Is slavery sinful? Being partial discussions of the proposition, Slavery is sinful, between Ovid Butler, esq., a bishop of the Christian Church, at Indianapolis, Ind., and Jeremiah Smith, Esq., late judge of the 11th and 13th judicial circuits, Ind.; and between Elder Thomas Wiley, late pastor of the Christian Church, at Union City, Ind., and Jeremiah Smith, late judge of the 11th and 13th judicial circuits, Indiana; with an introduction, episode, and conclusion of the discussion

Front matter

2^

I LlBRiRY OF CONGUffiS. ?

I UNITED STATUS Of AMERICA, |

Dedication

To all who love the truth; to all who are willing to "obey the truth;" to all who are willing to "do nothing against the truth, but for the truth;" to all who love their country, their fellow-citizens, their neighbors, themselves, and their posterity, this work is respectfully dedicated,

BY THE AUTHOR.

ERRATA

Preface

Our country is in a terrible condition. There is a cause, or causes, for its being so. All who love their country themselves and their posterity, should endeavor to ascertain the cause or causes of our present unhappy condition as a people, that by removing the cause of our troubles, we may restore the public health, vigor and prosperity.

It is alleged by the dominant party, that the sin of slavery is the cause of our calamities. If, however, slavery is not sinful, this is a false allegation. Hence, it behoves us all to examine the proposition, and ascertain correctly and satisfactorily^ whether it is true or false, that slavery is sinful. For, if the proposition is false, as the powers that be, the men who control the destinies of this great people, base their action upon the assumed truth of the proposition, they are shedding rivers of blood, and wasting millions of treasure, and making thousands of widows and orphans, carrying devastation, fire and sword throughout the land, and sweeping with the besom of destruction the fairest and hitherto the most blest and prosperous portion of God's foot-stool, upon a falsehood. If this is the true state of affairs, how great and how dreadful is the responsibility upon us as a nation and people ! andhow incumbent it is upon us to drop the falsehood, seek the truth, and pursue it ! ^

I am clearly satisfied that the proposition is false. The b PREFACE.

object of this book is to show that it is false. It is my duty not only to ascertain the truth upon the subject to govern my ov/n action by, but it is my duty to lend my humble aid to my fellow-citizens in ascertaining the trutli also, that they may govern their conduct by it. And this is the more so, inasmuch as it is so persistently iterated and reiterated that the proposition is true, by '• the power behind the throne greater than the throne," that now unfortunately controls the public affairs of this people. They, forsooth, will hardly brook the thought that the truth of the proposition should be doubted, denied, or controverted. But all who love the truth for truth's sake, are willing to examine and re-examine propositions, particularly when they are cardinal ones as this one is, to see if they are true or not. Truth never fears fair, candid investigation. And although clamor and detraction may decry her out of countenance for a time, yet eventually she will rise again, and shine the brighter for the ill-treatment flhe has received.

" Truth crushed to earth will rise again,

The eternal years of God are her.? : While error wounded writhes in pain,

And dies among her worshippers."

All that I ask of the reader is a careful, faithful, honest reading of the book; and a re-reading of it, if necessary to a full understanding and comprehension of the proofs adduced in it. If, after he shall have so read it, he still thinks the proposition true, let him do so. That is with him, and between him and his God and his country. We all have to answer for ourselves, and not for others.

I have written the book, or rather my portion of it, un-

PREFACE. 7

der great disadvantages, growing out of pressure of business and other affairs, including a protracted sickness which I had whilst it was being written. In the writing and preparation of it for the press, my thoughts were bestowed upon the matter — upon the proofs adduced — and not upon the manner, except to try to state the proofs so that they could be understood b}^ all. Diction, style, and fine rounding of periods, I paid no attention to. My thoughts were otherwise engaged. So the critics need not trouble themselves as to those matters. Should the public demand a second edition, I may, in the preparation of that, devote some attention to style and diction. But the fact, the truth of my position, and the proofs adduced, I am ready for the critics to go to work at, if they really want to come to the knowledge of the truth. If they do not, and want only to throw dust in the eyes of the public to prevent the people from reading the book, or considering the proofs, they will be unworthy of consideration or regard by me, or of answer from me.

All of which is respectfully submitted : and I now give the book to the public, for its examination and consideration.

Jer. Smith.

Winchester, Ind., Oct. 1st., 1863.

Introduction

Unfortunately for our country and people, slavery has been used as a subject of agitation and declamation, for a long series of years.

Agitate! agitate!! agitate!!! was the exclamation publicly made to his followers, by Mr. John Q. Adams, many years ago. Alas ! they too faithfully followed his advice.

