_Being the Substance of Remarks on the Subject of Domestic Slavery,
delivered to the Law Class of William and Mary College, December 2d,
1834_.
This subject is too interesting to be passed in silence. The time too
is rife with proofs, that unless we mean tamely to surrender a most
important interest, we must hold ourselves always on the alert to
defend it with tongue and pen.
The short and compendious argument of the commentator, and his
confident and peremptory judgment, seem to place us in the condition of
convicted delinquents, and hardly to leave us the poor privilege of
saying one word why sentence should not be passed upon us. And yet I
hope to show, that this argument, so specious, is not less superficial,
and that the conclusion, so promptly reached, has been attained by
overlooking the most important considerations involved in the subject.
It was natural, and it was right, that Mr. Blackstone should manifest a
zeal for the institutions of his own country, disposing him to excuse
what might be amiss, to vindicate what might be questionable, and to
place in the highest relief and in the most favorable light whatever is
praiseworthy. But while I acknowledge this, I cannot allow to him, and
them who think with him, a monopoly of this pious reverence for the
institutions of their forefathers. I would rather follow their example,
and, cherishing this sentiment so essential to the preservation of
every thing that is valuable, would ask, on behalf of it, the like
indulgence to what may be urged in defence of domestic slavery.
I shall not stop to show (what is incontestibly true) that it has done
more to elevate a degraded race in the scale of humanity; to tame the
savage; to civilize the barbarous; to soften the ferocious; to
enlighten the ignorant; and to spread the blessings of christianity
among the heathen, than all the missionaries that philanthropy and
religion have ever sent forth. This would be no vindication, for he who
can make the wrath of man to praise him; who can overrule evil, and
make it an instrument of good, might have made it conducive to these
ends, however wicked in itself it might be. "Be it a spirit of health,
or goblin damned," on _his_ errand it has gone forth. "Be its intents
wicked or charitable," it is _his_ instrument, in _his_ hands, doing
_his_ work. When that is done, and not till then, it will cease, as
will all things else, when their appointed course is run, and their
appointed end fulfilled.
It is hardly necessary to expose the sophistry by which Mr. Blackstone
affects to prove, that slavery cannot have had a lawful origin. We do
not pretend to trace our title to its source. We have no call to sit in
judgment between the conquered African and his conqueror. We rest our
defence on principles which legitimate our title, whatever its origin
may have been. Yet it may not be amiss to say a few words to show the
fallacy of those plausible and imposing dogmas, with which we too often
suffer ourselves to be talked down.
"Slavery," says Mr. Blackstone, "cannot originate in compact, because
the transaction excludes the idea of an equivalent." For an answer to
this specious fallacy, I shall content myself by referring you to the
masterly essay of Professor Dew, who has so clearly exposed it as to
leave me nothing to add.
But the commentator farther tells us, that "slavery cannot lawfully
originate in _conquest_, as a commutation for the right to kill;
because this right rests on necessity; and this necessity plainly does
not exist, because the victor does not kill his adversary, but makes
him captive." Is this a fair inference? Let us examine it.
There is a triple alternative in the case: to kill, to enslave, or to
set at large. It may be practicable to do either of the two first; and
yet dangerous in the extreme to do the last. With a savage and
treacherous foe it is always so, unless his power of annoyance be
completely annihilated. And how can this be between two tribes of
nearly equal force? Among such is one victory an assured pledge of
future and _bloodless_ victory to the end of time? May it not, must it
not, often be, that the victorious party can have no security against
future and fatal mischief, but in the destruction, or something
equivalent to the destruction, of the vanquished? This is obtained by
deportation to distant lands, by which alone, or by incarceration, or
something equivalent, or by extermination, or a near approach to
extermination, the enmity of a savage neighbor ever can be rendered
harmless. The necessity of the case, so long as it exists, justifies
the choice of these alternatives. Among these, no argument is necessary
to prove that foreign slavery is the mildest. But were this not so, the
laws even of civilized war do not peremptorily dictate to the victor
the choice he shall make among these remedies. He may kill; he may
incarcerate; or he may enlarge on parol, clogged with such conditions
as he may please to prescribe, according to the nature and measure of a
necessity, of which he is the only judge.[1]
[Footnote 1: It may be said that the laws of civilized war do not
permit that prisoners be slain or incarcerated; for that if this be
done, _the other party may retaliate_. This will prove, that he who is
cruel to his prisoners, _does a wrong to his own people who may happen
to be in his enemy's hands_; but that is all. The laws of civilized
warfare acknowledge the right to retaliate, and therefore _make a
case_, if there was no other, where slavery by conquest would be
lawful. Even though he who first enslaves his prisoners be wrong; yet
_ex concessis_ he who retaliates is right. Can Mr. Blackstone tell us
which of the savage African chiefs began the game?]
