Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1858-07-03
WHOLE NO. ga.

! But gcnNsnon here claim that the property idea
q. of man in man applies equally to the apprentice
and child TO the slave and thus. by the COM
$ mon law. man may hold property in man. This
i was the only reply Of the gentleman from Ten
c nessee Mr.. Maynnrdl tothe denial Of my col.
o league, Mr.. bingham According to Webster,
! an apprentice is one who is bound by covenant
G to serve mechanic other person, for certain
- time, with a view to learn his art, ystery or oc.
= cupHton, in which bis master is bound to instruct
4. him" Now which is property, the master or APP
prentice? The rights d-s i"utual the obligation
q is mutual; the interest is mutual and the whols
is created by contract The apprentice is proper
ty, is he Can be be bought and sold, descend
to heirs creditors, be denied the legal relations
of husband and wife, parent and child. the right
to hold prey ertg and acquire knowledge, his
whole being subjected 20 the will and sole benefit
ol another? Hear Judge Rufin on this point,
while dismissing a complaint for an assault upon
a slave by shooting. lie says: ,
,. This has been assimilated at the bar to the
other domestic relations and arguments drawn
from the well established principles which confer
and restrain the authority Of the parent the
child, the tutor the pupH the master the
apprentice, have been pressed us. The court
does net recognise their application. There is no
likeness 6etrcen the cases. They are in opposi pn
to each other, and there is an i'm passibie gulf be-
tween them. The difference is that which exists
between Freedom and Slavery; and greater can
not be imagined. L. the one, the end in view 10
the happiness Of the youth, born to equal rights
with the governor, on whom the duty devolves of
training the young to usefulness, in a station he is
afterwards to assume among freemen. With
slaves, it is far otherwise. The end is the profit
Of the master his security, and the public safety
the subject, one doomed in his person, and
IN his own posterlty, to live without knowledge,
and without the capacity 10 make anything his
own, and toll that another may reap the frits."
! Slate as uthR Deccreur, Noyfh Carolina Reports,
I2G3
! will not blasphcme the holy relation Of parent
and child, by dwelling upon the idea that the child
is the chatte the merchandise, of the father. In
some barbarous countries, where the law of the
strong hand has not yet been supplanted by the
Christian idea. such is the fact and blush 10
say that, in some Of the American States, a class
of iliegitimate children may lawfully be, and
sometimes are sold like cattle by their own faith.
ers. or half brothers and sisters.
True, there s. in one oersc q property in An
apprentice and hired servant, as in all contract
rights, The people have property in our servi.
ces; the parent has property in the instructor
Of his children the ward in his guardian the
hirer of a chNttel in'the thing hired But are we,
is the instructor or the guardian, or the eIiattle,
the property Of him who has interest conc err
ing them or it? The grand base idea of the re-
lletions are anirodes. The one is founded on con.
tract, on free VIII, with mutual rights the other,
as applied to man, on naked force, with no righte
the one is IAN obligaton-a temporary use !; the
othes ar absolute su!jection-a subsection that
can only be enforced upon things, never upof
man.
have spoken of the fact that the property idea
OF The chcent states not based upon natural
law, as given in the books of Moses that their
codes did not define the subjects of property. but
lndiscriminatey subjected to be treated as proper
ty whatever could be seized and held MS srch
that they confounded the Divine distinction be.
tween men and things. and enthroned force in the
robes and on the seat Of Justice
But ihis was no popularity of the old ciyiliza-
uon. 1t pertains to pagansn and barbarism ev-
erywhere; and that man, hold property in
man, has been naturalized in the United States
not from the common law, which had ignored even
seridom before the settlement of the colonies
not from the evil law. into which it had been in
corporated during the rotten reign of the tyrant
States, and from which it had been purged by the
genius Of Christianity; not from the law of nations,
which cannot define property, which has no NUM-
"pal authority, but simply pertains to the relationa
OF States, not of individuals and which in thas
relation, had long abolished throughout Christah,
dom the practice Of enslavng prisoners bf war;
but it incorporated in the customs of the colo
nies, and based alone upon the laws of the chiefs
of the Guinea coast | have heretofore and in n
former Congress, spoken of this fact; and allude
to 1t again, in view of the frequent boasts of tae
antiquity and universally of Slavery, of the argu-
ment that 1t must be according 10 the laws of ma
ture, because prncticed everywhere by man in a
stale OF nature, I. e., in a state Of barbafism. l
desire to show these Soasters. these men W no affect
to des!ise everything pertaining to Africa or the
African race, that they indebted to that coun-
try and to that race for the fundamental idea Of
their politics and their political morals ! before
quoted the opinion of Chief Justice Marshall upon
this point and / give it again. After showing
that the ensayement Of capGves was once lawful
he adds
Throughout Christendom this harsh rule had
been exploded, and longer considered
as giving right to ensaye eaptivos. But this
triumph had not been universal. Tho parties TO
the modern law of nations do not propagate their
principles by force and Africa has not yet Gdopt
cd them Throughout the whole extent of that
immense continent so far we know its history,
1t Is still the law OF nations that prisoners are
slaves. The question then was, could those who
had rorounccd this law be permitted to participate
in its effects. by purchasing the human beings
who are its victims? - JPheatoR'S Lolc Of Nations,
page 63h.
The same idea seems to be recognised By the
Supreme Court Of Georgia in Neal rs Farmer. 60
Georgia Reports page 65j,l where Nesbit, JUS
tice, on page $50, says H
Whence did he (the Georgia planterl derive
title ? Either directly from the slave dealer, or
from those who held him. and he from the slave
captor in Africa. The property in the slave, in
the planter, became thus Just the property Of the
original captor." .alf
The Senator from Virginia [Mr Mason, when
pressed to the wall Tor the legal origin of Slavery,
claimed that it was established in the col Duies by
the common law of England !; and see how he
makes it ont:
"lf the honorable Senator from Maine desires
to know what maxim or provision of the common
law treats slaves as property, will say to him
that the common law of England so Justly called
the contamination of human wisdom, recognised
everything as property which the subject Of
property in the country from which it was brought
unless prohibited by some positive law Of that
realm and thus il was, that when slaves were
first landed in Virginia, there being no law there
but the common law, they were admitted as other
property that law recognising that their condi'
ton in the country whence they we're brought
The condition Of property did not attach to them
after they reached the soil Of Virginia, but they
brought it with them. Such has been the law
from that dag TO this"
How that property arose, it is not SO easy to