Slavery and the Constitution Part 7

"$200 REWARD--Ran away from the subscriber, on the 23d of June last, a bright mulatto woman, named Julia, about 25 years of age. She is of common size, _nearly white_, and very likely. She is a good seamstress, and can read a little. _She may attempt to pa.s.s for white_,--dresses fine. She took with her Anna, her child, 8 or 9 years old, and considerably darker than her mother.... She once belonged to a Mr. Helm, of Columbia, Tennessee.

"I will give a reward of $50 for said negro and child, if delivered to me or confined in any jail in this State, so I can get them; $100, if caught in any other Slave State, and confined in a jail so that I can get them; and $200, if caught in any Free State, and put in any good jail in Kentucky or Tennessee, so I can get them.

"Nashville, July 9, 1849. A. W. JOHNSON."

The following three advertis.e.m.e.nts are taken from Alabama papers:

"RAN AWAY FROM THE SUBSCRIBER, working on the plantation of Col. H.

Tinker, a bright mulatto boy, named Alfred. Alfred is about 18 years old, pretty well grown, _has blue eyes, light flaxen hair, skin disposed to freckle. He will try to pa.s.s as free-born._

"Green County, Ala. S. G. STEWART."

"$100 REWARD.--Ran away from the subscriber, a bright mulatto man-slave, named Sam. _Light sandy hair, blue eyes, ruddy complexion,--is so white as very easily to pa.s.s for a free white man._ EDWIN PECK.

"Mobile, April 22, 1837."

"RAN AWAY, on the 15th of May, from me, a negro woman, named f.a.n.n.y.

Said woman is 20 years old; is rather tall; can read and write, and so forge pa.s.ses for herself. Carried away with her a pair of ear-rings,--a Bible with a red cover; is very pious. She prays a great deal, and was, as supposed, contented and happy. _She is as white as most white women, with straight light hair, and blue eyes, and can pa.s.s herself for a white woman._ I will give $500 for her apprehension and delivery to me. She is very intelligent.

JOHN BALCH.

"Tuscaloosa, May 29, 1845."

From the "Newbern (N.C.) Spectator:"

"$50 REWARD will be given for the apprehension and delivery to me of the following slaves,--Samuel and Judy, his wife, with their four children, belonging to the estate of Sacker Dubberly, deceased.

"I will give $10 for the apprehension of _William Dubberly_, a slave belonging to the estate. William is about 19 years old, _quite white, and would not readily be taken for a slave_.

"March 13, 1837. JOHN J. LANE."

The next two advertis.e.m.e.nts we cut from the "New Orleans Picayune" of Sept. 2, 1846:

"$25 REWARD.--Ran away from the plantation of Madame Fergus Duplantier, on or about the 27th of June, 1846, a bright mulatto, named Ned, very stout built, about 5 feet 11 inches high, _speaks English and French_, about 35 years old, waddles in his walk. _He may try to pa.s.s himself for a white man, as he is of a very clear color, and has sandy hair._ The above reward will be paid to whoever will bring him to Madame Duplantier's plantation, Manchac, or lodge him in some jail where he can be conveniently obtained."

"$200 REWARD.--Ran away from the subscriber, last November, _a white negro_ man, about 35 years old, height about 5 feet 8 or 10 inches, _blue eyes, has a yellow woolly head, very fair skin_, (particularly under his clothes).... Said negro man was raised in Columbia, S.C. and is well known by the name of d.i.c.k Frazier.... He was lately known to be working on the railroad in Alabama, near Moore's Turn Out, _and pa.s.sed as a white man_, by the name of Jesse Teams. I will give the above reward for his delivery in any jail, so that I can get him; and I will give $500 for sufficient proof to convict, in open court, any man who carried him away.

"Barnwell Court House, S.C. J. D. ALLEN.

"P.S. Said man has a good-shaped foot and leg, and his foot is very small and hollow."

In the "New Orleans Bee" of June 22, 1831, P. Bahi advertises as a runaway "_Maria, with a clear, white complexion_." Ellen Craft is as white as our own sisters. Wm. W. Brown ("Narrative," p. 34), describing a gang of slaves who were under his charge, and destined to supply the New Orleans market, thus speaks of one who attracted the attention of the pa.s.sengers and the crew:--

"It was a _beautiful girl_, apparently about twenty yeas of age, _perfectly white, with straight, light hair, and blue eyes_. But it was not the whiteness of her skin that created such a sensation among those who gazed upon her: it was her almost unparalleled beauty. She had been on the boat but a short time before the attention of all the pa.s.sengers, including the ladies, had been called to her; and the common topic of conversation was about the beautiful slave-girl."

A friend, a resident for some time in New Orleans, describes to us a very beautiful slave he saw there, who had light curling hair, blue eyes, and almost a blonde complexion. After having been kept as a mistress by her owner, he finally sold her to pay his debts! No isolated case is exhibited by Wm. W. Brown when he relates the history of poor Cynthia!

Is any sickly sentimentalist shocked at these recitals? Be of stout heart! Do not Christian bishops, and hundreds of other reverend fathers,--the messengers of G.o.d's everlasting truth to our souls,--a.s.sure us that _slavery_, "AS IT EXISTS," _is right_; and that, consequently, the fundamental maxim of slavery, "the child follows the condition of the mother," is right also! Why, then, should not the children of slave-women by white fathers be rightfully slaves? Of what consequence, then, is the pollution of the soul of the mother, compared with the fact of her increased value as a commodity? How utterly insignificant is the fact that a father holds his own children in slavery, compared with the advantages notoriously derived from such an improvement in the slave-stock? In sober, literal truth, the brother owns the body of his sister, and the sister that of her brother,--so sacred is the marriage-state of slaves! If the father wishes to repair the wrong he has done, the law forbids his teaching his own child to read or write! If he is poor, too poor to pay his debts, a creditor may seize his child in its very cradle, and sell it at auction to pay the debt! It ought not to be otherwise! Is it not agreeable to the order of Divine Providence, that a child should be sold to pay his father's debts? How fitting it is for Mr. Jones and Bishop Freeman to teach such a vendible commodity to say, "Thou shalt honor thy father and thy mother"!