When Col. Campbell, at the head of a few militia, stooped from the
mountains of Virginia on Carolina, and bore off the corps of Col.
Fergusson in his pounces, had he been pursued and overtaken by
Tarleton, he must have killed his prisoners. He could not have held
them, and to have enlarged them would have been to sacrifice the lives
of thousands. He who doubts this, knows nothing of the horrors of the
tory war that raged in that quarter. If he had had no place of refuge,
he might have handed them over to any custody, civilized or savage, in
which they might have been removed from the theatre of war. This is one
example among ten thousand, to show that the captivity of an enemy by
no means implies the security of the captor, should he allow his
prisoner to go free. The snared tiger is in your power: you may kill
him--you may cage him. "_Therefore_," says Mr. Blackstone, "you are
under no necessity to do either, and the noble beast has a fair claim
to his liberty."
But I have given too many words to the exposure of this grave
sophistry. In self-defence it might have been pardoned; in crimination
it is intolerable.
But, as I remarked in the outset, we have nothing to do with the origin
of any particular _mode_ of slavery. In some shape or other it exists,
and has existed every where, since first the decree went forth, which
cursed the earth, and denounced to man, "that in the sweat of his face
he should eat the fruit thereof." Here is its origin; and, as might be
expected of any thing so originating, the thing is evil in itself, and
in all its modes. The problem is to choose among them. To the practical
man it is a thing of small difficulty; _left to itself_, it assumes, in
every country, the form and texture best suited to the physical
peculiarities of that country, and the condition of society there. But
we have grown so wise, that we leave nothing to itself. The world is
full of associations and combinations of men, who make it the business
of their lives to regulate every thing but what concerns themselves. We
every where find a sort of moral treasuries of supererogatory virtue,
made up by voluntary contribution, for the benefit of all who do not
affect to be wiser and better than their fathers. Turn where we will,
we have the edifying spectacle of one half the world repenting for the
sins of the other half.
While the discussion of this subject was confined to ourselves; while
they who denounced the practice of domestic slavery were such as could
not condemn others, without standing self-condemned, we heard them
patiently, as we hear from the pulpit the meek expostulations of the
humble and contrite. Their interest afforded a pledge that they would
not rashly carry their doctrines into practice: their self-rebukes
excused them from the charge of arrogance; and the sincerity of their
enthusiasm commanded our respect and sympathy. But since we have seen
one community rashly overturning the domestic institutions of another;
and hear from our northern neighbors an avowal of the like benevolent
design toward us, it is time to look into the subject more narrowly.
Let us understand it well. If we are wrong, the discovery of our fault
may prepare us to bear, with becoming meekness, the impending judgment.
If we are right, an understanding conviction that we are so, may be
necessary to man our hearts and brace our nerves for the impending
struggle.
I have said that slavery exists every where--originating in the decree
which makes labor the price of subsistence. The correlative of this
proposition is that _subsistence_ is the _wages_ of labor. I shall pass
by the hackneyed topic of the process by which it inevitably happens,
in all societies, that some men rise to affluence, while others remain
as they began. So it ever has been, is, and will be, whether we find
out how it comes to pass or no. There will be rich and poor. The rich
man will not dig the earth: the poor man must. He becomes the rich
man's servant, and the wages of his abject toil are food and raiment.
This, his condition, is compulsory and inevitable; and compulsory toil
for food and raiment,--what is it but slavery? True, the compulsion is
not that of his fellow-worm. But is it the less crushing, because it is
enforced by one from whose power there is no escape?
But are food and raiment the wages to which labor is every where
stinted? Yes. Circumstances may make occasional differences in the
price of labor, as in the settlement of a new country; but the same law
which governs the price of every thing else, governs also the price of
labor. This is, in every case, the cost of production; and food and
raiment are the cost of the production of labor.
A few remarks will show the modifications to which this rule is
subject, and will prove, that strictly speaking, it admits of no
exception, though its modifications may occasionally afford, to
individuals, an escape from the _class_ of _laborers_ into that of
_employers_.
In a society perfectly stationary, (if there be such a thing,) where
the wants of the whole community, and the nature and amount of labor
necessary to supply those wants, and the subjects of labor are the same
from generation to generation, there will be a steady demand for a new
laborer, to supply the place of each one that dies off. Hence the
average wages will be such as to enable each pair to produce and bring
forward another pair; or, in other words, they will enable a man and
his wife to rear two children. If, on an average, they are more than
this, then on an average, more than two children will be reared; the
number of laborers will be increased; the supply will exceed the
demand; the competition will reduce wages below the standard of the
cost of production, until the surplus laborers are starved off; and
they will then return to that standard, and settle there.
