Read Ebook: Lectures on the Philosophy and Practice of Slavery As Exhibited in the Institution of Domestic Slavery in the United States with the Duties of Masters to Slaves by Smith William A William Andrew Summers Thomas O Thomas Osmond Editor

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Regarding the whole subject in this light, the duty of thoroughly investigating it seems to me to be laid upon the country as a moral necessity. It is useless to talk of "delicacy and humiliation," in the presence of such fruits as a false philosophy has already borne plentifully throughout the land.

"Truth crushed to earth will rise again: The eternal years of God are hers; But Error, wounded, writhes in pain, And dies amid her worshippers."

THE ABSTRACT PRINCIPLE OF THE INSTITUTION OF DOMESTIC SLAVERY.

Observe that it is the principle for which we inquire. What, then, is the system itself? For our idea of the system is the chronological condition of our idea of the principle, as our idea of the principle is the logical condition of our idea of the system. We must perceive an action before we can determine what is the principle of it, although we must have an antecedent knowledge of the principle before we can determine what character that principle gives to the action.

The system is made up of two correlative relations--master and slave. Here there are but two ideas--the idea of master and the idea of slave, as correlatives. These are all the ideas that enter into the system, as a system merely. Whatever abstract principle, therefore, this system envelops, is to be found in these two terms. It need not and should not be sought for anywhere else; for these two relations make the whole system. Without these it could not be a system of slavery; and with these, it is therein, and in virtue of that fact alone, a system of slavery. The answer to the question depends upon the meaning of these terms alone. What, then, is the correlative meaning of these terms?

However carelessly many persons are accustomed to speak on this subject, yet we may assure ourselves that a little reflection will satisfy any candid mind that the principle is a legitimate one, and cannot with any degree of propriety be regarded as sinful. It will readily occur to all intelligent minds, that this principle enters more or less as an essential element into every form of human government. No government can be appropriate to human beings, in their present fallen condition, that does not embody this generic element in a greater or less degree.

There are many among ourselves who, though they are not sufficient metaphysicians to detect and expose the error of a conclusion, are sufficiently candid to admit that if the conceded dogma of Jefferson be true, domestic slavery can never be justified in practice by any circumstances whatever; and they have pious feeling enough to prompt them to great hesitation in supporting the institution in view of this admission, although they are pressed to do so by circumstances of urgent duty to the slaves themselves. In this state of things there arises in many sensitive minds a most painful state of feeling. Pressed on the one hand by what is assumed to be correct principle, and on the other by the claims of a high moral necessity,--the necessity of governing and providing for their slaves, which they erroneously suppose to be in conflict with right principle,--they really find themselves in a most embarrassing situation, from which they sigh to be released. Many such have quietly retired from the State of their nativity and choice as their only alternative. Others remain, it is true, but it is rather an act of subjection than submission. Citizens of this class are of course always liable to become the victims of any fanatical movement on the subject of slavery that may be afoot in the land. To all this mischief, the speakers and writers in question have contributed their full share. Yea, for myself, I doubt not they have contributed much more to dissatisfy the religious community of the South--the large majority of the whole population--than all the abolitionists of the North put together. It is doubtless the magic of their names which at present enables the M. E. Church to maintain its footing in the District of Columbia, the States of Delaware and Maryland, and along the northern border of Eastern and through a large part of Western Virginia, together with a portion of Kentucky and Missouri. It is the authority of their names, also, which so disquiets the feelings of many good people in the whole country as to make them the victims of the political legerdemain of certain politicians, who, under cover of "free-soilism," "fugitive slave law," and "Nebraska" excitements, are overriding their rights and insulting the whole country before the civilized world; and who, last though not least, are daily oppressing the African population by the incubus of a morbid sensibility in regard to them, which utterly prevents the system under which they live from any thing like a reasonable participation in the progress of civilization. In view of these facts, we again assume that it is really time they had learned to chasten their language on the subject of African slavery. Public opinion in the whole country must soon become intolerant of so great an abuse of the truth.

OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED.

This is the form in which Dr. Wayland prefers to express the doctrine of equality. He explains himself thus: "Each separate individual is created with precisely the same right to use the advantages with which God has endowed him as any other individual." From this position, as thus explained, he deduces an argument the force of which, without expressing it in so many words, is constructively made to pervade the whole performance. For his whole argument may be embodied thus: the government which places an individual in any other condition than that of political equality is an odious tyranny: the government which establishes domestic slavery does this, and is therefore an odious tyranny.

