A COMPARISON: BETWEEN FREE LABOR AND SLAVE LABOR
Dublin Core
Title
A COMPARISON: BETWEEN FREE LABOR AND SLAVE LABOR
Description
The slave is bought, sometimes at a very high price; in free labor there is no such investment of capital. The slave does not care how slowly or carelessly he works; it is the freeman's interest to do his business well and quickly. The slave is indifferent how many tools he spoils; the freeman has a motive to be careful. The freeman will be honest for reputation's sake; but a slave has no care for reputation, while his poverty and sense of wrong both urge him to steal from his master. A salary must be paid to an overseer to compel the slave to work; the freeman is impelled by the desire of increasing the comforts of himself and family.
Mrs. Child.
Whenever the option exists to employ, at an equal hire, free or slave labor, the former will be decidedly preferred. It is more capable, more diligent, more faithful, and in every respect more worthy of confidence. It is believed that no where in the farming portion of the U.S. would slave labor be generally employed, if the proprietors were not tempted to raise slaves by the high price of the southern market, which keeps it up in his own.--Henry Clay
The labor of a West India slave costs about thrice as much as it would if executed by a free man.
Dr. Anderson.
A West India planter found by experiment that six slaves, stimulated by the offer of a premium, did more work in the same time, than eighteen who were driven by the lash.--Hodgson.
The mind of a slave, while a slave, is like a watch without its main-spring. You may take hold of its hands by direct physical force and move them round, but you cannot make them go alone. Th self-moving power is gone. But make that slave a freeman, restore his long-lost, but inalienable right, and by that single act, you have put the main-spring back again. --Phelps
Mrs. Child.
Whenever the option exists to employ, at an equal hire, free or slave labor, the former will be decidedly preferred. It is more capable, more diligent, more faithful, and in every respect more worthy of confidence. It is believed that no where in the farming portion of the U.S. would slave labor be generally employed, if the proprietors were not tempted to raise slaves by the high price of the southern market, which keeps it up in his own.--Henry Clay
The labor of a West India slave costs about thrice as much as it would if executed by a free man.
Dr. Anderson.
A West India planter found by experiment that six slaves, stimulated by the offer of a premium, did more work in the same time, than eighteen who were driven by the lash.--Hodgson.
The mind of a slave, while a slave, is like a watch without its main-spring. You may take hold of its hands by direct physical force and move them round, but you cannot make them go alone. Th self-moving power is gone. But make that slave a freeman, restore his long-lost, but inalienable right, and by that single act, you have put the main-spring back again. --Phelps
Creator
Mrs. Child (Lydia Maria Child), Henry Clay, Dr. Anderson, Hodgson, Phelps
Source
The Religious Intelligencer...Containing the Principal Transactions of the Various Bible and Missionary Societies, with Particular Accounts of Revivals of Religion 20:36, p. 566
Date
2.6.1836
Collection
Citation
Mrs. Child (Lydia Maria Child), Henry Clay, Dr. Anderson, Hodgson, Phelps, “A COMPARISON: BETWEEN FREE LABOR AND SLAVE LABOR,” No Stain of Tears and Blood, accessed October 22, 2026, https://productsoffreelabor.com/items/show/110.
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