SLAVERY. 



281 



inconsistencies and cruelties in the gratification of 

 this passion. History can show no instances of 

 such prolonged and cold-blooded cruelty as is pre- 

 sented in the nefarious slave-trade of the Euro- 

 peans and their descendants. A historical account 

 of the various forms of slavery in different nations, 

 and particularly a sketch of the laws respecting 

 slavery that have existed, and still exist, among 

 the more civilized nations, would be highly inter- 

 esting, but would far exceed our limits. 



The effects of slavery have always been most in- 

 jurious to the nations which have permitted it. It 

 is so directly opposed to the nature of man (which 

 can as little endure absolute power as absolute sub- 

 jection, without greatly degenerating), that it has 

 always v had a palsying influence on the industry and 

 morality both of the masters and the slaves. The 

 human mind cannot thrive without freedom. 

 Among the evils which have originated from slavery 

 are, the use of eunuchs, the shows of gladiators, 

 the encouragement of the grossest sensuality and 

 indolence, and an unparalleled disregard of human 

 life, the corrupt character of the freedmen, and the 

 outrages of the slave when he breaks his chains 

 from the horrible war in Italy, 70 B. C. (see Spar- 

 tacus*), down to the atrocities of the Haytian revo- 

 lution, and the bloody insurrections on the island of 

 Barbadoes in 1816, and several more recent ones. 

 These are a few of the consequences of slavery, 

 more or less conspicuous wherever it has existed, 

 but particularly so in ancient Rome, of whose ruin 

 slavery was the chief and most direct cause. In 

 Athens, slaves were treated with considerable mild- 

 ness; in Sparta and Rome, with harshness. By 

 the Roman law, if a master was killed, all the 

 slaves who were under the same roof, or near 

 enough to be able to hear his cry, were to be put 

 to death. The right of the master over the life of 

 the slave was not abolished till the time of the 

 Antonines, in the second century A. D. If slaves 

 were ill treated by a third person, the Aquilian kw 

 only allowed the owner of the slave to demand in- 

 demnification for the damage. In Athens, how- 

 ever, the perpetrator was punished sometimes even 

 with death. Modern legislation has, in many cases, 

 sought to protect slaves against abuses on the part of 

 their masters, and to afford them facilities for manu- 

 mission, but, as yet, with very imperfect success; 

 nor can legislation ever protect effectually a being 

 who is the property of another. Many legal inves- 

 tigations, of late years, respecting the treatment of 

 slaves, have brought to light atrocities which most 

 persons would have thought impossible in this age, 

 and which would make many believe that the su- 

 periority of our race consists less in moral advance- 

 ment than in refinement of manners. Examine, for 

 instance, the facts disclosed in the proceedings in- 

 stituted against Picton, the British governor of 

 Trhiidad. The laws of the Mohammedans respect- 

 ing slaves, in their general spirit, and compared to 

 the laws respecting free persons, are more humane 

 than those enacted by Christians; one cause of 

 which may be, that a part of their slaves are of the 

 same colour with themselves, whilst the slaves of 

 Christian nations are all of a different colour from 

 their masters ; and the colour itself, from 'associa- 

 tion, has become an object of disgust, peculiarly to 

 the descendants of the English race in the United 

 States of America. The laws respecting slaves are, 

 generally speaking, among Christians, milder in 

 monarchical governments than in the slave-holding 

 republics of the United States. Thus manumis- 



sion, under the Spanish and English laws, is much 

 easier than under those of that Union. Some of 

 the former governments allow the slave to accu- 

 mulate property, by which he may eventually pur- 

 chase his freedom. .This is the case in the Spanish 

 colonies; but no such right is recognised by law in 

 the United States. One reason of this difference 

 undoubtedly is, that in monarchical states the gov- 

 ernment is distinct both from the master and the 

 slave, whilst in republics, the masters (the inter- 

 ested party) are themselves the legislators, and, of 

 course, are guided principally by their interest in 

 the enactment of laws : another reason is, that re- 

 publics in which the executive department is in- 

 trusted with comparatively little power, must be 

 more attentive to provide for their safety, by severe 

 laws, than monarchical states, in which the execu- 

 tive has a strong military force at its disposal. 

 Thus, whilst several English laws encourage the 

 instruction of slaves in reading, arithmetic, and the 

 elementary truths of religion, several slave-holding 

 states of America prohibit the teaching them read- 

 ing and writing, under severe penalties. The evil 

 of slavery was entailed on the United States by the 

 measures of the mother country, during the period 

 of colonial dependence. The colonies made repeated 

 efforts to prevent the importation of slaves, but 

 could not obtain the consent of the English govern- 

 ment See Walsh's Appeal from the Judgments of 

 Great Britain (Philadelphia, 1819). In the ninth 

 section of that work the subject is fully discussed. 

 The constitution of the United States acknowledges 

 slavery, by the provision that "Representatives 

 and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the 

 several states which may be included within this 

 Union, according to their respective numbers, which 

 shall be determined by adding to the whole number 

 of free persons including those bound to service 

 for a term of years, and excluding Indians not taxed 

 three fifths of all other persons." Previous to 

 the admission of Missouri into the Union, in 1820, 

 a warm contest took place in congress, respecting 

 the permission of slavery in the new state. It was 

 finally admitted without any restriction in regard to 

 this point. 



A traffic in negroes was carried on from the be- 

 ginning of the sixteenth century, by the Portu- 

 guese, and, after them, by all the Christian colonial 

 powers, and has been continued to the latest times, 

 in consequence of the colonial system of the Euro- 

 pean powers, and the idea that the colonial produce 

 cannot be raised without slaves, with an atrocity 

 at which nature revolts, and which could never 

 have reached the height that it did, if the colour 

 of the slave had not given rise to the idea of his 

 being by nature a degraded being. In the year 

 1503, slaves were carried from the Portuguese pos- 

 sessions in Africa to the Spanish colonies in Amer- 

 ica.* It has been generally stated, that Bartolomeo 

 de las Casas proposed to cardinal Ximenes the regu- 

 lar importation of negroes, from charity towards the 

 feeble aborigines of South America, who were 

 treated by the Spaniards as mere beasts of burthen. 

 But this story has been contradicted by the abbe 

 Gregoire, in his Apologie de B. de las Casas, in the 

 Memoires of the French institute; also by the 

 writer of the article Casas, in the Biographic Uni- 



* It is stated that, in 1434. a Portuguese captain, named 

 Alonzo Gonzales, landed in Guinea, and carried away some 

 coloured lads, whom he sold advantageously to Moorish fami- 

 lies settled in the south of Spain. Six years after, he commit- 

 ted a similar robbery, and many merchants imitated the prac- 

 tice, and built a fort to protect the traffic. 



