples of the use of the word it is clear that the idea of chattel slavery is not found in it. It is used to express all kinds of service—the service of God, a king, a friend, or an employer.
The word ama, rendered maid-servant, bond-maid, maid, hand-maid, and the word shiphhah with similar renderings, are applied to Hagar, Ruth, Hannah, Abigail, Bilhah and Zilpah, and evidently mean no more than our English word servant in its usual acceptation. Those women were not slaves, they were free women. It has been very properly remarked that if chattel slavery existed among the Hebrews at any time it is not a little surprising that the language contains no word which expresses the relation.
Some have endeavored to force into the word translated servant &c., the idea of slavery because it is said that Abraham had servants “bought with money.” But from the ancient use of the word buy or bought we are not to infer that the persons bought became slaves. Wives were procured in the times of the patriarchs by purchase. Boaz said—“Moreover[Pg 103] Ruth, the Moabitess, the wife of Mahlon, have I purchased to be my wife.” The same word (kanithi) is used here to express the manner in which Boaz obtained his wife, that is used in Gen. to show how a part of Abraham’s servants were obtained. But the beautiful Ruth was not a slave. Jacob purchased his beloved Rachel, and less beloved Leah, but those wives and mothers of the twelve patriarchs could not have been slaves. Had they been chattels, why, then, according to an essential feature of the American slave code, the twelve patriarchs would all have been born in the same condition. Partus sequitur ventrem. A Hebrew might sell himself on a limited time, and he might be bought by a wealthy neighbor, but no one, I believe, has ever pretended that he became a SLAVE thereby. The contract was voluntary. The employer bought the services of his fellow, and paid in advance for the same, not to a third person, but to the servant himself. God is said to have purchased (kanitha) his people; Ps., 75: 2.
Hence from the scriptural use of the word buy, or bought, we are not authorized to infer that the persons purchased became slaves. Such an inference would do violence to the holy word.
The true state of the matter in respect to Abra[Pg 104]ham, and his case is mainly relied upon, was without a doubt this. Abraham, being a wise, wealthy and good man, gathered around him many devoted friends who, upon his removal to a distant location, desired to accompany him, to receive the benefits of his friendship and counsels, live under his patriarchship, as he was a prince, (see Gen., 23: 6,) and enjoy the protection of his power. Some of these may have been involved in pecuniary embarrassments or obligations of service to other persons, which made it necessary for the benevolent patriarch to release them by paying them in advance for many years of service.
Many of these servants were doubtless converts from idolatry, which had been made in Haran. In Gen. 12: 5, the fact is recorded of the removal of Abraham, Sarai, their effects, and of “the SOULS they had gotten.” This word “gotten” is translated, says Mr. Carothers, from osa, which is used in Ezekiel 18: 31, to express the work of conversion. “Cast away from you all your transgressions, and make you a new heart and a new spirit.” And this rendering of the word “gotten” is confirmed by the Chaldee paraphrase on this passage, which reads thus: “Souls they had instructed or turned from idolatry and taught in the true religion.” “The Hebrews have a tradition,”[Pg 105] says Banberg, “that Abraham brought over many men, and Sarah many women from infidelity to the knowledge and worship of the true God; and thus made them spiritually.” A similar mode of expression is used by St. Paul: “I have begotten you through the gospel.” The idea that Abraham and Sarah made slaves of their converts is simply preposterous.
From the foregoing facts and considerations it is perfectly clear to my mind, that the effort to find an apology for slaveholding in patriarchal servitude is a total failure. The charge that the patriarchs held slaves is wholly without foundation,—is a disingenuous attack upon their reputation, and a miserable subterfuge for hard-hearted oppressors, who are seeking an apology or excuse for sins which loudly cry for the vengeance of heaven! Could Father Abraham arise from the dead, visit the South, and there behold thousands of his spiritual children toiling without remuneration, shut out from the blessings of family and home, denied an education and all means of intellectual improvement, driven by the keen lash of a brutal overseer, and then should he hear an appeal made to the patriarchs in justification of this system of unmingled tyranny, he would indignantly repel the appeal as a base calumny!
It is surprising with what confidence the ex[Pg 106]ample of the patriarchs is urged in justification of slavery in the absence of all proof or semblance of proof, that they were implicated in this practice. But our surprise is increased when we consider that, even could it be made appear that the patriarchs did hold slaves, this fact of itself, would afford not the slightest apology for slaveholding now. The patriarchs, it is admitted, had a plurality of wives, but their example is not now a sufficient warrant for polygamy. There is not an ecclesiastical court in the United States and territories, if we may except the Mormon, Utah, which would accept the example of the patriarchs as an apology for the man who should stand up before that court with two wives leaning on his arms. The argument therefore appears utterly worthless and shallow from every point of view.
It is claimed by the advocates of human bondage that in the law delivered by Moses for the government of the children of Israel, until the establishment of the kingdom of Christ, slavery is distinctly recognized, carefully regulated, and unequivocally sanctioned; and hence, that it is an institution upon which Jehovah now looks with approbation. We cannot believe, they argue, that it is wrong for christians to practice what the law of Moses permitted or sanctioned. To this argument we reply:—
1. That many things were allowed by the law of Moses which are strictly prohibited by the law of Christ. That law was imperfect in its character, limited in its application, and temporary in its design. It contained a number of statutes which could by no means be incorporated into the laws of a christian state.
Among the things commanded and allowed by the law under consideration, the following may be specified:—
1. It commanded a Hebrew, even though a[Pg 108] married man, with wife and children living, to take the childless widow of a deceased brother, and beget children with her; Deut., 25: 5-10.
2. The Hebrews, under certain restrictions, were allowed to make concubines, or wives for a limited time, of women taken in war; Deut. 21: 10-14.
3. A Hebrew who already had a wife, was allowed to take another also; provided he still continued his intercourse with the first as her husband, and treated her kindly and affectionately; Exodus 21: 9-11.
4. By the Mosaic law, the nearest relative of a murdered Hebrew could pursue and slay the murderer, unless he could escape to the city of refuge; and the same permission was given in case of accidental homicide; Num. 35: 9-34.
5. The Israelites were commanded to exterminate the Canaanites, men, women and children; Deut. 9: 12; 20: 16-18.
“Each of these laws, although in its time it was an ameliorating law, designed to take the place of some barbarous abuse, and to be a connecting link by which some higher state of society might be introduced, belongs confessedly to that system which St. Paul says made nothing perfect. They are a part of the commandment which he says was annulled for the weakness and unprofitableness thereof, and[Pg 109] which, in the time which he wrote, was waxing old, and ready to vanish away.” (Dr. Stowe.)
Now, will any one pretend that it is proper for a christian, having a wife, to take also the wife of a deceased brother? But the law of Moses authorized this as clearly as any one pretends that it authorized slavery. Is it allowable for a christian to take a concubine or marry three or four wives? But the law of Moses allowed this as distinctly as any one believes that it allowed slavery. Would it be right for a christian to pursue a neighbor who had committed accidental or intentional homicide, overtake and slay him? But the law of Moses justified the Jewish man-slayer as plainly as the most ultra defender of slavery maintains that it justified slaveholding. Suppose we admit, for argument sake, that slavery was authorized by the law of Moses, does it follow as a matter of course, that the law of Christ authorizes it? By no means; for we have seen that the former authorized concubinage, polygamy, extermination of the heathen, and summary vengeance upon the unwitting murderer, all of which things are utterly incompatible with the precepts of the latter. And slavery might very properly be placed in the category of those practices allowed by the law, but prohibited by the gospel. Thus the argument for[Pg 110] slavery from the law of Moses proves too much, and therefore proves nothing.
2. But if, as is claimed, the Jews were authorized to enslave their fellow men, which we by no means admit, it was by express authority from God, who alone may deprive any of his creatures of the rights with which he has invested them. Express grants were made to the “chosen seed,” as for instance, the forcible occupancy of the land of Canaan, and of the cities thereof. Now those grants were not made to Americans, but to the ancient Israelites, and it is neither modest nor sensible for citizens of the United States to act under a charter which they admit was made to an ancient nation, for a temporary purpose. Let the American slaveholder show the same authority for slaveholding which he maintains the Jew could produce. Has God ever made a grant to Americans to enslave the Africans?
3. Again, the passage mainly relied upon is found in Leviticus, 25: 44-47; in which the Jews are authorized to procure servants of the nations, (not heathen, for heathen is not in the original) round about them. Now if this celebrated passage be at all to the purpose, it is, as Pres. Edwards has said, “a permission to every nation under heaven to buy slaves of the nations round about them; to us, to buy of our[Pg 111] Indian neighbors; to them, to buy of us; to the French to buy of the English, and to the English to buy of the French; and so through the world. Thus according to this construction, we have here an institution of a universal slave trade, by which every man may not only become a merchant, but may rightfully become the merchandize itself of this trade, and be bought and sold like a beast.” Who is willing to admit the consequences of this construction?
We might here rest the case, because these three considerations, taken separately, or together, destroy entirely the whole force of the argument for American slavery predicated upon Levitical servitude.
We shall now inquire what kind of servitude was recognized and regulated by the law of Moses. The particular statute upon which the main reliance is placed, by the friends of slavery, and which is supposed to contain the black and bloody charter for the degradation of humanity, is found in Leviticus 25: 44-47, and reads as follows:—
“Both thy bondmen and thy bondmaids which thou shalt have, shall be of the heathen that are round about you: of them shall ye buy bondmen and bondmaids. Moreover of the children of strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their fami[Pg 112]lies that are with you, which they beget in your land: and they shall be your possession. And ye shall take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit them for a possession, they shall be your bondmen forever.”[9]
1. The word slave, it will be observed, does not occur in this passage, nor does bondmen and bondmaids mean anything more than men-servants and women-servants. The word bond, as we have seen, is gratuitously supplied by our translators, and is not in the original; and the word servants means no more than laborers or workers. All kinds of servants are described by the term here found, and hence from its use in this place, it cannot be inferred that the persons referred to were slaves. The passage clearly authorized the procurement of servants from adjoining nations, which was a thing perfectly right in itself, and that is all it did authorize.
2. Nor does the fact that the passage allow[Pg 113]ed the purchase of servants, prove that the persons purchased were slaves, or became slaves. Irishmen were, many of them, a few years since, “bought servants.” They were sold to pay for their passage to this country, but the whole transaction was voluntary on the part of the “sons of Erin,” and looked to their benefit. Jacob, as we have seen, purchased Leah and Rachel with fourteen years of labor. Our blessed Savior hath purchased us with his own blood. The idea of chattel slavery cannot be associated with the word buy or bought, as used in the sacred writings, without doing great violence to their meaning. The phrase, “of them shall ye buy” may be properly rendered, “of them shall ye get, or obtain servants.” The word translated buy, in the passage before us, is in other places translated “get” or “getteth.” Thus, “He that beareth reproof getteth understanding.” Prov., 15: 32. “He that getteth wisdom, loveth his own soul.” Prov., 19: 8. But the meaning of the word buy, and sell, as applied to the purchase and sale of men, is definitely settled by its use in the context of the passage which we are examining. It is used in verse 47, “if thy brother wax poor and sell himself” etc. In verse 39, the reading is, “and be sold.” These passages are intended to convey an idea of the same transaction, and that transac[Pg 114]tion was nothing more nor less than the voluntary sale of a poor man to a rich one, not as a slave, but as a servant. The sale was made, and the money was received by the servant who sold himself, with which he released himself and family from pecuniary embarrassment. In this sale and purchase of a man, the idea of slavery is utterly excluded. Now is it probable that the words buy, and sell, in this same chapter, when applied to foreign servants, were used in a totally different sense? To suppose this would be to charge Moses, as Wm. Jay observes, with a fraudulent intent to render the meaning of his law doubtful and unintelligible.
3. Considerable stress is placed upon the phrase, “shall be of the heathen,” as if heathenism was a crime to be punished with a still deeper degradation than idolatry can produce. “The word heathen,” says Mr. Jay, “is gratuitously inserted by our translators instead of nations, the meaning of the original.”
4. Permission was also given for the purchase of the “children of the strangers.” “‘Children of the strangers’ is an orientalism, for strangers, as ‘children of the East,’ ‘children of the Province,’ ‘children of the Ethiopians.’ Hence, the Jews, instead of buying little boys and girls of their parents, were to buy foreigners residing in the country; and not only for[Pg 115]eigners, but their descendants, natives of Palestine.” (Jay.)
5. “They shall be your bondmen forever.” In this phrase is supposed to be found a charter for perpetual, hereditary, hopeless bondage. Mr. Jay very justly remarks upon it as follows: “The preconceived opinions of the translators tempted them to give such a color to this sentence as best accorded with their proslavery theory. Hence this strong expression in the text, while in the margin the literal translation is honestly given, “Ye shall serve yourselves with them forever.” Not a word about bondmen, but merely an unlimited permission, as to time, to use or employ foreigners or strangers.”
The proslavery construction renders the permission absurd, because in the first place it would be impossible for any one man literally to be a bondman forever, unless servitude could be continued in heaven or hell. And, in the next place, it could not continue in the same person in Israel beyond the great jubilee.
Now when this passage in Leviticus 25, is stripped of all the proslavery glosses of the translators, the following is, as the excellent writer just quoted observes, its plain and obvious meaning:—“You may buy of themselves, for servants, men and women who are natives[Pg 116] of the adjoining countries, just as you have already been authorized to buy your own countrymen for servants. You may also buy, for servants, strangers residing among you, and their descendants; and your children after you may do the same. You may always employ them as servants.”
The servitude permitted by the law of Moses has been most grossly misrepresented, and misunderstood. It was not an institution looking mainly to the advantage of the rich and powerful, while it crushed the poor and defenseless into the dust, disregarding their interests and their sorrows, but it was a benificent arrangement intended to relieve the unfortunate and open a door of hope to the Gentile inquirer of the way to Zion. Now observe carefully the following facts:—
1. Servants were not kidnapped or stolen from the surrounding nations. The stealing of a man was made a capital offense. He that stealeth a man and (or it should be) selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death. Ex. 21: 16. Now, as all the slaves in America have been stolen, those who stole them, and those who hold them, are worthy of death according to the law of Moses.
2. All the servants obtained by the Jews from neighboring nations were voluntary servants.[Pg 117] This is proved in the following way. 1. Foreign servants, and native Hebrew servants were obtained in the same manner. Native Hebrews became servants (except in cases of crime) by voluntary contract. 2. Obedience to the law of Moses was a condition of servitude in the Jewish state. An idolater was not allowed to remain in the land. And a bought servant was obliged to renounce idolatry, receive the rite of circumcision, and in all things conform to the law of Moses, as his master was required to do. Gen. 17: 10-15. Ex. 23: 15-20. Deut. 16: 10-18. All were required to enter into the most solemn religious covenant. “Ye stand this day, all of you, before the Lord your God; your captains of your tribes, your elders, and your officers, with all the men of Israel, your little ones, your wives, and thy stranger that is in thy camp, from the hewer of thy wood unto the drawer of thy water; that thou shouldest enter into covenant with the Lord thy God, and into his oath, which the Lord thy God maketh with thee this day.” Deut. 29. But conformity to the law of Moses was voluntary. We cannot conceive that a Jew was allowed to buy a heathen servant against his will, tie him, inflict upon him the rite of circumcision, and then compel him to observe the great feasts ordained by the law,[Pg 118] and, otherwise conform to the Jewish religion. Hence the acceptance of a place as a servant in a Jewish family was a matter of choice. 3. Servants were not obliged to remain with their masters. If they saw proper to change their situation, they had a perfect right to do so, just as laborers now have, and there was no fugitive slave law to prevent them from so doing. “Thou shalt not deliver unto his master the servant that is escaped unto thee. He shall dwell with thee, even among you, in that place he shall choose, in one of thy gates where it liketh him best: thou shalt not oppress him.” Deut. 23: 15, 16. From these facts, the conclusion is irresistible that servitude was not forced upon a foreigner, but voluntarily accepted by him, and that his continuance in that relation was voluntary. How great the contrast between this system and American slavery which utterly disregards the will of slaves.
