support his child, and is responsible for his actions. He has, therefore, a right to control the actions of the child, so long as this responsibility exists. He is under obligation to render that child a suitable member of the community; and this obligation he could not discharge, unless the physical and intellectual liberty of the child were placed within his

power.

2. As the parent has supported the child during infancy, he has, probably, by the law of nature, a right to his services during youth, or for so long a period as may be sufficient to insure an adequate remuneration. When, however, this remuneration is received, the right of the parent over the child ceases for ever.

3. This right he may, if he see fit, transfer to another, as in the case of apprenticeship. But he can transfer the right for no longer time than he holds it. He can, therefore, negotiate it away for no period beyond that of the child's minority.

4. A man may transfer his right over his own labor for a limited time, and for a satisfactory equivalent. But this transfer proceeds upon the principle that the original right vests in himself, and it is, therefore, no violation of that right. He has, however, no right to transfer the services of any other person except his child; nor of his child, except under the limitations above specified.

In strict accordance with these remarks, is the memorable sentence in the commencement of the Declaration of Independence, "We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." That the equality here spoken of is not of the means of happiness, but in the right to use them as we will, is too evident to need illustration..

18

SECTION II.

MODES IN WHICH PERSONAL LIBERTY MAY BE VIOLATED.

Personal liberty may be violated in two ways: 1. By the individual; 2. By society.

PART FIRST. Of the violation of personal liberty by the INDIVIDUAL. The most common violation of personal liberty, under this head, is that which exists in the case of Domestic Slavery.

Domestic slavery proceeds upon the principle that the master has a right to control the actions, physical and intellectual, of the slave, for his own, that is, the master's, individual benefit; and, of course, that the happiness of the master, when it comes in competition with the happiness of the slave, extinguishes in the latter the right to pursue it. It supposes, at best, that the relation between master and slave, is not that which exists between man and man, but is a modification, at least, of that which exists between man and the brutes.

Now, this manifestly supposes that the two classes of beings are created with dissimilar rights: that the master possesses rights which have never been conceded by the slave; and that the slave has no rights at all over the means of happiness which God has given him, whenever these means of happiness can be rendered available to the service of the master. It supposes that the Creator intended one human being to govern the physical, intellectual and moral actions of as many other human beings as by purchase he can bring within his physical power; and that one human being may thus acquire a right to sacrifice the happiness of any number of other human beings, for the purpose of promoting his own.

Slavery thus violates the personal liberty of man as a physical, intellectual, and moral being.

1. It purports to give to the master a right to control the physical labor of the slave, not for the sake of the happiness of the slave, nor upon terms mutually satisfactory to the

parties, but for the sake of the happiness of the master. It subjects the amount of labor, and the kind of labor, and the remuneration for labor, entirely to the will of the one party, to the entire exclusion of the will of the other party. 2. But if this right in the master over the slave be con ceded, there are of course conceded with it all other rights necessary to insure its possession. Hence, inasmuch as the slave can be held in this condition only while he remains in a state of comparative mental imbecility, it supposes the master to have the right to control his intellectual development, just as far as may be necessary to secure entire subjection. Thus, it supposes the slave to have no right to use his intellect for the production of his own happiness; but, only to use it in such manner as may be consistent with his master's profit.

3. And, moreover, inasmuch as the acquisition of the knowledge of his duty to God could not be freely made without the acquisition of other knowledge, which might, if universally diffused, endanger the control of the master, slavery supposes the master to have the right to determine how much knowledge of his duty a slave shall obtain, the manner in which he shall obtain it, and the manner in which he shall discharge that duty after he shall have obtained a knowledge of it. It thus subjects the duty of man to God, entirely to the will of man; and this for the sake of pecuniary profit. It renders the eternal happiness of the one party subservient to the temporal happiness of the other. And this principle is commonly recognized by the laws of all slave-holding countries.

If argument were necessary to show that such a system as this must be at variance with the ordinance of God, it might be easily drawn from the effects which it produces both upon morals and upon national wealth.

1. Its effects must be disastrous upon the morals of botl: parties. By presenting objects on whom passion may be satiated without resistance and without redress, it tends to cultivate in the master, pride, anger, cruelty, selfishness and licentiousness. By accustoming the slave to subject his moral principles to the will of another, it tends to abolish in him all moral distinctions; and thus fosters in him lying,

deceit, hypocrisy, dishonesty, and a willingness to yield himself up to minister to the appetites of his master. That in all slave-holding countries there are exceptions to this remark, and that there are principles in human nature which, in many cases, limit the effects of these tendencies, may be gladly admitted. Yet, that such is the tendency of slavery, as slavery, we think no reflecting person can for a moment hesitate to allow.

2. The effects of slavery on national wealth, may be easily seen from the fo.lowing considerations:

1. Instead of imposing upon all the necessity of labor, it restricts the number of laborers, that is, of producers, within the smallest possible limit, by rendering labor disgraceful.

2. It takes from the laborers the natural stimulus to labor, namely, the desire in the individual of improving his condition; and substitutes, in the place of it, that motive which is the least operative and the least constant, nainely, the fear of punishment without the consciousness of moral delinquency.

3. It removes, as far as possible, from both parties, the disposition and the motives to frugality. Neither the master learns frugality from the necessity of labor, nor the slave from the benefits which it confers. And hence, while the one party wastes from ignorance of the laws of acquisition, and the other because he can have no motive to economy, capital must accumulate but slowly, if indeed 't accumulate at all.

And that such are the tendencies of slavery, is manifest from observation. No country, not of great fertility, can long sustain a large slave population. Soils of more than ordinary fertility cannot sustain it long, after the first richness of the soil has been exhausted. Hence, slavery in this country is acknowledged to have impoverished many of our most valuable districts; and, hence, it is continually migrating from the older settlements, to those new and untilled regions, where the accumulated manure of centuries of vegetation has formed a soil, whose productiveness may, for a while, sustain a system at variance with the laws of nature. Many of our free and of our slave-holding States

were peopled at about the same time. The slave-holding States had every advantage, both in soil and climate, over their neighbors. And yet the accumulation of capital has been greatly in favor of the latter. If any one doubt whether this difference be owing to the use of slave labor, let him ask himself what would have been the condition of the slave-holding States, at this moment, if they had been inhabited, from the beginning, by an industrious yeomanry; each one holding his own land, and each one tilling it with the labor of his own hands.

But let us inquire what is the doctrine of revelation on this subject.

The moral precepts of the Bible are diametrically opposed to slavery. They are, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself, and all things whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them.

1. The application of these precepts is universal. Our neighbor is every one whom we may benefit. The obligation respects all things whatsoever. The precept, then, manifestly, extends to men, as men, or men in every condition; and if to all things whatsoever, certainly to a thing so important as the right to personal liberty.

2. Again. By this precept, it is made our duty to cherish as tender and delicate a respect for the right which the meanest individual possesses over the means of happiness bestowed upon him by God, as we cherish for our own right over our own means of happiness, or as we desire any other individual to cherish for it. Now, were this precept obeyed, it is manifest that slavery could not in fact exist for a single instant. The principle of the precept is absolutely subversive of the principle of slavery. That of the one is the entire equality of right; that of the other, the entire absorption of the rights of one in the rights of the other.

If any one doubt respecting the bearing of the Scripture precept upon this case, a few plain questions may throw additional light upon the subject. For instance,

1. Do the precepts and the spirit of the Gospel allow me to derive my support from a system, which extorts labor from my fellow-men, without allowing them any voice in the equivalent which they shall receive; and which can