Again, it is not true of barbarians, through any of the stages of barbarism. At no period are they in that state of intellectual and moral development in which they could use for the common welfare the blessings of civil freedom, as understood and enjoyed by a highly civilized people. If they were, they would not be barbarians, but a civilized people, to whom the right of civilization--political freedom--would inure.

Now I assume here, what I shall prove in a future lecture, that the African came into this country in a state of extreme barbarism; and that, in the judgment of Southern people--whom prejudice itself can hardly deny are honest and the only competent judges in this matter--they are still, as a race, in a state of semi-barbarism, to say the least. If we are right in this position, they also are an example of persons who are clearly not entitled to the rights which inure only to a state of civilization. With what propriety, therefore, could any decent man, whose object is not to insult, affirm that we are "odious tyrants," for withholding from the African the rights which are appropriate only to a state of civilization: unless he were prepared first to show that we are wrong in our position as to the question of fact, that they are still in a state of semi-barbarism, and, therefore, not entitled to civil freedom?

How shall we characterize the course of Dr. Wayland! After drawing an ingenious argument through many pages of his performance: appealing to the facts and principles of Holy Scripture: not failing, in the progress and application of his false position, to stigmatize the system of African slavery as an odious tyranny, and this for the obvious purpose of degrading the Southern States of this Union in the eyes of the whole civilized world: then, when he is confronted, as he necessarily was, in the progress of his own argument, by the only material fact in the whole discussion, he adroitly evades all consideration of it whatever! On page 216, fourth edition, he states the position of the South, that the "slaves are not competent to self-government," and shortly replies, "This is a question of fact which it is not the province of Moral Philosophy to decide." Why then did he decide it by an application of his false position to the South? Echo answers, Why?

Had he confined the application of his principles to the rights which belong to a civilized people, we should have no cause to complain; or had he adduced facts to invalidate the position of the South in regard to its African population, we should be bound to regard him as maintaining an honorable discussion; or, yielding this point, had he attempted to define that form of government most appropriate to a mass of semi-barbarians, dwelling in the midst of a highly civilized people, with whom they could not amalgamate; or, declining this, had he frankly confessed his incompetency to do justice to the subject of Moral Philosophy at this point at least--in either case we should be bound to respect his effort. But departing, as he evidently does, from all these obvious lines of duty in the pathway of his desolating errors, and inflicting so deep a wound upon the feelings of the whole Southern community, it must be allowed that our charity is heavily taxed in accounting for his course. He can have no cause to complain that we adopt the opinion that he has permitted an early prejudice to grow into a feeling of fanaticism, so fixed as to warp his judgment on points of very simple application in Moral Science.

THE QUESTION OF RIGHTS DISCUSSED.

There are questions which lie back of this discussion--errors, as I think, which underlie the popular ideas of both government and rights. We should not consider that we had fully met the difficulties of the subject if we passed them by.

Domestic slavery, it is said, is an abridgment of inalienable rights; and legitimate government is a voluntary concession of certain alienable rights.

Paley's Philosophy.--Moral Science.

M. Cousin.

"DECREE, EDICT, STATUTE, INSTITUTE, MANDATE, PRECEPT, are all past participles.

"F. What then is law?

"H. Always; and those sentiments confirm my democracy.

"H. Perfectly.

See his whole article on Rights.

The points established in this discussion are:

First--The essential good in his possession by natural endowment, and which is therefore inalienable. And, Second--The necessary conditions, whatever they may be, of the operation of the inherent good as an active principle. Some of these are inalienable, and others are alienable. To this view of natural rights the common usage of language conforms.

THE DOCTRINES OF RIGHTS APPLIED TO GOVERNMENT.

Government, human as well as Divine, is a necessity of man's fallen condition--All men concur in this--Man did not originate government: he has only modified the form--The legitimate objects of government, and the means which it employs to effect these objects--The logical inferences: 1. Although he has the power, he has no right to do wrong; 2. As a fallen being, he is, without a government over him, liable to lose the power of self-control--What are the rights of man: 1. In a state of infancy; 2. In a state of maturity; and, 3. In a savage or uncivilized state--Civil government is not founded on a concession of rights.

