EXTRACTS FROM THE AMERICAN SLAVE CODE.

The following are mostly abridged selections from the statutes of the slave States and of the United States. They give but a faint view of the cruel oppression to which the slaves are subject, but a strong one enough, it is thought, to fill every honest heart with a deep abhorrence of the atrocious system. Most of the important provisions here cited, though placed under the name of only one State, prevail in nearly all the States, with slight variations in language, and some diversity in the penalties. The extracts have been made in part from Stroud's Sketch of the Slave Laws, but chiefly from authorized editions of the statute books referred to, found in the Philadelphia Law Library. As the compiler has not had access to many of the later enactments of the several States, nearly all he has cited are acts of an earlier date than that of the present anti-slavery movement, so that their severity cannot be ascribed to its influence.

The cardinal principle of slavery, that the slave is not to be ranked among sentient beings, but among things—is an article of property, a chattel personal—obtains as undoubted law in all the slave States.

The dominion of the master is as unlimited as is that which is tolerated by the laws of any civilized country in relation to brute animals—to quadrupeds; to use the words of the civil law.

Slaves cannot even contract matrimony.

Louisiana.—A slave is one who is in the power of his master, to whom he belongs. The master may 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.

Slaves are incapable of inheriting or transmitting property.

Slaves shall always be reputed and considered real estate; shall be as such subject to be mortgaged, according to the rules prescribed by law, and they shall be seized and sold as real estate.

No owner of slaves shall hire his slaves to themselves, under a penalty of twenty-five dollars for each offence.

No slave can possess anything in his own right, or dispose of the produce of his own industry, without the consent of his master.

No slave can be party in a civil suit, or witness in a civil or criminal matter, against any white person.

A slave's subordination to his master is susceptible of no restriction (except in what incites to crime), and he owes to him and all his family, respect without bounds, and absolute obedience.

Every slave found on horseback, without a written permission from his master, shall receive twenty-five lashes.

Any freeholder may seize and correct any slave found absent from his usual place of work or residence, without some white person, and if the slave resist or try to escape, he may use arms, and if the slave assault and strike him, he may kill the slave.

It is lawful to fire upon runaway negroes who are armed, and upon those who, when pursued, refuse to surrender.

No slave may buy, sell, or exchange any kind of goods, or hold any boat, or bring up for his own use, any horses or cattle, under a penalty of forfeiting the whole.

Slaves or free colored persons are punished with death for wilfully burning or destroying any stack of produce or any building.

The punishment of a slave for striking a white person, shall be for the first and second offences at the discretion of the court, but not extending to life or limb, and for the third offence, death; but for grievously wounding or mutilating a white person, death for the first offence; provided, if the blow or wound is given in defence of the person or property of his master, or the person having charge of him, he is entirely justified.

A slave for wilfully striking his master or mistress, or the child of either, or his white overseer, so as to cause a bruise or shedding of blood, shall be punished with death.

Any person cutting or breaking any iron chain or collar used to prevent the escape of slaves, shall be fined not less than two hundred dollars, nor more than one thousand dollars, and be imprisoned not more than two years, nor less than six months.

All slaves sentenced to death or perpetual imprisonment, in virtue of existing laws, shall be paid for out of the public treasury, provided the sum paid shall not exceed three hundred dollars for each slave.

The State Treasurer shall pay the owners the value of all slaves whose punishment has been commuted from that of death to that of imprisonment for life.

If any slave shall happen to be slain for refusing to surrender him or herself, contrary to law, or in unlawfully resisting any officer, or other person, who shall apprehend, or endeavor to apprehend, such slave or slaves, &c., such officer or other person so killing such slave as aforesaid, making resistance, shall be, and he is by this act, indemnified, from any prosecution for such killing aforesaid, &c.

And by the negro act of 1740, of South Carolina, it is declared:

If any slave who shall be out of the house or plantation where such slave shall live, or shall be usually employed, or without some white person in company with such slave, shall refuse to submit to undergo the examination of any white person, it shall be lawful for such white person to pursue, apprehend, and moderately correct such slave; and if such slave shall assault and strike such white person, such slave may be lawfully killed!!

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