that in considering the subject of slavery, society seems to overlook the natural right, or personal interest of the slave himself, and to act exclusively for the welfare of the citizen. But this fact does not materially affect ultimate results, for the elementary question of the rightfulness or wrongfulness of slavery inheres in every form that discussion concerning it assumes. What is just to one class of men can never be injurious to any other; and what is unjust to any condition of persons in a State, is necessarily injurious in some degree to the whole community. An economical question early arises out of the subject of slavery—labor either of freemen or of slaves is the cardinal necessity of society. Some States choose the one kind, some the other. Hence two municipal systems widely different arise. The slave State strikes down and affects to extinguish the personality of the laborer, not only as a member of the political body, but also as a parent, husband, child, neighbor, or friend. He thus becomes, in a political view, merely property, without moral capacity, and without domestic, moral and social relations, duties, rights and remedies— a chattel, an object of bargain, sale, gift, inheritance, or theft. His earnings are compensated and ibis wrongs atoned, not to himself, but to his owner. The State protects not the slave -as a man, but the capital of another man, which he represents. On the other hand, the State w'hich rejects slavery encourages and i animates and invigorates the laborer by maintaining and developing his natural personality in all the rights and faculties of manhood, and generally with the privileges of citizenship. In the one case capital invested in slaves becomes a great political force, while in the other, labor thus elevated and enfranchised, becomes the dominating political power. It thus happens that we may, for convenience -sake, and not inaccurately, call slave States capital States, and free States labor States. So soon as a State feels the impulse of commerce or enterprise or ambition, its citizens begin to study the .effects of these systems of capital and labor respectively on its intelligence, its virtue, its tranquillity, its integrity or unity, its defense, its prosperity, its liberty, its happiness, its aggrandizement, and its fame. In other words, the great question arises, whether slavery is a moral, social, and political good, or a moral, social, and political evil. This is the slavery question at home. But there is a mutual bond of unity and brotherhood between man and man throughout the world. Nations examine freely the political systems of each other, and of all preceding times, and accordingly as they approve or disapprove of the two systems of capital and labor respectively they sanction and prosecute, or condemn and prohibit commerce in men. Thus, in one way or in another, the slavery question which so many amongst us, who are more willing to rnle than patient in studying the conditions of society, think is a merely accidental or unnecessary question that might and ought to be settled and dismissed at once, is, on the contrary, a world-wide and enduring subject of political consideration and civil administration. Men, states, and nations entertain it, not voluntarily, but because the progress of society continually brings it into their way. They divide upon it, not perversely, but because owing to differences of constitution, condition, or circumstances, they cannot agree. The fathers of the Republic encountered it. They even adjusted it so that it might have given us much less than our present disquiet, had not circumstances afterwards occurred which they, wise as they were, had not clearly foreseen. Although they had inherited, yet they generally condemned the practice of slavery and hoped for its discontinuance. They expressed this when they asserted in the Declaration of Independence, as a fundamental principle of American society, that all men are created equal, and have inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Each state, however, reserved to itself exclusive political power over the subject of slavery within its own borders. Nevertheless, it unavoidably presented itself in theii’ consultations on a bond of Federal Union. The new Government was to be a representative one. Slaves were capital in some States, in others capital had no investments in labor. Should those slaves be represented as capital or as persons, taxed as capital or as persons, or should they not be represented or taxed at all ? The fathers disagreed, debated long, and compromised at last. Each State, they determined, shall have two Senators in Congress. Three-fifths of the slaves shall be elsewhere represented and be taxed as persons. What should be done if the slave should escape into
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