Dissertation on Slavery / With a Proposal for the Gradual Abolition of it, in the State of Virginia

by St. George Tucker

ON THE
STATE OF SLAVERY IN VIRGINIA.

In the preceding Enquiry[1] into the absolute rights of the citizens of united America, we must not be understood as if those rights were equally and universally the privilege of all the inhabitants of the United States, or even of all those, who may challenge this land of freedom as their native country. Among the blessings which the Almighty hath showered down on these states, there is a large portion of the bitterest draught that ever flowed from the cup of affliction. Whilst America hath been the land of promise to Europeans, and their descendants, it hath been the vale of death to millions of the wretched sons of Africa. The genial light of liberty, which hath here shone with unrivalled lustre on the former, hath yielded no comfort to the latter, but to them hath proved a pillar of darkness, whilst it hath conducted the former to the most enviable state of human existence. Whilst we were offering up vows at the shrine of Liberty, and sacrificing hecatombs upon her altars; whilst we swore irreconcilable hostility to her enemies, and hurled defiance in their faces; whilst we adjured the God of Hosts to witness our resolution to live free, or die, and imprecated curses on their heads who refused to unite with us in establishing the empire of freedom; we were imposing upon our fellow men, who differ in complexion from us, a slavery, ten thousand times more cruel than the utmost extremity of those grievances and oppressions, of which we complained. Such are the inconsistencies of human nature; such the blindness of those who pluck not the beam out of their own eyes, whilst they can espy a moat, in the eyes of their brother; such that partial system of morality which confines rights and injuries, to particular complexions; such the effect of that self-love which justifies, or condemns, not according to principle, but to the agent. Had we turned our eyes inwardly when we supplicated the Father of Mercies to aid the injured and oppressed; when we invoked the Author of Righteousness to attest the purity of our motives, and the justice of our cause;[2] and implored the God of Battles to aid our exertions in its defence, should we not have stood more self convicted than the contrite publican! Should we not have left our gift upon the altar, that we might be first reconciled to our brethren whom we held in bondage? Should we not have loosed their chains, and broken their fetters? Or if the difficulties and dangers of such an experiment prohibited the attempt during the convulsions of a revolution, is it not our duty to embrace the first moment of constitutional health and vigour, to effectuate so desirable an object, and to remove from us a stigma, with which our enemies will never fail to upbraid us, nor our consciences to reproach us? To form a just estimate of this obligation, to demonstrate the incompatibility of a state of slavery with the principles of our government, and of that revolution upon which it is founded, and to elucidate the practicability of its total, though gradual, abolition, it will be proper to consider the nature of slavery, its properties, attendants, and consequences in general; its rise, progress, and present state not only in this commonwealth, but in such of our sister states as have either perfected, or commenced the great work of its extirpation; with the means they have adopted to effect it, and those which the circumstances and situation of our country may render it most expedient for us to pursue, for the attainment of the same noble and important end.[3]

