FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   178   179   180   181   182   183   184   185   186   187   188   189   190   191   192   193   194   195   196   197   198   199   200   201   202  
203   204   205   206   207   208   209   210   211   212   213   214   215   216   217   218   219   220   221   222   223   224   225   226   227   >>   >|  
at money cannot cancel. 10. _Bondage for crime, or governmental claims on criminals._ Must innocence be punished because guilt suffers penalties? True, the criminal works for the government without pay; and well he may. He owes the government. A century's work would not pay its drafts on him. He is a public defaulter, and will die so. Because laws make men pay their debts, shall those be forced to pay who _owe nothing?_ Besides, the law makes no criminal, PROPERTY. It restrains his liberty; it makes him pay something, a mere penny in the pound, of his debt to the government; but it does not make him a _chattel_. Test it. To own property is to own its product. Are children born of convicts government property? Besides, can _property_ be _guilty_? Are _chattels_ punished? 11. _Restrictions upon freedom._ Children are restrained by parents, wards by guardians, pupils by teachers, patients by physicians and nurses, corporations by charters, and legislators by constitutions. Embargoes, tariffs, quarantine, and all other laws, keep men from doing as they please. Restraints are the web of civilized society, warp and woof. Are they slavery? then civilized society is a mammoth slave--a government of LAW, _the climax of slavery_, and its executive a king among slaveholders. 12. _Involuntary or compulsory service_. A juryman is empannelled _against his will_, and sit he _must_. A sheriff orders his posse; bystanders _must_ turn in. Men are _compelled_ to remove nuisances, pay fines and taxes, support their families, and "turn to the right as the law directs," however much _against their wills_. Are they therefore slaves? To confound slavery with involuntary service is absurd. Slavery is a _condition_. The slave's _feelings_ toward it, are one thing; the condition itself, the object of these feelings, is _another_ thing; his feelings cannot alter the nature of that condition. Whether he _desire_ or _detest_ it, the _condition_ remains the same. The slave's _willingness_ to be a slave is no palliation of his master's guilt in holding him. Suppose the slave verily thinks himself a chattel, and consents that others may so regard him, does that _make_ him a chattel, or make those guiltless who _hold_ him as such? I may be sick of life, and I tell the assassin so that stabs me; is he any the less a murderer because I _consent_ to be made a corpse? Does my partnership in his guilt blot out his part of it? If the slave were willing t
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   178   179   180   181   182   183   184   185   186   187   188   189   190   191   192   193   194   195   196   197   198   199   200   201   202  
203   204   205   206   207   208   209   210   211   212   213   214   215   216   217   218   219   220   221   222   223   224   225   226   227   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

government

 

condition

 
feelings
 

chattel

 

property

 
slavery
 

punished

 
Besides
 
civilized
 

society


criminal
 

service

 

absurd

 

involuntary

 

compulsory

 

juryman

 

empannelled

 

Involuntary

 

Slavery

 
orders

nuisances
 

remove

 

compelled

 
bystanders
 
support
 

slaves

 

directs

 
families
 

sheriff

 

confound


holding
 

murderer

 

consent

 
assassin
 

corpse

 

partnership

 

desire

 

detest

 

remains

 
Whether

nature

 
object
 

willingness

 
palliation
 
consents
 

regard

 
guiltless
 

thinks

 

master

 
Suppose