In a society retrograde in its condition, the average of wages will be
less than enough to support a laboring pair and two children. There
will always be a stock of surplus labor to be starved off, and a ragged
lazaroni will mark this condition of society.
In a society advancing in all things, there must be an increasing
supply to keep up with the increasing demand. Competition among
employers will enhance the price of labor, and this will enable the
laboring class to reproduce itself in an increasing ratio. And this it
will do, for he who said "increase and multiply, and replenish the
earth," has commanded it.
It is thus perfectly true of _labor_, and the _laboring class
collectively_, that the cost of production is the measure of price; and
that food and raiment for the laborer of today, and for those future
laborers who are rising up to supply the future demand, are all that
enter into the cost of production. The seeming exceptions to the rule
do but confirm it, and show how its author has rivetted it on the necks
of men, _that they shall not escape from it_. It is the brazen collar
which marks the laborer "THE BORN THRALL OF NECESSITY." His wages are
never increased beyond the wants of his own individual nature, but for
a purpose, to which the law of that nature makes it sure that he will
apply them; the reproduction of _just so many_ others (neither more nor
less) as the exigencies of society may require, to follow in the same
dull round of labor in which his life has been spent.
There will indeed be individuals who may seem to form exceptions to
this rule, in every state of society. The laborer, whose superior
strength or skill commands more than the average of wages, will have
something to spare. So too, he who, from prudence or coldness, remains
unmarried; because his wages are established according to an average of
the necessities of the laboring class, from a part of which he keeps
himself exempt. Such a man, if industrious, frugal, provident and
thrifty, will improve in condition, and eventually _emerge from the
class of laborers into that of employers_. But the condition of _the
class_ remains unchanged. As _he_ rose from it, some one, unperceived,
came into it, to supply his place; and others to meet the new demand
occasioned by the addition of one more to the number of employers. Thus
it is, and so it must be, that the proportional number of the laboring
class never diminishes, while society advances; and, the more rapid the
advancement of the whole, the greater the proportion of laborers to
employers, and the greater the competition for employment. There is, of
course, a progressive reduction in the price of labor, accompanying
this progressive increase of the number condemned, by impealable laws,
to this low and hard condition.--There they are, forever toiling and
sweating in the dark and cheerless abodes of poverty, aliens to the
society in which they breathe, whose comforts are ever in an inverse
ratio to the sum of general prosperity.
But "in this lowest depth there is yet a lower deep." While superior
strength and skill, and exemption from family burdens, enable some to
escape to the upper air, others, under the pressure of disease,
infirmity and numerous children, sink into that gulph from which there
is no return. Of these we take no note. The few whom fortune favors,
come with _eclat_ upon the stage of higher life, and are pointed out as
brilliant examples of the blessings of a system of free labor. The
countless victims of her malice
"Drop from existence like the withered leaf
That from the summer tree is swept away,
Its loss unseen."
This compendious view of the condition of what is called "_free
labor_," in the various stages of society, is verified by the
observations and explained by the researches of the political
economists. I take it as I receive it from them, confirmed in my
conviction of its truth, by my own experience and reflections.
Let us place along side of this a view of the condition of slave labor,
as ascertained by observation, and by the laws that determine that
condition.
Of slave labor then, as of free labor, it may be said, that its wages
are food and raiment for the laborer of to-day, and for those future
laborers who are rising up to supply the future demand. Thus much they
have in common. I shall not pretend to point out all the differences
between the two, but shall remark on some of the most obvious and
important.
To the slave these wages are paid in kind, and can therefore be always
made precisely adequate, and no more. To the free man they are paid in
money, and may become deficient or superfluous, from a state of
scarcity or abundance. In the last case a slight advantage is afforded
to those who need it least; in the first a ruinous loss is sustained by
those least able to bear it.
To the slave, his due proportion of the common fund, paid to labor as a
whole, is measured out with unerring accuracy. Among free laborers,
some receive too much, and others, in a like degree, too little. For be
it remembered, that the average wages of free labor are given, not
merely as the price of the labor of the day, but also to indemnify the
daily expense of producing that amount of future labor, which the
future demand is to render necessary. He therefore who labors only, but
rears no children, receives more than his just share. He defrauds the
concern, by drawing from the common income a portion he has not earned;
while others, whom nature has burdened with more than the due
proportion of children, earn more than they receive, and suffer for
want of the necessaries of life. This is historically as well as
theoretically true.
