Rev. Alexander McLeod penned the following words in a chilling cry of exhortation to his church and the nation in his 1802 work, Negro Slavery Unjustifiable: A Discourse:

The toleration of slavery is a national evil. It is the worst of robberies sanctioned by law. It >>is treason against Heaven—a conspiracy against the liberties of his subjects. If the Judge >>of all the earth shall do right, he cannot but punish the guilty.

Nations, as such, have no existence in a future state: they must expect national judgments >>in the present.…O America, what hast thou to account for on the head of slavery!…Thou >>hast made provision for increasing the number and continuing the bondage of thy slaves. >>Thy judgments may tarry, but they will assuredly come.

Six decades later, President Abraham Lincoln intimated such divine judgment on the country for the slave industry in his second inaugural address, delivered March 4, 1865:

If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence >>of God…He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible >>war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any >>departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to >>Him? Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may >>speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the >>bondsman’s two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every >>drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was >>said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said “the judgments of the Lord are true >>and righteous altogether.

Rev. Alexander McLeod was a Scottish minister who had a pastoral call presented to him in 1800 from a congregation in Orange, N.Y., where some members owned slaves, a practice which he held to be inconsistent with Christianity. He thus hesitated to accept the call, but quickly wrote to the elders of the church with the idea of imploring the presbytery with his sentiments respecting slavery. This work he later published, largely as an exposition of Exodus 20:16: “He that stealeth a man, and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death.”

As a result of McLeod’s work, the Reformed Presbytery (now the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America) condemned the practice of owning slaves. Its original constitution, of which Rev. McLeod was a writer, disallowed members from owning slaves (it was the second denomination in America to do so). This was necessary during a time when the nation held slavery to be a constitutional right. McLeod later served the Coldenham, N.Y., RPC, as well as a church in New York City, and he eventually became a founding superintendent of Reformed Presbyterian Theological Seminary (RPTS).

As RPTS celebrates its bicentennial this year, it will make available a digital version of historical works mainly by ministers of the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America. These works feature important doctrine and practices for which the church has labored. This month, the seminary makes McLeod’s Discourse available in full on its web site, along with a special video that features an introduction and narration by Vince Sims, reporter and anchor for Channel 11 News (Pittsburgh’s NBC affiliate). RPTS first-year master of theological studies student, Alisha McCombs, sang Negro spirituals for background music. Andrew Cooper, a 2006 M.Div. alum of RPTS, performs the dramatic reading of excerpts from McLeod’s discourse for the video. Cooper also is a D.Min. student at the seminary, and he serves on staff as church and student relations specialist as well as adjunct professor of church history, teaching the Black Church History course.

The following are excerpts of some of McLeod’s booklet, Negro Slavery Unjustifiable:

God is omnipotent.…Whatever physical force can be exerted by man, is derived from his >>Maker.…He who, without [God’s] authority, breaks over the barriers of law, and, with >>physical force, deprives his neighbour of liberty or property, is an enemy to God and to >>man; much more so he who commences an unprovoked attack on any of his fellow men, >>and, with lawless power, steals him from his connections, barters him for some other >>commodity, or forces him to labour for the benefit of another, and that other an enemy, >>who has committed, or countenanced the commission of the theft.

The divine law declares this a crime, and prescribes the punishment. He who stealeth a >>man, and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death. If he >>who steals my purse, my coat, or my horse, be guilty of an immorality, he cannot be >>innocent who robs me of my father, my brother, my wife, or my child. Against this >>principle an inspired Apostle directs his argument, in his Epistle to Timothy (1 Tim. 1:9). >>Knowing this, that the law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and >>disobedient—for MAN STEALERS—and if there be any other thing that is contrary to >>sound doctrine. Man stealing is classed with the most detestable crimes. It is considered >>not only reprehensible among the ancient Hebrews, but a moral evil, in every age, and in >>every nation.…

The practice of buying, holding, or selling our unoffending fellow creatures as slaves is >>immoral.…The slave holder never had a right to force a man into his service, or to retain >>him, without an equivalent. To sell him, therefore, is to tempt another to sin, and to dispose >>of that, for money, to which he never had a right.… Under this proposition, McLeod goes on to argue the following main points in his first of >>three major sections:

