Sentiments of Several Authors, viz
Extracts from the writings
of several noted authors,
on the subject of the,
slavery of the Negroes,
viz.
George Wallace,
Francis Hutcheson,
James Foster.
George Wallace, in his System of the Principles of the Laws of Scotland, speaking of the slavery of the Negroes in our colonies, says, “We all know that they (the Negroes) are purchased from their Princes, who pretend to have a right to dispose of them, and that they are, like other commodities, transported, by the merchants who have bought them, into America, in order to be exposed to sale. If this trade admits of a moral or a rational justification, every crime, even the most atrocious, may be justified. Government was instituted for the good of mankind; kings, princes, governors, are not proprietors of those who are subject to their authority; they have not a right to make them miserable. On the contrary, their authority is vested in them, that they may, by the just exercise of it, promote the happiness of their people. Of course, they have not a right to dispose of their liberty, and to sell them for slaves. Besides no man has a right to acquire, or to purchase them; men and their liberty are not in commercio; they are not either saleable or purchaseable. One, therefore, has no body but himself to blame, in case he shall find himself deprived of a man, whom he thought he had, by buying for a price, made his own; for he dealt in a trade which was illicit, and was prohibited by the most obvious dictates of humanity. For these reasons, every one of those unfortunate men who are pretended to be slaves, has a right to be declared to be free, for he never lost his liberty; he could not lose it; his Prince had no power to dispose of him. Of course, the sale was ipso jure void. This right he carries about with him, and is entitled every where to get it declared. As soon, therefore, as he comes into a country in which the judges are not forgetful of their own humanity, it is their duty to remember that he is a man, and to declare him to be free. I know it has been said, that questions concerning the state of persons ought to be determined by the law of the country to which they belong; and that, therefore, one who would be declared to be a slave in America, ought, in case he should happen to be imported into Britain, to be adjudged, according to the law of America, to be a slave; a doctrine than which nothing can be more barbarous. Ought the judges of any country, out of respect to the law of another, to shew no respect to their kind, and to humanity? out of respect to a law, which is in no sort obligatory upon them, ought they to disregard the law of nature, which is obligatory on all men, at all times, and in all places? Are any laws so binding as the eternal laws of justice? Is it doubtful, whether a judge ought to pay greater regard to them, than to those arbitrary and inhuman usages which prevail in a distant land? Aye, but our colonies would be ruined if slavery was abolished. Be it so; would it not from thence follow, that the bulk of mankind ought to be abused, that our pockets may be filled with money, or our mouths with delicacies? The purses of highwaymen would be empty, in case robberies were totally abolished; but have men a right to acquire money by going out to the highway? Have men a right to acquire it by rendering their fellow-creatures miserable? Is it lawful to abuse mankind, that the avarice, the vanity, or the passions of a few may be gratified? No! There is such a thing as justice to which the most sacred regard is due. It ought to be inviolably observed. Have not these unhappy men a better right to their liberty, and to their happiness, than our American merchants have to the profits which they make by torturing their kind? Let, therefore, our colonies be ruined, but let us not render so many men miserable. Would not any of us, who should—be snatched by pirates from his native land, think himself cruelly abused, and at all times entitled to be free? Have not these unfortunate Africans, who meet with the same cruel fate, the same right? Are they not men as well as we, and have they not the same sensibility? Let us not, therefore, defend or support a usage which is contrary to all the laws of humanity.
“But it is false, that either we or our colonies would be ruined by the abolition of slavery. It might occasion a stagnation of business for a short time. Every great alteration produces that effect; because mankind cannot, on a sudden, find ways of disposing of themselves, and of their affairs; but it would produce many happy effects. It is the slavery which is permitted in America, that has hindered it from becoming so soon populous as it would otherwise have done. Let the Negroes be free, and, in a few generations, this vast and fertile continent would be crowded with inhabitants; learning, arts, and every thing would flourish amongst them; instead of being inhabited by wild beasts, and by savages, it would be peopled by philosophers, and by men.”
