| "Drop from existence like the withered leaf That from the summer tree is swept away, Its loss unseen." |
This compendious view of the condition of what is called "free labor," in the various stages of society, is verified by the observations and explained by the researches of the political economists. I take it as I receive it from them, confirmed in my conviction of its truth, by my own experience and reflections.
Let us place along side of this a view of the condition of slave labor, as ascertained by observation, and by the laws that determine that condition.
Of slave labor then, as of free labor, it may be said, that its wages are food and raiment for the laborer of to-day, and for those future laborers who are rising up to supply the future demand. Thus much they have in common. I shall not pretend to point out all the differences between the two, but shall remark on some of the most obvious and important.
To the slave these wages are paid in kind, and can therefore be always made precisely adequate, and no more. To the free man they are paid in money, and may become deficient or superfluous, from a state of scarcity or abundance. In the last case a slight advantage is afforded to those who need it least; in the first a ruinous loss is sustained by those least able to bear it.
To the slave, his due proportion of the common fund, paid to labor as a whole, is measured out with unerring accuracy. Among free laborers, some receive too much, and others, in a like degree, too little. For be it remembered, that the average wages of free labor are given, not merely as the price of the labor of the day, but also to indemnify the daily expense of producing that amount of future labor, which the future demand is to render necessary. He therefore who labors only, but rears no children, receives more than his just share. He defrauds the concern, by drawing from the common income a portion he has not earned; while others, whom nature has burdened with more than the due proportion of children, earn more than they receive, and suffer for want of the necessaries of life. This is historically as well as theoretically true.
The slave is said to labor, uncheered by hope. This may be so. To those who know him best, he certainly seems a stranger to despair. Metaphysicians, I think, tell us that hope will not be without its objects. But it must be confessed there are things which the slave cannot hope for, though the freeman may. On the other hand, he is free from many anxieties to which the freeman is exposed. In this sense of security he has something which may well be offset against the freeman's hopes, and which some (and they not the least wise) may deem a fair equivalent to men of sordid habits and untaught minds; and such are the great body of laborers, bond or free.
Among slaves, the individual is the slave of an individual master. Among free laborers, the class is held in vassalage by the class of employers. Collectively the one class may be said to be the slave of the other. I shall not go into a minute examination of this matter. As our controversy is with Mr. Blackstone, I shall use no authority against him but his own. Hear what he says of the law of England, his boasted home of freedom. "All single men between twelve years old and sixty, and married ones under thirty years of age, and all single women between twelve and forty, not having any visible livelihood, are compelled, by two justices, to go out to service in husbandry or certain specific trades." This is as much as to say, "they who can only live by labor shall be made to labor." What more do we? They compel him to choose a master. We appropriate his labor to a master to whom use and a common interest attach him, and who is generally the master of his choice. The wages of both are the same.
In sickness, the slave looks for support to a master who is interested to maintain and cherish him, and who, for the most part, knows and loves him. What is the freeman's equivalent? Hear Mr. Blackstone:—"There is no man so wretched or indigent, but he may demand a supply sufficient for all the necessities of life, from the more opulent part of the community, by means of the several statutes enacted for the relief of the poor. A humane provision; yet, though dictated by the principles of society, discountenanced by the Roman laws. For the edicts of the Emperor Constantine, commanding the public to maintain the children of those who were unable to provide for them, in order to prevent the murder and exposure of infants, were rejected in Justinian's collection." Who ever heard of infanticide by a slave?
It is here; on this very point, of the necessity of forcing those to labor who are unable to live honestly without labor, that we base the defence of our system. That such compulsion is often necessary, all reason and experience prove. But to a people jealous of freedom, it is a delicate question whether such a power over the citizen can be safely trusted to the municipal authority. To make it effectual it must be a power dangerous to liberty. It could never be carried into effect, but by a degree of rigor which must bow the spirit of the laborer and effectually disqualify him for the political functions of a sovereign citizen. It might be too much to say, that this consideration alone would warrant the introduction of domestic slavery. Lycurgus thought so. But we, finding it among us, think we follow the example of that wisdom which used to characterize our English ancestors, in turning it to use, as a safeguard of our political freedom. We have learned too, from a great master in political science, himself an enemy to slavery in all its forms, that in every country where domestic slavery exists, "those who are free, are by far the most proud and jealous of their freedom. Freedom is to them not only an enjoyment, but a kind of rank and privilege. Not seeing that freedom, as in countries where it is a common blessing, and as broad and general as the air, may be united with much abject toil, with great misery, with all the exterior of servitude, liberty looks, amongst them, like something that is more noble and liberal.... Such were all the ancient Commonwealths; such were our Gothic ancestors; such, in our days, were the Poles; and such will be all masters of slaves who are not slaves themselves. In such a people, the haughtiness of domination combines with the spirit of freedom, fortifies it, and renders it invincible."