Walking into Slavery

There are many desperate people in the world who walk right into slavery. In the bible, it was not unusual for people who followed a family in its wanderings to voluntarily agree to give up their freedom and become a slave to the family. People would become economically dependent on the family they spent a lifetime following. Freedom, in itself, was not worth that much in those days. There are many kinds of slavery. The slavery of the captive, the slavery of trade, and the slavery of the contract. 

Joseph is sold by his brothers into slavery to the Egyptian royal family and he emerges as a member of the Royal household. He succeeds as a slave. Slavery was his job and his master benefited from his gifts.

The Happy Hebrew Slave in the Bible.

Many Hebrew families had slaves and the biblical law of the sabbatical was that male family slaves had to be freed in their seventh year. Many slaves simply agreed to remain slaves because they were safe and freedom would simply mean hardship. Moreover, if the slave chose freedom, he was given the tools for subsistence, but he would often have to leave alone, without the wife and family he was given by his master. The slave would declare, "I love my master, and my wife and children. I do not wish to go free." The master would pierce the ear of the slave, as a kind of brand and he had to remain a slave for life. Female slaves were not granted sabbatical freedom. Female slaves had some of the economic rights of wives--the master could be judged as having broken faith with female slaves.

In the colonial period, when slavery was legal and human beings could be owned, bought, and sold in an open market, laws were complex with differentiation by race and gender, but the slave was considered chattel and could be bought, sold, traded like any property. 

Forms of Buying People: The modern era.

Even in the modern era, people find that freedom is too big a burden. The question often arises, can I sell myself into slavery? Until the moment the contract is signed, the signer is free. He or she is signing as a free person. Then the answer boils down to economics. How much is freedom worth? Slavery always implies that it's in the interest of the slave owner to keep slaves healthy. It's ok for a person to volunteer his or her services for life. The only real issue is the conditions under which the slave is kept. Labor standards law is the only real legal point of contact between voluntary slavery and the legal system. 

In this world where people are living under desperate circumstances, going some place for a better life can and often does involve selling freedom for what is worth. In this kind of economic environment, people seeking a better life often get cheated, of course. Often those who sell themselves do not really mean to. Often the buyers lie about the price or fail to observe the terms of the contract they make with their slaves. Often the contract implies a limited period of slavery or indenture, but the terms of the contract are violated and the slave remains captured for longer periods and can't escape. The civil law about slavery is difficult to enforce as a simple breach of contract.

The American federal laws prohibiting sex trafficking follow the format of state laws about prostitution in general. The law prohibiting labor trafficking and the law prohibiting sex trafficking prohibit fraud, use of force, and coercion in the recruitment process. The law also forbids undervaluing labor. It does not forbid undervaluing freedom. It's hard to put a price on that in today's marketplace.