3. Foreign servants were to be treated in all respects precisely as native Hebrew servants were to be treated. “Ye shall have one manner of law, as well for the stranger as for one of your own country, for I am the Lord your God.” Lev. 24: 22.
4. Ample provisions were made for the religious improvement of servants of all classes and especially foreign servants. They were to[Pg 119] observe the sabbath, go up with their masters to the three great annual feasts celebrated at Jerusalem, listen to the reading of the law, and in short enjoy all the advantages of the Jewish religion. Mr. Barnes estimates that in a period of fifty years, not less than twenty three were appropriated to the exclusive benefit of servants, during which time their whole attention might be devoted to the interests of their souls. Does not this indicate that the great design of the employment of foreign servants was religious? Is there the least similarity between this system of servitude and American slavery?
5. Special provisions were made to secure the kind treatment of all foreigners, foreign servants of course included. “Thou shalt not vex a stranger nor oppress him.” “Thou shalt not oppress a stranger, for ye know the heart of a stranger.” “Cursed be he that perverteth the judgment of the stranger.” “The Lord your God regardeth not persons. Love ye therefore the stranger.” But does not American slavery vex and oppress the stranger and pervert his judgment? The wide world cannot produce a class of persons who are, or ever have been oppressed, if American slaves are not. The word oppression is too feeble to express the tyranny suffered by the strangers in our land.
6. Servants under the law of Moses could not be sold. No permission was given for the sale of servants. They could not be taken for the payment of debts, or as pledges, or presents. They never were sold or given away. The reason of this is found in the fact that they were not chattels,—they were recognized as men, and had made a contract for service which their masters could not at pleasure annul. We have seen that the trade in slaves is an extensive and lucrative business.
7. The Hebrew law regarded servants as naturally equal to their masters, and hence, they were allowed to marry into their master’s family, and inherit, under some circumstances, their master’s property. Deut. 21: 10-14. A slave is not regarded as a man, can own nothing, and inherit nothing. What a contrast! American slavery, and Hebrew servitude seem to be erected upon totally different foundations.
8. At stated periods the mild form of servitude instituted by the law of Moses expired. A Hebrew who became a servant could not be required to continue in that relation more than six years. And every fiftieth year was a grand Jubilee, at the commencement of which liberty was proclaimed throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof. Lev. 25: 10, 11. Contracts for service, under any circumstances,[Pg 121] could not hold beyond that great jubilee. It was a glorious institution, and a type of the proclamation of the gospel. But American slavery knows no joyful jubilee! For three hundred years no proclamation of freedom has been made throughout all this land unto all the inhabitants thereof. No, generation after generation of slaves goes down to their graves in despair! Slavery is without a jubilee.
9. The grand design of the introduction of foreign servants into the Jewish state was their salvation. From a careful examination of this whole subject, we are fully satisfied that the 25th chapter of Lev. contains, as Mr. Smith has said, “the constitution of Heaven’s first Missionary society, by which a door of mercy and salvation was opened to the heathen, through which they could obtain access to the altar of God, find mercy and live.”
It will be observed that a foreigner could obtain a permanent residence in Israel in but two ways,—1st By becoming a servant in a Jewish family, and, 2d By purchasing a house in a walled city. Now, when in connection with these facts, we consider that to the Jews were committed the “lively oracles;” that the only temple of God on earth was erected on Mt. Moriah; that the divinely appointed priesthood and sacrifices were in Jerusalem; and also that[Pg 122] a renunciation of idolatry and hearty acceptance of the God and religion of the bible was absolutely required of those foreigners who desired to become servants; that when they did become servants they were blessed with all the precious privileges of the Jewish religion, and after a few years, became, with their families, adopted members of the Jewish state, having all the rights, immunities and honors of the chosen people of God; I say, when all these facts are impartially weighed, they convince us that the end of the provision alluded to for the admission of foreign servants was religious—the salvation of those servants.
And history affords a powerful argument in support of this position. What was the practical operation of the law of Moses in relation to foreign servants? If the pro-slavery view of that law be correct, then history would record the fact that the commonwealth of Israel was a slaveholding commonwealth. It would state that the Jews traded in men, and that this traffic was important. We should read of poor, ignorant, chained idolaters traveling in mournful procession to a great slave pen at Jerusalem, situated under the shadow, perhaps of the temple of God, and from thence into every part of the land. And when our Savior appeared, he would have come into contact[Pg 123] with those wretched slaves, and would have said something about them. Do we find these facts in history? No, not one of them. Jerusalem, thank God, was a free city. Judea a free state. Foreigners were employed from age to age, as servants, but as was contemplated, they embraced the religion of God, became adopted citizens and were fully identified with the commonwealth of Israel. “After circumcision they were,” as Jahn says, “recorded among the Hebrews,” and after the jubilee they enjoyed all the immunities of the children of Abraham. Such was the intention, and such the results of Levitical servitude. Between that system and American slavery there is scarcely any thing in common. Slavery originated in piracy, is a system of savage tyranny, degrading to the intellect, destructive of morality, blasting to hope and happiness, and tending to barbarism and crime. Servitude under the law of Moses, originated in a benevolent desire to open a door of hope to the heathen, was kind and just in its requirements, guarding with extreme jealousy the interest of servants, and admirably calculated to lead their minds to morality, virtue and the knowledge of God. Slavery, therefore, can find no sanction in the law of Moses. Why, if that law were applied to American slavery[Pg 124] it would abolish it. Compel slaveholders to use their slaves as the law of Moses required servants to be used, and you will soon see an end of slavery.
Our Lord’s New Testament is the bulwark of human freedom. Its great, broad, solid truths constitute an impregnable foundation for a temple of liberty capacious enough to hold the entire human race. This is the last book in the world to search in order to find any thing favorable to oppression; and oppressors have usually preferred to “burrow amid the types and shadows of the ancient economy.” An effort has been made, however, to wrest a sanction for the abomination of slavery out of this last and best revelation from heaven, and to convert some passages found in the writings[Pg 125] of the apostles into chains and fetters to bind in hopeless bondage those very persons for whom Christ died.
We will quote the passages usually adduced to prove that it is the duty of some men to be slaves, and of others to be slaveholders.
“Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in singleness of your heart, as unto Christ; not with eye-service, as men-pleasers; but as the servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart; with good will doing service, as to the Lord, and not to men; knowing that whatsoever good thing any man doeth, the same shall he receive of the Lord, whether he be bond or free. And ye masters, do the same things unto them, forbearing threatening: knowing that your Master also is in heaven; neither is there respect of persons with him.” Eph. 6: 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. “Servants, obey in all things your masters according to the flesh; not with eye-service, as men-pleasers; but in singleness of heart, fearing God.” Col. 3: 22. “Let as many servants as are under the yoke count their own masters worthy of all honour, that the name of God and his doctrine be not blasphemed. And they that have believing masters, let them not despise them, because they are brethren; but rather do them service, because they are[Pg 126] faithful and beloved partakers of the benefit. These things teach and exhort.” 1st Tim. 6: 1, 2. “Exhort servants to be obedient unto their own masters, and to please them well in all things; not answering again; not purloining, but showing all good fidelity; that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things.” Titus, 2: 9, 10. “Masters, give unto your servants that which is just and equal; knowing that ye also have a Master in heaven.” Col. 4: 1.
We will inquire in the first place whether these passages teach that it is the duty of some persons to be slaves. And it may be remarked that if a class of human beings ought to sustain this horrible relation, the law requiring them to do so, should be written in the plainest possible manner. If any one should claim me and my family as slaves, upon a pretense that God had authorized our enslavement, I would demand a warrant for so terrible a degradation, which no reasonable man could question. Let us see whether the scriptures cited prove unquestionably that to live in a state of slavery is a duty which God requires.
1. It will be seen at a glance that there is not a word said about slaves in any of these quotations. The word slave or slaves is not once used! And yet these passages, inculca[Pg 127]ting the duties of servants, have been rung in the ears of our poor slaves for the last three hundred years, by hypocritical preachers and slaveholders, as if heaven were chiefly interested and delighted in the perpetuation of an institution which degrades millions of men to a point as low as manhood can possibly descend. The whole gospel preached to slaves is mixed up with this satanic perversion. Even the song of angels announcing “peace on earth and good will to men,” is accompanied to the ear of the American bondman, with the base, coarse corruption,—“Slaves, obey your masters.”
2. The word servants, used in these scriptures, is not synonymous with the word slaves, as the preachers of oppression assume. The word andrapodon means slave, but that word, the learned tell us, does not occur in the sacred writings. The word douloi, used in the above quotations, and translated servants, means precisely what our English word servants means, as that word is understood in free countries. “Our English word servant,” says a good authority, “is an exact translation of the Greek word doulos. And to translate it into the definite word slave is a gross violation of the original. Our translators of the scriptures have uniformly translated the word doulos into the[Pg 128] word servant, never into the word slave, and for the reason that it never means slave. The apostles addressed servants in general, but never slaves in particular; and therefore the term slave (andrapodon) is not found in apostolic writings.”
The word doulos occurs in the New Testament one hundred and twenty two times,[10] and in no case has it been translated slave. To show the utter fallacy of the assumption that it is synonymous with slave, permit us to supply slave in a few passages where doulos occurs, instead of servant, for if slave and servant mean the same thing, they may be used interchangeably without violating the sense. “Paul and Timotheus the slaves of Jesus Christ.” “These are the slaves of the Most High God which do show unto us the way of salvation.” “And a voice came out of the throne, saying, Praise our God all ye his slaves, and ye that fear him small and great.” “I am thy fellow slave.” We might extend these quotations indefinitely, but a sufficient number have been given to show the absurdity of the assumption that the words servant and slave describe the same relation. The pro-slavery rendering of doulos, would make slaves of all the redeem[Pg 129]ed, and of the holy angels, and would, as Mr. Smith remarks, extend the territory of slavery over heaven itself.
3. The phrase “servants under the yoke” means no more than obligation to perform service according to agreement or contract. He who had an engagement with an unbelieving master should perform his contract, or fulfill his obligation with scrupulous fidelity in order that the name of God and his doctrine be not blasphemed. The word “yoke” does not necessarily imply slavery. Our Savior said “take my yoke upon you,” but certainly he did not invite any one to become a slave. The word yoke is used in the scriptures to represent the ceremonial law; “dominion of Jacob over Esau, in the matter of his father’s blessing;” political subjugation of the Israelites; the authority of king David over his subjects, etc., etc.; but not in a single passage in the scriptures, unless it be in 1st Tim. 6: 1, does it describe the state of a domestic slave, and the assumption that it means slave in this place is altogether without proof to sustain it.
4. There is one passage in the New Testament addressed to servants which has not yet been quoted. “Servants be subject to your masters with all fear; not only to the good and gentle, but also to the froward. For this is[Pg 130] thank-worthy, if a man for conscience toward God endure grief, suffering wrongfully.” 1st Pet. 2: 18, 19. In this passage doulos does not occur, but oiketes, which some suppose, means slave. But of this evidence is wanting. The same word is used four times only in the New Testament, and is, in no case, translated slave. (See Luke 16: 13. Acts 10: 7. Rom. 14: 4. 1st Pet. as above.) In one place it is rendered household-servant, and it seems to be used to distinguish house-servants from others. “The word comes from oikos, a house.”[11]
5. If the sacred writers above quoted had intended to address slaves, they would, in the first place, have done so plainly by calling them slaves. In the second place the directions would have been applicable to persons in a state of slavery. As to the terms used in the directions, we have seen that they do not apply properly to slaves; and the directions themselves afford proof that they were given to persons who were not chattel slaves. The advice and exhortations imply freedom from absolute authority and a power of choice not compatible with slavery. They are exhorted to perform service “As the servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart.” That[Pg 131] is, they were to be actuated by the highest motives, and were not to toil as the servants of men, but of God. Again, they are advised not to “DESPISE” their masters. Such directions have no pertinence, if addressed to human chattels. To whom then were they addressed? We answer, to voluntary laborers or servants who received a compensation for their work. The relations of servant and master or laborer and employer are necessary, legitimate and honorable relations. All men have not the skill to acquire or manage capital, and capital is essential to the accomplishment of great enterprises, to the march of improvement, and the progress of civilization. Capital invested in railroads, canals, machinery, factories, ships, merchandise, etc., requires many laborers to manage it; and the directions we are considering require that those laborers be honest, faithful, pleasant, and industrious in the discharge of the duties they engage to perform. And even though an employer be not a very good man, as is often the case with men of capital, christian servants or laborers are instructed to attend to their duties in the fear of God and in a manner that will recommend to those employers the religion which they profess. Yea, though servants have an engagement with a hard-hearted, overbearing, abusive heathen[Pg 132] master, the apostles would have them perform their part, with the utmost fidelity, suffering “wrongfully” if need be, for the sake of Christ. These directions are judicious, and their observance would work to the advantage of laborers in all countries.
Now it is clear that those scriptures do not teach unquestionably that it is the duty of some persons to be slaves. If the apostles had said, “slaves be obedient to your masters for you are their property and they have a right to you and all you can earn, because you are property,” then the matter would have been settled. Then we should admit that some men ought to be slaves, but upon the heels of this admission would follow a question very difficult to settle viz: Who is to obey the command to be a slave? How is it to be determined who shall become a human chattel and who the owner of said chattel?
But the assertion that God requires men to be slaves is a wicked assertion. It charges God with folly and inconsistency. He desires the elevation of man, but slavery brutalizes him. He encourages the enlightenment of the mind and the expansion of the understanding, but slavery darkens the mind and enchains the understanding. God cannot be pleased with the ignorance, stupor, injustice[Pg 133] and servile wretchedness which are necessary to the very existence of slavery, and hence he can not make it the duty of any man to be a slave, for this would be the same as to make it his duty to be stupid, ignorant and wretched. No, God does not will that any man or woman should be a slave. Man was made in the image of God’s independence and sovereignty. The instinct of freedom is strong in his bosom. It has resisted oppression in all ages, and it will resist it, with God on its side, until it shall triumph!
We will now inquire whether the apostolic addresses to masters authorize some men to sustain the relation of slaveholders. It should be observed that there are but two places in the New Testament in which the duties of masters are pointed out. Permit us to repeat those duties. “And ye masters do the same things unto them, forbearing threatening, knowing that your master also is in heaven.” “Masters give unto your servants that which is just and equal, knowing that ye also have a master in heaven.”
