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of man and wife are not respected among the slaves themselves? Still more is this true of their race in Africa. Indeed, we find a still lower moral condition

among the free negroes of the Northern States, where marriage between the whites and blacks is either prohibited or unknown, than among the slaves, although neither the scorching sun of the South is there to develope the passion of lust, nor the lascivious slaveholder' to accomplish his desires by violence. According to the United States Census of 1850, of each 100 persons of the free coloured population, there were in Maine 51, New Hampshire 54, Massachusetts 34, Connecticut 30, and Rhode Island 24, mulattoes. In Liberia and Sierra Leone the same thing is notorious.*

First

As a political relation, the slavery of the Southern States is a conservative element in the State. of all, the effect of it is to equalize more nearly all classes of the dominant race. There are certain kinds of menial labour which are never performed by the whites, although not slave-holders. Then, too, the slave owes a certain respect and obedience to every white person, poor or rich. Consequently every white man, be he a slave-owner or not, has the consciousness that he belongs to the superior Hence it is that there is no conflict between classes in the South.

race.

* Bowen, 'Central Africa,' p. 32.

Moreover, there is no conflict between capital and labour, for the labourer is himself capital. Among the systems of labour in use in Europe this conflict is perpetually going on. Brilliant theories have been devised to remove the ever-present enmity between these two great forces of human progress; but all have been of no avail. The difficulty has as yet been obviated only by slavery.

Again, little attraction is offered for emigration to the Southern States, for only capitalists, who may acquire property in slaves, find it to their interests to emigrate thither. By this means the South has been protected from the outpourings of the dregs of European society.

It has been remarked that the situation of the slave-owner qualifies him, in an eminent degree, for discharging the duties of a free citizen. His leisure enables him to cultivate his intellectual powers, and his condition of independence places him beyond the reach of demagogues and corruption. In this way he is preeminently suited for filling the highest political stations in the Government. Therefore, such positions are not coveted for the income they yield, but only out of a patriotic ambition. When the slave-owner occupies an official position, he receives the acknowledgement of his fellow-citizens, who have all the same interests and the same opinions as himself. Consequently he does not fear

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to be subverted by the intrigues of demagogues; and political humbug is unknown.

Slavery is, also, a great protection against pauperism; for the labouring class, being slaves, must by law be supported by their owners.

Need it be said that it is not in consequence of slave labour, as asserted by Northern Abolitionists, that the soil of the South is soon exhausted? The kind of crops produced, known as 'clean crops,' cause the soil in the South soon to become impoverished, unless much attention is paid to enriching it. For the naked-ploughed soil is exposed to the scorching southern sun for a considerable part of the year, which, as every agriculturist is aware, has a most deleterious effect upon it. This would hold equally true, whether free or slave labour were employed.

The generally accepted law that free labour is cheaper than slave labour, finds no application in the South. There is no doubt that where the labouring population is very dense, as in certain parts of Europe, where the free man must work or starve, free labour is cheaper than any other; for no capital is then needed to be employed in owning labour. In this case free labour must and will drive out involuntary labour. But the question assumes quite a different

* An interesting example is afforded by the Abstract of the Seventh Census, p. 28, according to which, in 1850, Rhode Island, with 147,545 inhabitants, had 2,560 paupers, while Georgia, with a population of 524,503 free whites, had only 1,036 paupers.

phase when we attempt to apply the principle to labour in the South. In the first place, there is no such abundance of free labour to be had there; while the climate makes it almost throughout impossible for the white man to work. He cannot support the damp hot atmosphere and the miasma of the Savannas. Were it, however, possible to acclimatize the whites in that region, and were a thick white population to be obtained, such free labour would not be adapted to the cultivation of the Southern products, such as rice, sugar, tobacco, and cotton. A species of labour is needed for these productions, which is not liable to be disturbed by 'strikes' or accident. It is indispensable to have a system of organized, regular, and uninterrupted labour, in order to make the production of rice, sugar, tobacco, and cotton profitable. If the negro slaves were free, we know full well from experience that they would not work without compulsion. As long, therefore, as the climate of the South remains an insuperable obstacle in the way of the white man, and as long as no means can be devised for counteracting the natural indolence and want of self-respect of the negro, which prefer theft to industry, involuntary or slave labour must remain the only possible labour for the South, and, therefore, the cheapest that can be employed for its products. The labour of the South is chiefly of a nature which requires physical strength, endurance,

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and uniformity, without the capacity for judgement, as in skilled labour. For such labour the African slave is alone adapted.

II. Status of the Slaves.

With the Romans, the slave was considered as a chattel (res). As such the Roman slave was deprived of the right of personal liberty, and the right of property. The power of life and death, 'jus vitæ necisque,' also belonged to the master.

The status of the slave in the Southern States is, on the contrary, a double one. On the one hand, the slave is a chattel; but, on the other, a legal protection has been accorded to him, through the instrumentality of Christianity and the developement of human civilization, by which his condition has been ameliorated materially. The slave is, therefore, by reason of his thus modified condition, also a person, and his legal person is by no means so subordinate as is generally supposed in Europe. Prominent is the protection accorded to life and to limb.

Throughout all the States where slavery exists, the homicide of a slave is made by law to be murder. In the case of the killing of a slave by his master, or any other person, the slayer incurs the same penalty as if the slave had been a free white. Consequently,