Agitation is not a means of acquiring either truth or knowledge. Examination, investigation, comparison, induction, &c., are the means of ascertaining truth, and thereby storing the mind with knowledge. This is true in all departments of truth and knowledge, whether moral, mental, physical, scientific, or historical. Agitation is only a perturbation, a disturbance of the thoughts; it excites the passions and prevents reason, reflection, and comparison. The agitator infuriates a nation, and makes it cry, even of the Lord of Life, crucify him ! crucify him ! ! or pours millions of infatuated Europeans into Asia, as did Peter the hermit.

Hence, nought else could be expected from the continued agitation of the subject of slavery, but the terrible calamities with which our beloved country is now overwhelmed.

The great Jefferson, saw the danger at the beginning. " This momentuous question," said he in his letter of April 22d, 1820, to John Holmes, of Missouri, " like a fire bell in the night, awakened and filled me with terror. I considered it at once as the knell of the Union. '^ -'"^ -^ ^^ * I regret that I am now to die in the belief, that the useless , sacrifice of themselves by the generation of 177G, to acquire self-government and happiness, to their country, is to be thrown away by the unwise and unworthy passions of their sons, and that my only consolation is to be, that I live not to weep over it."^

(1) Jefferson's Works, vol. vii, pp. 159-60.

The National Intelligencer, then the leading political paper of the Union, in its issue of August 16th, 1825, said:

"We will inform the editor of the Boston Sentinel that we are neither the champions nor the apologists of slavery ; and that we lament its existence v/ith as much sincerity as any of those humane gentlemen who daily fulminate their anathemas against it, and the only effect of whose writings, if they have any, on the foul blot which they rail at, is toexcite insurrection and consequent hlood-shed."

Even Mr. Horace Greelj, who for twent}^ years last past, has been so great an agitator of the subject of slavery, some twenty-seven or twenty-eight years ago, in his Neiv Yorkev, the first paper, I believe, that he ever edited and published, said :

"To a philosophical observer, the existance of domestic servitude in one portion of the Union, while it is forbidden and condemned in another, would seem, indeed, to afford 110 plausible pretext for variance or alienation. The Union was formed with a perfect knowledge on the one hand that slavery existed at the South, and on the other that it was utterly disapproved and discountenanced at the North. But the framers of the Constitution &aw no reason for distrust and dissension in this circumstance. Wisely avoiding all discussion of a subject so delicate and exciting, they proceeded to the formation of a more perfect Union, which, leaving each section the possession of its undoubted right of regulating its own internal Government and enjoying its own speculative opinions, provided only for the common benefit and mutual well being of the whole. And why should not this arrangement.be satisfactory and perfect? Why should not even the existing evils of one section be left to the correction of its own wisdom and virtue, when pointed out by the finger of experience ? "

Had a prophet of God then met Mr. Greely and told him that he would do the evil to the government and people of the United States that he has since done and is still doing, would Mr. Greely have replied to him as Hazael did to Elisha, " But what ! is thy servant a dog that he should do this great thing? "'

Mr. Jefferson, the National Intelligencer^ and Mr. Greely^ looked on it, and spoke of it, in its political aspect, as a political question. That is what it is. Slavery is an institution of civil society, or civil government. Its adoption or rejection in any State or nation, is a political question ; a question to be decided by the kingdoms ©f this world, which all civil governments are, as contra-distinguished from the kingdom or government of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Hence its consideration, as an institution to be adopted or rejected originally where it does not exist, or to be continued or abolished where it does exist, is purely and truly, a political question, to be determined by the laws of political economy.

In our form of civil government in the United States, it belongs exclusively to each State to determine, for herself, whether or not she will have the institution. The right to interfere with her in her choice to adopt or reject the institution, or to inter-meddle with it, or with her in her management and enjoyment of it if she adopts or has it, is not granted by her in the Constitution of the United States,, to the Federal Government, nor to the people of other States, but is expressly reserved, by her, in that instrument, to herself and her people.^

Viewed in that, its true aspect, there have been and are differences of opinion among the States and people of this Union. Some States and their people choose to have the institution; some because according to their views of political economy, as to their soil, climate, production, and social and domestic habits, think it proper for them; and some because the institution existed among them when they became independent States, and when the present generation was born and came into existence, and they can see no^ proper and safe mode, consistent with humanity, of getting rid of it. On the other hand, some States and their people,, now constituting a majority of the States and people of the Union, choose not to have the institution. Some of the States that were originally slave States, have by systems of emancipation devised and carried out by themselves, each; within herself, rid themselves of the" institution. They disapprove of it politically as a domestic institution, and hence have decided and still decide not to have it.