Is it possible that from these words men will take license to seize their fellows and convert them into property; despoil them of all their rights; deny them an education; banish them from courts of justice; break up their homes;[Pg 134] take their wages without compensation; drive them in chain-gangs from state to state, and whip, beat, and abuse them until they perish from the earth? Yes, it is possible. This has been done. “Was there ever,” said Dr. Wayland, “such a moral superstructure raised on such a foundation? * * If the religion of Christ allows such a license from such precepts as these, the New Testament would be the greatest curse that ever was inflicted on our race.” We remark
1. In these directions there is not the slightest intimation that the masters addressed were slaveholders and that the servants in their employ were slaves. The term slaveholders (andrapodistais,) is not used in the above passages, and this term is only once found in the apostolic writings.[12] It is found in the following text: “Knowing this that the law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for the unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, for whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for andrapodistais, (slaveholders or menstealers) for liars, etc.” 1st Tim. 1: 9, 10.
And it is not only a fact that slaveholders are not addressed in these passages, but the directions given are such as no slaveholder in the world can observe. How can a slaveholder give unto a slave that which is just and equal? The slave can own nothing, will nothing, inherit nothing, and hence it is impossible, in the very nature of the case, for his owner to give him a just compensation for his labor. And the slave has a just right to himself to liberty and the very first honest and enlightened effort of a slaveholder to give to his slave that which is just and equal would result in his emancipation! Justice and equality are incompatible with slaveholding. Injustice and inequality are its essential principles. Let us hear Mrs. Stowe’s comment on what Christian legislators have seemed to consider just and equal when making laws for slaves:—
“First, they commence by declaring that their brother shall no longer be considered as a person, but deemed, sold, taken, and reputed, as a chattel personal.—This is “just and equal!”
This being the fundamental principle of the system, the following are specified as its consequences:
1. That he shall have no right to hold property of any kind, under any circumstances.—Just and equal!
2. That he shall have no power to contract a legal marriage, or claim any woman in par[Pg 136]ticular for his wife.—Just and equal!
3. That he shall have no right to his children, either to protect, restrain, guide or educate.—Just and equal!
4. That the power of his master over him shall be ABSOLUTE, without any possibility of appeal or redress in consequence of any injury whatever.
To secure this, they enact that he shall not be able to enter suit in any court for any cause.—Just and equal!
That he shall not be allowed to bear testimony in any court where any white person is concerned.—Just and equal!
That the owner of a servant, for “malicious, cruel, and excessive beating of his slave, cannot be indicted.”—Just and equal!
It is further decided, that by no indirect mode of suit, through a guardian, shall a slave obtain redress for ill-treatment. (Dorothea v. Coquillon et al, 9 Martin La. Rep. 350.)—Just and equal!
5. It is decided that the slave shall not only have no legal redress for injuries inflicted by his master, but shall have no redress for those inflicted by any other person, unless the injury impair his property value.—Just and equal!
Under this head it is distinctly asserted as follows:
There can be no offence against the peace of the state, by the mere beating of a slave, unaccompanied by any circumstances of cruelty, or an intent to kill and murder. The peace of the state is not thereby broken.” (State v. Manner, 2 Hill’s Rep. S. C.)—Just and equal!
If a slave strike a white, he is to be condemned to death; but if a master kill his slave by torture, no white witnesses being present, he may clear himself by his own oath. (Louisiana.)—Just and equal!
The law decrees fine and imprisonment to the person who shall release the servant of another from the torture of the iron collar. (Louisiana.)—Just and equal!
It decrees a much smaller fine, without imprisonment, to the man who shall torture him with red-hot irons, cut out his tongue, put out his eyes, and scald or maim him. (Ibid.)—Just and equal!
It decrees the same punishment to him who teaches him to write as to him who puts out his eyes.—Just and equal!
As it might be expected that only very ignorant and brutal people could be kept in a condition like this, especially in a country where every book and every newspaper are full of dissertations on the rights of man, they therefore enact laws that neither he nor his children to all generations, shall learn to read and write.—Just and equal!
And as, if allowed to meet for religious worship, they might concert some plan of escape or redress, they enact that “no congregation of negroes, under pretence of divine worship, shall assemble themselves; and that every slave found at such meetings shall be immediately corrected without trial, by receiving on the bare back twenty-five stripes with a whip, switch or cowskin.” (Law of Georgia, Prince’s Digest, p. 447.)—Just and equal!
Though the servant is thus kept in ignorance, nevertheless in his ignorance he is punished more severely for the same crimes than freemen.—Just and equal!
By way of protecting him from over-work, they enact that he shall not labor more than five hours longer than convicts at hard labor in a penitentiary!
They also enact that the master or overseer, not the slave, shall decide when he is too sick to work.—Just and equal!
If any master, compassionating this condition of the slave, desires to better it, the law takes it out of his power, by the following decisions:
1. That all his earnings shall belong to his master, notwithstanding his master’s promise to the contrary; thus making him liable for his master’s debts.—Just and equal!
2. That if his master allow him to keep cattle for his own use, it shall be lawful for any man to take them away, and enjoy half the profits of the seizure.—Just and equal!
3. If his master sets him free, he shall be taken up and sold again.—Just and equal!
If any man or woman runs away from this state of things, and, after proclamation made, does not return, any two justices of the peace may declare them outlawed, and give permission to any person in the community to kill then by any ways or means they think fit.—Just and equal!”
(See Key, pp. 241.)
If slaveholding is an illustration of what St. Paul meant by justice and equality, who can tell what is injustice and inequality? Let it[Pg 139] be understood that a slaveholder cannot give to a slave, while he holds him as a slave, that which is just and equal, because the greatest injustice and inequality enters into the very nature of the relation of slaveholder. Could a man be a just robber or an honest thief? No, because injustice and dishonesty enter necessarily into the business of robbing and stealing. Even so is it impossible for justice and equality to enter into slaveholding, because, it is in its very nature, robbery, theft, extortion, oppression, and a complication of almost all villainies.
It is clear from the examination of all the passages in the New Testament relating to masters and servants, that those masters were not slaveholders and that those servants were not slaves.
But it will be asked did not slavery exist in the apostles’ days? We answer it did exist. The Roman government tolerated chattel slavery. Why then did not the apostles regulate it by prescribing the duties of slaveholders and slaves? It has been assumed, and justly too, that “slavery no more than murder can be regulated. That which is essentially and eternally wrong has nothing in it on which the claim of morality can rest. Morality requires its destruction, not its regulation.”[13] The law of[Pg 140] God does not point out the duties of liars, adulterers and thieves, because as such, they can have no duties. So God did not attempt to regulate Roman slavery which was a most vile and crushing despotism. He did not intend that SLAVERY should be continued, and hence it was not to be regulated but destroyed. We have no evidence in the above passages that SLAVEHOLDERS were admitted into the church of Jesus Christ by the apostles.
Slaveholders and the upholders of the infamous Fugitive Slave Law, lay the case of Onesimus to their consciences as a healing unction when dogging down the fugitive slave. In their blindness they assume that Philemon was a slaveholder, Onesimus a slave, and St. Paul a slave-catcher. But not a word of this is true.
1. Onesimus was a SERVANT and not a SLAVE, and Philemon was not a SLAVEHOLDER. The assumption that the one was a slave and the other a slave-owner is altogether without support.
2. Onesimus was not forcibly sent back. St. Paul did not arrest him, and send him in chains to Philemon, charging the expense to the government.
3. He was not sent back as a servant, much less a slave. How then? Why as a “brother[Pg 141] beloved.” “Thou therefore receive him as mine own bowels— * * receive him as myself.” “If he oweth thee ought put that on mine account.” These directions are wholly inconsistent with the idea of slavery. If Onesimus was the property of Philemon, Paul knew that he owed the service of his whole life. But Onesimus was no slave. Had he been a slave Paul would have said, “Receive him not as a slave (andrapodon) but above a slave,” instead of saying, “not as a servant (doulos) but above a servant.” Onesimus was a relative of Philemon, probably a natural brother,—brother “in the flesh;” as may be inferred from Philem., verse 16. He was undoubtedly a young man of great promise, and was not only entrusted with the epistle of Paul to Philemon, but jointly with Tychicus was the bearer of the venerable apostle’s letter to the church at Colosse. On the authority of Calmet, and indeed of Ignatius, it is affirmed that he succeeded Timothy as bishop of Ephesus.
They who affirm that the New Testament writers sanctioned Roman slavery, seem not to be aware of the serious imputation they cast upon that book and its authors. Look at that awful despotism, that you may understand what a savage, scaly, bloody-mouthed beast was welcomed into the church and baptized[Pg 142] with a Christian baptism, if we may believe the advocates of human bondage.
1. “The (Roman) slave had no protection against the avarice, rage, or lust of the master, whose authority was founded in absolute property; and the bondman was viewed less as a human being subject to arbitrary dominion, than as an inferior animal, dependent wholly on the will of his overseer.[14]
2. “He might kill, mutilate or torture his slaves for any or no offence; he might force them to become gladiators or prostitutes.
3. “The temporary unions of male with female slaves were formed and dissolved at his command; families and friends were separated when he pleased.
4. “Slaves could have no property but by the sufferance of their masters.
5. “While slaves turned the handmill they were generally chained, and had a broad wooden collar to prevent them from eating the grain.
6. “The runaway when taken was severely punished, * * * sometimes with crucifixion, amputation of a foot, or by being sent to fight as a gladiator with wild beasts; but most frequently by being branded on the brow with letters indicative of his crime.
7. “By a decree passed by the Senate, if a master was murdered when his slaves might possibly have aided him, all his household within reach were held as implicated and deserving of death.”
Is it possible that the holy apostles gave their sanction to a system based on such laws?
But all the fundamental principles of revealed religion are against slavery.
1. The character of god.—God is just and cannot favor a system which disregards all the principles of justice. But slavery outrages every principle of justice: therefore God must be opposed to slavery. God is impartial,—no respecter of persons, and he cannot be favorable to a system which is based upon partiality. But slavery is a system of superlative partiality: hence God is opposed to slavery. God is love,—and love wills the highest happiness of the intelligent universe, and the removal of every obstruction to the progress of men to that happiness. But slavery obstructs that progress. It is a barbarizing system, necessarily involving millions of men in ignorance, crime and misery: therefore God must will its extirpation. All the divine attributes are hostile to slavery. “Thus saith the Lord, execute ye judgment and righteousness, and deliver the spoiled out of the hand of the[Pg 144] oppressor.” “Learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed; judge the fatherless; plead for the widow.”
2. The common origin of man.—The unity of the human race is admitted by all scientific men, and the bible plainly teaches us that “out of one blood hath God made all nations to dwell upon the face of the earth.” Whatever difference of feature, color, intellect or stature, may be found in the various parts of the globe, is attributable to manners, climate, education, and the pleasure the Creator has in variety. Every human being is a man, possessing all the rights of a man. All men are brothers, born into the world on a common level. Hence one man cannot claim his brother and his brother’s family without committing an outrageous insult. If the right to claim belongs to any, it belongs to all, and now whose right shall hold? We say if the right to enslave belongs to any it belongs to all, and how is it to be determined who will sink from the right to own slaves to the condition of a SLAVE? Must the strong reduce to slavery the weak, and thus make might the arbiter? Such a conclusion would be contrary to the plainest dictates of reason. If men have a common parentage, and are brothers, they inherit common rights, and those rights ought to be respected. That system[Pg 145] which authorizes one part of the common family of man to plunder another part of their dearest rights—of all their rights, is a wrong system. But slavery authorizes this very thing: therefore slavery is wrong.
3. Jesus Christ is the Redeemer of all.—Jesus is the second Adam, and sustains a relation to the human family co-extensive with the first Adam. He is the Mediator, High Priest and Elder Brother of every child of man. All have been purchased with a priceless offering; and hence the claims of Christ are paramount to all other claims, and no one can rightfully become the owner of a fellow-being, unless Christ as Creator and Redeemer first relinquish his claim. A system which should attempt forcibly, and without divine permission, to seize upon the Saviour’s purchase, would be robbery—a robbery of God. But slavery does seize upon the purchase of a Saviour’s blood without divine permission: therefore slavery is robbery—robbery of God.
4. The Moral Precepts of Christianity.—The moral precepts of Christianity condemn slavery. Take for example the golden rule—“Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them.” Can any slaveholder obey this precept? If that wealthy planter who stands at[Pg 146] the head of a large family, were a slave with all his household, what course would he have his owner pursue? Would he not wish him to grant a deed of immediate manumission to all his family and to himself? Would he not urge the matter as one of immense importance? Is it possible that he could desire to be deprived of liberty, education, permanent family connections, and of the proceeds of his toil? Could any sane man wish to have his sons and daughters grow up in the stupor, ignorance, and miseries of slavery? No, it is not possible. Every sound-minded man would regard the subjugation of himself and family to slavery as a dreadful calamity, and would consider the man who should hold them in that condition as an unfeeling, inhuman tyrant.—Therefore no sound-minded man can hold a slave without violating the golden rule—without doing unto others as he would not have others do to him.
5. The commandments are all against slavery. “Honor thy father and thy mother.” But slavery places the master between the child and the parent, and makes it impossible for the child practically to obey this command, in the performance of those duties which cheer the hearts and lighten the burdens of parents, especially in old age. “Thou shalt not kill.”[Pg 147] But slavery authorizes in many cases the killing of slaves. “In North Carolina, any person may lawfully kill a slave who has been outlawed by running away or lurking in the swamps.” “By a law of South Carolina, a slave endeavoring to entice another slave to run away, if provisions, etc., be prepared to aid in such running away, shall be punished with death.” “Another law of the same State, provides that if a slave when absent from the plantation, refuse to be examined by any white person, such white person may seize and chastise him; and if the slave shall strike such person, he may be lawfully killed.”—“Thou shalt not commit adultery.” But female slaves are compelled to commit adultery. The law places them wholly within the power of their masters and overseers, and they dare not, they cannot resist their demands. “Thou shalt not steal.” But slavery exists by theft. Every slave is a stolen man. Every slaveholder is a man-stealer. The slave was stolen from Africa, or stolen from his rightful owner, himself, in America. No sophistry can make it plausible that the African slave trade is piracy, and that the perpetuation of slavery is an innocent business. It is theft as clearly to go to the negro hut in Virginia and steal a babe as to go to a hut in Africa and do the same deed.[Pg 148] Certainly a child born in our happy Republic is as free in the sight of God as one born under the rule of the King of Dahomey! “All are created free,” hence the holding of any one as a slave is theft persevered in. “Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.” But slavery does bear false witness against the slave, who is our neighbor. It denies his natural equality, his right to liberty, property—in short, his manhood. This is all as false as false can be. “Thou shalt not covet.” But slavery covets not only a man’s property, but the man himself. We see that slavery violates every commandment of the second table of the Decalogue, and indeed violates every precept of the first table, as might readily be shown.
It is clear that slavery receives no sanction from the curse pronounced upon Canaan, from patriarchal servitude, from the law of Moses, nor from the law of Christ. In the light of the divine word it appears a gigantic barbarism, full of hate to the human brotherhood. It annuls the law of God respecting the family and society. It obstructs the progress of education and religion. It is condemned by the whole spirit of revealed religion. Only a devil could pray for its perpetuation and extension. It is not only a sin, but a combination of stupen[Pg 149]dous sins—“the sum of all villainies,” in the language of Wesley, “an enormity and a crime, for which perdition has scarcely an adequate punishment,” in the language of Clarke. “Slavery,” said the celebrated Jabez Bunting, “is always wrong, essentially, eternally, incurably wrong.”
