The Code Noir of the
South _robs the slave of all his rights_ as a _man_, reduces him to a
chattel personal, and defends the _master_ in the exercise of the most
unnatural and unwarrantable power over his slave. They each bear the
impress of the hand which formed them. The attributes of justice and
mercy are shadowed out in the Hebrew code; those of injustice and
cruelty, in the Code Noir of America. Truly it was wise in the
slaveholders of the South to declare their slaves to be "chattels
personal;" for before they could be robbed of wages, wives, children,
and friends, it was absolutely necessary to deny they were human beings.
It is wise in them, to keep them in abject ignorance, for the strong man
armed must be bound before we can spoil his house--the powerful
intellect of man must be bound down with the iron chains of nescience
before we can rob him of his rights as a man; we must reduce him to a
_thing_; before we can claim the right to set our feet upon his neck,
because it was only _all things_ which were originally _put under the
feet of man_ by the Almighty and Beneficent Father of all, who has
declared himself to be _no respecter_ of persons, whether red, white, or
black.
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