The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus

by American Anti-Slavery Society

Before the objector can make out his case, that the life of the slave is protected by the law, he must not only show that the words of the law grant him such protection, but that such a state of public sentiment exists as will carry out the provisions of the law in their true spirit. Any thing short of this will be set down as mere prating by every man of common sense. It has been already abundantly shown in the preceding pages, that the public sentiment of the slaveholding states toward the slaves is diabolical. Now, if there were laws in those states, the words of which granted to the life of the slave the same protection granted to that of the master, what would they avail? ACTS constitute protection; and is that public sentiment which makes the slave 'property,' and perpetrates hourly robbery and batteries upon him, so penetrated with a sense of the sacredness of his right to life, that it will protect it at all hazards, and drag to the gallows his OWNER, if he take the life of his own property? If it be asked, why the penalty for killing a slave is not a mere fine then, if his life is not really regarded as sacred by public sentiment—we answer, that formerly in most, if not in all the slave states, the murder of a slave was punished by a mere fine. This was the case in South Carolina till a few years since. Yes, as late as 1821, in the state of South Carolina, which boasts of its chivalry and honor, at least as loudly as any state in the Union, a slaveholder might butcher his slave in the most deliberate manner—with the most barbarous and protracted torments, and yet not be subjected to a single hour's imprisonment—pay his fine, stride out of the court and kill another—pay his fine again and butcher another, and so long as he paid to the state, cash down, its own assessment of damages, without putting it to the trouble of prosecuting for it, he might strut 'a gentleman.'—See 2 Brevard's Digest, 241.

The reason assigned by the legislature for enacting a law which punished the wilful murder of a human being by a fine, was that 'CRUELTY is HIGHLY UNBECOMING,' and 'ODIOUS.' It was doubtless the same reason that induced the legislature in 1821, to make a show of giving more protection to the life of the slave. Their fathers, when they gave some protection, did it because the time had come when, not to do it would make them 'ODIOUS,' So the legislature of 1821 made a show of giving still greater protection, because, not to do it would make them 'odious.' Fitly did they wear the mantles of their ascending fathers! In giving to the life of a slave the miserable protection of a fine, their fathers did not even pretend to do it out of any regard to the sacredness of his life as a human being, but merely because cruelty is 'unbecoming' and 'odious.' The legislature of 1821 nominally increased this protection; not that they cared more for the slave's rights, or for the inviolabity of his life as a human being, but the civilized world had advanced since the date of the first law. The slave-trade which was then honorable merchandise, and plied by lords, governors, judges, and doctors of divinity, raising them to immense wealth, had grown 'unbecoming,' and only raised its votaries by a rope to the yard arm; besides this, the barbarity of the slave codes throughout the world was fast becoming 'odious' to civilized nations, and slaveholders found that the only conditions on which they could prevent themselves from being thrust out of the pale of civilization, was to meliorate the iron rigor of their slave code, and thus seem to secure to their slaves some protection. Further, the northern states had passed laws for the abolition of slavery—all the South American states were acting in the matter; and Colombia and Chili passed acts of abolition that very year. In addition to all this the Missouri question had been for two years previous under discussion in Congress, in State legislatures, and in every village and stage coach; and this law of South Carolina had been held up to execration by northern members of Congress, and in newspapers throughout the free states—in a word, the legislature of South Carolina found that they were becoming 'odious;' and while in their sense of justice and humanity they did not surpass their fathers, they winced with equal sensitiveness under the sting of the world's scorn, and with equal promptitude sued for a truce by modifying the law.

The legislature of South Carolina modified another law at the same session. Previously, the killing of a slave 'on a sudden heat or passion, or by undue correction,' was punished by a fine of three hundred and fifty pounds. In 1821 an act was passed diminishing the fine to five hundred dollars, but authorizing an imprisonment 'not exceeding six months.' Just before the American Revolution, the Legislature of North Carolina passed a law making imprisonment the penalty for the wilful and malicious murder of a slave. About twenty years after the revolution, the state found itself becoming 'odious,' as the spirit of abolition was pervading the nations. The legislature, perceiving that Christendom would before long rank them with barbarians if they so cheapened human life, repealed the law, candidly assigning in the preamble of the new one the reason for repealing the old—that it was 'DISGRACEFUL' and 'DEGRADING! As this preamble expressly recognizes the slave as 'a human creature,' and as it is couched in a phraseology which indicates some sense of justice, we would gladly give the legislature credit for sincerity, and believe them really touched with humane movings towards the slave, were it not for a proviso in the law clearly revealing that the show of humanity and regard for their rights, indicated by the words, is nothing more than a hollow pretence—hypocritical flourish to produce an impression favorable to their justice and magnanimity. After declaring that he who is 'guilty of wilfully and maliciously killing a slave, shall suffer the same punishment as if he had killed a freeman;' the act concludes thus: 'Provided, always, this act shall not extend to the person killing a slave outlawed by virtue of any act of Assembly of this state; or to any slave in the act of resistance to his lawful overseer, or master, or to any slave dying under moderate correction.' Reader, look at this proviso. 1. It gives free license to all persons to kill outlawed slaves. Well, what is an outlawed slave? A slave who runs away, lurks in swamps, &c., and kills a hog or any other domestic animal to keep himself from starving, is subject to a proclamation of outlawry; (Haywood's Manual, 521,) and then whoever finds him may shoot him, tear him in pieces with dogs, burn him to death over a slow fire, or kill him by any other tortures. 2. The proviso grants full license to a master to kill his slave, if the slave resist him. The North Carolina Bench has decided that this law contemplates not only actual resistance to punishment, &c., but also offering to resist. (Stroud's Sketch, 37.) If, for example, a slave undergoing the process of branding should resist by pushing aside the burning stamp; or if wrought up to frenzy by the torture of the lash, he should catch and hold it fast; or if he break loose from his master and run, refusing to stop at his command; or if he refuse to be flogged; or struggle to keep his clothes on while his master is trying to strip him; if, in these, or any one of a hundred other ways he resist, or offer, or threaten to resist the infliction; or, if the master attempt the violation of the slave's wife, and the husband resist his attempts without the least effort to injure him, but merely to shield his wife from his assaults, this law does not merely permit, but it authorizes the master to murder the slave on the spot.

The brutality of these two provisos brands its authors as barbarians. But the third cause of exemption could not be outdone by the legislation of fiends. 'DYING under MODERATE correction!' MODERATE correction and DEATH—cause and effect! 'Provided ALWAYS,' says the law, 'this act shall not extend to any slave dying under moderate correction!' Here is a formal proclamation of impunity to murder—an express pledge of acquittal to all slaveholders who wish to murder their slaves, a legal absolution—an indulgence granted before the commission of the crime! Look at the phraseology. Nothing is said of maimings, dismemberments, skull fractures, of severe bruisings, or lacerations, or even of floggings; but a word is used the common-parlance import of which is, slight chastisement; it is not even whipping, but 'correction' And as if hypocrisy and malignity were on the rack to outwit each other, even that weak word must be still farther diluted; so 'moderate' is added: and, to crown the climax, compounded of absurdity, hypocrisy, and cold-blooded murder, the legal definition of 'moderate correction' is covertly given; which is, any punishment that KILLS the victim. All inflictions are either moderate or immoderate; and the design of this law was manifestly to shield the murderer from conviction, by carrying on its face the rule for its own interpretation; thus advertising, beforehand, courts and juries, that the fact of any infliction producing death, was no evidence that it was immoderate, and that beating a man to death came within the legal meaning of 'moderate correction!' The design of the legislature of North Carolina in framing this law is manifest; it was to produce the impression upon the world, that they had so high a sense of justice as voluntarily to grant adequate protection to the lives of their slaves. This is ostentatiously set forth in the preamble, and in the body of the law. That this was the most despicable hypocrisy, and that they had predetermined to grant no such protection, notwithstanding the pains taken to get the credit of it, is fully revealed by the proviso, which was framed in such a way as to nullify the law, for the express accommodation of slaveholding gentlemen murdering their slaves. All such find in this proviso a convenient accomplice before the fact, and a packed jury, with a ready-made verdict of 'not guilty,' both gratuitously furnished by the government! The preceding law and proviso are to be found in Haywood's Manual, 530; also in Laws of Tennessee, Act of October 23, 1791; and in Stroud's Sketch, 37.

