hdrawn, though on the other hand
slaves were granted by implication a legal power to enter contracts for
self-purchase. Slave marriages, furthermore, were declared void of all
civil effect; and jurisdiction over slave crimes was transferred to courts
of inferior grade and informal procedure. By way of reciprocation the state
of Alabama when framing a new slave code in 1852 borrowed in a weakened
form the Louisiana prohibition of the separate sale of mothers and their
children below ten years of age. This provision met the praise of citizens
elsewhere when mention of it chanced to be published; but no other
commonwealth appears to have adopted it.[6]

[Footnote 6: _E. g_., Atlanta _Intelligencer_, Feb. 27, 1856.]

The severity of the slave laws in the commonwealths of English origin, as
compared with the mildness of the Louisiana code, was largely due to
the historic possession by their citizens of the power of local
self-government. A distant autocrat might calmly decree such regulations as
his ministers deemed proper, undisturbed by the wishes and apprehensions of
the colonial whites; but assemblymen locally elected and responsive to the
fears as well as the hopes of their constituents necessarily reflected more
fully the desire of social control, and preferred to err on the side of
safety. If this should involve severity of legislative repression for
the blacks, that might be thought regrettable and yet be done without a
moment's qualm. On the eve of the American Revolution a West Indian writer
explained the regime. "Self preservation," said he, "that first and ruling
principle of human nature, alarming our fears, has made us jealous and
perhaps severe in our _threats_ against delinquents. Besides, if we attend
to the history of our penal laws relating to slaves, I believe we shall
generally find that they took their rise from some very atrocious attempts
made by the negroes on the property of their masters or after some
insurrection or commotion which struck at the very being of the colonies.
Under these circumstances it may very justly be supposed that our
legislatures when convened were a good deal inflamed, and might be induced
for the preservation of their persons and properties to pass severe laws
which they might hold over their heads to terrify and restrain them."[7] In
the next generation an American citizen wrote in similar strain and with
like truthfulness: "The laws of the slaveholding states do not furnish