The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus

by American Anti-Slavery Society

It may be remarked here, that the political and other disabilities of the Strangers, which were the distinctions growing out of a different national descent, and important to the preservation of national characteristics, and to the purity of national worship, do not seem to have effected at all the social estimation, in which this class of servants was held. They were regarded according to their character and worth as persons, irrespective of their foreign origin, employments, and political condition.

The common construction put upon the expression, "rule with rigor," and an inference drawn from it, have an air so oracular, as quite to overcharge risibles of ordinary calibre, if such an effect were not forestalled by its impiety. It is interpreted to mean, "you shall not make him an article of property, you shall not force him to work, and rob him of his earnings, you shall not make him a chattel, and strip him of legal protection." So much for the interpretation. The inference is like unto it, viz. Since the command forbade such outrages upon the Israelites, it permitted and commissioned the infliction of them upon the Strangers. Such impious and shallow smattering, captivates two classes of minds, the one by its flippancy, the other by its blasphemy, and both, by the strong scent of its unbridled license. What boots it to reason against such rampant affinities!

In Exodus, chap. i. 13, 14, it is said that the Egyptians "made the children of Israel to serve with rigor," "and all their service wherein they made them serve, was with rigor." The rigor here spoken of, is affirmed of the amount of labor extorted from them, and the mode of the exaction. This form of expression, "serve with rigor," is never applied to the service of servants either under the Patriarchal, or the Mosaic systems. Nor is any other form of expression ever used, either equivalent to it, or at all similar. The phrase, "thou shalt not RULE over him with rigor," used in Leviticus xxv. 43, 46, does not prohibit unreasonable exactions of labor, nor inflictions of personal cruelty. Such were provided against otherwise. But it forbids, confounding the distinctions between a Jew and a Stranger, by assigning the former to the same grade of service, for the same term of time, and under the same national and political disabilities as the latter.

We are now prepared to survey at a glance, the general condition of the different classes of servants, with the modifications peculiar to each class. I. In the possession of all fundamental rights, all classes of servants were on an absolute equality, all were equally protected by law in their persons, character, property and social relations. All were voluntary, all were compensated for their labor. All were released from their regular labor nearly one half of the days in each year, all were furnished with stated instruction; none in either class were in any sense articles of property, all were regarded as men, with the rights, interests, hopes, and destinies of men. In these respects the circumstances of all classes of servants among the Israelites, were not only similar but identical, and so far forth, they formed but ONE CLASS.

II. DIFFERENT CLASSES OF SERVANTS.

1. Hired Servants.—This class consisted both of Israelites and Strangers. Their employments were different. The Israelite, was an agricultural servant. The Stranger was a domestic and personal servant, and in some instances mechanical; both were occasional, procured temporally to serve an emergency. Both lived in their own families, their wages were money, and they were paid when their work was done. As a class of servants, the hired were less loved, trusted, honored and promoted than any other.

2. Bought Servants, (including those "born in the house.")—This class also, was composed both of Israelites and Strangers, the same general difference obtaining in their kinds of employment as was noticed before. Both were paid in advance[^A], and neither was temporary.

[A]: The payment in advance, doubtless lessened considerably the price of the purchase; the servant thus having the use of the money from the beginning, and the master assuming all the risks of life, and health for labor; at the expiration of the six years' contract, the master having experienced no loss from the risk incurred at the making of it, was obliged by law to release the servant with a liberal gratuity. The reason assigned for this is, "he hath been worth a double hired servant unto thee in serving thee six years," as if it had been said, he has now served out his time, and as you have experienced no loss from the risks of life, and ability to labor which you incurred in the purchase, and which lessened the price, and as, by being your permanent servant for six years, he has saved you all the time and trouble of looking up and hiring laborers on emergencies, therefore, "thou shalt furnish him liberally," &c.

The Israelitish servant, in most instances, was released after six years. (The freeholder continued until the jubilee.) The Stranger, was a permanent servant, continuing until the jubilee. Besides these distinctions between Jewish and Gentile bought servants, a marked distinction obtained between different classes of Jewish bought servants. Ordinarily, during their term of service, they were merged in their master's family, and, like the wife and children of the master, subject to his authority; (and of course, like them, protected by law from its abuse.) But one class of the Jewish bought servants was a marked exception. The freeholder, obliged by poverty to leave his possession, and sell himself as a servant, did not thereby affect his family relations, or authority, nor subject himself as an inferior to the control of his master, though dependent upon him for employment. In this respect, his condition differed from that of the main body of Jewish bought servants, which seems to have consisted of those, who had not yet come into possession of their inheritance, or of those who were dislodging from it an incumbrance.