My own views, I believe, concur with those of the massof the people of the free States. I am satisfied that they do with the mass of the people of ISTorthAvestern States, where I reside. I think it proper, in the out-set, to prevent misapprehension and misrepresentation, to state my views as to the institution.

I am opposed to the institution, and prefer to live in a community where it does not exist, for various reasons,, some of which are: 1st. I prefer not to live in a community where negroes are, either slave or free. God, by his fiat, has placed a broad and marked line of distinction between that race and ours, and I prefer, in my political and social relations, to regard that distinction, and not to mingle

(I) Art. X, Amendments to the ConstitutioQi with them in political and social relations, either of equality, or of servility on their part, and mastery on mine; and much more, of servility on my part and mastery on theirs. 2d. My political principles being democratic, I prefer to live in a community where all can have equal political privileges ; and as negroes can not enjoy those privileges among the American people, either as slaves or free, I separated my- ♦ self from them thirty six years ago, as Abram did from Lot, by coming from a slave State to wooden, wet, cold Indiana, and want myself and my posterity to remain separate and apart from them for all time to come. 8d. As a question of political economy, I am of opinion that the institution of slavery is injurious both to the country and people where it exists.

For these reasons, I am opposed both to the institution of slavery, and to living in contact with the negro race. And in coming to this conclusion, it is not necessary for me 'to settle the captious question sprung by abolitionists, whether it is because 1 am better or w^orse than the negroes, that I decline to stand in political and social contact with them. God has placed a broad and palpable line of demarkation between the races; and that is enough for me to know or answer, in determining whether as a political question, it is proper to keep the races separated, or to commingle them, without determining the question whether the races are equal, or the one is superior to the other. I have however, my views, and am well established in them, as to the question of equality of the two races, and of the inferiority or superiority of one race to the other.

The two races are here,*and were here when this government was formed. It was formed by the white race, and not by the negroes. They did not participate in, nor have any hand whatever, in forming the Constitution and the Union. The Constitution Avas formed by the white race, to secure the blessings of liberty to themselves and their POSTERITY,^ and not to secure those blessings to the negroes.' The status of the negroes was left as it was, subject to the action of each State within herself and for hferseU. And,

(1) Preamble to the Constitution of the United States. They had a pftrfect legal and moral right to confine the objects of the Constitution to those stated. They were as mnch legally and morally bound to undertake, by the Constitution, to secure the blessings of liberty to the down-trodden of Europe and Asia, as they were to secure them to the servile race in the several States And even abolitionists do not contend that the object of the Constitution was to secure liberty to the subjects of despotical or monarchical governtuents.

as Mr. Greely pertinently asked in the extract above given, Why should net this arrangement he satisfactory and perfect ? It Avas satisfactory to all who were willing to obey the Constitution in its letter and spirit, and while so obeyed, the system was perfect. Its failure has been brought about by a failure to live up to the rule, and not because the system was imperfect. The system of Christianity is a perfect system to unite all the human family in harmony and brotherly kindness. It has hitherto failed to do so, not because of the imperfection of the S3^stem, but because its requirements are not lived up to. So of the federal system aevised by the Constitution; its failure is not because of its imperfection, but because its letter and spirit have not been lived up to — because the people have barkened to, and acted upon the false theory of an "irrepressible conflict."

Mr. Jefferson, with the political sagacity that he possessed so thoroughly, gave the true reason why the arrangement made by the founders of the government, was not satisfactory, lie said that the slavery agitation was a mere party trick. That " the leaders of federalism, defeated in the schemes of obtaining power by rallying partisans to the principles of raonarcbisra, a principal of personal not of local division, have changed their tack, and thrown out another barrel to the whale. They are taking advantage of the virtuous feelings of the people to effect a division of parties by a geographical line; they expect that this will insure them, on local principles, the majority they could never obtain on principles of federalism;" but he thought that they would fail in the effort.' He was right in that; for they failed as long as they agitated the question on mere political grounds. The rights and duties of the people of the several States on that subject, were too clearly laid down in the Constitution, and the patriotic hearts of the people too firmly fixed in the determination to observe and respect all its rights and guaranties, to be drawn off by this federal trick, so long as the effort was made to operate upon them merely on political grounds.

