"Linda" (who in reality is author Harriet Jacobs) could find little protection being a slave because ".no matter whether the slave girl be as black as ebony or as fair as her mistress. In either case, there is no shadow of law to protect her from insult, from violences, or even from death; all these are inflicted by fiends who bear the shape of men"(27). Harriet Jacobs also asks her readers to reflect on the existence of a double standard in considering her actions under slavery. After admitting to having sacrificed her purity for the sake of escaping Dr. Flints advance, she asks for understanding: "the condition of a slave confuses all principles of morality, and in fact renders the practice of them impossible" (55). Jacobs lives in a society that refuses to protect her with laws or customs, and she should therefore be judged with different precepts in mind. If one cannot legally own their body, how can they be responsible for its actions?.
On an indirect level, there are other parties that suffer the consequences of slavery. The slave holders for example; slavery's strong power puts them in a situation where they are entirely in control of another human life. This can only ultimately lead to the downfall of their moral character, for they believe that these slaves are born to serve them in whatever way they see fit. In "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl" Dr. Flint was the perfect example. His control over Linda fuels his immoral practices and to the young slave girl she saw him "a man forty years my senior daily violating the most sacred commandments of nature. He told me I was his property; that I must subject to his will in all things"(27) The jealous wives of these slave holders also suffer from this abominable organization, slavery. It ruins the relationship between husband and wife, filling it with an uncertainty of fidelity and emotions raging from utter despair to utter rage; and most of the rage is directed to the un-wanting party; the slave.
