ABSTRACT
This chapter briefly examines the imperial reform context and Thomas Macaulay's ideological influences. It examines Macaulay's India law reforms, focusing on labour provisions that made masters fully liable for crimes and regulated the growing trade in indentured Indian workers, but allowed local slave labour practices to continue and extended criminal sanctions for employee breach of contract. The India Penal Code (IPC) was the first criminal code in the British Empire and also a fuller implementation of Jeremy Bentham's ideas than later British jurisdiction codes. The chapter takes a brief look at servitude in India, the imperial indentured labour trade, colonial master and servant laws elaborated to discipline Indian plantation workers, and the efforts of the succeeding generation of liberal colonial reformers to curb labour exploitation. Adam Smith-influenced economic assumptions contributed to reformers' failure to anticipate the labour transition to a new form of servitude. Utilitarianism overshadowed Macaulay's humanitarianism as the primary influence on his India law reforms.
