"an assault with intent to murder a slave is indictable." (Wheeler, p. 244.)

"Commonwealth vs. Carver, June T., 1827. 5 Rand's Va. Reports, 600.-The prisoner was indicted for feloniously, maliciously, and unlawfully shooting, with intent to maim, disfigure, disable, and kill a negro man slave, of the name of Armistead, THE PROPERTY of Andrew Houten, under the Act of 9th of February, 1819. The Judge DOUBTED whether a negro slave is the subject or person on which the offense created and the penalties prescribed by the Act can be committed or incurred, and adjourned the case to the General Court.

"The Court-Breckenbrough, J.,—after referring to Dolly Chapple's case, 1 Virg. Cas. 184, declared that the slave was a person on whom the offense of stabbing and shooting might be committed; and that the Act was intended to protect slaves as well as free persons from such outrages. It may further be remarked that there appears no reason, arising from the relation of master and slave, why a free person should not be punished as a felon for maiming a slave. Whatever power our laws may give to the MASTER over his slave, IT IS AS IMPORTANT FOR THE INTEREST OF THE FORMER as for the protection of the latter, that A STRANGER should not be permitted to exercise an UNRESTRAINED authority over him. The opinion of the Court is, that judgment ought not to be arrested." (Wheeler, p. 254.)

The plain implication here is, that the power of the MASTER IS as unrestrained as was repre

sented and decided by Judge Ruffin, as before cited.

And in this case, again, we see the criminal law of "the State" wielded as a mere implement for enforcing "the liabilities of others to the master, for abusing his slave," to the injury of his "interests."

In the case of Fields vs. the State of Tennessee, (Jan. T., 1829, 1 Virger's Reports, 156,) on writ of error to arrest judgment against said Fields, on a verdict against him for manslaughter, it was decided that "the felonious slaying of a slave without malice is manslaughter." Judgment affirmed.

We close our examination of Wheeler's Law of Slavery on the topics involved in our present chapter, without having been able to ascertain a single instance in which a slave owner has been convicted or even prosecuted for the murder of his own slave; nor have we found an exception to the statement of Judge Ruffin, before cited, that a "cruel and unreasonable battery on a slave" by his owner, or hirer, is not an indictable offense, and that "there have been no prosecutions of this sort." Thus far, therefore, the statement of Judge Stroud, that "the master may, at his pleasure, inflict any species of punishment on the person of his slave," though contradicted by Mr. Wheeler, stands unimpeached, so far as we can discover, by any cases he has recorded in his compilation of Reports. Not even the case of Markham vs. Close furnishes any such instance, so far as appears from his Report of it.

If it be said that a motive of self-interest in the

master would prevent his inflicting outrages upon his slave, we answer, (1.) That this restraint operates only in those cases where the injury would destroy his property in the slave, or impair his power to labor: it would be no protection against the infliction of any sufferings and indignities which fall short of this. (2.) Abundant evidence is at hand to prove that this motive is not, in numerous instances, sufficient to restrain the passions of the masters, and prevent the maiming and killing of their own slaves, as will be shown in another chapter. (3.) Were it otherwise, the fact remains that the law does not protect the slave against his master. (4.) Anger and malice often act in opposition to self-interest. How comes it that "our books are full of criminal prosecutions for cruelty to horses and other animals," if the interest of the owner is itself a security against his abuse of his own property? The malignant passions of the master are far more likely to be excited against his slave, who by a word or a look may dispute his authority, defy his power, or withhold the respect he claims, than by a dumb animal, governed only by natural instinct.

CHAPTER XV.

OF THE DELEGATED POWER OF OVERSEERS.

All the Power of the Owner over his Slave is held and exercised also by Overseers and Agents.

WE have, thus far, considered chiefly the power of the slave owner. It has been seen, likewise, that essentially the same power is lodged in the hirer of a slave. Incidentally, the power of overseers and agents has been alluded to. But we must now take a more distinct view of this feature of slavery. It has been expressed thus:

be

"All the power of the master over the slave may exercised, not by himself only, in person, but by any one whom he may depute as his agent. (Stroud's Sketch, p. 44.)

Considering the judicial authority vested in the slave owner, whoever he may be, (drunk or sober,) and the duty of the "sheriffs" and public negro whippers to execute his decisions, (as already noticed,) this additional power of delegating his magisterial dignity and authority to whomsoever (drunk or sober) he may think proper, becomes a very re

markable one. Irresponsible himself, and absolute, he commits the same authority over the slave to a subordinate despot, responsible solely to himself.

LOUISIANA, by express statute, enacts as follows: "The condition of a slave BEING MERELY A PASSIVE ONE, his subordination to his master, AND ALL WHO REPRESENT HIM, is not susceptible of any modification or restriction, (except in what can excite the slave to the commission of crime,) in such manner that he owes to his master and to all his family a respect WITHOUT BOUNDS and an ABSOLUTE OBEDIENCE, and he is consequently to execute all the orders which he receives from him or from them." (1 Martin's Digest, 616.)

Thus does "the innocent legal relation" of slave ownership confer on every slave owner a power which no magistrate or government holds over him, or over any subject or citizen; and, not content with this, it clothes him with the prerogative of transferring this authority, not only by the sale of the slave, but by verbal commission while he yet owns him. His wife, his housekeeper, his overseer, and even his young children share his unlimited power and authority over the slave, though at the age of threescore! Instead of controlling his own children, the slave is controlled by the children of his master, and by hired overseers.

The exception, in the statute just cited, informs us that when the slave is "incited to crime" by the commands of his tyrant, whom he may not resist, he may nevertheless be held responsible for the