George Fitzhugh's Slaves Without Mastres

This study will analyze George Fitzhugh's Cannibals All! or Slaves Without Masters. The study will consider the ways the author supports his arguments in favor of slavery, the evidence he uses and how he uses it, and to what extent the evidence is unconvincing.

As the book's editor points out, Fitzhugh himself admits that he is not trying to convince the reader of the truth of his thesis by using objective arguments based on well-documented and clearly presented evidence. To the contrary, Fitzhugh argues that the enemy---those who would outlaw slavery---are split into many camps and therefore "we are compelled to vary our mode of attack from regular cannonade to bushfighting, to suit the occasion" (xvi).

In other words, the issue of slavery is so essential to the author and to the South which he represents that what Fitzhugh is engaged in is not reasonable argument between reasonable men, but war to the end between sworn enemies. This deceptive and manipulative attitude of the part of the author does not engender a work based on evidence which will convince an intelligent reader who analyzes closely what he reads. As the editor of this book goes on to say, Fitzhugh is not above

resorting to a variety of tricks to confuse his opponents. He deliberately adopted a style . . . "in which facts, and argument, and rhetoric, and wit, and sarcasm, succeed each other with rapid iteration." . . . He wrote: "I see great evils in slavery, but in a controversial work I ought not to a

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North, which they in fact were not, this does not mean they were therefore advocating slavery as an alternative. In the third place, the abolitionists "to a man" did not advocate Free Love, Communism, or Socialism as a remedy to the flaws of the system in the North. Simply because a Northerner is honest about the flaws in his socioeconomic system is no evidence whatsoever that he therefore endorses or is willing to accept the evils of slavery. In the fourth place, those who called for a socialistic system in the North were a minuscule minority, and it is deceptive for Fitzhugh to give their arguments such prominence in his analysis. A parallel example of such deception was practiced by pro-Vietnam War advocates who gave undue prominence to radical anti-war protestors who called advocated the overthrow of the government, for such protestors were similarly an insignificant minority in the anti-war movement. Fitzhugh uses as "evidence" in supporting his thesis the philosophical and social arguments of such ancients as Aristotle (12-13). However, this again is misleading and deceptive because Aristotle lived in an era when slavery was accepted almost universally as a "natural" relationship between "superior" and "inferior" groups. A

Category: History - G