The free-labor system conforms to the divine law of equality, which is
written in the hearts and consciences of man, and therefore is always
and everywhere beneficent.
The slave system is one of constant danger, distrust, suspicion, and
watchfulness. It debases those whose toil alone can produce wealth and
resources for defence, to the lowest degree of which human nature is
capable, to guard against mutiny and insurrection, and thus wastes
energies which otherwise might be employed in national development and
aggrandizement.
The free-labor system educates all alike, and by opening all the fields
of industrial employment and all the departments of authority, to the
unchecked and equal rivalry of all classes of men, at once secures
universal contentment, and brings into the highest possible activity all
the physical, moral, and social energies of the whole state. In states
where the slave system prevails, the masters, directly or indirectly,
secure all political power, and constitute a ruling aristocracy.
In states where the free-labor system prevails, universal suffrage
necessarily obtains, and the state inevitably becomes, sooner or later,
a republic or democracy.
Russia yet maintains slavery, and is a despotism. Most of the other
European states have abolished slavery, and adopted the system of free
labor.
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