Juneteenth is about freedom. That includes economic freedom.
Tomorrow Americans celebrate Juneteenth, a federal holiday commemorating the end of slavery. It is difficult to fathom what it must have been like to be enslaved, but most of us have an intuitive sense of what it means to be free. The drafters of the Declaration of Independence captured it in the preamble by identifying our inalienable rights: “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
In 1868, three years after slavery’s demise, drafters of North Carolina’s Constitution went one better, specifically including among the list of inalienable rights “the enjoyment of the fruits of one’s labor.” Why did the North Carolina Constitution explicitly include a Fruits of Their Own Labor clause?
Credit for the addition of the clause—unique among state constitutions—is attributed to Albion Tourgée, a zealous lawyer, abolitionist, and civil rights activist. (Tourgée represented Homer Plessy in the Supreme Court case of Plessy v. Ferguson, which, shamefully, upheld the “separate but equal” doctrine.) Framers of North Carolina’s Reconstruction Constitution recognized that while slavery had ended, economic bondage had not. They wanted to ensure that former slaves would have access to economic opportunity despite their lack of political ties that protected existing businesses from competition. Adding the Fruits of Their Own Labor clause to the list of inalienable rights made explicit that which slavery, by its very operation, denied: the right to work in the occupation of one’s choosing and enjoy the fruits of that choice. Without it, former slaves could not be truly equal nor truly free.
Today, in every state around the country (including North Carolina), laws and regulations stifle economic liberty and keep individuals from creating businesses, plying their trades, and enjoying the fruits of their labor. These obstacles often appear as barriers to entry in the form of occupational licensing laws, certificate of need laws, permit restrictions, and scope of practice laws. While supporters of these laws claim they are necessary to protect the health and safety of consumers, they serve to protect special interests. And these laws mask losses that labor statistics don’t measure—the entrepreneur that gave up, the business that never got started.
For example, in North Carolina, we represent an entrepreneur who is prohibited from operating her mobile art gallery in the Town of Kill Devil Hills during the summertime unless she agrees to donate 100% of her profits—the fruits of her labor—to a charity, lest the brick-and-mortar stores lose customers. In Louisiana, shampoo assistants must log 40 hours of training before they can be paid for their work. In many states, nurse practitioners can’t treat patients independently unless they pay a physician to supervise them. These laws have nothing to do with health or safety—although they masquerade under that guise—and everything to do with stifling competition. As a result, they stand in the way of true freedom.
It is “self-evident,” as the Founders wrote in the Declaration, “that all men are created equal.” Not everyone is born into equal circumstances: Some have family money and connections, some don’t. Until June 19, 1865, some were born into slavery. But human beings are equal in human dignity, the intrinsic value in humanity that makes freedom our birthright. The only way to recognize this equal dignity—and to prevent people from being trapped into whatever circumstance they inherited by birth—is through economic opportunity. People must have agency over their own lives: to create opportunities and take them, to pursue happiness, to freely make their lives what they want them to be.
Happy Juneteenth.
(Editor’s note: In the photo at the top of this post, historical re-enactors celebrate Juneteenth 2024 with a parade at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC.)