Civil government deals chiefly with the relations of man to his fellow-man. It coincides with the Divine government. They each aim at the control of the lower nature of man, and the development of his higher nature. The means they employ are the same in principle. They address the same passions. The rewards and punishments of the one are in this life, and of the other chiefly in the life to come. Withal, the civil has the sanction of the Divine, and the Divine should always have the sanction of the civil, government. But still they are entirely distinct, and should not be confounded either in theory or in practice. The one is secular, and the other is Divine.

That both the object of government, and the means which it employs, are correctly stated, will not be disputed. All men concur in these views. They underlie all our opinions and reasonings on the subject of civil government. But in assenting to this much, may we not stand committed to much more than many theoretical politicians are aware?

Let us trace the logical inferences which arise from the principles discussed.

But our subject leads us to notice:

No savage community was ever known to rise unaided to a state of civilization; and every example of savage society furnishes evidence that it is a state into which they have fallen by the tendencies of depraved nature. They are instances in which the government originally enjoyed--both human and Divine--has failed to preserve to the individual that liberty of will in the pursuit of the good which government is designed to secure. The pure intelligence is not sufficiently developed to constitute an enlightened conscience. Dwelling apart from civilized society, the absence of all the artificial wants of civilization is highly favorable to many of the natural virtues--such as hospitality to strangers, truth, fidelity, and generosity to their friends; but the undeveloped state of the pure reason leaves the moral sense in a state of so much immaturity, as to characterize them as unfaithful, cruel, and revengeful to their enemies. These are characteristics which, in their condition of physical maturity, make them terrible to their neighbors.

Now the question is, What are the rights of such a people? It is useless to discuss this question so far as it relates to mere savage government; for in this view it is a question of no interest. But the question, What rights can they claim of a civilized people? is the one with which we have to deal.

The man who should gravely propose in Congress to annex the savage tribes of our border, as sovereign States of this Union, would, by all right-minded men, be regarded as insane. No one of the managers of looms, spindles, and other machinery, among the agrarian portion of our northern community, with all their boasted knowledge of the natural rights of man, and their readiness to accord equal rights to all men, and to protect them in asserting those rights, have, as yet, made up their minds to go thus far--although we may be at a loss to account for it that they so far falsify their principles as not to do so.

THE ABSTRACT PRINCIPLE OF SLAVERY DISCUSSED ON SCRIPTURE GROUNDS, AND MISREPRESENTATIONS OF THE PRINCIPLE EXAMINED.

The true subjective right of self-control defined according to the Scriptures--The abstract principle of slavery sanctioned by the Scriptures--The Roman government--Dr. Wayland's Scripture argument examined and refuted--The positions of Dr. Channing and Prof. Whewell examined and refuted.

Now if we could suppose that the Saviour intended his language to be understood in the first sense, it will not perhaps be disputed that it is our duty to abolish domestic slavery, for we should, no doubt, desire to be released, if we were in a state of domestic slavery. But, unfortunately for the argument, this interpretation would not stop at the abolition of domestic slavery in the case of the African. It would reach to the domestic slavery of the child also. There is scarcely a wayward lad in Christendom who could not justly claim release from parental restraint on the same principle! Nay, more, the criminal at the bar of civil justice, the inmates of State prisons, and the poor man in his hovel, would all claim release! And as that which is duty in others, in such cases, is a right in them, not to grant them release would certainly be a denial of their just rights! Is this the sense in which Dr. Wayland would have us understand the Saviour of mankind? Certain it is, that this is the only sense in which his words can be understood so as to involve the necessary abolition of slavery! We cheerfully acquit Dr. W. from the purpose to teach any such agrarian folly. Still, we can see no good reason why one so eminent, as a Christian and a scholar, should permit even an early prejudice as to a practical question, about which he allows that he is uninformed, to betray him into such views of a plain principle as logically involve him in the grossest absurdities.

In accordance with this fundamental law of the nation, God proceeded to provide in their civil institutions for the operation of a regular system of domestic slavery. Under these institutions, a Hebrew might lose his liberty and become a domestic slave, in six different ways.

All who became slaves under this system were emancipated in the seventh year, except those who should refuse to accept liberty. Ex. xxi. 2-6. They were emancipated in the year of jubilee.

Among the strange, if not wholly unaccountable, misconceptions, if not gross misrepresentations, of the fundamental ideas of domestic slavery, we may place those of Dr. Channing and Prof. Whewell. The latter, in his "Elements of Morality," states that "slavery converts a person into a thing--a subject merely passive, without any of the recognized attributes of human nature." "A slave," he further says, "in the eye of the law which stamps him with that character, is not acknowledged as a man. He is reduced to the level of a brute;" that is, as he explains it, "he is divested of his moral nature."