Enough has been said already to show, that though the laws of the slave states profess to grant adequate protection to the life of the slave, such professions are mere empty pretence, no such protection being in reality afforded by them. But there is still another fact, showing that all laws which profess to protect the slaves from injury by the whites are a mockery. It is this—that the testimony, neither of a slave nor of a free colored person, is legal testimony against a white. To this rule there is no exception in any of the slave states: and this, were there no other evidence, would be sufficient to stamp, as hypocritical, all the provisions of the codes which profess to protect the slaves. Professing to grant protection, while, at the same time, it strips them of the only means by which they can make that protection available! Injuries must be legally proved before they can be legally redressed: to deprive men of the power of proving their injuries, is itself the greatest of all injuries; for it not only exposes to all, but invites them, by a virtual guarantee of impunity, and is thus the author of all injuries. It matters not what other laws exist, professing to throw safeguards round the slave—this makes them blank paper. How can a slave prove outrages perpetrated upon him by his master or overseer, when his own testimony and that of all his fellow-slaves, his kindred, associates, and acquaintances, is ruled out of court? and when he is entirely in the power of those who injure him, and when the only care necessary, on their part, is, to see that no white witness is looking on. Ordinarily, but one white man, the overseer, is with the slaves while they are at labor; indeed, on most plantations, to commit an outrage in the presence of a white witness would be more difficult than in their absence. He who wished to commit an illegal act upon a slave, instead of being obliged to take pains and watch for an opportunity to do it unobserved by a white, would find it difficult to do it in the presence of a white if he wished to do so. The supreme court of Louisiana, in their decision, in the case of Crawford vs. Cherry,(15, Martin's La. Rep. 112; also "Law of Slavery," 249,) where the defendant was sued for the value of a slave whom he had shot and killed, say, "The act charged here, is one rarely committed in the presence of witnesses," (whites). So in the case of the State vs. Mann, (Devereux, N.C. Rep. 263; and "Law of Slavery," 247;) in which the defendant was charged with shooting a slave girl 'belonging' to the plaintiff; the Supreme Court of North Carolina, in their decision, speaking of the provocations of the master by the slave, and 'the consequent wrath of the master' prompting him to bloody vengeance, add, 'a vengeance generally practised with impunity, by reason of its privacy.'

Laws excluding the testimony of slaves and free colored persons, where a white is concerned, do not exist in all the slave states. One or two of them have no legal enactment on the subject; but, in those, 'public opinion' acts with the force of law, and the courts invariably reject it. This brings us back to the potency of that oft-quoted 'public opinion,' so ready, according to our objector, to do battle for the protection of the slave!