The christian church ought to be a faithful exponent of the benevolent spirit and doctrines of Jesus Christ. Liberty, truth and humanity, though insulted, betrayed and proscribed every where else, should find within its sacred enclosures a welcome, a refuge and a stronghold. Its watchmen ought to be faithful men, uninfluenced by flattery, uncorrupted by gold, unawed by the popular will. The church ought to be the most independent[Pg 150] body on earth. Standing as it does upon the Eternal Rock, holding the promise of successful resistance against the “gates of hell,” and of certain triumph over all the powers of darkness, the oppressor ought to know that he could not intimidate it by menace, silence its witnesses, win its smiles, or by any means be permitted to set his unhallowed feet within its pale. The church ought to be a terror to slaveholders; and although usage, prejudice, pride, passion, wealth, literature, and the selfish interests of men should all be combined against the oppressed, they should be certain of an unswerving and powerful friend and advocate in the church.
We say such should be the acknowledged and indisputable character and conduct of that body popularly known as the church, because then it would be a faithful exponent of the divine philanthropy of Jesus, of his “good will to men,”—then it would be precisely what the church was when it acknowledged no law superior to the will of God.
We propose now to ascertain the position of the American churches in relation to the slavery question. The most of them have been compelled to take some action on this exciting subject. We shall notice, more especially, the late action of various denomina[Pg 151]tions, both for and against slavery, that the reader may know precisely where each branch of the Protestant churches of this country, may be found. We do not deem it necessary to exhibit the relation of the Catholic church to slavery. We may remark here, however, by the way, that this church, if it be proper to call it a church, is soundly pro-slavery, and is, in America, as it is everywhere else, a staunch advocate of oppression. Few Protestant churches excel the Catholic in slaveholding.
The Presbyterian church (O.S.) stands fully and unequivocally on the side of the oppressor. It is true that a few earnest anti-slavery men may be found in this denomination, but their influence upon it is scarcely felt. They are not able in the least to modify the decided, unfaltering pro-slavery position maintained by the General Assembly. So far as I know, the most ultra friends of slavery are perfectly satisfied with the late ecclesiastical action and influence of this church. It makes no pretensions to anti-slavery. The slaveholder is welcomed to its communion, is authorized to preach and is elevated to the highest posts of honor. At the last General Assembly fifty slaveholding presbyteries were represented. The place of meeting was Charleston, South Carolina. Dr.[Pg 152] Lord, author of a celebrated sermon in support of the fugitive slave law, was elected moderator. The General Assembly of 1845, by a vote of 168 to 13, “Resolved, That the existence of domestic slavery, under the circumstances in which it is found in the southern portion of this country, is no bar to Christian communion.”
This church has been progressing in the wrong direction. In 1818, before the excision of the Presbyteries which formed the New School body, the General Assembly declared that “the voluntary enslaving of one part of the human race by another was a gross violation of the most precious and sacred rights of human nature,” “utterly inconsistent with the law of God,” and “totally irreconcilable with the spirit and principles of the gospel.” This was a noble declaration, but slaveholders were not excluded from the church as they should have been, but continued to flock in, until in 1836, a slaveholder presided over the General Assembly who openly said—“I draw my warrant from the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament to hold my slaves in bondage.”—Since 1836 the General Assembly has been wholly under the control of the pro-slavery interest. Her doctors of divinity have written learned treaties in defense of slavery, and[Pg 153] slaveholders are at ease, yea, sleep undisturbed in her communion, and for all that that church is likely to say or do, will sleep on until they find themselves in company with Dives.
When the New School General Assembly was organized only three slaveholding Presbyteries were represented. There are now about twenty. A very large proportion of the ministers and members of this church are somewhat anti-slavery, and many of them decidedly anti-slavery; but the holding of slaves is not made a test of communion. Slaveholders have been and are now flocking into it. Ministers of the sanctuary and members of the General Assembly are slaveholders. Nevertheless, the action of the General Assembly has been such as to keep up an agitation and render the southern portion of the church somewhat restless.
The following resolution was adopted by the General Assembly, which convened at Detroit in 1850:
“That the holding of our fellow-men in the condition of slavery, EXCEPT in those cases where it is unavoidable by the laws of the State, by the obligations of guardianship or the demands of humanity, is an offense, in the proper import of that term, as used in the Book of Discipline, chap. i., sec. 3, which should be treated in the same manner as other offenses.”
The exceptions in this resolution are sufficient, especially when explained at the south, to cover almost all cases of slaveholding.
The Assembly of 1853 adopted a report earnestly requesting the Presbyteries in the slaveholding States to lay before the next Assembly distinct and full statements touching the following points:
“1. The number of slaveholders in connection with the churches under their jurisdiction, and the number of slaves held by them.
“2. The extent to which slaves are held by an unavoidable necessity, ‘imposed by the laws of the States, the obligations of guardianship, and the demands of humanity.’
“3. Whether a practical regard, such as the Word of God requires, is evinced by the Southern churches for the sacredness of the conjugal and parental relations as they exist among slaves; whether baptism is duly administered to the children of slaves professing Christianity; whether slaves are admitted to equal privileges and powers in the Church courts; and in general to what extent and in what manner provision is made for the religious well-being of the enslaved.”
The debate on this report and the subsequent action of the southern Presbyteries prove conclusively that the Detroit resolution is utterly futile, and that slaveholding goes on in the southern part of the church without interruption. On this report, Rev. Mr. McLain, of Mississippi said:
“We disavow the action of the Detroit Assembly. We have men in our Church who buy slaves, and work them, because they can make more money by it than any other way. All who can, own slaves; and those who cannot, want to.”
Rev. William Homes, of Mo., said:
“The action of the Assembly of Detroit is null and void; for how can any man be found, not to be included in one or the other of the exceptions contained in it? All claim that their slaveholding is involuntary and justifiable. He concluded by strenuously asserting that the South would not submit to these inquiries.”
Rev. William Terry, of Va., said:
“He could not promise that the Virginia Presbyteries would give any replies to these inquiries. There was no hope, so long as slavery exists, that the church shall be free from it. If it has come to be true that the feeling of the North will not suffer the slaveholding ministers and members to remain in fellowship with the Church, the South will not remain with you. They do not contemplate a disconnection with slavery.”
Since the meeting of the Assembly the Presbyteries in the South have almost unanimously protested against the action in relation to slavery as “inquisitorial,” and have resolved to disregard totally the “earnest request” of the General Assembly. They have also resolved that the agitation of the subject in the Assembly must cease as a condition of the continued union of the church. Whether the pro-slavery element of this denomination will prevail, so as to “bury out of sight the Detroit resolution, silence the General Assembly on slavery, and make the New School Presbyterian Church a quiet home for those who “buy” “sell” and “work” slaves “because they can make money out of them,” cannot now be de[Pg 156]termined. We hope not, but knowing the aggressive spirit of slavery, we fear.[15]
It is somewhat difficult to define with any great degree of precision, the position of the Congregational churches in relation to slavery. Many of these churches are actively anti-slavery. The Congregationalists of Ohio, in a convention held at Mansfield:
“Resolved That we regard American slavery as both a great evil and a great violation of the law of God and the rights of man; and that we deem it our sacred duty to protest, by every christian means, against slaveholding, and against any and all acts which recognize the false and pernicious principle that makes merchandise of man.”
The largest representative body of congregationalists which has expressed itself on the question of slavery recently was the Albany Convention which met in 1852. This body adopted the following resolution:
Resolved, That in the opinion of this Convention, it is the tendency of the gospel, wherever preached in its purity, to correct all social evils, and to destroy sin in all its forms; and that it is the duty of Missionary Societies to grant aid to churches in slaveholding[Pg 157] States in the support of such ministers only as shall so preach the gospel, and inculcate the principles and application of gospel discipline, that, with the blessing of God, it shall have its full effect in awakening and enlightening the moral sense in respect to slavery, and in bringing to pass the speedy abolition of that stupendous wrong; and that wherever a minister is not permitted so to preach, he should, in accordance with the directions of Christ in such cases “depart out of that city.”
It is believed that Congregationalists generally are progressing in the right direction.[16]
John Wesley pronounced slavery to be the “sum of all villanies.” The discipline of the Methodist Episcopal Church is quite positive in its condemnation of slavery. Some of the early Methodist preachers gave no quarters to this sin. But as the church increased in numbers and popularity, slaveholders, who at first came in by mere sufferance, assumed a bolder position, and finally ruled the whole church “with a rod of iron.”
The General Conference which convened in Cincinnati in 1836, after a warm discussion, adopted the following resolution:
“Resolved, By the delegates of the Annual Conferences, in General Conference assembled, that we are decidedly opposed to modern abolitionism, and wholly disclaim any right, wish, or intention to interfere in the civil and political relation between the master and slave as it exists in the slaveholding States of this Union.” Yeas 120, nays 14.
This resolution was an offering to appease the bloody Moloch of slavery, which had been aroused somewhat by Orange Scott. At a Gen. Conf. in 1840, held in Baltimore, a resolution was passed depriving colored persons of the right of testifying against white persons. The resolution reads as follows:
“Resolved, That it is inexpedient and unjustifiable for any preacher to permit colored persons to give testimony against white persons, in any State where they are denied that privilege by law.”[17]
The division of this Church (or secession, as some call it, of the Church South) has as yet resulted, so far as we can see, in no advantage to the slave. The southern portion or branch[Pg 159] is not more pro-slavery than before; and the northern division occupies precisely the ground maintained when the resolutions of 1836 and 1840 were adopted, and when there were embraced within her communion the owners of 200,000 slaves. Slaveholding is not a bar to membership in the Methodist Episcopal Church North. Ten or eleven conferences are now slaveholding, and between 30 and 40,000 slaves are owned at the present time by members of this church.
The Baltimore Conference, which belongs to the church North, passed in 1836 the following resolution:
“Resolved, That this Conference disclaims any fellowship with abolitionism. On the contrary, while it is determined to maintain its well known, and long established position, by keeping the traveling preachers composing its own body, free from slavery; it is also determined not to hold connexion with any ecclesiastical body, that shall make non-slaveholding a condition of membership in the Church.”
This conference, so far from regarding slaveholding in the membership a sin, seems to consider it a virtue, and a condition of fellowship.
An effort to introduce the slavery question into the last General Conference was defeated, speakers were choked down, and the conference closed in disorder. Since the meeting of that body a number of Conferences have passed resolutions calling for the adoption of a rule which would exclude slaveholders from[Pg 160] the church. Some strong men[18] seem determined not to rest the question until there is a semblance at least of consistency between the professions and practice of Methodism on slavery. This church has been “as much as ever deploring the evils of slavery,”[19] for scores of years, and as much as ever strengthening and building up the iniquity! And as a Methodist writer in the Northern C. Advocate in a late article asks—“Is it not high time for honest and God-fearing anti-slavery ministers and members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, to inquire whether in her official position, her anti-slavery professions and character are not all a mere sham!” It is to be feared that the good men of this church, who are laboring to effect its renovation from this foul sin, are doomed to disappointment, as many others, who have preceded them, have been. The fact that three new slaveholding conferences will be represented in the next General Conference of this body, augurs unfavorably.
This branch of the Methodist family is fearfully involved in the sin of slaveholding.—[Pg 161]Slavery has silenced the voice of the church organ. Slaveholders have free access to its communion. The discipline contains a very disgraceful clause in relation to colored members. Article 12, Sec. 1st secures the right of suffrage to all male members who are WHITE. Article 7, Sec. 3, gives to each annual conference power to make for colored members of the church “such terms of suffrage” as they may think proper. In the same article the apparently neutral, but really pro-slavery character of this church is seen in the following words: “But neither the General Conference nor any annual conference shall assume power to interfere with the constitutional powers of the civil governments, or with the operations of the civil laws.” The civil law is the highest law recognized in this article, and where that makes chattels of men, this church is forbidden to interfere. In these quotations the principles of caste and lower-lawism, are most clearly inculcated. It is with surprise and sorrow that we find such odious features in the discipline of a church which boasts of MUTUAL RIGHTS.
This denomination of Christians stands boldly and unequivocally upon the solid bible anti-slavery platform; and although not a large[Pg 162] body, its influence has already been widely felt. It comes behind in no anti-slavery gift or grace. Its pulpit and press speak out earnestly and powerfully. The Syracuse Conference recently adopted the following resolutions, which are such as all the conferences of the connection pass unanimously:
“Resolved, That we hold—as ever—in abhorrence the system, esteeming it as ranking first in the dark list of systematized piracy, and all intelligent supporters of the abomination as being nothing, less or more, than willing pirates.
“Resolved, That to ask us to fraternize with any of the thousand and one organized or unorganized influences, going directly or indirectly to sustain the system, prominent among which are the principal churches and the great political parties of the country, is to offer direct insult to our sense of Christian propriety and gentlemanly courtesy.”
The Regular Baptist Church occupies a decidedly pro-slavery position. Where slavery exists, it does not make slaveholding a bar to communion. It is true that there is a division between the Northern and Southern Baptist churches in benevolent operations, but this division is “one, not of principle, but of policy. Hence, there has been from the first, between the leaders of the Northern and Southern Associations, a cordial fraternization.”[20] This church is very influential in the South, and from[Pg 163] no ecclesiastical organization has American slavery received a more powerful and hearty sanction. Many Baptists are, however, warm friends of the slave, but they have not been able to change or modify in the slightest degree the pro-slavery position of the general body.
The Free-will Baptist Church is decidedly anti-slavery. It stands in the front rank of those societies which are on the side of the oppressed battling for humanity. Amongst other excellent resolutions submitted by the committee on slavery at the last General Conference the following will show on what platform to look for a true Free-will Baptist:
“Resolved, That we re-affirm our opposition to the whole system of American Slavery; holding it to be absurd in the light of Reason, infamous in the eye of Justice, a deadly foe to human welfare, a libel on the Decalogue, and a reckless attack on the religion of Christ; and the only change we would recommend in our denominational attitude and policy on this subject, is, to take an advanced position in our warfare against the system, and to give a more open and public expression to our hostility.”
The position of this branch of the Baptist family may be known from the following resolution passed by the Eastern Association:
“Resolved, That we enter our solemn protest against the system of American slavery, as a[Pg 164] sin against God, and a libel on our national declaration, that “all men are created free and equal.””
The Evangelical Association has inserted in its discipline the following resolution which indicates its ecclesiastical position:
“Question. What is to be done respecting slaveholders and the slave-trade?
“Answer. We have long since been convinced that the buying and selling of men and women, and slavery, is a great evil, and ought to be abhorred by every Christian: be it therefore known to all fellow-members, that none shall be allowed, under any pretence or condition whatever, the holding of slaves or the trafficking in the same.”
This church believes slavery to be in itself a sin. The Constitution, which can only be altered by a vote of two-thirds of all the members of the society, declares that “involuntary servitude shall in no way be tolerated.” The 32d Section of Discipline reads as follows:
“All slavery in every sense of the word is totally prohibited, and shall in no way be tolerated in our Church. Should any be found in our society who hold slaves, they cannot continue as members unless they do personally manumit or set free such slaves. And when it is known to any of our ministers in charge of a circuit, station or mission, that any of its members hold a slave or slaves, he shall admonish such member to manumit such slave or slaves; and[Pg 165] if such persons do not take measures to carry out the discipline, they shall be expelled by the proper authorities of the church; and any minister refusing to attend to the duties above described shall be dealt with by the authorities to which he is amenable.”
