This word "servants" of course legally describes individuals known as such to the laws, and distinguished as such from other persons generally. But no class of Africans "imported," were known as "servants," as distinguished from Africans generally, or in any manner to bring them within the legal description of "servants," as here used. In 1682 and in 1705 acts were again passed declaring "that all servants," &c., imported, should be slaves. And it was not until 1748, after slavery had existed an hundred and twenty-eight years, that this description was changed for the following:

"That all persons, who have been or shall be imported into this colony," &c., &c., shall be slaves. *

In 1776, the only statute in Virginia, under which the slave-holders could make any claim at all to their slaves, was passed as late as 1753, (one hundred and thirty-three years after slavery had been introduced ;) all prior acts having been then repealed, without saving the rights acquired under them. †

Even if the colonial charters had contained no express pro

* Hening, vol. 5, p. 547-8.

+ In 1753 Virginia passed a statute, occupying some twelve or fifteen pages of the statute book, and intended to cover the whole general subject of slavery. One of the sections of this act is as follows:

"That all and every other act and acts, clause and clauses, heretofore made, for or concerning any matter or thing within the provision of this act, shall be and are hereby repealed."—Hening's Statutes, vol. 6, p. 369.

No reservation being made, by this section, of rights acquired under former statutes, and slave property being a matter dependent entirely upon statute, all title to slave property, acquired under former acts, was by this act annihilated; and all the slaves in the State were made freemen, as against all prior legislation. And the slaves of the State were thenceforward held in bondage only by virtue of another section of the same act, which was in these words:

"That all persons who have been, or shall be imported into this colony, by sea or land, and were not Christians in their native country, except Turks and Moors in amity with his majesty, and such who can prove their being free in England, or any other Christian country, before they were shipped for transportation hither, shall be accounted slaves, and as such be here bought and sold, notwithstanding a conversion to Christianity after their importation."-Hening, vol. 6, p. 356–7.

The act also provided, "That all children shall be bond or free, according to the condition of their mothers and the particular directions of this act."

hibition upon slave laws, it would nevertheless be absurd to pretend that the colonial legislature had power, in 1753, to look back an hundred and thirty-three years, and arbitrarily reduce to slavery all colored persons that had been imported into, or born in the colony within that time. If they could not do this, then it follows that all the colored persons in Virginia, up to 1753, (only twenty-three years before the revolution,) and all their descendants to the present time, were and are free; and they cannot now be distinguished from the descendants of those subsequently imported. Under the presumption-furnished by the constitution of the United States-that all are free, few or no exceptions could now be proved.

In North Carolina no general law at all was passed, prior to the revolution, declaring who might be slaves,—(See Iredell's statutes, revised by Martin.)

In South Carolinia, the only statutes, prior to the revolution, that attempted to designate the slaves, was passed in 1740-after slavery had for a long time existed. And even this statute, in reality, defined nothing; for the whole purport of it was, to declare that all negroes, Indians, mulattoes and mestizoes, except those who were then free, should be slaves. Inasmuch as no prior statute had ever been passed, declaring who should be slaves, all were legally free; and therefore all came within the exception in favor of free per

*The following is the preamble and the important enacting clause of this statute of 1740 :

"Whereas, in his majesty's plantations in America, slavery has been introduced and allowed; and the people commonly called negroes, Indians, mulattos and mestizoes have (been) deemed absolute slaves, and the subjects of property in the hands of particular persons; the extent of whose power over such slaves ought to be settled and limited by positive laws, so that the slaves may be kept in due subjection and obedience, and the owners and other persons having the care and government of slaves, may be restrained from exercising too great vigor and cruelty over them; and that the public peace and order of this province may be preserved: Be it enacted, That all negroes, Indians, (free Indians in amity with this government, and negroes, mulattos and mestizoes, who are now free, excepted,) mulattos and mestizoes, who

The same law, in nearly the same words, was passed in Georgia, in 1770.

These were the only general statutes, under which slaves were held in those four States, (Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia,) at the time of the revolution. They would all, for the reasons given, have amounted to nothing, as a foundation for the slavery now existing in those states, even if they had not been specially prohibited by their charters.

now are or shall hereafter be in this province, and all their issue and offspring born or to be born, shall be and they are hereby declared to be and remain forever hereafter absolute slaves, and shall follow the condition of the mother," &c.-Grimke, p. 163-4. Brevard, vol. 2, p. 229.

4

CHAPTER V.

THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE.

ADMITTING, for the sake of the argument, that prior to the revolution, slavery had a constitutional existence, (so far as it is possible that crime can have such an existence,) was it not abolished by the declaration of independence?

The Declaration was certainly the constitutional law of this country for certain purposes. For example, it absolved the people from their allegiance to the English crown. It would have been so declared by the judicial tribunals of this country, if an American, during the revolutionary war or since, had been tried for treason to the crown. If, then, the declaration were the constitutional law of the country for that purpose, was it not also constitutional law for the purpose of recognizing and establishing, as law, the natural and inalienable right of individuals to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? The lawfulness of the act of absolving themselves from their allegiance to the crown, was avowed by the people of the country-and that too in the same instrument that declared the absolution-to rest entirely upon, and to be only a consequence of the natural right of all men to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. If, then, the act of absolution was lawful, does it not necessarily follow that the principles that legalized the act, were also law? And if the country ratified the act of absolution, did they not also necessarily ratify and acknowledge the principles which they declared legalized the act?

It is sufficient for our purpose, if it be admitted that this principle was the law of the country at that particular time,

(1776)—even though it had continued to be the law only for a year, or even a day. For if it were the law of the

country even for a day, it freed every slave in the country(if there were, as we say there were not, any legal slaves then in the country.) And the burden would then be upon the slaveholder to show that slavery had since been constitutionally established. And to show this, he must show an express constitutional designation of the particular individuals, who have since been made slaves. Without such particular designation of the individuals to be made slaves, (and not even the present constitutions of the slave States make any such designation,) all constitutional provisions, purporting to authorize slavery, are indefinite, and uncertain in their application, and for that reason void.

But again. The people of this country-in the very instrument by which they first announced their independent political existence, and first asserted their right to establish governments of their own-declared that the natural and inalienable right of all men to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, was a "self-evident truth."

Now, all “self-evident truths,” except such as may be explicitly, or by necessary implication, denied, (and no government has a right to deny any of them,) enter into, are taken for granted by, and constitute an essential part of all constitutions, compacts and systems of government whatsoever.— Otherwise it would be impossible for any systematic government to be established; for it must obviously be impossible to make an actual enumeration of all the "self-evident truths," that are to be taken into account in the administration of such a government. This is more especially true of governments founded, like ours, upon contract. It is clearly impossible, in a contract of government, to enumerate all the "self-evident truths" which must be acted upon in the administration of law. And therefore they are all taken for granted, unless particular ones be plainly denied.

This principle, that all "self-evident truths," though not