The slave is said to labor, uncheered by hope. This may be so. To those
who know him best, he certainly seems a stranger to despair.
Metaphysicians, I think, tell us that _hope will not be without its
objects_. But it must be confessed there are things which the slave
cannot hope for, though the freeman may. On the other hand, he is free
from many anxieties to which the freeman is exposed. In this sense of
security he has something which may well be offset against the
freeman's hopes, and which some (and they not the least wise) may deem
a fair equivalent to men of sordid habits and untaught minds; and such
are the great body of laborers, bond or free.
Among slaves, the _individual_ is the slave of an _individual_ master.
Among free laborers, the _class_ is held in vassalage by the _class_ of
employers. Collectively the one class may be said to be the slave of
the other. I shall not go into a minute examination of this matter. As
our controversy is with Mr. Blackstone, I shall use no authority
against him but his own. Hear what he says of the law of England, his
boasted home of freedom. "All single men between _twelve_ years old and
_sixty_, and married ones under thirty years of age, and all single
women between twelve and forty, not having any visible livelihood, are
_compelled, by two justices_, to go out to service in husbandry or
certain specific trades." This is as much as to say, "they who can only
live by labor shall be made to labor." What more do we? They compel him
to choose a master. We appropriate his labor to a master to whom use
and a common interest attach him, and who is generally the master of
his choice. The wages of both are the same.
In sickness, the slave looks for support to a master who is interested
to maintain and cherish him, and who, for the most part, knows and
loves him. What is the freeman's equivalent? Hear Mr.
Blackstone:--"There is no man so wretched or indigent, but he may
demand a supply sufficient for all the necessities of life, from the
more opulent part of the community, by means of the several statutes
enacted for the relief of the poor. _A humane provision;_ yet, though
dictated by the principles of society, discountenanced by the Roman
laws. For the edicts of the Emperor Constantine, commanding the public
to maintain the children of those who were unable to provide for them,
_in order to prevent the murder and exposure of infants_, were rejected
in Justinian's collection." Who ever heard of infanticide by a slave?
It is here; on this very point, of the necessity of forcing those to
labor who are unable to live honestly without labor, that we base the
defence of our system. That such compulsion is often necessary, all
reason and experience prove. But to a people jealous of freedom, it is
a delicate question whether such a power over the citizen can be safely
trusted to the municipal authority. To make it effectual it must be a
power dangerous to liberty. It could never be carried into effect, but
by a degree of rigor which must bow the spirit of the laborer and
effectually disqualify him for the political functions of a sovereign
citizen. It might be too much to say, that this consideration alone
would warrant the _introduction_ of domestic slavery. _Lycurgus thought
so._ But we, _finding it among us_, think we follow the example of that
wisdom which _used_ to characterize our English ancestors, in turning
it to use, as a safeguard of our political freedom. We have learned
too, from a great master in political science, himself an enemy to
slavery in all its forms, that in every country where domestic slavery
exists, "those who are free, are by far the most proud and jealous of
their freedom. Freedom is to them not only an enjoyment, but a kind of
rank and privilege. Not seeing that freedom, as in countries where it
is a common blessing, and as broad and general as the air, may be
united with _much abject toil, with great misery, with all the exterior
of servitude_, liberty looks, amongst them, like something that is
_more noble and liberal_.... Such were all the ancient Commonwealths;
such were our Gothic ancestors; such, in our days, were the Poles; _and
such will be all masters of slaves who are not slaves themselves_. In
such a people, the haughtiness of domination combines with the spirit
of freedom, fortifies it, and renders it invincible."
Such is the lesson read to us sixty years ago, by one who wished us
well, and who thoroughly understood the character of our people, and
the causes that had influenced in the formation of that character. It
is of a piece with the general maxims of that school of practical
wisdom, and sound political philosophy, in which our fathers learned
the grand principles imbodied in our institutions. In that school,
every thing was conceded to liberty; nothing to licentiousness: every
thing to religion; nothing to fanaticism: every allowance was made for
the natural and untaught feelings of the human heart; none for sickly
artificial sensibility. Its maxims were drawn from experience,
observation and reflection _on man as he is_; not from fanciful
speculations on _man as he might have been_, had it pleased God to have
made him differently. But since that day great light has risen on the
world, and the descendants of these statesmen now find, that the
imperfect vision of their fathers did but "see men, as trees walking."