This section, substantially, has been in force since 1821. The United Brethren have congregations in Missouri, Kentucky, Virginia and Maryland.
At the General Conference, May 12, 1853, the Southern delegates reported that there were twelve cases of legal connection with slavery in the Church, but they were of a character so peculiar, that a difference of opinion had arisen as to whether the discipline intended to exclude them. The opinion and advice of the Conference was asked. The following answer, in substance, was given:
“All those cases reported are cases prohibited by the plain letter of our Discipline. Execute papers of immediate emancipation.—The sympathy of this Conference given to palliated cases of slavery would be an entering wedge of slavery into our Church. The Church must be disconnected with slavery in all its forms. The bishops are instructed to carry out the letter of Discipline.”
The action in this case was taken without a dissenting vote, and the delegates from the South assured the Conference that the intention of the Discipline, as above explained, should be executed.
The General Conference made provision for the publication of a monthly magazine. The following is from the Prospectus:
“The immediate abolition of slavery; rejecting that most odious and barbarous notion, that man has a right to hold property in man. The position will be taken that this is a monster that can never be tamed, a sin which violates every precept of the Bible. It will be our object to show that slavery (by which we mean the holding of property in man) is sinful, necessarily sinful, under all possible and conceivable circumstances.”
Besides the churches already mentioned the following are decidedly anti-slavery:—“Associate Presbyterian,” “Reformed Presbyterian,” “Free Presbyterian,” (of which the venerable John Rankin is a member,) many local “Independent” churches, and the “Friends” or Quakers. The Quakers have a world-wide reputation for practical philanthropy. And on the other hand the following large denominations are decidedly pro-slavery:—“German Reformed,” “Dutch Reformed,” “Cumberland Presbyterian,” “Lutheran” and “Disciple” (or Campbellite.)
The following estimate made by W. G. Gephart, a Presbyterian minister, will give a “bird’s eye view” of the relation of the leading denominations of this country to slavery as it stood a few years since. At the present time they are only more deeply involved in the trade in the souls of men, than they were when this estimate was made:
| DENOMINATIONS. | NO. OF SLAVES. |
|---|---|
| Methodists, | 219,563 |
| Presbyterian, Old and New School, | 77,000 |
| Baptists, | 125,000 |
| Campbellites, | 101,000 |
| Episcopalians, | 88,000 |
| Allow for all other denominations, | 50,000 |
| Total number of slaves owned by ministers of the gospel and members of the different Protestant churches, | 660,563 |
“Now, suppose the average value of all these slaves be only $400 each, and it will give a capital of $264,225,200! invested in humanity, the interests of 660,653 beings upon whom God has chartered immortality, and stamped it with the signet of his own image.”
From this review it will be perceived that the most influential denominations have given their sanction to slavery. They have opened wide their doors to slaveholders, and have welcomed them to their communion. They have not advised nor commanded them to emancipate their slaves as a condition of admission to the church, to the Lord’s table, to the pulpit, or even into heaven itself!
Divines have, by a perversion of the Bible, corrupted the consciences of Southern, aye, even of Northern Christians, by the most subtle and monstrous errors. The holy Bible has been made, in the language of Blanchard, a smith shop whence consecrated hands have brought fetters for the feet, and manacles for the mind! “We have,” said Frederick Douglass, “men-stealers for ministers, woman-whippers for missionaries, and cradle-plunderers for church-members. The man who wields the blood-clotted cow-skin during the week fills the pulpit on Sunday and claims to be a min[Pg 168]ister of the meek and lowly Jesus. The man who robs me of my earnings at the end of each week, meets me as class-leader on Sunday morning, to show me the way of life, and the path of salvation. He who sells my sister, for purposes of prostitution, stands forth as the pious advocate of purity. He who proclaims it a religious duty to read the Bible, denies me the right of learning to read the name of God who made me. He who is the religious advocate of marriage, robs whole millions of its sacred influence, and leaves them to the ravages of wholesale pollution. The warm defender of the sacredness of the family relation is the same that, scatters whole families,—sundering husbands and wives, parents and children, sisters and brothers,—leaving the hut vacant, and the hearth desolate. We see the thief preaching against theft, and the adulterer against adultery. We have men sold to build churches, women sold to support the gospel, and babes sold to purchase Bibles for the poor heathen! all for the glory of God and the good of souls! The slave auctioneer’s bell and the church-going bell chime in with each other, and the bitter cries of the heart-broken slave are drowned in the religious shouts of his pious master. Revivals of religion and revivals in the slave trade go hand[Pg 169] in hand together. The slave prison and the church stand near each other. The clanking of fetters and the rattling of chains in the prison, and the pious psalm and solemn prayer in the church may be heard at the same time. The dealers in the bodies and souls of men, erect their stand in the presence of the pulpit, and they mutually help each other. The dealer gives his blood-stained gold to support the pulpit, and the pulpit, in return, covers his infernal business with the garb of Christianity.”
We shall now proceed to show what we conceive to be the true position of a Christian church in relation to slavery. It has been demonstrated that slavery is a complicated[Pg 170] and monstrous iniquity involving a direct violation of the whole second table of the Decalogue. This being an established position it will not be difficult to determine the relation which the church should sustain to this sin, and to those who commit it.
The scriptural position of a Christian and a Christian society in relation to sin, may be ascertained from the following quotations: “But I have written unto you not to keep company—if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or railer, or drunkard, or extortioner, with such an one, no, not to eat.”
“Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord; and touch not the unclean thing, and I will receive you.”
“And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them.”
“Now we command you brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly.”
In these passages the duty of open and decided non-fellowship with sinners is unequivocally asserted. 1. Do not “keep company” with covetous persons and extortioners. Do not “eat” with them at the sacramental table, for this would imply a sanction of their sin. 2.[Pg 171] “Come out from among them.” Let there be between you a plain line of demarcation so that the whole world will know that you are not in favor with their sin, and are not a party to it. “Have NO FELLOWSHIP.” Be not united in any associations which require it. Go not with them to the sacramental board. Unite not with them in benevolent efforts for the conversion of the world, for this would require fellowship. Have no fellowship. 4. “In the name of the Lord Jesus withdraw yourselves”—cut off all ties which imply fellowship. Do this solemnly—do it in the name of the blessed Jesus—do it for the glory of God—do it as an act of discipline—withdraw yourselves from every disorderly walker—from every “darkness worker,”—let them be unto you “as a heathen man and a publican.”
Now how are these scriptures to be obeyed respecting the great sin of slavery? We answer: 1. The church should debar slaveholders from its communion. While they remain impenitent in relation to the monstrous sin of slavery and refuse to emancipate their slaves, they should be peremptorily refused admittance into the fellowship of saints. At the door they ought to be met by an emphatic “No sirs; your hands are red with blood, your purses are filled with unjust gains, you rob the widow and[Pg 172] the fatherless, you make merchandise of men, repent, reform, do justly, love mercy, or away ye men-stealers!”
2. If by any means slaveholders have obtained a place in the church, they should be plainly dealt with, according to the directions given in such cases by the sacred writers, and in case of a refusal on their part to “hear the church,” they should be immediately thrust out—accounted as “heathen”—“delivered unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh.”
3. But in case a church refuses to discipline slaveholders, as it disciplines other offenders against God, and on the contrary persistently retains them in its communion and officially recognizes them as members of the household of faith,—as holy persons,—as good christians, then a christian can do no better than to withdraw from that church. He cannot remain in it without giving an expressed or implied sanction to a slaveholding christianity. The whole force of his piety and influence will go abroad to create the conviction that slavery is right and quite consistent with holiness.
In support of this view of the true position of a church and of christians in relation to slavery, the following additional considerations are submitted:
1. The church is required to be holy. But it cannot approximate to holiness while welcoming into its pale sinners such as slaveholders are, and sanctioning such an impurity as is slavery.
2. The Church is required to be the “pillar and ground of the truth.” But a slaveholding church wofully perverts and corrupts the truth in many important particulars. The truth that God hates oppression and robbery for instance, is corrupted by it, for it pronounces the very chief oppressors and robbers the true children of God, and assures the world that He approbates their conduct. It corrupts the truth in relation to the true idea of a christian. It denies that justice, mercy and love, are essential attributes of a christian character, by passing off upon a deluded world a class of persons as christians who are pre-eminently unjust, unmerciful, and full of hate to the human brotherhood.
3. The church should honor the holy scriptures. But a slaveholding church necessarily dishonors them. The church is presumed to be a faithful and competent expounder of the doctrines and moral precepts of the Bible, and hence what it approves, it is supposed, the Bible sanctions, and as it approves of slavery, it gives currency to the idea that the Bible is[Pg 174] a pro-slavery book,—that Christianity is favorable to oppression, and an enemy to equality and fraternity. Thus a slaveholding church dishonors the Word of Truth and is an infidel-making organization. Non-fellowship with slaveholding is demanded as a condition of faithfulness to the Bible.
4. The church is expected to convert the world to righteousness. But it can never do this while shielding the Leviathan of sins. Slavery is a system of barbarism which must necessarily be destroyed in order to the evangelization of America and of the world. The tyranny, injustice and cruelty of masters, and the ignorance, servility and general degradation of slaves are inconsistent with christianity, and to sanction these is to sanction and sustain sin, and interpose a barrier to the progress of truth and righteousness. And in addition to this, a church must have a character to give it influence with men. A church without character for disinterestedness, benevolence and truth, will be despised by men and forsaken of God. A slaveholding church is without a good moral character, and hence lacks moral power. Men will be slow to believe that, while fiercely defending a monstrous national sin, it is in earnest in its opposition to lesser crimes and trivial wrongs. How pow[Pg 175]erless is a body of christians whose virtue gives way under the temptation of a popular and lucrative vice! How justly branded with cowardice and hypocrisy!
5. Duty to slaveholders demands non-fellowship with slaveholding. The course pursued by the popular churches involves the souls of slaveholders in imminent peril. Their consciences are lulled into quietude or narcoticized by deadly moral nostrums, skillfully prepared and treacherously administered by time-serving, fleece-seeking hirelings, who assume the sacred office of shepherds. Many of them are not aware of their sin and danger, and how can they be aroused while honored in the church and flattered as good christians, and imitators in the slaveholding business, of the good old patriarchs? To save these men the church must be plain with them, and require repentance of all their sins, and especially of the sin of slaveholding, as a condition of a place in the temple of God.
6. Duty to the slave demands non-fellowship with slaveholding. The oppressed have a claim upon the church, because Christ died for them, and they are, while enslaved, in such a situation that they can neither love him with all their powers, nor do much to establish his church and publish his name in the[Pg 176] earth. Hence it is the duty of christians and christian societies to break off the fetters which bind not only their limbs but their minds. The American church is able to emancipate every slave in the land. Who doubts that it is its duty? But in order to do this glorious work, the principle of strict non-fellowship with slaveholders must be adopted. Let every church in America declare slavery to be a sin and exclude slaveholders from its communion, and the doom of slavery will be sealed. All the laws and compromises and compacts which the ingenuity of the prince of darkness could invent would not preserve it. It is the church which is the bulwark of slavery. Not one day could it stand up in this country without the strength imparted to it by a powerful but awfully corrupted church. “Let all the evangelical denominations,” says Albert Barnes, “but follow the simple example of the Quakers in this country, and slavery would soon come to an end. There is not vital energy enough; there is not power of numbers and influence enough, out of the church, to sustain it. Let every religious denomination in the land detach itself from all connection with slavery, without saying a word against others; let the time come when, in all the mighty denominations of Christians, it can be announ[Pg 177]ced that the evil has ceased with them FOREVER, and let the voice from each denomination be lifted up in kind, but firm and solemn testimony against the system—with no ‘mealy’ words; with no attempt at apology; with no wish to blink it, with no effort to throw the sacred shield of religion over so great an evil—and the work is done. There is no power out of the church that could sustain slavery an hour if it were not sustained in it.” Hence the reasons for non-fellowship with slaveholding are as vast as the interests temporal and eternal of millions and millions of our fellow-creatures, and as vast as the treachery which leaves them in chains! Depend upon it the curse of God will come down upon the American church in a storm of fiery vengeance if it arise not and do justice to the slave!
7. If slaveholders are admitted to church-fellowship no class of sinners on earth should be excluded. The church cannot consistently expel from its communion the rich man who grinds the face of the poor laborer that reaps down his fields, and at the same time retain the slaveholder who lives entirely upon the unpaid labor of the poor. He who occasionally cheats his neighbor out of a few dollars cannot consistently be censured by the church while the man who cheats whole families out[Pg 178] of domestic comfort, home, education, and their all, passes without reproof. The occasional adulterer cannot receive church discipline in the presence of him who compels his slaves to live together without the sanction, and without the protection of the law. He who steals a sheep cannot be cast out from a church in which he who steals men occupies a high seat. As slaveholding is a violation directly or indirectly of every commandment of the Decalogue, if it cannot and must not be disciplined, then church discipline is useless; and all classes of sinners should be admitted and retained in this Holy Temple, unless the principle be established that he who commits a petty offense shall be cast out, but he who has the heart and courage to commit a high offense, a daring crime, shall remain in full fellowship. I have wondered how slaveholding church members could try and expel from a religious society a poor negro who, in addition to his peck of corn per week, had stolen a little meat, while they were conscious of robbing that same negro of the products of his daily toil, and of his own soul and body.
8. To maintain its independence the church must discard fellowship with slaveholders.—In no case have slaveholders been willing to occupy an humble position in a religious body[Pg 179] long. They assume to be pre-eminently the members of the church, and the press, pulpit, and General Assembly or General Conference, must, unequivocally, endorse, or patriarchalize their slaveholding. The history of all the pro-slavery churches in America is proof of this remark. A few slaveholders are able to change entirely the action of a powerful ecclesiastical body—to range it on the side of oppression, to silence or subborn its witnesses, to shut up its sympathies and take away the bow of hope from the slave. How many of the hundreds of ministers in the whole south are free to utter their convictions on slavery to day? How many religious presses are unfettered? If then the church would stand upon the solid rock of truth, unawed by the popular will, uncorrupted with gold, the immutable friend of man, proclaiming and enforcing the whole truth, it must keep out of her communion legalized and practiced tyrants.
9. Regard for decency, refined sensibility and common humanity, urges non-fellowship with slaveholders. The members of a slaveholding church become insensible to the grossest outrages upon the better feelings of slaves, and they habitually commit acts, without a blush, which, one should think, would pale the cheek of a demon. For illustration[Pg 180] take a well authenticated fact: “A runaway slave in 1841, assigned the following as the reason why he refused to commune with a church of which he was a member. ‘The church,’ said he, ‘had silver furniture for the administration of the Lord’s supper, to procure which they sold my brother! and I could not bear the feelings it produced to go forward and receive the sacrament from the vessels which were the purchase of my brother’s blood!’” But the members of that church, generally, were altogether without feeling upon the subject, and were as little disturbed in selling a slave to purchase silver ware for the sacramental table, or to pay a parson, or to support a missionary, as in selling a mule for the same purposes.
