The Slavery Question

by John Lawrence

6. “The runaway when taken was severely punished, * * * sometimes with crucifixion, amputation of a foot, or by being sent to fight as a gladiator with wild beasts; but most frequently by being branded on the brow with letters indicative of his crime.

7. “By a decree passed by the Senate, if a master was murdered when his slaves might possibly have aided him, all his household within reach were held as implicated and deserving of death.”

Is it possible that the holy apostles gave their sanction to a system based on such laws?

But all the fundamental principles of revealed religion are against slavery.

1. The character of god.—God is just and cannot favor a system which disregards all the principles of justice. But slavery outrages every principle of justice: therefore God must be opposed to slavery. God is impartial,—no respecter of persons, and he cannot be favorable to a system which is based upon partiality. But slavery is a system of superlative partiality: hence God is opposed to slavery. God is love,—and love wills the highest happiness of the intelligent universe, and the removal of every obstruction to the progress of men to that happiness. But slavery obstructs that progress. It is a barbarizing system, necessarily involving millions of men in ignorance, crime and misery: therefore God must will its extirpation. All the divine attributes are hostile to slavery. “Thus saith the Lord, execute ye judgment and righteousness, and deliver the spoiled out of the hand of the oppressor.” “Learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed; judge the fatherless; plead for the widow.”

2. The common origin of man.—The unity of the human race is admitted by all scientific men, and the bible plainly teaches us that “out of one blood hath God made all nations to dwell upon the face of the earth.” Whatever difference of feature, color, intellect or stature, may be found in the various parts of the globe, is attributable to manners, climate, education, and the pleasure the Creator has in variety. Every human being is a man, possessing all the rights of a man. All men are brothers, born into the world on a common level. Hence one man cannot claim his brother and his brother’s family without committing an outrageous insult. If the right to claim belongs to any, it belongs to all, and now whose right shall hold? We say if the right to enslave belongs to any it belongs to all, and how is it to be determined who will sink from the right to own slaves to the condition of a SLAVE? Must the strong reduce to slavery the weak, and thus make might the arbiter? Such a conclusion would be contrary to the plainest dictates of reason. If men have a common parentage, and are brothers, they inherit common rights, and those rights ought to be respected. That system which authorizes one part of the common family of man to plunder another part of their dearest rights—of all their rights, is a wrong system. But slavery authorizes this very thing: therefore slavery is wrong.

3. Jesus Christ is the Redeemer of all.—Jesus is the second Adam, and sustains a relation to the human family co-extensive with the first Adam. He is the Mediator, High Priest and Elder Brother of every child of man. All have been purchased with a priceless offering; and hence the claims of Christ are paramount to all other claims, and no one can rightfully become the owner of a fellow-being, unless Christ as Creator and Redeemer first relinquish his claim. A system which should attempt forcibly, and without divine permission, to seize upon the Saviour’s purchase, would be robbery—a robbery of God. But slavery does seize upon the purchase of a Saviour’s blood without divine permission: therefore slavery is robbery—robbery of God.

4. The Moral Precepts of Christianity.—The moral precepts of Christianity condemn slavery. Take for example the golden rule—“Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them.” Can any slaveholder obey this precept? If that wealthy planter who stands at the head of a large family, were a slave with all his household, what course would he have his owner pursue? Would he not wish him to grant a deed of immediate manumission to all his family and to himself? Would he not urge the matter as one of immense importance? Is it possible that he could desire to be deprived of liberty, education, permanent family connections, and of the proceeds of his toil? Could any sane man wish to have his sons and daughters grow up in the stupor, ignorance, and miseries of slavery? No, it is not possible. Every sound-minded man would regard the subjugation of himself and family to slavery as a dreadful calamity, and would consider the man who should hold them in that condition as an unfeeling, inhuman tyrant.—Therefore no sound-minded man can hold a slave without violating the golden rule—without doing unto others as he would not have others do to him.

5. The commandments are all against slavery. “Honor thy father and thy mother.” But slavery places the master between the child and the parent, and makes it impossible for the child practically to obey this command, in the performance of those duties which cheer the hearts and lighten the burdens of parents, especially in old age. “Thou shalt not kill.” But slavery authorizes in many cases the killing of slaves. “In North Carolina, any person may lawfully kill a slave who has been outlawed by running away or lurking in the swamps.” “By a law of South Carolina, a slave endeavoring to entice another slave to run away, if provisions, etc., be prepared to aid in such running away, shall be punished with death.” “Another law of the same State, provides that if a slave when absent from the plantation, refuse to be examined by any white person, such white person may seize and chastise him; and if the slave shall strike such person, he may be lawfully killed.”—“Thou shalt not commit adultery.” But female slaves are compelled to commit adultery. The law places them wholly within the power of their masters and overseers, and they dare not, they cannot resist their demands. “Thou shalt not steal.” But slavery exists by theft. Every slave is a stolen man. Every slaveholder is a man-stealer. The slave was stolen from Africa, or stolen from his rightful owner, himself, in America. No sophistry can make it plausible that the African slave trade is piracy, and that the perpetuation of slavery is an innocent business. It is theft as clearly to go to the negro hut in Virginia and steal a babe as to go to a hut in Africa and do the same deed. Certainly a child born in our happy Republic is as free in the sight of God as one born under the rule of the King of Dahomey! “All are created free,” hence the holding of any one as a slave is theft persevered in. “Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.” But slavery does bear false witness against the slave, who is our neighbor. It denies his natural equality, his right to liberty, property—in short, his manhood. This is all as false as false can be. “Thou shalt not covet.” But slavery covets not only a man’s property, but the man himself. We see that slavery violates every commandment of the second table of the Decalogue, and indeed violates every precept of the first table, as might readily be shown.