According to Justinian; ⁽¹⁾¹ Lib. 1. Tit. 2. the first general division of persons, in respect to their rights, is into freemen and slaves. It is equally the glory and the happiness of that country from which the citizens of the United States derive their origin, that the traces of slavery, such as at present exists in several of the United States, are there utterly extinguished. It is not my design to enter into a minute enquiry whether it ever had existence there, nor to compare the situation of villeins, during the existence of pure villenage, with that of modern domestic slaves. The records of those times, at least, such as have reached this quarter of the globe, are too few to throw a satisfactory light on the subject. Suffice it that our ancestors migrating hither brought not with them any prototype of that slavery which hath been established among us. The first introduction of it into Virginia was by the arrival of a Dutch ship from the coast of Africa having twenty Negroes on board, who were sold here in the year 1620. ⁽²⁾² Stith 182. In the year 1638 we find them in Massachusetts.[4] They were introduced into Connecticut soon after the settlement of that colony; that is to say, about the same period.[5] Thus early had our forefathers sown the seeds of an evil, which, like a leprosy, hath descended upon their posterity with accumulated rancour, visiting the sins of the fathers upon succeeding generations.—The climate of the northern states less favourable to the constitution of the natives of Africa, ⁽³⁾³ Dr. Belknap. Zephan. Swift. than the southern, proved alike unfavourable to their propagation, and to the increase of their numbers by importations. As the southern colonies advanced in population, not only importations increased there, but Nature herself, under a climate more congenial to the African constitution, assisted in multiplying the blacks in those parts, no less than in diminishing their numbers in the more rigorous climates of the north; this influence of climate moreover contributed extremely to increase or diminish the value of the slave to the purchasers, in the different colonies. White labourers, whose constitutions were better adapted to the severe winters of the New England colonies, were there found to be preferable to the Negroes, ⁽⁴⁾⁴ Dr. Belknap. Zephan. Swift. who, accustomed to the influence of an ardent sun, became almost torpid in those countries, not less adapted to give vigour to their laborious exercises, than unfavourable to the multiplication of their species; in those colonies, where the winters were not only milder, and of shorter duration, but succeeded by an intense summer heat, as invigorating to the African, as debilitating to the European constitution, the Negroes were not barely more capable of performing labour than the Europeans, or their descendants, but the multiplication of the species was at least equal; and, where they met with humane treatment, perhaps greater than among the whites. The purchaser therefore calculated not upon the value of the labour of his slave only, but, if a female, he regarded her as "the fruitful mother of an hundred more:" and many of these unfortunate people have there been in this state, whose descendants even in the compass of two or three generations have gone near to realize the calculation.—The great increase of slavery in the southern, in proportion to the northern states in the union, is therefore not attributable, solely, to the effect of sentiment, but to natural causes; as well as those considerations of profit, which have, perhaps, an equal influence over the conduct of mankind in general, in whatever country, or under whatever climate their destiny hath placed them. What else but considerations of this nature could have influenced the merchants of the freest nation, at that time in the world, to embark in so nefarious a traffic, as that of the human race, attended, as the African slave trade has been, with the most atrocious aggravations of cruelty, perfidy, and intrigues, the objects of which have been the perpetual fomentation of predatory and intestine wars? What, but similar considerations, could prevail on the government of the same country, even in these days, to patronize a commerce so diametrically opposite to the generally received maxims of that government. It is to the operation of these considerations in the parent country, not less than to their influence in the colonies, that the rise, increase, and continuance of slavery in those British colonies which now constitute united America, are to be attributed, as I shall endeavour to shew in the course of the present enquiry. It is now time to enquire into the nature of slavery, in general, and take a view of its consequences, and attendants in this commonwealth, in particular.

Slavery, says a well informed writer ⁽⁵⁾⁵ Hargrave's case of Negroe Somerset. on the subject, has been attended with circumstances so various in different countries, as to render it difficult to give a general definition of it. Justinian calls it a constitution of the law of nations, by which one man is made subject to another, contrary to nature. ⁽⁶⁾⁶ Lib. 1. Tit. 3. Sect. 2. Grotius describes it to be an obligation to serve another for life, in consideration of diet, and other common necessaries. ⁽⁷⁾⁷ Lib. 2. c. 5. Sect. 27 Dr. Rutherforth, rejecting this definition, informs us, that perfect slavery is an obligation to be directed by another in all one's actions. ⁽⁸⁾⁸ Lib. 1. c. 20. pa. 474. Baron Montesquieu defines it to be the establishment of a right, which gives one man such a power over another, as renders him absolute master over his life and fortune. ⁽⁹⁾⁹ Lib. 15. c. 1. These definitions appear not to embrace the subject fully, since they respect the condition of the slave, in regard to his master, only, and not in regard to the state, as well as the master. The author last mentioned observes, that the constitution of a state may be free, and the subject not so. The subject free, and not the constitution of the state. ⁽¹⁰⁾¹⁰ Lib. 12. c. 1. Pursuing this idea, instead of attempting a general definition of slavery; I shall, by considering it under a threefold aspect, endeavour to give a just idea of its nature.

I. When a nation is, from any external cause, deprived of the right of being governed by its own laws, only, such a nation may be considered as in a state of political slavery. Such is the state of conquered countries, and generally, of colonies, and other dependant governments. Such was the state of united America before the revolution. In this case the personal rights of the subject may be so far secured by wholesome laws, as that the individual may be esteemed free, whilst the state is subject to a higher power: this subjection of one nation, or people, to the will of another, constitutes the first species of slavery, which, in order to distinguish it from the other two, I have called political; inasmuch as it exists only in respect to the governments, and not to the individuals of the two countries. Of this it is not our business to speak, at present.

