His nature is consulted in his treatment, in distinction from that of the horse, only as that of the horse is consulted in distinction from the inanimate objects of property.

This claim of property in the slave always involves the following things:

1. It is wholly involuntary on the part of the slave. He has never conceded any such right over himself to others, and no one has done it who had any authority to do it. He has not made a voluntary surrender of himself to his master to be regarded as his; to be owned by him, and to yield to him the avails of his labour, and be sold by him when and where he pleases. And no one has done this who had a right to do it. The power originally asserted over him or his ancestors, was a power of usurpation or robbery; was against his consent or theirs; and was successfully asserted only because he had not the means of resistance. It was that which no parent had the prerogative of yielding, and which in most instances no parent pretended to yield. The whole system is involuntary on his part, and the property which is claimed in his person, his services, his wife, his children, was never the result of compact or voluntary agreement.

2. It is property claimed in that which naturally belongs to him, but which he is not at liberty to resume to himself. He is not at liberty to claim a property in his own time, person, family, bodily vigour, talent, or skill. There may be instances-as we are often told there are in slaveholding communities, and as we have no reason to doubt there are in which, from kind treatment or other causes, the slave would prefer to remain with his master than to take the chances of freedom. He may see great and certain evils which would result if he were thrown upon his own resources, if, in the existing state of society, he should undertake to provide for himself and his family. Or, slavery may have so effectually accomplished its work, by destroying all that is noble in his nature, that he prefers to be a slave

to being a freeman. But while this may be true, he is not at liberty to do otherwise if he should choose, without the consent of his master. He has no independent volition in the case. A horse, if he had a choice, might prefer to remain the property of his owner by whom he was well taken care of, but he would not be at liberty to do otherwise if he chose.

3. There is a right of property in all that pertains to the slave. It is a right extending, (1.) to his time. The slave can claim none as his own. The hours when he shall begin his work, and when he shall close it, his master claims the right of determining, and he has no choice in the case. (2.) To his service. "When this idea of property comes to be analyzed, it is found to be nothing more than a claim of service either for life or for a term of years. This claim is transferable, and is of the nature of property, and is consequently liable for the debts of the owner, and subject to his disposal by will or otherwise."* There is "something

more" than this in the claim of property claimed in the slave, but this concession shows, what indeed no one would deny, that the master has a claim of service' in the slave, which is of the nature of transferable property. (3.) To his bodily strength and power of labour. The master asserts a claim over these, and the price of the slave, that is, the value of the property in him, is estimated in accordance with these things. Whatever the slave has of youth, physical power, vigour of constitution, capacity for enduring labour, enters into the notion of the property in him-just as much as the metal, speed, bottom, and pedigree of the horse does of his value. (4.) To his talent or skill. If he has a tact for labour; if he has skill in any of the mechanic arts; if he has genius so that he can facilitate or abridge toil by useful inventions, it is all the property of the master. He is the more valuable on that account, and his superior worth is often published, when he is exposed to sale, if he

* Bib. Repertory, pp. 293, 294.

is a skilful and accomplished house-servant, or if he is endowed with mechanical talent. He has no right to avail himself of any skill which he may have in making a shoe, a carriage, or a machine. He would have no right to take out a patent for the most useful invention; he would have no right to enter a copyright for a book. Such a thing is never contemplated in the laws regulating slavery, and if a slave had any such endowment it would be wholly at the disposal of the master.

4. The master claims this right of property in his services without equivalent or compensation. He does not pretend to have given him any valuable consideration for the surrender of his freedom, and he furnishes him no equivalent for his labour. It is in vain to say that the food, the raiment, and the cottage of the slave are any equivalent for his services, or that the deficiency of these is made up by the implied pledge of the master that he will furnish him with medicine when he is sick, and that he will take care of him when he is old. None of these things are such an equivalent for his services that a freeman would be willing to contract for them by selling himself into slavery; they are not what a freeman can secure by voluntary labour. Besides, slavery is of necessity a system of unrequited toil. The master expects to make something by the slave; that is, he expects to secure more from the labour of the slave than he returns to him. The whole arrangement of the system contemplates such a profit in slave labour, or such an increase of property from it over and above what the slave himself receives, as to meet the following expenses :-First, the interest on the capital paid for the slave-paid, not to him, but to the one from whom he is purchased. Secondly, all the diminution of the worth of the property from advancing age, from the probabilities of sickness, and the risk of death. This is no inconsiderable sum. If a man at twenty-five years of age costs five hundred dollars, his value is constantly diminishing by advancing age, and there is a constant risk of a total loss of

the property; and to make a return to the master for this diminution and the risk of the total loss, there must be in the system a calculation to receive from the labour rendered so much over and above what the slave himself receives, as to meet the chances of this loss and this regular decrease in his value. Thirdly, there must be, according to the system, enough received from the labour of slaves over and above what they receive, to support the master and his family, so far as any advantage is derived from slave labour, in idleness, and usually in luxury-for the system always has been, and essentially is, one of luxury. It is not designed in the system that the master shall labour. He buys his slaves in order that he and his family may not be under the necessity of earning any thing. The consequence is, that there is contemplated in the system the receipt from the labour of the slave, over and above what he himself receives, enough to maintain the master himself and his family in indolence. It follows from this, that the amount of the unrequited labour of the slave on the whole is that which is necessary to meet the interest on the capital invested in him; that which is necessary to meet the regular diminution of his own value from advancing age and the risk of death; and that part of his individual labour which will be necessary to support his master. Of course, the amount involved in this latter item will be regulated somewhat by the number of slaves. Each slave is to do his part. The system is to support all the masters and their families in indolence, or, at least so far as the system avails, it is to release him and them from the necessity of as much labour as is gained from the unrequited labour of the slave. This differs wholly from a free system, where the labourer receives what to him is a full compensation for his work. His employer has invested no capital in the person of the labourer; makes no calculation about the diminution of his value or risk from sickness; and does not contemplate being supported in indolence on unrequited labour. He gives

what the labourer considers a full equivalent for his work; he receives what is to him of equal value with the wages.

(5.) This possession of property in the slave involves the right to sell him as the master pleases. It is not a right merely to dispose of his service for a term of years or for life; it is a right to sell the slave himself. He sets the slave up at auction-not his services; he disposes of the slave, in his will, by name-not of his unexpired term of service. He disposes of his person, his skill, his physical strength-all that he has that can be of value to himself or to another. He retains nothing to himself; he reserves no rights for the slave. This disposal of property is in all respects as absolute and entire as it is where a man sells a farm, a mill, or a horse. He may, moreover, sell or alienate him in any way he pleases, whether by a private bargain, by auction, or by a testamentary disposition-as is the case in any other property. He may sell him by sundering any ties which bind him to others; regardless of any remonstrances of father or mother; and irrespective of any obligations which the slave may feel himself under to a wife, a sister, or a child. "This claim," says the Biblical Repertory, "is transferable, and is consequently liable for the debts of the owner, and subject to his disposal by will or otherwise." This is the common view of slavery the world over, and on the subject of selling him the master feels himself under no more restrictions than he does in selling his dromedary or ox.

That these are correct views of the nature of slavery, will be apparent from a brief reference to some of the existing laws on the subject, showing in what light slaves are regarded in the statutes of the slaveholding states in our country. Judge Stroud, in his "Sketch of the Laws respecting Slavery," says, "The cardinal principle of slavery, that the slave is not to be ranked among sentient beings, but among thingsobtains as undoubted law in all these [the slave] states." The law of South Carolina says, "Slaves shall be claimed, held, taken, reputed and adjudged in law, to be CHATTELS