This made it necessary for the " leaders of federalism " to devise another and more deeply laid " party trick." As religious feeling is the strongest sentiment of the human'

(1) Jefferson'B Works, voK vii, p. 180, letter to Mr. Pinckney, of Sept. 30th, 1820..

heart, their trick was to attack the institution of slavery on moral grounds, declare it a sin, and get up a religious phrenzy and furor against it, and induce political action upon a " higher law " than the Constitution, with a total disregard of its injunctions as to the rights and duties of the several States and the people thereof. This they did after Mr. Jefferson had gone the way of all the earth. And after years of incessant " agitation," they have succeeded in " obtaining power," but at the fearful cost of a dissolution of the Union, and of a gigantic civil war !

In their denunciation of slavery as a sin, they had peculiar advantages in misleading the public mind, and working it up to religious phrenzy. They operated in the free States, and in them alone. In those States, the politicians and political press opposed to abolitionism, confined their discussion of the question, to constitutional and political duty and obligation, and did not touch the moral phaze of the question, becouse that was a question of tlieology, and hence not legitimately within the pale of political discussion. For a cardinal maxim of our theory and form of government, is, that church and State should be kept distinct and separate. Whether slavery was sinful or not, they did not inquire into nor discuss, because we, in the free States, did not have the institution, and were all agreed not to have it; and, whether sinful or not, we had to discharge our constitutional duties and obligations to the States and people that had the institution'. This and this only, was urged by the political press and orators opposed to abolitionism.

The clergy of the free States who were not abolitionized, did not enter into the discussion of the question in their pulpits, for the very good and sufhcient reason, that slavery was a political institution, and questions relating to it were political questions, and hence improper themes for the pulpit. The same reason operated upon the religious press not abolitionized, and kept it from the discussion of the question.

Those not politicians in the free States, being opposed to slavery as a political institution of their civil society or government, did not care to examine the question Avhether the institution was sinful or not, and felt wholly indifferent to it, as they and their States did not have the institution. While those that had examined the question and ascertained that the institution was not sinful, were deterred from combatting; the abolition rant upon the subject, lest they should be placed in the fiilse position before the community of being advocates of the institution, when they really were opposed to it as an institution of civil society, on political grounds. I was of this class for some years. Some ten years ago, I investigated the subject for myself, and became satisfied that slavery v.as not sinful, and that the abolition denunciation of it as a sin, was all false clamor. But I was, and had been for thirty years, opposed to the institution, and still continue to be, and expect to remain so. Had I combatted the abolition dogma that slavery is sinful, the whole brood would have poured their denunciations upon my devoted head, that I was the advocate of slaver^^ — a pro-slavery man — a slave-holder in sentiment, &c. A principal means of operation used by abolitionists, is, and has been for years, to overwhelm with misrepresentation, vituperation, and slang, all who attempted any opposition to their wikl vagaries. Hence I, in common with thousands of others, who desire " to lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty,"^ refrained from combatting the abolition dogma that slavery is sinful.

But when I saw the fearfid calamities that were being brought upon our otherwise happy country and people, by the uncontradicted assertion and re-assertion of the dogma, I felt that duty to myself and my children, required that I should no longer refrain. Friends whose opinions were entitled to my most profound respect, advised me still to desist. The most, prominent among our Christian brotherhood, wrote to me — ■ " Still in the present state of affairs, I would let the matter rest, at least, for the present. They will put you in a false issue continally, and make you the advocate of slavtry.^^ Yet I have yielded to what I felt it to be my duty to do, and have entered the arena to cast in my humble mite to disabuse the public mind upon the subject, and roll back the torrent of misrepresentation, declamation, and sophistry, that abolitionists have been surfeiting the public mind with, for years. And for this I have already received a considerable amount of vituperation and slander, and shall doubtless receive much more hereafter. But having put my hand to the plow, I shall fearlessly advocate THE TRUTH, and leave the event with God. As the abolition dogma that slavery is sinful, is the cardinal tenet of their theory, and the main lever with which they have wrought the present great mischief to our country and people, it is absolutely necessary that its fallacy be shown, to restore to our unhappy and distracted country, the blessings of which she has been bereft by the belief of the dogma. This restoration I earnestly desire to see before I am called hence; for I can not bear the thought that the political blessings I inherited from my ancestors, I can not transmit to my posterity, because they perished in my keeping. And this is the reason why I have engaged in this work.

The reason why the people of the slave States did not combat this abolition dogma, was correctly stated by a presbyterian gentleman, a citizen of Kentucky, in a conversation I had with him last fall. He said: " That is a question I will not debate Avith them, [the abolitionists]; for if it is a sin it is my sin, and not theirs, and they are not accountable for it." This, I have no doubt, is the sentiment of the entire southern people, and is the reason why they did not enter into the discussion of the question with the abolitionists.