Does any reader still doubt whether an owner thus has uncontrolled authority over the body of his female slave? Let him read the following extract from an opinion of the Supreme Court of the State of North Carolina,--the Old North State, whence Bishop Ives has long since ceased to weep over the "imaginary sufferings" of the slaves! To avoid a chastis.e.m.e.nt, a female slave ran off, and, on her refusal to stop when called, was shot at and wounded. Judge Ruffin, in delivering the opinion of the court (State _vs._ Mann, 2 Dev. Rep. 263), says:--

"The inquiry here is, whether a cruel and unreasonable battery on a slave by the hirer is indictable?... In criminal proceedings, and, indeed, in reference to all other persons but the general owner, the hirer and possessor of a slave, in relation to both rights and duties, is, for the time being, the owner....

"With slavery it is far otherwise. The end is the profit of the master, his security, and the public peace. The subject is one doomed in his own person, and in his posterity, to live without knowledge, and without capacity to make any thing his own, and to toil that others may reap the fruits.

"What moral considerations shall be addressed to such a being to convince him what it is impossible but that the most stupid must feel and know can never be true, that he is thus to labor upon a principle of natural duty, or for the sake of his own personal happiness? Such services can only be expected from one who has no will of his own, who surrenders his will in explicit obedience to that of another. _Such obedience is the consequence only of uncontrolled authority over the body._ There is nothing else which can operate to produce the effect. The power of the master must be absolute to render the submission of the slave perfect. I most freely confess my sense of the harshness of this proposition. I feel it as deeply as any man can. And, as a principle of moral right, every person in his retirement must repudiate it. But, in the actual condition of things, it must be so. There is no remedy. This discipline belongs to slavery."[O]

Judge Ruffin had not enjoyed the benefit of the instruction imparted some years later by Bishops Ives and Freeman. If he had, he would not thus have followed the dictate of a "desperately wicked" heart, and have repudiated the discipline of slavery as morally wrong!

The Rev. Robert J. Breckenridge, of the Presbyterian Church, himself a slaveholder, was a delegate to the State Emanc.i.p.ation Convention recently held in Kentucky. In a speech made by him before the Convention, he is reported to have said ("Louisville Examiner"), that--

"The system of slavery denies to a whole cla.s.s of human beings the sacredness of marriage and of home, compelling them to live in a state of concubinage; for, in the eye of the law, _no colored slave-man is the husband of any wife in particular, nor any slave-woman the wife of any husband in particular; no slave-man is the father of any children in particular, and no slave-child is the child of any parent in particular_."

Who will venture even to conceive, much less compute, the deep degradation caused by the denial of marriage to the slaves?

CHAPTER VII.

"SOUL-DRIVING."

"A negro speculator, or a _soul-driver_ as they are generally called among slaves."--_Wm. W. Brown's Narrative_, p. 39.

If we would most effectually degrade a man, we need only trample on the highest and holiest of all his rights,--his right to himself; we have only to make him the subject of barter and sale, a thing for speculators to make money on, for jockeys to deceive about, and for buyers to depreciate. And yet how few act as if they admitted this truth, or even faintly realized the enormity of this wrong!

Slaves, as subjects of property, are continually spoken of and treated as horses and cows, and other live-stock! Tens of thousands of advertis.e.m.e.nts might be adduced to prove this. We have room only for a very few proofs. The Civil Code of Louisiana provides:--

"Art. 2500. The latent defects of slaves and animals are divided into two cla.s.ses,--vices of body and vices of character.

"Art. 2501. The vices of body are distinguished into absolute and relative....

"Art. 2502. The absolute vices of slaves are leprosy, madness, and epilepsy.

"Art 2503. The absolute vices of horses and mules are short wind, glanders, and founder."

In the "National Intelligencer" of May 2, 1843, the administrators of Alexius Boarman advertise for sale "twelve or thirteen likely young negroes, among whom are two carpenters; four head of horses, two yoke of oxen, several head of cows, all the sheep and hogs belonging to said deceased." The same paper of December 2, 1843, contains the following:--

"PUBLIC SALE OF VERY VALUABLE NEGROES AND STOCK.--The subscriber will offer at public sale at his residence, near Bladensburg, Prince George's County, Maryland, on Wednesday, the 20th of December next, if fair, if not, the next fair day thereafter, _forty-five or fifty very valuable young negroes, consisting of men and women, boys, girls, and children_.

"_At the same time and place, he will offer his entire stock of blood horses, together with some farm stock._

"The terms of sale will be a credit of nine and eighteen months; the purchaser giving bond with approved security, bearing interest from the day of sale.

"Sale to commence at 10 o'clock, A. M. SAMUEL SPRIGG.

"The Marlborough Gazette will copy till day of sale."

In the same paper of January 25, 1843, directly under an advertis.e.m.e.nt for sale of "_a girl_ about 18 years of age, who is honest, industrious, and a good cook, fine washer and ironer, and a good seamstress," we find the notice of a "_Blooded colt_ at auction.--A thorough bred colt, two years old the coming spring, got by Farmer, dam by Lafayette"! D. H.