"But if slaves were allowed to redeem themselves progressively, by purchasing one day of the week after another, as they can in the Spanish colonies, habits of industry would
be gradually formed, andenterprise would be stimulated, by their successful efforts to
acquire a little property. And if they afterward worked better as free laborers than they
now do as slaves, it would surely benefit their masters as well as themselves...
But the slave holders try to stop all the efforts of benevolence, by vociferous complaints
about infringing upon their property; and justice is so subordinate to self-interest, that
the unrighteous claim is silently allowed, and even openly supported, by those who
ought to blush for themselves, as Christians and as republicans." ---Lydia Maria Child, from
Propositions Defining Slavery and Emancipation, 1833