Hence, the abolitionists had a clear field. The politicians did not combat their dogma that slavery is a sin, because that was a theological question; the clergy of the free States not abolitionized, did not combat it, because slavery was a political institution, and not a proper subject for pulpit discussion ; the citizens of the free States not politicians, did not discuss it, because they were indifferent to the question, as they had not the institution ; and the citizens of the slave States did not discuss it with the abolitionists, because they were satisfied it was not a sin, but if it was a sin, it was not the sin of the abolitionists, and hence their intermeddling with it was sheer impertinence.

In addition to these advantages that the abolitionists had to mislead the public mind, the religious periodicals that first took the ground that slavery was sinful, closed their columns against those who wished to meet and refute their dogma. ^

(1> Pulpit Politics, pp» T5 and 78, and proofs there cited.

How they proceeded in the various churches and ecclesiastical bodies to effect their objects, is well and fully shown by Professor Christie in his Pulpit Politics, a work that all should read who desire to ascertain the facts bearing on the subject. I shall oniit giving here, even a summary of their action. They severed the churches one after another with their dogma that slavery is a sin. All sound-thinking men saw that these were but steps foreshadowing and leading to the final severance of the Union.

I shall close this branch of the subject by copying the views of the great statesman and patriot, Henry Clay, as reported by Dr. Hill, editor of The Freshyferian Herald^ of Louisville, Ky. He says :

"Concprning the greatest source of danger to the country. A fewM'eeks prior to the death of Hon. Ilonry Clay, when he passed through our city on his way to Washington, at the request of a Methodist minister from oiie of the Northern States, who had never seen the great statesman, we called with him to see him. He was quite feeble, and spoke of his death as a probable event within a few months. He said that nothing but a deep and abiding conviction that the Union of the States was in imnunent peril, could have induced him, in his state of health, to leave the quiet of his own home, and go back to the Senate, the seat of so many of his struggles and great achievements. The opinion was expressed by one or both of us, that the danger of disunion was greatly overestimated ; that if it ever came to the test, it would be found that there were very few who would be mad enough to rush into disunion, either North or South. He shook his head ominously, and replied: ' Gentlemen, if I have studied anything, it is tlic ucnius and s])iritofthe American people, both in the North and in the South: find I tell ycu, tiinr is d;ui,mT. There is a spirit rising up in both sections of this republic, which, if not spi"( dily ijmll( il, will bring about a severance of the Uuion of these States, not into two, but into half a dozen little petty repuVdics, or despotisms, as the case may be.' It was replied that on several lormer occasions, the North and the South had been arrayed against each other in bitter hostility, but that the hostility had died away, and the parties restored to nioif tlian their former ftriendly relations. 'Ah!' said he, ^ tJiat wan before the r/Kc of modiin Ahnlitionixm.

Faiiaticism. can not be controlled, and especially rcligioux jtiiKiticiKni. TJie churches of the country then stood together, and. in t?uir great )iati(>)i<tl assemblies they drew the bond of Union and of brotherhood together. Koto irwst of them ha'oe been rent assunder, and they are acting as dividers, rather than to bind the country.^ Said he : ' Gentlemen^ you are both ministers of the gospel, and I tell you that this sundering of the religious ties uhich hare hitherto bound our people together, Iconsider the greatest source of danger to the country. If our religious men can not live together in peace, what can he expected of us politicians, very few of whom p>rofess to be goverried by the great principles of loiie. If all the churches divide on the subject of slavery, there will be nothing left to bind the people together but trade and commerce. That ' said he, ' is a very jiowerful bond, I admit ; but when the people of these States become thoroughly alienated from eaah other, and get their passions aroused, they are not apt to stop to consider what is to their interest. It is against the interest of both parties in every contest, to go to war, but nations constantly do it, notwithstanding the fact. It is against the intertcrest of men to fight duels, but they often do it, when they know that ruin, both to themselves and families, stares them full in the face. S<),' said he, 'men will fight, if they consider their rights trampled upon, even if you show them that ruin to themselves and families will be the probable result. Besides, in times of high i)arty excitement, the violent men on both sides get the control of matters, and moderate men are thrown into the back-ground, and their councils go unheeded.' Finding that the venerable statesman had exhausted his strength in talking, we arosq,to bid him adieu, as we thought, for the last time on earth. He shook the hands of both of us, and said, ' If you preachers will only keep the churches from running into excesses atid fanaticism, I think the politicians can control the masses. But,'' added he, ^ yours is the hardest task, a>id if you do not perform it, we v:ill not be able to do our part. That I consider the greatest source of danger to our country. ' "