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“But I do earnestly desire to arouse the women of the North to a realizing sense of the condition of two millions of women at the South, still in bondage, suffering what I have suffered, and most of them far worse.”<ref>Harriet Jacobs,''Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl: Written by Herself'' (1861, repr., New York: Penguin, 200), 3-4.</ref>These are the words of Harriet Jacobs, who lived in a state of chattel slavery for twenty-seven years. After her courageous escape to the North, through various undertakings, she was able to write her personal history. In the preface to her story——and throughout the text——she appeals to women of the North as mothers to act on behalf of the enslaved mothers of the South. Through personal experience, she understood the level of degradation suffered by a slave and that the right Americans had to trade in human beings was a bad law.

== Fugitive Slave Laws in America ==

America was built on the backs of slaves. On the eve of the Civil War, these human beings were second only to land as the most valuable commodity in the southern states. Slave owners, therefore, felt compelled to initiate legislation to protect their valuable, human assets. Although the United States Constitution protected slavery under Article IV, and the Fugitive Slave Law of 1793 allowed slave owners to cross state lines to retrieve their property, a growing number of abolitionist groups in the North were harboring runaway slaves in order to protect them from the pursuit of their masters. As tensions grew between the two regions of the country regarding the South’s ''peculiar institution,'' the U.S. Supreme Court rendered a decision in 1842 finding, “the slaveholder’s right to his property overrode any contrary state legislation.”<ref>James McPherson, ''Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era''(New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), 79.</ref>The Court, however, continued in its opinion that enforcing the Constitutional clause relating to slavery was the onus of the federal government and that “states need not cooperate in any way.”<ref>McPherson, 79.</ref> That being the case, large plantation owners of the South pressured their Democratic representatives in congress to pass the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which mandated “all good citizens” to report their knowledge of fugitive slaves to authorities.

== The Philosophy of Abolitionists ==

The paradox of slavery is really quite remarkable. In an essay published one month before the start of America’s Revolutionary War, Thomas Paine denounced the practice of slavery. Paine condemns “Traders in MEN (an unnatural commodity!)…who wilfully[''sic''] sacrifice Conscience, and the character of integrity to that golden idol.”<ref>Thomas Paine, “African Slavery in America,” ''Pennsylvania Journal and the Weekly Advertiser,'' March 8, 1775, http://constitution.org/tp/afri.htm.</ref>Succinctly stated, Paine suggests the vehement support for slavery was driven by money whereas abolitionists had the desire to see justice served. They achieved this by returning to the men and women of African descent ''their'' moral ''property;'' freedom.

Carlyle, like so many others who defended slavery, defined intellect by skin color. Carlyle, writing from England, was referring to the slaves of the West Indies whereas Thomas Paine, writing from the United States, refuted such arguments before they were ever uttered. Although at the time speaking of an inherited monarchy, one can juxtapose Paine’s words based on his consistent anti-slavery opinions. In a small pamphlet entitled, ''Common Sense,'' he wrote that “male and female are the only distinctions of nature, good and bad the distinctions of heaven; but how a race of men came into the world so exalted above the rest, and distinguished like some new species, is worth enquiring into.”<ref>Thomas Paine, ''Common Sense''(1776, repr., London: Penguin, 1986), 72.</ref>That unanswered query was the cause of civil war and potentially irreparable harm.

Harm has been deemed too subjective to be succinctly defined. There are some cases of harm that can be considered fairly objective and agreed upon: A woman who is raped is harmed; A child who is taken from his mother never to see her again is harmed, and so is the mother; A man who is stripped to the waist and whipped with a leather strap on his bare skin is harmed; and one who physically labors in the elements from sunrise until sunset without compensation is harmed. These irrefutable harms are also irrefutable facts of slavery. The slave was abused and had no legal right to defend himself. The slave had no right to anything. The denial of the innate right of the freedom to choose is perhaps the greatest harm of all, as from this one harm all of the others grew. Whereas “over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign,” anyone taking action to impede individual sovereignty is causing harm. It is in the prevention of such action that “power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will” (On Liberty, 8). Individuals acting in such a manner to prevent harm are not extraordinary beings but rather they are courageous enough to fulfill the duties of humanity and utilitarian justice.

== Conclusion ==

If we return to the beginning, we must do so from the end; from the opposite. That being the case, if a “just person is just because of his knowledge…the unjust person [is] unjust for the opposite reason.”<ref>Plato, ''On Justice,'' 375 c.</ref> If that is factored in with experience, then knowledge becomes wisdom, therefore making it true that “the just person is just because of his wisdom…the unjust person is unjust, then, because of his ignorance.”<ref> Plato, ''On Justice, '' 375c.</ref> We have, it seems, been endowed with justice in the form of wisdom and injustice in the form of ignorance. Further, if people are ''unwillingly ignorant,'' they must therefore be unwillingly unjust. It can therefore be concluded that the just abolitionist acted with wisdom. Finally, it can be deduced that injustice stems from a lack of wisdom and those who continually commit unjust acts are those who are content with, albeit unaware of, their ignorance.

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