The Journal of Negro History
Chapter 90 : There were, however, other effects of slavery which offset its advantages. The slave ha

There were, however, other effects of slavery which offset its advantages. The slave had no true home life and without this it is impossible to train personality and character. The father felt no responsibility for children that were not really his but his master's.

The mother merely discharged the animal functions of bearing and rearing the child, all the finer instincts of motherhood being prost.i.tuted to a selfish commercial end. The slave-mother, of course, did not feel the pathos of the situation when pointing to her children she said: "Look missis! little n.i.g.g.e.rs for you and ma.s.sa; plenty little n.i.g.g.e.rs for you and little missis." The slave lived perpetually in an atmosphere of fawning and flattery by no means conducive to the development of independent manhood either in himself or his master.

Being outside those social sanctions which keep the free man honest and trustworthy he was often guilty of petty theft and deceit and the law recognized the logical results of his status upon his character by refusing to take the word of a slave against a freeman. The slave had no social standing and no respect for himself or his fellow slaves and hence exercised unbounded insolence and tyranny towards his fellows.

This gave to the social intercourse between slaves a flavor of vulgarity and insincerity utterly incompatible with the development of the finer instincts of personality.[344]

The essential injustice of slavery lies in withholding the legitimate use of those means for self-development which are the inalienable right of every creature born with potentialities for personality. It becomes a national crime when the public conscience in any age recognizes in a group or an individual potentialities for the exercise of rights or the discharge of social functions with a rational regard for the well-being of society as a whole, and yet through powerful cla.s.s interests refuses to give legal recognition to those rights. The paradox of the slaveholder's position and the fundamental injustice of it appear even in the slave codes and the arguments used in defense of the "peculiar inst.i.tution." The slave codes treated the slave in one clause as a chattel, an irrational thing, and yet proceed to embody in the same code regulations against learning to read and write, theft, and murder, thus acknowledging that the slave is both rational and moral. Laws against teaching slaves were pa.s.sed in South Carolina in 1834, in Georgia, 1829, Louisiana, 1829, Alabama, 1830 and Virginia, 1849.

As a result of this negation of his personality the slave thought and acted solely in terms of the social mind of the white. Hence the prevailing idea of the slave, "ma.s.sa can do no wrong."[345] The slave had no social consciousness, no ethical code apart from that of the white master; his self-determining powers of personality had no scope for expression or development. He looked down with infinite scorn upon the "poor white trash" which had no entree into his master's circle and he pitied the free Negro because his lack of a master gave him no social standing. To have a Negro overseer was a disgrace. Olmsted overheard the following conversation between two Negroes: "Workin' in a tobacco factory all de year roun', an' come Christmas, only twenty dollars! Workin' mighty hard too--up to twelve o'clock o'night very often--_an' den to hab a n.i.g.g.e.r oberseah_!" "A n.i.g.g.e.r!" "Yes dat's it yer see. Wouldn't care ef it warn't for dat. _Nothin' but a dirty n.i.g.g.e.r! orderin' 'round, jes' as ef he was a wite man_."[346] To be sure, on the basis of this submerged status of the slave, ties of the greatest intimacy and affection often grew up between master and slave. But the slave's personality was absorbed by that of his master.

Petty thefts, deceits and delinquencies of the slave were excused because it was all in the family. The master even felt his slave's acts to be morally his own and condoned them as he would his own foibles. It should never be forgotten that when the Negro made the transition from the artificial and quasi-social status of the slave to a free democratic order, where individual worth and social efficiency determine one's place in society, he was like a child taught to swim with bladders and suddenly deprived of them.

"Jove fixed it certain, that whatever day Makes man a slave, takes half his worth away."

JOHN M. MECKLIN.

FOOTNOTES:

[291] Turner, _op. cit._, p. 14 ff.

[292] Moore, _op. cit._, p. 10; Johnson, _op. cit._, p. 18.

[293] "Economic and Social History of New England," 1620-1789, II, pp.

450, 451.

[294] Dabney, "Defence of Virginia," p. 58.

[295] Locke, _op. cit._, Ch. V.

[296] Turner, _op. cit._, p. 87.

[297] "Notes on the History of Slavery in Ma.s.sachusetts," pp. 241, 242.

[298] Moore, _op. cit._, pp. 228 ff.

[299] "Diary," p. 149.

[300] No exaggeration! See Turner, "The Negro in Pennsylvania," pp.

146, 147.

[301] "Democracy in America," I, pp. 361 ff.

[302] See Steiner, "History of Slavery in Connecticut," pp. 45 ff. for the famous instance of the Quakeress, Miss Prudence Crandall, and her school.

[303] "Society in America," 1, pp. 193-196.

[304] "Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation," p. 11.

[305] Hart, "Slavery and Abolition," pp. 256 ff.

[306] _Journal_, p. 86.

[307] See Turner's excellent account, "The Negro in Pennsylvania,"

Chs. IX-XIII.

[308] Turner, pp. 242, 245.

[309] _Ibid._, pp. 160 ff. for details.

[310] "Democracy in America," I, pp. 379 ff.

[311] 19 Howard's R., p. 624, quoted by Hurd, "Law of Freedom and Bondage," I, p. 358, see also pp. 321 ff. of Hurd.

[312] Hurd, I, pp. 217 ff., for the colonial legislation and II, Chs.

XVII, XVIII, XIX, for subsequent legislation in the different states and territories.

[313] "Doc.u.mentary History of American Industrial Society," I, p. 75.

[314] "Doc.u.mentary History of American Industrial Society," I, p. 91.

See also Cairnes, "The Slave Power," pp. 52 ff.; Nieboer, "Slavery as an Industrial System," pp. 417 ff.

[315] For an account of the growth of the cotton industry see Baines, "History of the Cotton Manufacture," pp. 116 ff. See also DuBois, "Suppression of the Slave Trade," pp. 151 ff.

[316] Phillips, "Origin and Growth of the Southern 'black belts,'" pp.

798 ff., Vol. XI of _The American Historical Review_.

[317] Hart, "Slavery and Abolition," pp. 67 ff.

[318] "Physics and Politics," p. 73, ed. of 1896; Ingram, "History of Slavery," p. 5.

[319] Rhodes, I, pp. 347 ff.

[320] Livermore, "An Historical Research Respecting the Opinions of the Founders of the Republic on Negroes as Slaves, as Citizens, and as Soldiers," pp. 56 ff.

[321] Foley, "The Jeffersonian Cyclopedia," secs. 7926 ff.

[322] "Doc.u.mentary History of American Industrial Society," II, p.

158.

[323] Greeley, "The American Conflict," I, p. 109.

[324] Stroud, "A Sketch of the Laws relating to Slavery," p. vi.

[325] Quoted by Olmsted, "Seaboard Slave States," I, pp. 334, 335.

[326] "Wks.," II, 632.

[327] Speech in Senate, Feb. 29, 1860.

[328] _Cong. Globe_, 39 Cong., 1st Session, pp. 557, 596.