Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 29, 2025
In Connecticut the crime of man-stealing was made punishable by death; and in 1646 the Massachusetts General Court awoke to the growing condition of affairs and bore witness "by the first Optunity, ag't the hainous & crying sinn of man-stealing," and undertook to send back to "Gynny" negroes who had been kidnapped by a slaver and brought to New England, and to send a letter of explanation and apology with them.
In the Old Testament, they stare you in the face: in the family of Abraham, in his slaves, bought with his money and born in his house, in Hagar, running away under her mistress's hard dealing with her, and yet sent back, as a fugitive slave, by the angel, in the law which authorized the Hebrews to hold their brethren as slaves for a time, in which parents might sell their children into bondage, in which the heathen were given to the Hebrews as their slaves forever, in which slaves were considered so much the money of their master, that the master who killed one by an unguarded blow was, under certain circumstances, sufficiently punished in his slave's death, because he thereby lost his money, in which the difference between man-stealing and slave-holding is, by law, set forth, in which the runaway from heathen masters may not be restored, because God gave him the benefits of an adopted Hebrew.
The General Court, urged thereto by Sir Richard Saltonstall and many of the ministers, passed an order that, for the purpose of "bearing a witness against the heinous sin of man-stealing, justly abhorred of all good and just men," the negroes should be taken back to their own country at the charge of the Colony; which was soon after done.
The slaves were usually taken to the West Indies, although occasionally part of a cargo found its way to New England, where the wholesome old laws against man-stealing had become a dead letter on the statute-book. In 1767 a bill was brought before the Legislature of Massachusetts to prevent "the unwarrantable and unnatural custom of enslaving mankind."
So, then, that crime was not the mere stealing a man, nor the selling a man, nor the holding a man, but the stealing and selling, or holding, a man under circumstances thus forbidden of God. Was the Israelite Master a Man-Stealer? I now ask, Did God intend to make man-stealing and slave-holding the same thing? Let us see. Sir, that man was not a hired servant. He was bought with money.
Of the legends, many are far from answering to their reputed Oriental source; their barbarism and indelicacy represent the state of Europe. The outrage of Kronos on his father Uranos speaks of the savagism of the times; the story of Dionysos tells of man-stealing and piracy; the rapes of Europa and Helen, of the abduction of women.
The Visiter denied that the advertisement was immoral, and carried the war into Africa that old man-stealing Africa and there took the ground that chattel slavery never did exist among the Jews; that what we now charge upon them as such was a system of bonded servitude; that the contract was originally between master and servant; the consideration of the labor paid to the servant; that in all cases of transfer, the master sold to another that portion of the time and labor of the servant, which were still due; that there was no hint of any man selling a free man into slavery for the benefit of the seller; that the servants bought from "the heathen around about," were bought from themselves, or in part at least, for their benefit, to bring them under general law and into the church; that nothing like American slavery was ever known in the days of Moses, or any other day than that of this great Republic, since our slavery was "the vilest that ever saw the sun," John Wesley being witness.
But the infliction of death for man-stealing exacted the utmost possibility of reparation. It wrung from the guilty wretch as he gave up the ghost, a testimony in blood, and death-groans, to the infinite dignity and worth of man, a proclamation to the universe, voiced in mortal agony, "MAN IS INVIOLABLE" a confession shrieked in phrenzy at the grave's mouth "I die accursed, and God is just."
"The General Court, conceiving themselves bound by the first opportunity to bear witness against the heinous and crying sin of man-stealing, as also to prescribe such timely redress for what has passed, and such a law for the future as may sufficiently deter all others belonging to us to have to do in such vile and odious courses, justly abhorred of all good and just men, do order that the negro interpreter, and others unlawfully taken, be by the first opportunity, at the charge of the country for the present, sent to his native country, Guinea, and a letter with him of the indignation of the Court thereabout, and justice thereof, desiring our honored Governor would please put this order in execution."
Joseph's declaration, that he "was stolen," favors this definition of man-stealing. Jewish Commentators authorise it. Money, as it does not own itself, cannot be stolen from itself But when we reflect, that man is the owner of himself, it does not surprise us, that wresting away his inalienable rights his very manhood should have been called man-stealing.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking