William A. Smith, DD. President of Randolph-Macon College, and Professor of Moral and Intellectual Philosophy....

The following pages contain the substance of Lectures on the subject of Domestic Slavery in the United States, which for several years have been delivered to the classes in Moral Science in Randolph Macon College. Since the year 1844, I have been frequently called on to discuss this subject on various popular occasions in Virginia and North Carolina. My classes in college were compelled to deal with the subject of domestic slavery. Not only the popular ideas in regard to African slavery in this

The great question which arises in discussing the slavery of the African population of this country— correctly known as “Domestic slavery”— is this: Is the institution of domestic slavery sinful? The position I propose to maintain in these lectures is, that slavery, Per se, is right; or that the great abstract principle of slavery is right, because it is a fundamental principle of the social state; and that domestic slavery, as an Institution, is fully justified by the condition and circumstance

I now propose to enter directly upon the inquiry, Is the institution of domestic slavery sinful? My plan will make it necessary, in this lecture, to limit the inquiry to the Principle of the institution. If the institution be sinful, it must be so either in the abstract principle it involves, or in the specific form under which it embodies that principle, or in both. In either case, Mr. Jefferson's doctrine is verified; for if the Abstract principle be wrong, then the institution which envelops

It is now appropriate to consider some of the speculations in Moral Science which may be supposed to invalidate the position discussed in the preceding lecture. As far as they have come under my notice, they all belong to One class. The general objection may be thus stated: Slavery is an abridgment of rights to which the enslaved are entitled by nature; or, more logically, slavery is an abridgment of inalienable rights. This doctrine is expressed in different forms of language, but is essentiall

There are questions which lie back of this discussion— errors, as I think, which underlie the popular ideas of both government and rights. We should not consider that we had fully met the difficulties of the subject if we passed them by. Domestic slavery, it is said, is an abridgment of inalienable rights; and legitimate government is a voluntary concession of certain alienable rights. Natural rights are, of course, such as are inherent in the constitution of man : inalienable, because in point

Philosophers, it seems to me, strangely overlook the tendency of man's fall to modify the operation of the laws of mind; and those who admit the fall still overlook this fact, that the depravity of man's nature was the result of Deprivation, and not the infusion of an evil principle as an attribute of his nature. But it is not with the theology of this subject that we are now dealing. The fact that, as a fallen being, he was deprived of the immediate presiding influence of the Divine Spirit, is

The inquiry, if the institution of domestic slavery existing amongst us agrees in its Details with the teachings of the Holy Scriptures, is reserved for a future lecture. We now inquire how far it agrees with the Holy Scriptures in its great fundamental principles?— the abstract principles which, thus far, have been shown to be right. We, of course, acknowledge the full authority of the Scriptures. Although not a formal philosophical treatise, the Bible embodies no other than the profoundest pri

Having proved that the abstract principle of the institution of domestic slavery is a legitimate principle, both in itself, and in this, that it coincides with the great fundamental principle of Right, and does not necessarily conflict with the Right, and is therefore in itself Good, and Not evil; the next inquiry that arises is this: “Is the institution of domestic slavery, existing among us, and involving this principle, justified by the circumstances of the case, and therefore right?”— accord

It having been proved that both the doctrine and the assumption of fact by Northern fanatics, in regard to the claim of the African to a republican form of government, are false, and that the presumption is in favor of the position of the South, that domestic slavery is the appropriate form of government for them, we are now left free to pursue our inquiry, without offset from these vagaries, into the merits of this system, and its appropriateness to the African race in this country. The African

“That the Africans are not, in point of intellectual and moral development, fitted for that measure of self-government which is necessary to political sovereignty: that political equality cannot be justly claimed for them— they have no right to it: that to them it could not be an essential good, but an essential evil, a curse; and that to confer it on them, by an act of direct or gradual emancipation, would be eminently productive of injury to the whole country, and utterly ruinous to them.” Thi

Immediate emancipation is the scheme of the abolitionists proper, whilst gradual emancipation is the favorite plan of the anti-slavery party, The ground we should take is this, that no plan of emancipation, either immediate or gradual, is adapted to the present moral condition and relative circumstances of our African population. Nothing of the kind could at this time be attended with good, but only with evil. I limit this discussion to the subject of gradual emancipation, because the reasons by

One point remains to be considered to complete a full and candid view of the Institution of domestic slavery. It is erroneously said that “We Keep the African in a state of barbarism, and then plead that barbarism in vindication of our policy.” Every thing is liable to abuse. I know that there are instances in the South of great neglect of the slaves, both of their moral and physical condition. The same may be said of individuals at the North. Superiors often neglect their inferiors, and that, i

We have seen that nowhere throughout the South have the masses of our African population given evidence of the First intelligent conception of political freedom. As to insurrections, we are freer from their disturbing influences than are the communities of many of the Northern States from the progress of a no less dangerous influence— the agrarian spirit which pervades a somewhat similar portion of society. We of the South fear them less; and we have less cause to fear them. On, this score they

“Masters, give unto your servants (Dou/lois, slaves) that which is just and equal, knowing that ye also have a Master in heaven.”— Col.. IV. 1. The duty of masters and the rights of slaves reciprocal. 1. The duty of masters to their slaves considered as “Their money”— in regard to working, resting, feeding, clothing, housing, and the employment of persons over them; also to the sick and the aged. 2. Their duty to their slaves considered as social beings. Punishments and the social principle disc