10. If slavery be fellowshiped in the church, then slaveholding preachers will be coming around and preaching the gospel to us! A dealer in human flesh will undertake to teach us to be just and merciful. We will be expected to receive the elements of the holy sacrament from hands that use the cowskin occasionally on the backs of slaves! It is notorious that churches which fellowship slavery have an exceedingly dumb and callous ministry on the subject of oppression. Frederick Douglass, I think it was, who said that the[Pg 181] hardest master he ever served was a Methodist Protestant preacher. The following incident will illustrate this thought: “A minister of the gospel owned a female slave, whose husband was owned by another man in the same neighborhood. The husband did something supposed to be an offense sufficient to justify his master in selling him for the southern market. As he started, his wife obtained leave to visit him. She took her final leave of him, and started to return to her master’s house. She went a few steps and returned and embraced him again, and started a second time to go to her master’s house; but the feelings of her heart again overcame her, and she turned about and embraced him the third time. Again she endeavored to bear up under the heavy trial, and return; but it was too much for her—she had a woman’s heart. She returned the fourth time, embraced her husband—and turned about,—A MANIAC!”—(Anti-slavery Record.)
Good God! can any one plead for the admission of such cruelty into the bosom of the church and into the ministry?
And let it be remembered that this preacher simply did what the legal relation authorized, and what all slaveholding ministers may do without ecclesiastical censure.
11. If slavery be fellowshiped in the church, then we shall be compelled to sit in religious meetings, class-meetings and conference meetings, and hear a good experience told by one who lives on the toil of wretched slaves, and who would sell at public sale one of our own brethren in the Lord, yea, even ourselves, if the laws would allow it. Take the following specimen of a Methodist sister, and ask yourselves how you would like to attend class with her.
“A poor woman was put in jail about a week since. It is the jail that cost the people of the United States nearly, or quite, $60,000. Had this woman committed crime? Not the least in the world. Her mistress wants to sell her, and pocket the money—that’s all. She puts her into jail simply to know where she is when she finds a customer. This poor woman, offered for sale, expects to be confined in a few weeks. She has a husband and mother, but neither of them are allowed to go into the jail to visit her. The husband tried to talk with her through the grated window, the other day, but was driven off by some menial of the establishment. Amanda, the slave-woman, is a member of the Methodist Church, which takes the name of Bethlehem. I hear she is in good standing in the Church, and sustains[Pg 183] a fair and good character generally. The mistress—the owner—the trader—who is she? She is Miss A. B., a venerable spinster, a few years ago from Virginia, and now residing in this city. She brought with her this woman, her mother, and two or three children, upon whose wages she has lived for years past, and now proposes to put Amanda in her pocket. She (Miss A. B.) is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, belongs to the M’Kendree Chapel congregation, and attends class regularly. I am glad to say some of the brethren are a little stirred about this transaction.”—Elliott, page 73.
“A little stirred!” Indeed! One would think they would have stirred that villainous woman out of the Church in short metre, or stirred out of it themselves. But no, they were only “a little stirred!”
1. It has been objected that fellowship should not be withdrawn from all slaveholders, because some of them are exceedingly kind to their slaves. To this it may be answered that it is impossible for a master to be really very kind to those he holds in slavery, because the holding of them in that relation is extreme unkindness. A kind slaveholder? What entitles him to that character? Does he renounce the claim of property in his slaves? No. Does he hire them to work for him and pay them when the work is done? No. Does he open a school on his plantation for their mental and moral culture? No. Does he permit his slaves to instruct each other in the rudiments of education? No. Does he use his influence to have the diabolical laws enacted to crush the manhood out of the colored man, repealed? No. Does he secure his slaves against the chances of the inter-state slave trade—against[Pg 185] sale at auction for his debts—against the lash of a Legree? No. What then entitles him to the character of a kind slaveholder? Why he simply treats them as a good man treats a fine horse or a favorite dog. He feeds them well, works them moderately, whips but little, but robs them of all! We abuse language when we say—a benevolent robber, a gentlemanly pickpocket, an honorable pirate or a kind slaveholder.
The poet, Longfellow, while traveling in Va., became acquainted with an honest old slave owned by a fine specimen of a kind, Christian, Presbyterian slaveholder. Said he:
“Calling at a blacksmith’s shop for a small job of work, I found the smith was a slave. On inquiring to whom I should make payment, he told me I might to him. His practice was to receive all the money paid at the shop, and pay it over to his master at night. I asked him how his master knew whether he rendered a just account. He replied, that he knew him too well not to trust him. That, as wrong as his master did by him, it was no excuse for him to do wrong by his master. He could deceive his master, but he could not deceive God, to whom he must render his final account. He said he was a Baptist, and had regular family prayers. His master was a Presbyterian, to[Pg 186] whom he gave credit for good usage and good training. But as he had faithfully served him fifty years, he did think that he ought to have the remainder of his days to himself. He regretted that he could not read the Bible; and I was pained to hear him attempt to quote it, he made such blunders. The tears started in the eyes of the poor man as he spoke of his hard condition, and looked forward to death only for release from his bondage. He thanked God that he had no children to inherit his ignorance and servitude.”
The kindness of certain slaveholders might be mere favorably considered if it were productive of any permanent practical benefits to the slave; but while it leaves him in the depth of his wretchedness,—exposed to all the horrors of the worst form of slavery, it is a meritless thing—unworthy the name of kindness. The kind slaveholder knows that when he dies his slaves will be sold at auction together with his horses, cattle, and plantation. What avails his fancied kindness when he knows the horrible chances to which he subjects his helpless victims. And how deeply guilty is he in the sight of God for refusing to break every yoke when he has the opportunity! To illustrate this thought and show the sequel of kind slaveholding we will subjoin a sketch of a woman’s[Pg 187] history who was the property of a kind slaveholder.
“A kind slave-master, in one of the Carolinas, had a large family, of various colors, some enslaved, some free. One of the slaves was his favorite daughter, and much accomplished. Dying, he willed his heir, her brother, to provide for her handsomely, and make her free. But her brother was a slave-master, and she was a slave. He kept and debauched her. At the end of four years he got tired of her; and that notorious slave-dealer, Woolfork, coming down to collect a drove, he sold his sister to him. “There is her cottage,” said he to Woolfork; “she is a violent woman. I don’t like to go near her; go and carry her off by yourself.” Woolfork strode into the cottage, told her of the fact and ordered her to prepare. She was dreadfully agitated. He urged her to hasten. She arose and said, ‘White man, I don’t believe you. I don’t believe that my brother would thus sell me, and his children. I will not believe unless he come himself.’—Woolfork coolly went, and required her brother’s presence. The seducer, the tyrant came, and, standing at the door, confirmed the slaveholder’s report. ‘And is it true? and have you sold me?’ she exclaimed. ‘Is it really possible? Look at this child! Don’t you see in every[Pg 188] feature the lineaments of its father? Don’t you know that your blood flows in its veins? Have you, have you sold me?’ The terrible fact was repeated by her master. ‘These children,’ said she, with a voice only half articulate, ‘shall never be slaves.’ ‘Never mind about that,’ said Woolfork, ‘go and get ready. I shall only wait a few minutes longer.’ She retired with her children. The two white men continued alone. They waited. She returned not. They grew tired of waiting, and followed her to her chamber. There they found their victims beyond the reach of human wickedness, bedded in their blood.”—(Anti-Slavery Record.)
2. Slaveholders ought not to be excluded from the church, it is argued, because their views and feelings on the subject of slavery have been corrupted by the prevalence of this popular sin. They are not, it is maintained, individually responsible—the fault—the sin, the shame attaches to a false public morality. Dr. McClintock offers this objection in the following words: “Their position,” he says, “has the eminent unhappiness of almost necessitating a feeble or corrupt moral sense on this subject; they are carried along by a great movement that absorbs their individuality, so to speak; the personal conscience is lost in[Pg 189] the general sense of the community. The great work to be done is to purify that general sense; not to curse and malign individual slaveholders, but to break up the false public morality in which the system finds its main support.”[22]
We answer that no man is excusable for falling in with a “great movement” which is manifestly wicked. Noah, Lot, Abraham and Elijah were not carried along with sin in this way. Their moral sense was neither enfeebled nor corrupted by the prevailing vices. The apostles did not lose their “personal conscience” in the “general sense” of idolatrous communities, in the midst of which they labored. And in no case does the Bible excuse a sinner because of the prevalence of sin.—Idolaters were not taken into church because that vice was sustained by law and prevailing custom. And he who lived in Corinth in the days of St. Paul, found himself in the midst of gross, shameless sensuality—and it was quite easy for such a person to fall in with the vices for which that city was notorious; and some Christians did fall in with those vices. But did St. Paul excuse them, and forbid their expulsion from the church, throwing the blame of their conduct upon the prevailing vice? Did[Pg 190] he ordain that until the “general sense” were purified, the “fornicator,” the “incestuous person” and the “drunkard” must remain in the church? By no means. He knew that the public conscience was made up of individual consciences—that public corruption was the aggregate of individual corruption—and hence that the only possible method of reaching and purifying the general sense, was by reaching and purifying the individual sense. And hence individual purity was required as a condition of church membership. Churches now proceed precisely upon this principle in relation to all sins, however prevalent, slavery excepted; and no good reason can be offered for making it an exception. And if slaveholders have an enfeebled moral sense, which is certainly the case, it is because the ministry and church have been recreant to duty and truth, and have said to them “peace, peace, when God had not spoken peace.” The only way to prevent them from being swept along by the flood tides of this devastating iniquity until they launch upon the shoreless sea of wrath, is to sound the alarm! But alas, those watchmen who have their ear are apt to say to them, do not be alarmed—the “false public morality” will be a satisfactory apology for your sins! When asked by the judge[Pg 191] why you were an oppressor, you can answer, that you only followed the prevailing example!
3. Slavery, it is objected, is a political question and hence the church ought not to meddle with it. We answer, that slavery is not only a political, but a moral question—it is a question concerning the rights of man, and all that concerns man concerns a christian. Temperance is made a political question, should the church therefore fellowship the drunkard? The observance of the Sabbath is a political question—must the church therefore drop it, lest it be entangled with politics? The same may be said of gambling, perjury and theft.
4. But, says one, the laws uphold slavery, and whatever of blame attaches to slaveholding is justly chargeable to the laws. To this it is answered that slaveholders are the makers of their own laws, and hence are responsible for them. But if they had no voice in the government it would be impossible to shift the responsibility of slaveholding upon the laws, because, in the first place, a good man cannot innocently avail himself of the provisions of laws which permit him to injure his fellow creatures; and in the next place, the laws compel no one to hold slaves. They allow it, but do not require it.
5. But some, it is urged, are slaveholders from necessity, hence they ought not to be blamed. This cannot be. The laws do not compel people to buy, steal, trade for, receive as a gift, or inherit slaves. Any one may refuse to own this kind of property unless he is an idiot or a child. And if by any means a man finds himself in possession of slaves he can emancipate them. It is not far to the free states. Why do not those pious Methodists and Presbyterians, who are always talking of the impossibility of “getting rid” of their slaves, permit the abolitionists to help them? They would cheerfully pilot them, or give them a free passage on the Under-Ground Railroad! But all those pious slaveholders from necessity are ready to lynch or imprison any man who may undertake to release them from the “necessary evils” of slavery. A slaveholder from necessity is one who holds slaves because holding them is a necessary condition of robbing them.
6. But the church has no right to ask a man to give away his property and impoverish himself. Yes, the church has a right to require a man to restore stolen property, and this is the kind of property slaves are. As to impoverishing slaveholders, there is danger of that, but poverty is no crime and is often good for the[Pg 193] soul. It is better to be a Lazarus in this world with his future, than a Dives with his future. And besides, there is no law of God allowing a man to roll in wealth acquired by robbery.
7. Nothing can be said against some slaveholders only that they hold slaves. In every other respect they are christian-like in their conduct, and it seems hard to exclude such fine people from the church.
Alas that any christian should speak of slaveholding as “only” a small objection. But one sin may ruin the soul. Some men are in every respect excellent persons except that they are addicted to intemperate habits, to lying, or to licentiousness—shall they therefore be excused for their besetting sin, and allowed to indulge it? One who has cheated a poor white neighbor out of only one year’s toil, ought never to be admitted into the church until he makes restitution. So in the case of a slaveholder—let him be just to every creature of God—let him give up his idol or serve it in its appropriate temple, and not disgrace the church of God with its image and worshiper.
8. It has been maintained that slaveholders should be taken into the church that they may come under the direct influence of the gospel, the tendency of which is to destroy slavery.[Pg 194] We answer—a. The same reason might be urged with equal force for the admission of the drunkard, liar, thief or adulterer.
b. Experience proves that slaveholders, when admitted to church fellowship, are not more likely to emancipate their slaves than others. They are apt to settle down in the belief that it is right to hold slaves, and the height of impertinence for any one to meddle with them about it. A minister in Kentucky, Rev. Mr. Fee, who is well acquainted with this subject from experience and actual observation, says of the slaveholder—“The way to lull his conscience on the subject is, to bring him into the church in the practice of his sin. I know repeated instances of persons whose consciences and hearts, at the time of their awakening, seemed to be tender on the subject of slaveholding. But after they had been fully received, and a few comfortable meetings passed over, they became wholly indifferent; and after hearing or reading one or two pro-slavery sermons, declaring slavery to be a Bible institution, they were almost ready to seize the torch, and apply the fires of persecution to the individual who would disturb their Zion. The place to induce the slaveholder to give up his sin is at the time, or before, he enters the door of the church; before he has been pronounced[Pg 195] as being in a salvable state; for ‘all that a man hath will he give for his life.’”
But this is no abstruse question as “cotton Divines” would persuade us. Slaveholding is a wicked business and must be treated as such. It is impossible to treat it as such while fellowship is extended to slaveholders. The christian is bound to refuse that fellowship. If any branch of the church officially or practically sanctions slavery and endorses the piety of slaveholders, then, in order to be consistent and safe, a christian must come out of that church, because in it, he will be a partaker of its sins and a sufferer of its plagues.
Civil government is necessary to the preservation, prosperity and safety of society. In some important sense, “the powers that be, are ordained of God.” It does not appear that[Pg 196] the Creator has established any specific form of government, but the genius of christianity is evidently democratic. The leading objects of government are defined to be “the punishment of evil doers and the praise of them that do well.” When a government fails to protect and encourage the good and to punish evil doers,—when it becomes a mighty engine of oppression, the object of its institution is frustrated.
In the United States the voters are responsible for the character of the government. The people are the sovereign rulers. The ballot box controls legislation. If our country is badly governed it is the people’s fault.
The free white people of America are responsible for the existence of American slavery. They could at the ballot box break every yoke. They have the power to release more than three millions of slaves and thereby make heaven and earth rejoice!
A weighty responsibility, therefore, rests upon voters in relation to slavery. If it continue, it will be because they shall will it, and express that will at the ballot box. He who votes for a representative that is pledged to sustain slavery, becomes responsible for that representative’s acts on the slavery question. The responsibility cannot be shifted or dodged.[Pg 197] Representatives consult the will of their constituents and act as they wish them to act. They are only the people’s agents, the echo of the people’s voice.
