PROP. 6.--_The master has absolute power to punish a slave, &c._
Stroud says, "There was a time in many, if not in all the slaveholding districts of our country, when the murder of a slave was followed by a pecuniary fine only. In one State, the change of the law in this respect has been very recent. At the present date (1827) I am happy to say the wilful, malicious, deliberate murder of a slave, by whomsoever perpetrated, is _declared_ to be punishable with death in every State. The evil is not that the laws _sanction_ crime, but that they do not _punish_ it. And this arises chiefly, if not solely, from the exclusion of the testimony, on the trial of a white person, of all those who are _not_ white."
"The conflicting influences of humanity and prejudice are strangely contrasted in the law of North Carolina on this subject. An act passed in 1798, runs thus: 'Whereas by another act of assembly, passed in the year 1774, the killing of a slave, however wanton, cruel, and deliberate, is only punishable in the first instance by imprisonment, and paying the value thereof to the owner, which distinction of criminality between the murder of a white person and one _who is equally a human creature, but merely of a different complexion_, is disgraceful to humanity, and degrading in the highest degree to the laws and principles of a free Christian, and enlightened country, be it enacted, &c., that if any person shall hereafter be guilty of wilfully and maliciously killing a slave, such offender shall, upon the first conviction thereof, be adjudged guilty of murder, and shall suffer the same punishment as if he had killed a free man; _Provided always, this act shall not extend to the person killing a slave outlawed by virtue of any act of assembly of this State, or to any slave in the act of resistance[N] to his lawful owner or master, or to any slave_ DYING _under_ MODERATE CORRECTION.'"
[Footnote N: "It has been judicially determined that it is _justifiable_ to kill a slave, resisting, or _offering to resist_ his master by force."--_Stroud._]
In the laws of Tennessee and Georgia, there is a similar proviso. Where could such a monstrous anomaly be found, save in a code of slave laws? _Die_ of _moderate_ punishment!! Truly, this _is_ an unveiling of consciences!