Muscatine weekly journal. [volume] (Muscatine, Iowa) 185?-1890, 1860-01-13

WIFI HIS True SeutlueulS, diiu ooeS NV "iiP
the devil round the stump as our Northern
friends of the Locofoco stamp do when they
try to support slavery by argument Sd. lie
is battling for the cause of his own section,
interests and brethren, and not against it, as
is the case with the Northern doughface
fighting for slavery.
W. thinks that our strongest argument
against slavery is the fact that negro has
soul, and he then turns round and trlum-
phantly says "But how do you know that the
horse has not soul? You can't prove that
he has not" And then he goes on to estab-
lish the proposition that there may be wrong
done in holding horses as property, viz
treating them with cruelty, and finishes by
asserting that it is the abuse of slavery that
is wrong, not its use-that is, if you treat
your horse humanely you have perfect right
to hold him as property-and just so if you
treat your negro kindly, you have the same
right of property in him as in your horse.
This, we think, is fair statement of WIS
II,
that this is the true Southern doctrine.
Now we, in answer to WIS position, reply
in brief
LIST. That on the earth there are two dis
tinct classes Of existences, recognized in all
laws, all sciences and all religions, to-wit !:
persons and things. So
Ond fYha m bat a 1v;pr thin
and person is this, one we call humanity,
the other brute life. The human creature or
the person, has moral sense, the sense of
right and wrong and he has the faculty Of
communicating his thoughts by an articulate
and intelligent language. The living thing
or brute, has neither of these, and it makes
no difference whether the brute lives forever
or perishes completely at death, this broad
distinction would still remain to all eternity
wide and impossible, between the brute and
the man, the thing and the person.
Now, we lay down the following as a pro-
position in law which can not be controversial,
to wit: that man has natural right of pro-
perty in THINGS inanimate or animate, life
less or living, which he derives from nature
aud revelation, and that this right of property
in a horse or house is not derived from any
human law, but exists before and above all
such lav-law merely huds the right and
protects ~, Ny right of property in my
horse is not> right derived from or created
nv law but il Mo Inherent right of an intel
lgent moral being over a british unintelli-
gent thing.
Sd. Property Of one person in another per-
son, is a species of Property, the right to
which, (if any there is) is not natural but ar.
tiicial, and created by the Law Of the dominant
class in the land where it exists that is to say,
it is the right Of the strongest han over the
weakest. This sort of property ia contrary
to nature, can be created only by the positive
law Of the strongest party in the land where
II exists, and the right Of the owner in Sub
property is of no force Whatever except Sc
far as the power of that law which gives hin
his slave extends.
9TH. The law which gives the dominant
class the right of property in the weaker
class of persons, is no law at oil so iar as the
slave is concerned, and has no binding or OBJ
lisatory force upon him, and he is at liberty
to consider it no law and take his liberty at
the first chance that offers itself; and he vio-
lates no law in so doing, for the law Of the