Another proof that 'public opinion,' in the slave states, plunders, tortures, and murders the slaves, instead of protecting them, is found in the fact, that the laws of slave states inflict capital punishment on slaves for a variety of crimes, for which, if their masters commit them, the legal penalty is merely imprisonment. Judge Stroud in his Sketch of the Laws of Slavery, says, that by the laws of Virginia, there are 'seventy-one crimes for which slaves are capitally punished though in none of these are whites punished in manner more severe than by imprisonment in the penitentiary.' (P. 107, where the reader will find all the crimes enumerated.) It should be added, however, that though the penalty for each of these seventy-one crimes is 'death,' yet a majority of them are, in the words of the law, 'death within clergy;' and in Virginia, clergyable offences, though technically capital, are not so in fact. In Mississippi, slaves are punished capitally for more than thirty crimes, for which whites are punished only by fine or imprisonment, or both. Eight of these are not recognized as crimes, either by common law or by statute, when committed by whites. In South Carolina slaves are punished capitally for nine more crimes than the whites—in Georgia, for six—and in Kentucky, for seven more than whites, &c. We surely need not detain the reader by comments on this monstrous inequality with which the penal codes of slave states treat slaves and their masters. When we consider that guilt is in proportion to intelligence, and that these masters have by law doomed their slaves to ignorance, and then, as they darkle and grope along their blind way, inflict penalties upon them for a variety of acts regarded as praise worthy in whites; killing them for crimes, when whites are only fined or imprisoned—to call such a 'public opinion' inhuman, savage, murderous, diabolical, would be to use tame words, if the English vocabulary could supply others of more horrible import.

But slaveholding brutality does not stop here. While punishing the slaves for crimes with vastly greater severity than it does their masters for the same crimes, and making a variety of acts crimes in law, which are right, and often duties, it persists in refusing to make known to the slaves that complicated and barbarous penal code which loads them with such fearful liabilities. The slave is left to get a knowledge of these laws as he can, and cases must be of constant occurrence at the south, in which slaves get their first knowledge of the existence of a law by suffering its penalty. Indeed, this is probably the way in which they commonly learn what the laws are; for how else can the slave get a knowledge of the laws? He cannot read—he cannot learn to read; if he try to master the alphabet, so that he may spell out the words of the law, and thus avoid its penalties, the law shakes its terrors at him; while, at the same time, those who made the laws refuse to make them known to those for whom they are designed. The memory of Caligula will blacken with execration while time lasts, because be hung up his laws so high that people could not read them, and then punished them because they did not keep them. Our slaveholders aspire to blacker infamy. Caligula was content with hanging up his laws where his subjects could see them; and if they could not read them, they knew where they were, and might get at them, if, in their zeal to learn his will, they had used the same means to get up to them that those did who hung them there. Even Caligula, wretch as he was, would have shuddered at cutting their legs off, to prevent their climbing to them; or, if they had got there, at boring their eyes out, to prevent their reading them. Our slaveholders virtually do both; for they prohibit their slaves acquiring that knowledge of letters which would enable them to read the laws; and if, by stealth, they get it in spite of them, they prohibit them books and papers, and flog them if they are caught at them. Further—Caligula merely hung his laws so high that they could not be read—our slaveholders have hung theirs so high above the slave that they cannot be seen—they are utterly out of sight, and he finds out that they are there only by the falling of the penalties on his head.[[35]] Thus the "public opinion" of slave states protects the defenceless slave by arming a host of legal penalties and setting them in ambush at every thicket along his path, to spring upon him unawares.

[Footnote [35]: The following extract from the Alexandria (D.C.) Gazette is all illustration. "CRIMINALS CONDEMNED.—On Monday last the Court of the borough of Norfolk, Va. sat on the trial of four negro boys arraigned for burglary. The first indictment charged them with breaking into the hardware store of Mr. E.P. Tabb, upon which two of them were found guilty by the Court, and condemned to suffer the penalty of the law, which, in the case of a slave, is death. The second Friday in April is appointed for the execution of their awful sentence. Their ages do not exceed sixteen. The first, a fine active boy, belongs to a widow lady in Alexandria; the latter, a house servant, is owned by a gentleman in the borough. The value of one was fixed at $1000, and the other at $800; which sums are to be re-imbursed to their respective owners out of the state treasury." In all probability these poor boys, who are to be hung for stealing, never dreamed that death was the legal penalty of the crime.

Here is another, from the "New Orleans Bee" of —— 14, 1837—"The slave who STRUCK some citizens in Canal street, some weeks since, has been tried and found guilty, and is sentenced to be HUNG on the 24th.">[