The present generation see clearly, and renouncing all respect for
those whom God commands to honor living, and to reverence in death,
bless themselves, saying, "If we had been in the days of our fathers we
would not have been partakers" in their sins. Even so let it be. Let
them desecrate and demolish the tombs of their fathers, to build up a
monument to their own praise. But what spell is upon us, that we should
follow their example, and signalize our ingratitude to the men to whose
teachings we owe all that is valuable in our institutions, by joining
in a crusade against our own rights, and "lending an active compliance
to our own ruin?"
_We_ certainly have reason to believe that the existence of domestic
slavery among us has been of singular advantage in preserving the free
spirit of our people. Slave labor pre-occupies and fills the low and
degrading stations in society. Menial offices are altogether discharged
by it; and all the tasks of mere brute strength are left to it. To the
freeman belong those services which imply trust and confidence, or
require skill; which therefore command higher wages than mere animal
labor, and give a sense of respectability and a feeling of
self-respect. I know we are told that if we wish to see the perfection
of free government, we must look elsewhere. We look; and we do indeed
see the theory of democracy carried to its full extent, but we behold
no practical results which we at all envy. We do not find that any good
has come from elevating the whole class of laborers, in all its servile
and degraded branches, to the sovereign privilege of voting. We
believed _a priori_ (and observation proves that we were right) that
the first and only use the hireling would make of his political
franchise, would be to sell it to the demagogue. _But though convinced
of this, the experience of other states justifies a doubt, whether_, IF
ALL OUR LABORERS WERE FREEMEN, _it would be possible to withhold from
them the privilege of voting_. We know that it has been elsewhere wrung
from the reluctant grasp of the freeholders, who deeply, _but
silently_, lament the forced concession. Our statesmen have been
_privately_ admonished by them to profit by the experience of their
error, and hold fast by our institutions. _Publicly_ indeed, we are
taunted with what are called the aristocratic features of our
government; but we know, and the enemies of freedom know it too, that
when power has marched unchecked and unchallenged over the prostrate
democracy of free labor and universal suffrage, it has always found
here the most formidable barriers to its progress.
* * * * *
I take the liberty of appending, by way of note, a quotation from the
same statesman, whose words I have already used, which shows that this
idea of the connexion between DOMESTIC _slavery_ and MUNICIPAL
_liberty_, is not new. Our _former oppressors_ were aware of it sixty
years ago, and seriously meditated the destruction of the latter by the
abolition of the former. The following extract may show where our
_present oppressors_ got the first hint of that scheme of interested
philanthropy which proposes to strip us of our property for the good of
our souls.
Mr. Burke says, (in 1775) "With regard to the high aristocratic spirit
of Virginia and the southern colonies, it has been proposed, I know,
_to reduce it, by declaring a general enfranchisement of slaves_. This
project has had its advocates and panegyrists; yet I never could argue
myself into any opinion of it. Slaves are often much attached to their
masters. A general wild offer of liberty would not always be accepted.
History furnishes few instances of it. It is sometimes as hard to
persuade slaves to be free, as it is to compel freemen to be slaves;
and, in this auspicious scheme, we, should have both these pleasing
tasks on our hands at once. But when we talk of enfranchisement, do we
not perceive that the American master may enfranchise too, _and arm
servile hands in defence of freedom?_ A measure to which other people
have had recourse more than once, and not without success, in a
desperate situation of their affairs.
"Slaves as these unfortunate black people are, and dull as all men are
from slavery, must they not a little suspect an offer of freedom from
that very nation which has sold them to their present masters? From a
nation, one of whose causes of quarrel with those masters, is their
refusal to deal any more in that inhuman traffic? An offer of freedom
from England would come rather oddly, shipped to them in an African
vessel, which is refused an entry into the ports of Virginia or
Carolina, with a cargo of three hundred Angola negroes. It would be
curious to see the Guinea captain attempting at the same instant to
publish his proclamation of liberty, and to advertise his sale of
slaves."
This last absurdity, our northern _guardians_, _pastors_, or _masters_,
(I am not particular about the designation,) have wisely avoided. As
long as the slave trade was allowed, they were only anxious to secure
to themselves a monopoly of the advantage of carrying it on. Having
lost this, they seek an equivalent by putting a new face on the matter.
Let me not be understood as bringing this charge against all who are
engaged in this crusade against our rights. Like all other crusades, it
is the work of a few knaves and many dupes. The latter are,
proverbially, the tools of the former. Without them, the knave cannot
carry on his trade. There are things to be done which he cannot do in
person, and which are best accomplished by the clumsy zeal of bungling
philanthropy. The fate of the West Indies is a case in point. The case
of the tame bear, set by a mischievous wag to keep the flies off of the
face of the sleeping hermit, is another.
For the Southern Literary Messenger.