Finally in this connection a word regarding the treatment of slave marriages in New England may not be wholly out of place. With respect to the morality of slavery and the slave trade as viewed by the Puritan the record is perfectly clear. He was no better and no worse than his contemporaries. In his eyes the commerce in human chattels, whether red, black, or white,[673] was as legitimate a business as the handling of West India molasses; though like the Spaniard he may sometimes have excused or extolled it as affording a field for missionary work. "The seventeenth century," observes Weeden, "organized the new western countries, and created an immense opportunity for labor. The eighteenth coolly and deliberately set Europe at the task of depopulating whole districts of Africa, and of transporting the captives, by a necessarily brutal, vicious, and horrible traffic, to the new civilizations of America.... New England entered upon this long path of twisted social development—the wanton destruction of barbaric life in the hope of new civilized life, this perversion of the force of the individual barbarian into an opportunity for social mischief—with no more and no less consciousness than prevailed elsewhere at that time. The Winthrops and other Puritan colonists asked and received Indian captives for slaves as freely as any partisan went for loot or plunder."[674]
With respect to matrimonial rights nothing can be more misleading than the self-gratulations of writers who have treated colonial history from what Charles Francis Adams has aptly called the "filio-pietistic" point of view.[675] Thus in his early edition Bancroft, referring to the alleged mitigating character of Massachusetts legislation, securing to the slave such protection "as the Hebrew scriptures seemed to enjoin," declares that "this brought about a total modification of the character of negro slavery by giving to the slave the rights of marriage and the family."[676] Palfrey goes even farther in his zeal, solemnly assuring us that "from the reverence entertained by the Fathers of New England for the nuptial tie, it is safe to infer that slave husbands and wives were never parted."[677] In like spirit statesmen, jurists, and historians have reiterated the assertion that slavery was not hereditary in Massachusetts. "In all her annals," says Charles Sumner, "no person was ever born a slave" on her soil; and if, in fact, "the issue of slaves was sometimes held in bondage, it was never by sanction of any statute or law of Colony or Commonwealth."[678] Similar statements are made by Hurd, Washburn, and Belknap.[679] Justice Gray declares that "previously to the adoption of the State Constitution in 1780 negro slavery existed to some extent, and negroes held as slaves might be sold, but all children of slaves were by law free."[680] The unsupported dictum of Palfrey is equally confident. "In fact," he says, "no person was ever born in legal slavery in Massachusetts."[681]
Since the appearance of Moore's able monograph it is perhaps needless to explain that the facts are against these comfortable theories. Slavery was authorized by statute in Massachusetts under sanction of the Mosaic law; and so the children of slave mothers were also slaves.[682] The evils of the institution may, indeed, have been somewhat mitigated by the simple industrial conditions which then prevailed. The climate and soil were ill suited to slave labor. Occasionally there may have been a mind far enough ahead of the age to perceive dimly the social danger lurking in the system. Almost the only clear voice raised against it is that of Samuel Sewall,[683] whose practice nevertheless was not always consistent with his doctrine.[684] Mixture of race was not favored. But not until 1705 was intermarriage between a white person and a negro or mulatto forbidden by statute.[685] Through Sewall's influence the prohibition was not then extended to Indians;[686] and he succeeded in having a clause retained in the act enjoining that "no master shall unreasonably deny marriage to his negro with one of the same nation."[687] A passage in his diary shows that the laws relating to banns, as also, it is safe to infer, those regarding celebration and registration, were applied in the case of such unions; while at the same time we are given a pleasing picture of the humane treatment which slaves sometimes received from their masters. On September 26, 1700, he records that "Mr. John Wait and Eunice his Wife, and Mrs. Debora Thair come to Speak to me about the Marriage of Sebastian, Negro Servt of said Wait, with Jane, Negro Servt of said Thair. Mr. Wait desired they might be published in order to Marriage. Mrs. Thair insisted that Sebastian might have one day in six allow'd him for the support of Jane, his intended wife and her children, if it should please God to give her any. Mr. Wait now wholly declin'd that, but freely offer'd to allow Bastian Five pounds, in Money [=p] a[=n]um towards the Su[=p]ort of his children [=p] said Jane (besides Sabastians cloathing and Diet). I persuaded Jane and Mrs. Thair to agree to it, and so it was concluded; and Mrs. Thair gave up the Note of Publication to Mr. Wait for him to carry it to Wm Griggs, the Town Clerk, and to Williams in order to have them published according to law."[688]
Examples of such kindly usage were doubtless not uncommon among New England slave-owners, just as they were often found at all times in the South. But it is vain to apologize for a system, wicked and corrupting in itself, on the ground of individual benevolence or of laws which inconsistently in certain particulars seem to recognize the spiritual and social equality of human chattels. In a community where a black man or woman for sexual misconduct with a member of the favored race was condemned by statute to be sold into another province;[689] where Indian prisoners were divided among the captors, and sold as legitimate spoil;[690] where African fathers and mothers, bought on their native soil for watered rum with short measure, were shipped across the ocean in stifling death-traps,[691] to be "knocked down" from the auction block to the highest bidder,[692] it seems rather more than absurd to assume that under the benign influence of Puritan religion and morality slave wives and husbands were never parted through the lust or greed of their owners. Nor in general was the alleged hope of converting the "benighted heathen to enjoy the blessings of a Gospel dispensation" more than a soothing balm to quiet the incipient throes of a rudimentary conscience in this regard.[693] Nay, in New England as elsewhere, the Christianizing of the blacks was sometimes actually discouraged, lest it should put in jeopardy the white man's property in them. During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries a typical "case of conscience" arose. Would not the baptism of a slave in effect be a dangerous admission of his spiritual equality with the master? "Could an intelligent being, who, through the Mediator, had participated in the spirit of God, and by his own inward experience had become conscious of a Supreme Being, and of relations between that Being and humanity be rightfully held in bondage? From New England to Carolina, the 'notion' prevailed that 'being baptized is inconsistent with the state of slavery;' and this early apprehension proved an obstacle to the 'conversion of these poor people.' The sentiment was so deep and so general that South Carolina in 1712, Maryland in 1715, Virginia repeatedly from 1667 to 1748, set forth by special enactments that baptism did not confer freedom."[694]