I. To hold any of our fellow men in perpetual slavery is sinful…[A man’s] life and his faculties are the gift of God. From heaven he derives positive rights, defined by positive precepts.…To oppose the force of an individual, or of a society, to this, is to wage war against the Supreme Ruler:…a denial of his right to the person enslaved, and an arrogant assumption of lawless authority by the usurper. Is it necessary to pursue this argument before an American audience?…

2. If an opposite principle of action were universally admitted, it would lead to absolute absurdity. A demonstration of this will confirm the proposition. If one man have a right to the services of another, without an equivalent, right stands opposite and contrary to right. This confounds the distinction between right and wrong.…

3. The practice of enslaving our fellow men stands equally opposed to the general tenor of the sacred scriptures.

The Bible is the criterion of doctrine and conduct. It represents the European and the Asiatic, the African and the American, as different members of the same great family—the different children of the same benign and universal parent. God has made of one blood all the nations of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the bounds of their habitation (Acts 17:26).…Our reciprocal duties the divine Jesus summarily comprehends in that direction commonly called the golden rule…How opposite the spirit of these precepts and doctrines to the practice of the slave-holder!…

4. The practice which I am opposing is a manifest violation of four precepts of the decalogue.…By inference…the whole decalogue is violated; but there is a direct breach of the fifth, the sixth, the eighth and the tenth commandments.

The fifth requires the performance of those duties which respect the several relations in which we stand to one another; and particularly enforces obedience to our natural parents…But the slave-holder sets aside the authority of the immediate parent.…

The sixth requires the use of all lawful means to preserve the lives of men. But ah! Slavery, how many hast thou murdered?…Thou hast huffed them on board thy floating prisons, and hast chained them in holds, which have soon extinguished the remaining spark of life. The few who have escaped thou hast deprived of liberty, dearer itself than life.

The eighth forbids the unlawful hindrance of our neighbour’s wealth. The whole life of the slave-holder is an infringement upon it….

The tenth commandment forbids all inordinate desires after worldly property. The practice of the slave-holder is an evidence of his avarice.…The American slave-holder also, is convicted of a breach of the tenth precept of the moral law.

5. The system against which I contend is also inimical to that benevolent spirit which is produced and cherished by the gospel of free grace.…Look at your slave!…How long will religion suffer you to retain him in bondage? for life? Ah! hard-hearted Christian! is it thus you imitate his example who died for your sins?…

*6. The last argument I shall use for confirming the doctrine of the proposition, shall be taken from the pernicious consequences of the system of slavery.

1. This practice has a tendency to destroy the finer feelings, and render the heart of man more obdurat.e…

2. It debases a part of the human race, and tends to destroy their intellectual and active powers.…

** 3**. Another evil consequence is the encouragement of licentiousness and debauchery.…

4. This leads to a fourth lamentable consequence—the destruction of natural affection.…

5. Domestic tyranny, which exists as a correlative to domestic slavery, is a nursery for civil tyrants.…

6. This practice is calculated to bring down the judgments of God on societies and individuals.

McLeod goes on to refute six objections common in his day to his argued principles, such as the incongruent appeal to Hebrew slavery. He shows a remarkably broad knowledge of history, literature, science, and industry in his arguments aimed at proving the innate equality of Africans and decrying the atrocious sins against them in America. McLeod powerfully concludes:

It must appear ridiculous to Europeans “to hear of an American patriot signing with one >>hand declarations of independency, and with the other brandishing a whip over an >>affrighted slave.”

Let me warn my hearers to consider the evil hand they may have in the system of slavery, >>and especially that they are by nature in the worst of slavery themselves. Come for >>deliverance from the bondage of sin into the Son of God: for, whom the Son makes free, >>shall be free indeed. Standing fast in this liberty, use it in the service of God and of man. >>You are no more your own; ye are bought with a price: Glorify God in your bodies and >>spirits which are his. Amen.

To read McLeod’s discourse against slavery in full, along with some of his other works, visit http://www.rpts.edu/support/BicentennialSeries.php. The brief corresponding video of selected readings from this work, complemented by images and the singing of Negro spirituals, produced by RPTS, also is available there to view.

—Grant Van Leuven and Marlyn Black