In the light of these facts how can a christian vote for a slaveholder or a friend of slavery? How can he, by his vote, say that slavery shall be perpetual? Every pulsation of a christian’s heart beats in harmony with liberty; he could not have slaves in his own hands. How then can he, how dare he, by his vote, chain them and deliver them over to the slave driver? It is mean and wicked for a strong man to beat a weak one, but it is equally as mean and wicked to hold the weak man so that the strong one may beat him at his leisure and with ease. So it is bad to own a slave and tax his sinews, sweat and blood, to beat and bruise him, but it is equally wrong to hold the slave while the southern slaveholder does the same thing. Hence, he who votes for pro-slavery representatives, votes for slavery and all its swarms of evils, and is indirectly a slaveholder himself.
Let it be distinctly understood, then, that political power has been entrusted to the christian people of America by the God of nations, who holds them responsible for its proper exercise; and that acting politically is a serious[Pg 198] business, affecting the interests directly, in this country, of twenty millions of freemen, and more than three millions of slaves; and also affecting indirectly, the interests of the whole human family.
If the supporters of slavery continue to control the policy of the American government; to trample under foot the “higher law;” to render the Declaration of Independence a nullity; to denationalize liberty; to nationalize slavery and perpetuate and extend it; and thus to belie all our professions of Democracy, and render this government a Godless tyrant, delighting in crushed hopes and hearts—then the whole human race may weep. That our government has been progressing toward this terrible consummation for the last thirty years is but too evident.
The Declaration of Independence is a sound anti-slavery document. It does not regard the right of all men to liberty as an unsettled opinion or a question to be proved by abstruse argument, but pronounces it a “SELF EVIDENT TRUTH.”
The Constitution in form if not in fact, pretty fully embodies the sentiments of the Declaration. The word slave is not found in it, and it was kept out not accidentally, but purposely. The framers of the Constitution[Pg 199] carefully guarded that instrument against any endorsement of slavery. In the convention which formed the Constitution, Gov. Morris of Pennsylvania said, “He never would concur in upholding domestic slavery. It was a nefarious institution.” Mr. Getry, of Massachusetts, in the same convention said, “we had nothing to do with the conduct of the States as to slavery, but we ought to be very careful not to give any sanction to it.” The idea that there could be property in man was carefully excluded from the Constitution. It was about to be foisted into that instrument by the adoption of a report of a committee fixing a tax on importations. But Mr. Sherman was against “acknowledging men to be property, by taxing them as such under the character of slaves.” Madison “thought it wrong to admit in the constitution the idea that there could be property in man.” But if the idea of property in man was carefully excluded from the Constitution, then it is clear that chattel slavery is not in form recognized, much less established by that instrument.
It is evident that the framers of the Constitution expected the speedy abolition of slavery; and hence, while providing in fact though not in form, for its continuance under the constitution, by virtue of local State laws, they so[Pg 200] framed that instrument that it would not countenance slavery or deny the glorious doctrines of the immortal Declaration, which contained what Mr. Sumner calls “the national heart, the national soul, the national will, and the national voice.”[23]
Washington said “That it was among his first wishes to see some plan adopted, by which slavery may be abolished by law.”
Adams regarded slavery as “a sacrilegious breach of trust.”
Hamilton considered slaves, “though free by the law of God, held in slavery by the laws of men.”
Jefferson said that the “abolition of domestic slavery was the greatest object of desire.”
Patrick Henry said—“I will not, I cannot justify it.”
Benj. Franklin, when 84 years of age, came up before Congress with a petition from the “Abolition Society of Pennsylvania, praying that body to countenance the restoration of liberty to those unhappy men, who alone, in this land of freedom are degraded into perpetual bondage, and who, amidst the general joy[Pg 201] of surrounding freemen are groaning in servile subjection.” This petition besought Congress to “step to the VERY VERGE of the power vested in them for discouraging every species of traffic in the persons of our fellow men.”
These facts afford conclusive evidence, that the founders of the American Republic did not intend to fasten upon the object of their toils, perils and sacrifices, a monster which would speedily eat out its virtue, destroy its vitality and overthrow it forever.
But the policy of the government has been reversed. Millions of acres of territory have been purchased and annexed to make room for slavery, which has become a great national pet—the god before whom aspiring politicians must kneel and worship as a condition of political elevation.
The President of the United States and his Cabinet, the Supreme Court, and both Houses of Congress are all under the control of the Slaveocracy. No man can be a President of the United States unless he bows the knee and swears upon the altar of this modern Baal. Zeal for the infamous Fugitive Slave Law is now a particular test of political orthodoxy. A Congressman who advocates the principles of Washington, Franklin and Jefferson is considered as standing outside of any “healthy[Pg 202] organization” and is not deemed worthy of a place on the most insignificant Congressional committee. Our government has been thoroughly changed from an anti-slavery to a pro-slavery government.
In view of these facts how important that the concentrated moral and political power of every American christian be brought to the rescue of our great Republic from the sin and shame of its present position.
Christians, in the States where slavery exists, are under obligations to use their whole political and moral power to bring about the speedy repeal of the entire slave code. That code is a miserable barbarism and should be swept away forever from the statutes of Christian States. My christian brethren in Virginia, Kentucky and Missouri, are you prepared to use all the power, moral and political, with which you are entrusted, as you shall answer to God, for the emancipation of your suffering fellow citizens? Your political influence must tell somewhere! Remember that.
Christians in the free States are obliged to do what is in their power for the repeal of all laws which bear upon the colored man because he is a colored man. The word “white” ought to be erased from the statutes of all christian States. All “black laws” are anti-democratic,[Pg 203] anti-christian, and not only insult and annoy, but discourage the colored man and obstruct his progress in the path of improvement.—Christian brethren of the free States, you have not done your duty toward your colored brother. You have sustained laws which gall his neck as a heavy yoke. You have treated him as an alien and an enemy. Will you henceforth do him justice, as you shall answer to God?
Christian citizens of all the States are directly responsible for the existence of slavery in the District of Columbia, and they should not be content until that foul pollution is wiped away from the Capital of our country. Slavery at Washington is especially a national disgrace, a blistering shame, a satire upon our professions.
When the foreign minister or visitor comes to our country, and goes to Washington, he sees in the streets, at the hotels, and everywhere, a poor, stupid, oppressed people, whose very speech and looks betray their ignorance and servility. Ah! Is this American freedom? Equality? Republicanism? Upon inquiry, he finds that one-seventh of all the people are in this state of servile wretchedness.
And when a member of Congress from a free State goes to the proud Capital of his[Pg 204] country, he beholds passing by the tall and splendid buildings of the government, droves of men, women and children, chained together,—some sullenly indifferent to their fate—others weeping as if their hearts would break.—Who are these? American citizens!
Men, as white as some members of Congress, and women as fair as their wives and as virtuous as their daughters, are cried off at auction to the highest bidder, in Washington!
There our senators and representatives sit and legislate, in sight of the slave prison, and slave market—in hearing of the clanking of chains, and coffles,—and of the wail of slave mothers, weeping for their children, because they are
They are also responsible for the extension of slavery into territory now free. If they go not to the utmost verge of their power to save the Lord’s free earth from the overspreading and blighting curse of slavery, they cannot but be execrated by an enlightened posterity.
But more than all this. A christian is a citizen of the world, and hence is required to employ the whole force of his moral and political power for the extirpation of slavery from every State in the Union, and from every country on the globe. The influence of an[Pg 205] intelligent, active christian citizen is worldwide. He cannot be the dupe or tool of any party; he is never shackled by party organizations; he does not commit the keeping of his conscience to political leaders. He sincerely loves God, believes the Bible, and loves his fellow-men, because they are men. Prejudice, caste, and all other relics of barbarism, he has thrown away. He talks, votes and prays for universal liberty and righteousness. In the pulpit, in the shop, on the farm, anywhere, everywhere the whole weight of his influence is thrown against slavery in the territories, in the District of Columbia, in the States, and against it wherever it exists in the world. As he seeks for the physical, intellectual and moral improvement and happiness of all men, he must desire intensely the speedy extirpation of slavery from the earth.
Christian voter, when you approach the ballot box, think of the three millions of bondmen who are holding up their hands “all manacled and bleeding,” pleading to you for deliverance!
Many persons, who appear to be sensible of the evils of slavery, seem utterly at a loss for some feasible method of abolishing it. “It is here in our midst,” say they, “and how are we to get rid of it?”
To this question we have a plain scriptural answer. “Loose the bands of wickedness,”—“undo the heavy burdens,”—“Let the oppressed go free,”—“break every yoke,”—“proclaim liberty throughout all the land, unto all the inhabitants thereof.”
Immediate, unconditional, universal emancipation is the only just, the only reasonable and the only possible method of adjusting the[Pg 207] slavery question. To this measure the people of the United States must come. A general Jubilee is inevitable. Slavery is an unmitigated wrong. Every element of it is at variance with the happiness of man and the law of God. It is without a single redeeming principle, and hence its destruction—its total annihilation is necessary.
Since the gigantic wrongs of slavery have been so generally made known as somewhat to arouse the public conscience from its long sleep, some writers, anxious to preserve the system, have proposed to reform it. They say, “Slavery, of itself, is a very innocent relation, but its evils are horrible. Let us correct the evils and preserve the system.”
But slavery cannot be reformed, so as to make it a tolerable institution because its essential feature—viz, property in a human being, is, wherever imposed, an outrageous, an insufferable wrong. Who would think of reforming robbery—of making laws to regulate robbers in their trade—and to prevent brutal men from engaging in it? What if it should be enacted by grave senators that none but gentlemen should rob, and that they must do it genteelly—using no unnecessary cruelty or coercion? All the world would laugh such senators to scorn. But slavery is from beginning[Pg 208] to end a system of robbery, which it is as impossible to reform, so as to take away its “evils,” as it is to so reform piracy as to destroy its evils, and make it a humane, just and christian trade.
But the American slaves, it is maintained, are not prepared for freedom. This objection is without foundation. God creates men free, and sends them forth into the world with such endowments as are needed in a state of freedom, and as are suited to no other state. To say that a race, which God has created free, is unprepared for freedom is to reproach the Maker. Freedom is the native element of man. And
“Not prepared for freedom?” This has been the watchword of oppressors in all ages. The “people,” the uninformed “masses,” have, in the estimation of tyrants, always been prepared for slavery and injustice of every kind, but never for freedom. And it has ever been their policy to render them less fit for any station or any responsibility in life. They never put forth an effort to prepare their victims for any higher business than obsequious submission to usurped authority. True to this spirit, those who are most noisy about the unfitness of slaves for freedom, are most zealous for the[Pg 209] maintenance of those odious laws and usages which shut them out from all chance of mental and moral culture.
And if the slaves are unprepared for freedom, what is to prepare them for it? Their present degradation is owing to slavery, and it is not likely that the continuance of the cause of their degradation will elevate them. Remove the cause, and the effect will cease. Emancipate the colored man, open to him our schools and colleges, place before him motives for action such as animate freemen, and swell the hearts of Christians, give him an opportunity and he will prove himself every whit a MAN. How mean and hypocritical the objection, that slaves are not prepared for freedom, when we employ the whole weight of our laws and prejudices to crush out their manhood, and as far as possible unfit them for any condition except that of working animals.
But thousands of slaves have fled from their oppressors, and, in the midst of the greatest difficulties and embarrassments, have not only proved themselves prepared for freedom, but also to take a position amongst the most cultivated and honored freemen.
The half-free colored people of the United States prove themselves worthy of all the rights of American citizens.
There are now in Canada about 35,000 fugitive slaves; and no people have ever entered upon the possession of freedom under more embarrassing circumstances. They were born in chains. The iron yoke had galled their necks. Their backs had felt the keen lash. In their flight they were pursued by hungry blood-hounds and more hungry marshals.—Naked, broken in spirit, impoverished and uneducated, they reached a cold, ungenial clime. But they were free! And those 35,000 escaped slaves are rapidly improving in wealth, intelligence, and in every social virtue. In the town of Buxton 130 families reside who own a body of 9,000 acres of land. The fugitive slaves of Canada West now own 25,000 acres of land. Were they not prepared for freedom?
Immediate emancipation worked admirably in the British West Indies. The masters were not murdered by the emancipated slaves, as was predicted, but good order reigned everywhere. The liberated people have been rapidly improving in intelligence and wealth.—The terrible wrongs and miseries of slavery are no more. Rev. Mr. Richardson, a missionary in Jamaica, speaking of the moral condition of those islands, says:
“Marriage is much more common than formerly, and the blessings of the family and[Pg 211] social relations are much more extensively enjoyed. The Sabbath is also more generally observed. The means of education and religious instruction are better enjoyed, although but little appreciated and improved by the great mass of the people. It is also true, that the moral sense of the people is becoming somewhat enlightened. But while this is true, yet their moral condition is very far from being what it ought to be.
“Our brightest hopes and fondest anticipations must and will centre around the YOUTH of this island. I see the hand of Providence steadily urging onward, with resistless might, the car of Progress. Gaunt Prejudice and grim Superstition gradually give way; Darkness and Error recede before the sunlight of Truth; and even the demon of Lust and the giant Intemperance (twin brothers in Satan’s family) are bereft of their power, and chained for a season. I see intelligence, purity, and piety supplanting ignorance, licentiousness, and irreligion, and this moral waste becoming transformed until it blooms and flourishes as the garden of God.”
“Immediate emancipation?” exclaims a fearful friend, “that will never do! Murder, amalgamation, and many other evils will be inevitable consequences of such a measure.[Pg 212] Let us colonize the slaves. Send them back to their own country.” To these objections it may be answered,
1. Colored men are not more inclined to murder than are white men. Africans have the same natural dispositions which distinguish other races.
2. Many masters have emancipated their slaves, and thereby secured their undying affection. Liberated slaves have never turned with bloody hands upon their liberators.
3. In the West India Islands 800,000 slaves were emancipated in one day, and although sixteen years have since elapsed, none of the terrible massacres which were predicted by the opponents of the measure have occurred.
4. This fear of the vengeance of emancipated slaves arises, doubtless, from a guilty conscience—or a feeling that it is richly deserved. A highwayman robs a man, and then says, if I let him go he may have me arrested and punished, therefore I will kill him. Americans say, on the same principle, we have most terribly abused our slaves, and hence, if we let them go they will retaliate, therefore, we must continue the wrong for self preservation!