II. Civil liberty being, no other than natural liberty so far restrained by human laws, and no farther, as is necessary and expedient for the general advantage of the public, ⁽¹¹⁾¹¹ Blackstone's Com. c. 125 whenever that liberty is, by the laws of the state, further restrained than is necessary and expedient for the general advantage, a state of civil slavery commences immediately: this may affect the whole society, and every description of persons in it, and yet the constitution of the state be perfectly free. And this happens whenever the laws of a state respect the form, or energy of the government, more than the happiness of the citizen; as in Venice, where the most oppressive species of civil slavery exists, extending to every individual in the state, from the poorest gondolier to the members of the senate, and the doge himself.

This species of slavery also exists whenever there is an inequality of rights, or privileges, between the subjects or citizens of the same state, except such as necessarily result from the exercise of a public office; for the pre-eminence of one class of men must be founded and erected upon the depression of another; and the measure of exaltation in the former, is that of the slavery of the latter. In all governments, however constituted, or by what description soever denominated, wherever the distinction of rank prevails, or is admitted by the constitution, this species of slavery exists. It existed in every nation, and in every government in Europe before the French revolution. It existed in the American colonies before they became independent states; and notwithstanding the maxims of equality which have been adopted in their several constitutions, it exists in most, if not all, of them, at this day, in the persons of our free Negroes and mulattoes; whose civil incapacities are almost as numerous as the civil rights of our free citizens. A brief enumeration of them, may not be improper before we proceed to the third head.

Free Negroes and mulattoes are by our constitution excluded from the right of suffrage,[6] and by consequence, I apprehend, from office too: they were formerly incapable of serving in the militia, except as drummers or pioneers, but now I presume they are enrolled in the lists of those that bear arms, though formerly punishable for presuming to appear at a muster-field. ⁽¹²⁾¹² 1723. c. 2. During the revolution war many of them were enlisted as soldiers in the regular army. Even slaves were not rejected from military service at that period, and such as served faithfully during the period of their enlistment, were emancipated by an act passed after the conclusion of the war. ⁽¹³⁾¹³ Oct. 1783. c. 3. An act of justice to which they were entitled upon every principle. All but housekeepers, and persons residing upon the frontiers are prohibited from keeping, or carrying any gun, powder, shot, club, or other weapon offensive or defensive: ⁽¹⁴⁾¹⁴ 1748. c. 31. Edit. 1794. Resistance to a white person, in any case, was, formerly, and now, in any case, except a wanton assault on the Negroe or mulattoe, is punishable by whipping. ⁽¹⁵⁾¹⁵ Ib. c. 103. No Negroe or mulattoe can be a witness in any prosecution, or civil suit in which a white person is a party. ⁽¹⁶⁾¹⁶ 1794. c. 141. Free Negroes together with slaves were formerly denied the benefit of clergy in cases where it was allowed to white persons; but they are now upon an equal footing as to the allowance of clergy, though not as to the consequence of that allowance, inasmuch as the court may superadd other corporal punishments to the burning in the hand usually inflicted upon white persons, in the like cases. ⁽¹⁷⁾¹⁷ 1794. c. 103. Emancipated Negroes may be sold to pay the debts of their former master contracted before their emancipation; and they may be hired out to satisfy their taxes where no sufficient distress can be had. Their children are to be bound out apprentices by the overseers of the poor. Free Negroes have all the advantages in capital cases, which white men are entitled to, except a trial by a jury of their own complexion: and a slave suing for his freedom shall have the same privilege. Free Negroes residing, or employed to labour in any town must be registered; the same thing is required of such as go at large in any county. The penalty in both cases is a fine upon the person employing, or harbouring them, and imprisonment of the Negroe. ⁽¹⁸⁾¹⁸ 1794. c. 163. The migration of free Negroes or mulattoes to this state is also prohibited; and those who do migrate hither may be sent back to the place from whence they came. ⁽¹⁹⁾¹⁹ 1794. c. 164. Any person, not being a Negroe, having one-fourth or more Negroe blood in him is deemed a mulattoe. The law makes no other distinction between Negroes and mulattoes, whether slaves or freemen. These incapacities and disabilities are evidently the fruit of the third species of slavery, of which it remains to speak; or, rather, they are scions from the same common stock: which is,

III. That condition in which one man is subject to be directed by another in all his actions; and this constitutes a state of domestic slavery; to which state all the incapacities and disabilities of civil slavery are incident, with the weight of other numerous calamities superadded thereto. And here it may be proper to make a short enquiry into the origin and foundation of domestic slavery in other countries, previous to its fatal introduction into this.