Francis Hutcheson, professor of philosophy at the university of Glasgow, in his System of Moral Philosophy, page 211, says “He who detains another by force in slavery, is always bound to prove his title. The slave sold, or carried into a distant country, must not be obliged to prove a negative, that he never forfeited his liberty. The violent possessor must, in all cases, shew his title, especially where the old proprietor is well known. In this case, each man is the original proprietor of his own liberty. The proof of his losing it must be incumbent on those who deprive him of it by force. The Jewish laws had great regard to justice, about the servitude of Hebrews, founding it only on consent, or some crime or damage, allowing them always a proper redress upon any cruel treatment, and fixing a limited time for it; unless upon trial the servant inclined to prolong it. The laws about foreign slaves had many merciful provisions against immoderate severity of the masters. But under christianity, whatever lenity was due from an Hebrew towards his countryman, must be due towards all; since the distinctions of nations are removed, as to the point of humanity and mercy, as well as natural right; nay, some of these rights granted over foreign slaves, may justly be deemed only such indulgences as those of poligamy and divorce, granting only external impunity in such practice, and not sufficient vindication of them in conscience.”
Page 85. It is pleaded, that “In some barbarous nations, unless the captives were bought for slaves, they would be all murthered. They, therefore, owe their lives, and all they can do, to their purchasers; and so do their children, who would not otherwise have come into life.” But this whole plea is no more than that of negotium utile gestum to which any civilized nation is bound by humanity; it is a prudent expensive office, done for the service of others without a gratuitous intention; and this founds no other right, than that to full compensation of all charges and labour employed for the benefit of others.
A set of inaccurate popular phrases blind us in these matters; “Captives owe their lives, and all to the purchasers, say they. Just in the same manner, we, our nobles, and princes, often owe our lives to midwives, chirurgeons, physicians,” &c. one who was the means of preserving a man’s life, is not therefore entitled to make him a slave, and sell him as a piece of goods. Strange, that in a nation where the sense of liberty prevails, where the christian religion is professed, custom and high prospects of gain can so stupify the conscience of men, and all sense of natural justice, that they can hear such computations made about the value of their fellow-men, and their liberty, without abhorrence and indignation.
James Foster, D.D. in his discourses on natural religion and social virtue also shews his just indignation at this wicked practice; which he declares to be “a criminal and outrageous violation of the natural right of mankind.” At page 156, vol. 2 he says, “Should we have read concerning the Greeks or Romans of old, that they traded with a view to make slaves of their own species, when they certainly knew that this would involve in schemes of blood and murder, of destroying, or enslaving each other; that they even fomented wars, and engaged whole nations and tribes in open hostilities, for their own private advantage; that they had no detestation of the violence and cruelty, but only feared the ill success of their inhuman enterprises; that they carried men like themselves, their brethren, and the off-spring of the same common parent, to be sold like beasts of prey, or beasts of burden, and put them to the same reproachful trial, of their soundness, strength, and capacity for greater bodily service; that quite forgetting and renouncing the original dignity of human nature, communicated to all, they treated them with more severity, and ruder discipline, than even the ox or the ass, who are void of understanding—should we not, if this had been the case, have naturally been led to despise all their pretended refinements of morality; and to have concluded, that as they were not nations destitute of politeness, they must have been entire strangers to virtue and benevolence?
“But notwithstanding this, we ourselves (who profess to be christians, and boast of the peculiar advantage we enjoy, by means of an express revelation of our duty from heaven) are, in effect, these very untaught and rude heathen countries. With all our superior light, we instill into those, whom we call savage and barbarous, the most despicable opinion of human nature. We, to the utmost of our power, weaken and dissolve the universal tie, that binds and unites mankind. We practise what we should exclaim against, as the utmost excess of cruelty and tyranny, if nations of the world, differing in colour, and form of government, from ourselves, were so possessed of empire, as to be able to reduce us to a state of unmerited and brutish servitude. Of consequence, we sacrifice our reason, our humanity, our christianity, to an unnatural sordid gain. We teach other nations to despise, and trample under foot, all the obligations of social virtue. We take the most effectual method to prevent the propagation of the gospel, by representing it as a scheme of power and barbarous oppression, and an enemy to the natural privileges and rights of men.
“Perhaps all that I have now offered, may be of very little weight to restrain this enormity, this aggravated iniquity; however, I still have the satisfaction of having entered my private protest against a practice, which, in my opinion, bids that God, who is the God and Father of the Gentiles, unconverted to christianity, most daring and bold defiance, and spurns at all the principles both of natural and revealed religion.”