Dr. Channing, the great apostle of Unitarianism in America, says, "The very idea of a slave is that he belongs to another: that he is bound to live and labor for another; to be another's instrument, that is, in all things, just as a threshing-machine, or another beast of burden; and to make another's will his habitual law, however adverse to his own." He adds, in another place, "We have thus established the reality and sacredness of human rights; and that slavery is an infraction of these, is too plain to need any labored proof. Slavery violates not one, but all; violates them not incidentally, but necessarily, systematically, from its very nature."

These, together with your text, young gentlemen, are leading authorities on this subject. Following these, we should adopt the belief that the principle of slavery in question is, as they express it, "an absorption of the humanity of one man into the will of another;" or, in other words, that "slavery contemplates him, not as a responsible, but a mere sentient being--not as a man, but a brute."

If this be so, the wonder is not, as they affirm, that the civilized world is so indignant at its outrageous wrongs, but that "it has been so slow in detecting its gross and palpable enormities: that mankind, for so many ages, acquiesced in a system as monstrously unnatural as would be a general effort to walk upon the head or to think with the feet!" We need have no hesitation in flatly denying the truth of this description, and pronouncing it a caricature. For if this be a faithful description, we can safely affirm that no instance of slavery ever existed under the authority of law in any nation known to history.

A right, therefore, to the time and labor of another to a definite extent, by no means involves the right to his humanity. Such right is a mere fiction, to which even the imagination can give no significance or consistency. "It is the miserable cant of those who would storm by prejudice what they cannot demolish by argument."

Whether the Southern States of this Union have wisely adapted this principle to the moral condition of the African population residing within their borders, and thereby secured to them an essentially free government, remains to be considered.

THE INSTITUTION OF DOMESTIC SLAVERY.

The question stated--The conduct of masters a separate question--The institution defined--The position of the abolitionists and that of the Southern people--The presumption is in favor of the latter--Those who claim freedom for the blacks of this country failed to secure it to those on whom they professed to confer it--The doctrine by which they seek to vindicate the claim set up for them, together with the fact of history assumed to be true, is false.

Having invalidated this doctrine as a piece of gross sophistry, we remark:

In the seventeenth century, African slaves were first introduced into this country, and the practice was continued, under the sanction of law, until the years 1778 and 1808, inclusive. At an early period, public opinion was matured on this subject both in England and in the colonies, and we see that for a long period it sustained the practice of introducing slaves directly from Africa into this country. Now, we affirm that the position postulated in regard to this case is among the most palpable absurdities that can be conceived. The character of the men who controlled public opinion in that day, and the patriotic and Christian age in which they lived, utterly disprove the gross assumption that they yielded themselves up to falsify the truth and the conscience that was in them, and become a mere corporation of landpirates and freebooters! If our ignorance of the history of those times should disqualify us to account for the existence of this state of public opinion on any strictly rational grounds, common sense would forbid that we assign for it so unreasonable a cause as this; whilst the least that charity could suggest would be, that we place it among those things for which we were unable to account.

In the colonies, during this time, there lived Cotton Mather, Brainerd, Eliot, and Roger Williams; Winthrop, Sir H. Vane, and Samuel Adams, with Henry, Washington, and Franklin.

These great men, and some of them eminently good men, stood connected with a numerous class of highly influential men, though inferior in position, and all together may be regarded as embodying and controlling public opinion in their day. Some of them were pre?minently distinguished for their patriotic devotion to the rights of humanity. Many others were men of wide views on all subjects, and of broad and expansive feelings of benevolence, and indeed of the soundest piety. Add to all this, many of them are to this day without a peer in intellectual distinctions, if indeed the same may not be said of their attainments in literature and science. The age of Barrow, and of Locke, and Newton, in philosophy, and of Washington and Franklin, in patriotism, public benevolence, common sense, and general learning, still stands on the pages of history without a rival. But these men, and their numerous compeers and co-laborers, were no better than a hoard of mountain robbers! They coolly coincided with each other, without formal concert or convention, but by the common attraction of their natural affinity for power and plunder, to murder, rob, and enslave thousands of their innocent and defenceless fellow-creatures--the helpless victims of public cupidity! Such is the shameless position strangely postulated in regard to these men and their times! We scruple not to affirm that this is more than a stupid gratuity! It is a gross calumny upon humanity itself, of which the authors should be profoundly ashamed!

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