Naturally the Puritan was deeply exercised by the same scruples. He sorely dreaded lest through extending the means of grace to his serf Christ should inadvertently be put "in bondage." But he solved the problem in the same way as his southern brother—at the expense of the bondman. In Massachusetts as in Rhode Island slavery was consecrated "without regard to the religion of the slave."[695] Accordingly in 1696 "the ministers of Boston" submitted to the general court "That ye wel-knowne Discouragemt upon ye endeavours of masters to Christianize their slaves, may be removed by a Law which may take away all pretext to Release from just servitude, by receiving of Baptisme." But to the credit of the court, we are told, "this proposal was not noticed."[696] Over forty years later a different result was reached by the clergy of Connecticut. At a meeting of the General Association for that colony in 1738, "It was inquired—whether the infant slaves of Christian masters may be baptized in the right of their masters—they solemnly promising to train them in the nurture and admonition of the Lord: and whether it is the duty of such masters to offer such children and thus religiously to promise. Both questions were affirmatively answered."[697] Thus the negro of Connecticut was admitted to the covenant of grace without jeopardizing his owner's chattel interest in his body.
The attitude of Massachusetts slave-owners on this problem is revealed in Sewall's "question" from the Athenian Oracle: "What then should hinder but these be Baptized? If only the Covetousness of their Masters, who for fear of losing their Bodies, will venture their Souls; which of the two are we to esteem the greater Heathens? Now that this is notorious Matter of Fact, that they are so far from persuading those poor Creatures to Come to Baptism, that they discourage them from it, and rather hinder them as much as possible, though many of the wretches, as we have been informed, earnestly desire it; this we believe, none that are concern'd in the Plantations, if they are ingenuous, will deny, but own they don't at all care to have them Baptized. Talk to a Planter of the Soul of a Negro, and he'll be apt to tell ye (or at least his Actions speak it loudly) that the Body of one of them may be worth twenty Pounds; but the Souls of an hundred of them would not yield him one Farthing; and therefore he's not at all solicitous about them, though the true Reason is indeed, because of that Custom of giving them their Freedom, after turning Christians." Whether this custom be "reasonable" the writer doubts; for neither the "Father of the Faithful" nor St. Paul commands masters to liberate their slaves and Christianity does not "alter any Civil Right." In the "mean time, if there be such a Law or Custom for their Freedom, to encourage 'em to Christianity, be it reasonable or otherwise, this is certain, that none can excuse those who for that Reason should in any way hinder or discourage 'em from being Christians; some of whose excuses are almost too shameful to repeat, since they seem to reflect on the Christian Religion, as if that made Men more untractable and ungovernable, than when bred in Ignorance and Heathenism."[698]
Much of the same casuistry is manifested in dealing with the question of slave marriages. A bondman might be made amenable to the law of banns and celebration; but his continued enjoyment of marital rights and family life was absolutely precarious. As Moore suggests, the proviso of the act of 1705 forbidding the "unreasonable denial of marriage to negroes is very interesting. Legislation against the arbitrary exercise and abuse of authority proves its existence and the previous practice."[699] Besides, the adoption of that law was prompted perhaps as much by self-interest as by regard for morality. It was in effect a prudent police ordinance. Masters were liable for the legal fines imposed on their slaves for sexual offenses. It might be cheaper and less troublesome to allow orderly wedlock. "Moreover it is too well known," writes Sewall, "what Temptations Masters are under, to connive at the Fornication of their Slaves; lest they should be obliged to find them Wives, or pay their Fines. It seems to be practically pleaded that they might be Lawless; 'tis thought much of, that the Law should have satisfaction for their Thefts, and other Immoralities; by which means, Holiness to the Lord is more rarely engraven upon this sort of servitude. It is likewise most lamentable to think, how in taking Negroes out of Africa, and selling of them here, That which God has joined together, men do boldly rend asunder; Men from their Country, Husbands from their Wives, Parents from their Children. How horrible is the Uncleanness, Mortality, if not Murder, that the ships are guilty of that bring great Crouds of these miserable Men and Women. Methinks when we are bemoaning the barbarous Usage of our Friends and Kinsfolk in Africa: it might not be unreasonable to enquire whether we are not culpable in forcing the Africans to become Slaves amongst ourselves."[700]
For another reason families were in constant danger of being separated. The breeding of slaves was not generally regarded as convenient or profitable in New England. According to Belknap, "negro children were considered an incumbrance in a family; and when weaned, were given away like puppies," and they were "publickly advertised in the news-papers" to be so disposed of.[701]
That there was something grotesque in using the solemn ritual of the church in the marriage of slaves was faintly realized. In 1748 Rev. Noah Hobart "challenged the want of flexibility in the forms of the Liturgy of the Church of England, as tending 'to introduce irreligion and profaneness'—especially in the use of the office of Matrimony for marriages contracted between slaves." The use of the phrase "with all my worldly goods I thee endow, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost" he regarded as particularly sacrilegious, although the prayers employed by the Congregational minister at slave weddings were equally profane.[702]