5. As to amalgamation we have only to say that slavery is an extensive system of forced amalgamation. In the free States this much[Pg 213] dreaded evil is of rare occurrence. Immediate emancipation would speedily arrest the very thing here deprecated.
a. The colonization scheme is impracticable. Between three and four millions of people can never be shipped off to Africa. It is impracticable to send even the annual increase of the free colored population. There are in America now about twelve millions of colored people, and there is no power, civil or ecclesiastical, which can carry them away to Africa.[24] A few will go and ought to go as missionaries, but the great and rapidly increasing masses are firmly planted on this continent and here they must remain.
b. Forcible colonization is wrong. Colored people have the same right to live in America that white people have. The Creator made the earth for the habitation of man, and He has never surrendered his ownership of it to[Pg 214] any government. The colored man has a right to live in any country on the globe—a right derived from the Creator. Has God said that every race under heaven may have a home in America but the African? Never. It is impertinent as well as wicked for one people to say to another, “you shall not live in this State, nor on this continent.” Such people arrogate to themselves a prerogative which Jehovah only possesses.
c. The present popular scheme of colonization leaves unquestioned the title of the slaveholder, encourages the doctrine that the Bible sanctions the institution, appeals to the basest prejudices of the American people to induce them to countenance the scheme, and encourages the enactment of such laws as now disgrace the statutes of several of the free States, in order, it would seem, to harrass the free colored man until he shall be compelled to flee from the land of his birth to a distant shore for refuge. One who speaks what he knows, says,
“I speak the words of soberness and truth when I say that the most inveterate, the most formidable, the deadliest enemy of the peace, prosperity, and happiness of the colored population of the United States, is that system of African colonization which originated in and[Pg 215] is perpetuated by a worldly, Pharaoh-like policy beneath the dignity of a magnanimous and Christian people;—a system which receives much of its vitality from ad captandum appeals to popular prejudices, and to the unholy, groveling passions of the canaille;—a system that interposes every possible obstacle in the way of the improvement and elevation of the colored man in the land of his birth;—that instigates the enactment of laws whose design and tendency are obviously to annoy him, to make him feel, while at home, that he is a stranger and a pilgrim—nay more,—to make him ‘wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked;’—to make him ‘a hissing and a by-word,’ ‘a fugitive and a vagabond’ throughout the American Union;—a system that is so irreconcilably opposed to the purpose of God in making ‘of one blood all nations for to dwell on all the face of the earth,’ that when the dying slaveholder, under the lashes of a guilty conscience, would give to his slaves unqualified freedom, it wickedly interposes, and persuades him that ‘to do justly and love mercy’ would be to inflict an irreparable injury upon the community, and that to do his duty to God and his fellow-creatures, under the circumstances, he should bequeath to his surviving slaves the cruel alternative of either[Pg 216] expatriation to a far-off, pestilential clime, with the prospect of a premature death, or perpetual slavery, with its untold horrors, in his native land.”—Watkins.
Many objections are offered against immediate emancipation, but they are evidently mere excuses. This may be laid down as a safe rule: Offer no objection to the manumission of slaves which would not satisfy you were you yourselves the slaves to be manumitted. Tried by this reasonable and scriptural rule all apologies, objections and excuses offered for the perpetuation of human bondage, vanish away. There can be no good reason advanced for the continuance of this curse a single year longer. Too long already has it dishonored our churches and our country. Too many souls have been already involved by it in hopeless ruin. Too many generations of slaves have already gone in sorrow and despair down to their graves. Too long has the public conscience been debauched. Justice, humanity and religion with united voice call for immediate emancipation.
If our free institutions are to be preserved they must be released from the folds and the deadly charm of this monster serpent. Freedom cannot flourish in its coils nor survive in its slimy embrace.
Individual and national repentance and reformation only can avert the terrible judgments of an offended God. The cries of the oppressed have gone up into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth, and he will be avenged speedily.
There are not more than one hundred and twenty thousand slaveholders in the United States, and it would be easy for them to settle this whole question in one year or even in a day. Let them simply be honest, be just, obey the Bible, overcome their pride, avarice, prejudices and lusts, and the work will be done. The example of Freeborn Garretson is commended to the special attention of all slaveholders, and especially of those who profess religion. This good man says:
“As I stood with a book in my hand, in the act of giving out a hymn, this thought powerfully struck my mind: ‘It is not right for you to keep your fellow-creatures in bondage; you must let the oppressed go free.’ I knew it to be that same blessed voice which had spoken to me before. Till then I had not suspected that the practice of slave-keeping was wrong; I[Pg 218] had not read a book on the subject, nor been told so by any. I paused a minute, and then replied, ‘Lord, the oppressed shall go free.’ And I was as clear of them in my mind, as if I had never owned one. I told them they did not belong to me, and that I did not desire their services without making them a compensation. I was now at liberty to proceed in worship. After singing, I kneeled to pray. Had I the tongue of an angel, I could not fully describe what I felt: all my dejection, and that melancholy gloom which preyed upon me, vanished in a moment, and a divine sweetness ran through my whole frame.
“It was God, not man, that taught me the impropriety of holding slaves: and I shall never be able to praise him enough for it. My very heart has bled, since that, for slaveholders, especially those who made a profession of religion; for I believe it to be a crying sin.”
Are there any prospects that the long and dreary night of American despotism will speedily end in a joyous morning?
If we turn our eye towards the political horizon we shall find it overspread with heavy clouds portentous of evil to the oppressed. The government of the United States is intensely pro-slavery. The great political parties, with which the masses of the people act, vie with each other in their supple and obsequious devotion to the slaveocracy. The wise policy of the fathers of the Republic to confine slavery within very narrow limits, so that it would speedily die out and be supplanted by freedom, has been abandoned; the whole spirit of our policy has been reversed—and our national government seems chiefly concerned for the honor, perpetuation and extension of slavery.
The powerful religious denominations have been following in the wake of the state. Their ancient and bold testimony against slavery[Pg 220] has been expurgated from their confessions and disciplines, or completely neutralized.—Slavery as it is receives their unqualified sanction. The giant Christian publication societies of the day so completely ignore the question of slavery that a reader of all their books would not suspect that millions of slaves are groaning under an iron yoke in this country. Dark as a starless, moonless midnight, is the aspect presented by the heavens of the popular religious denominations.
American prejudice is yet very powerful. The polite, educated, and talented free colored traveler is exposed, in most parts of the Union, to the coarsest insults from this gaunt demon. He feels everywhere its hellish power. One who was more than twenty years a slave presents in the following eloquent language a true picture of the present anomalous condition of the children of Ham in the midst of the general joy of freedom:
“The Hungarian, the Italian, the Irishman, the Jew and the Gentile, all find in this goodly land a home; and when any of them, or all of them, desire to speak, they find willing ears, warm hearts, and open hands. For these people, the Americans have principles of justice, maxims of mercy, sentiments of religion, and feelings of brotherhood in abundance. But[Pg 221] for my poor people, (alas, how poor!)—enslaved, scourged, blasted, overwhelmed, and ruined, it would appear that America had neither justice, mercy, nor religion. She has no scales in which to weigh our wrongs, and no standard by which to measure our rights.... Here, upon the soil of our birth, in a country which has known us for two centuries, among a people who did not wait for us to seek them, but who sought us, found us, and brought us to their own chosen land,—a people for whom we have performed the humblest services, and whose greatest comforts and luxuries have been won from the soil by our sable and sinewy arms,—I say, sir, among such a people, and with such obvious recommendations to favor, we are far less esteemed than the veriest stranger and sojourner.... We are literally scourged beyond the beneficent range of both authorities—human and divine. We plead for our rights, in the name of the immortal declaration of independence, and of the written constitution of government, and we are answered with imprecations and curses. In the sacred name of Jesus we beg for mercy, and the slave-whip, red with blood, cracks over us in mockery.... We cry for help to humanity—a common humanity, and here too we are repulsed. American[Pg 222] humanity hates us, scorns us, disowns and denies, in a thousand ways, our very personality. The outspread wing of American christianity, apparently broad enough to give shelter to a perishing world, refuses to cover us. To us, its bones are brass, and its feathers iron. In running thither for shelter and succor, we have only fled from the hungry bloodhound to the devouring wolf,—from a corrupt and selfish world to a hollow and hypocritical church.”—Fred. Douglass.
But dark as is this picture, there is still hope. The exorbitant demands of the slave power, the extreme measures it adopts, the deep humiliation to which it subjects political aspirants, will produce a reaction. Inflated with past success it is throwing off its mask and revealing its hideous proportions. It is now proving itself the enemy of all freedom.
The extreme servility of the popular churches is opening the eyes of many earnest people to the importance of taking a bolder position. They are finding out that it is a duty to come out from churches which sanction the vilest iniquity that ever existed, or exhaust their zeal for the oppressed in tame resolves, never to be executed.
The truth is gaining ground that slaveholding is a great sin, that slaveholders are great[Pg 223] sinners, and that he who apologises for the system is a participator in the guilt and shame.
Free mission societies, reform publication societies, and free churches are rising up all over the country, in the free and in the slave States. They take their stand upon a solid Bible platform, and their power will be rapidly augmented until the strongholds of oppression will tremble at their approach.
Literature is coming to the rescue of the slave, and even now is pleading his cause with astonishing power in all the languages of christendom.
Christianity is on the side of the slave, and its true spirit is beginning to be practically applied.
Thousands of devout persons are found day and night pleading with God for the speedy deliverance of the captive.
But a voice from heaven is heard saying, “Hope thou in God.” God is on the side of the oppressed. He will never abandon them. He approves their cause, hears their cries, and is interested in all their movements. Those millions of colored Americans are now in the fiery furnace, but He will bring them out. From their house of bondage they will come forth, and accomplish a glorious mission on[Pg 224] the earth. God has reserved for them some of the grandest achievements in music, poetry, science, arts, morals, freedom and religion. Never has he permitted a people to be more deeply humbled, and none will in the end be more highly exalted. God’s ways are not as our ways. He can make the wrath of man to praise him.
The day of deliverance is not distant. God is stirring up the nations. The slavery question is agitating the whole enlightened world. It cannot be put to rest. Politicians pronounce it dead and solemnly bury it, but it rises before the third day and confronts them in every assembly. Church councils resolve to let it alone, but it will not let them alone. They hate agitation, and cry for peace, but are answered, “first pure, then peaceable.”
God of liberty! hasten the hour when the reddening East shall authorize the joyful announcement to American bondsmen—“the morning cometh.” Till then let us “TOIL AND TRUST.”
[1] See Elliott on Slavery, p. 40.
[2] R. Walsh, Encyclopedia Americana, Art. Slavery.
[3] Here are a few advertisements taken from respectable southern papers, verbatim.
Slaves Wanted.—We are at all times purchasing Slaves, paying the highest cash prices. Persons wishing to sell will please call at 242 Pratt St. (Slatter’s old stand.) Communications attended to.
B. M. & W. L. Campbell.
A Negro for Sale.—I wish to sell a black girl about 24 years old, a good cook and washer, handy with a needle, can spin and weave. I wish to sell her in the neighborhood of Camden Point; if not sold there in a short time, I will hunt the best market; or I will trade her for two small ones, a boy and girl.
November 15, 1852
M. Doyal.
100 Negroes for Sale, at my depot on Commerce street, immediately between the Exchange Hotel and F. M. Gilmer, Jr.’s Warehouse, where I will be receiving constantly, large lots of Negroes during the season, and will sell on as accommodating terms as any house in this city. I would respectfully request my old customers, and friends to call and examine my stock.
Montgomery, November 2, 1852.
Jno. W. Lindsey.
Great sale of Negroes by J. & L. T. Levin.—On Thursday, December 30, at 11 o’clock, will be sold at the Court House in Columbia, one hundred valuable negroes.
It is seldom such an opportunity occurs as now offers. Among them are only four beyond 45 years old, and none above 50. There are twenty five prime young men, between sixteen and thirty; forty of the most likely young women, and as fine a set of children as can be shown!
Terms, &c.
December 18, 1852.
[4] Prof. B. B. Edwards says—“From the time of Augustus to Justinian we may allow three slaves to one free man; we shall thus have a free population in Italy of 6,944,000; and of slaves 20,832,000.”
On the treatment of Roman slaves Guizot remarks that “it would be easy to give the most frightful and heartrending accounts of the manner in which the ancient Romans treated their slaves. Entire volumes are occupied with the details.” (Hist. Civilization.)
[5] These facts are well authenticated. The “Union Point” tragedy did not occur in 1854, as reported recently, and denied by the “Free Trader,” but it did occur in 1842, and we have quoted the “Trader’s” own account.
[6] Accepting this celebrated curse as an inspired prophecy, and we are inclined to receive it as such, it finds an easy fulfillment in the conquests of Joshua over the Canaanites; in the oppression of the Phœnicians, (who were descendants of Canaan,) by the Chaldeans, Persians and Greeks; and finally in the subjugation and destruction of the Carthaginians, by the Romans. This is the opinion of President Edwards, and it is entitled to respect.
[7] I avail myself in what follows upon this point, of the investigations of Rev. E. Smith, who has thrown much light upon this subject. See “Bible Servitude” pp. 91, for a full discussion of this point.
[8] For these criticisms on the Hebrew word the author is indebted to Albert Barnes’ ‘Inquiry into the scriptural views of slavery.’
[9] The passage in Ex. 21: 20, 21, applies, as all admit, mainly, if not exclusively, to native Hebrew servants, and as no one finds in the limited voluntary servitude of the native Hebrews a warrant for hereditary slavery, I have not thought it necessary to dwell upon it. It may be observed, however, that the word “punished,” is rendered in the marginal reading, “avenged;” and the meaning of the law is that the interest the master had in the life of the servant should be taken as presumptive evidence that he did not intend to kill him, unless the case was very clear, and hence that he should not be avenged summarily, by a relative of the servant, but be regularly tried and punished by the appointed authorities.
[10] See Barnes’ Inquiry.
[11] See Smith.
[12] Tract of the American Reform Book and Tract Society.
[13] Bible Servitude.
[14] These facts are drawn by Jay from Blair’s Inquiry into the state of slavery among the Romans.
[15] Note. One little circumstance, which occurred in the General Assembly of 1853, indicates a remarkably conservative spirit in that body. Dr. Judd, in writing the history of the division of the Old and New-Schools, put in one chapter on slavery. This chapter made the book offensive to the south. To reconcile all parties, it was agreed that two editions of the work be printed, one for northern, the other for southern circulation—the latter to be minus the chapter on slavery!
[16] The “American Missionary Association,” which has no fellowship with slaveholding, and the American Reform Book and Tract Society, which is doing much for the dissemination of Christian anti-slavery doctrines, are sustained mainly by Congregationalists. The main body of the Congregationalists, however, adhere to the old Boards.
[17] Can any one conceive of any virtuous reason which prompted the passage of such a rule? Is there not a deep and dark iniquity among slaveholders which makes it not only necessary that slaves should be excluded from civil, but also from ecclesiastical tribunals?
[18] Amongst these, and at the head of them stands Mr. Hosmer, Editor of the Northern C. Advocate, author of “Slavery and the Church,” and a number of other excellent books.
[19] See Methodist Discipline.
[20] Annual Report of American and Foreign Anti-slavery Society.
[21] Distinguished from the Moravians, or old United Brethren by the additional phrase—“in Christ.”
[22] Methodist Quarterly.
[23] Hon. Charles Sumner’s speech on the Repeal of the Fugitive Slave Bill, delivered in the Senate, August 1852, is one of the finest specimens of eloquence in the English language. Its arguments too, are unanswerable.
[24] The following estimate of their numbers and localities is taken from one of the able reports of the British and Foreign Anti-slavery Society, carefully drawn up by its former Secretary, John Scoble, Esq.:
| United States, | 3,650,000 |
| Brazil, | 4,050,000 |
| Spanish Colonies, | 1,470,000 |
| S. Amer. Republics, | 1,130,000 |
| British Colonies, | 750,000 |
| Hayti, | 850,000 |
| French Colonies, | 270,000 |
| Dutch Colonies, | 50,000 |
| Danish Colonies, | 45,000 |
| Mexico, | 70,000 |
| Canada, | 35,000 |
| Total, | 12,370,000 |
Rep. Am. and For. Anti. Slav. Society.
Transcriber's Note:
Every effort has been made to replicate this text as faithfully as possible. Some minor corrections of spelling and puctuation have been made.
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